Posted: Oct 02, 2022 2:03 am
1. Cognitive Discourse Analysis: An introduction - Thora Tenbrink
2. Cynical Theories: How Activist Scholarship Made Everything About Race, Gender And Identity- And Why This Harms Everybody – Helen Pluckrose and James Lindsay
3. A History of the World in 12 Maps – Jerry Brotton
4. Origins of the Specious: Myths and Misconceptions of the English Language – Patricia T. O’Connor & Stewart Kellerman
5. Peer Interaction and Second Language Learning - Jenefer Philip, Rebecca Adams & Noriko Iwashita
6. Eugene Onegin - Alexander Pushkin
7. Found in Translation: How Language Shapes Our Lives and Transforms the World - Nataly Kelly & Jost Zetzche
8. English Words: A Linguistic Introduction - Heidi Harley
9. Questions: Formal, Functional and Interactional Perspectives Jan P. de Ruiter (Ed.)
10. Persepolis Rising - James S.A. Corey
11. English Prepositions: Their meanings and uses - R.M.W. Dixon
12. Draußen vor der Tür - Wolfgang Borchert
13. Metonymy: Hidden Shortcuts in Language, Thought and Communication - Jeannette Liitlemore
14. Tiamat's Wrath - James S.A. Corey
15. Leviathan Falls - James S.A. Corey
16. The Horse, the Wheel and Language: How Bronze-Age Riders from the Eurasian Steppes Shaped the Modern World - David W. Anthony
17. The Unfortunate Traveler and Other Works - Thomas Nashe
18. A Qualitative Approach to the Validation of Oral Language Tests (Studies in Language Testing, Series Number 14) - Anne Lazarton
19. Are Some Languages Better than Others? - R.M.W. Dixon.
20. The Expedition of Humphry Clinker - Tobias Smollet
21. Body Part Terms in Conceptualization and Language Usage - Iwona Kraska-Szlenk (Ed.)
22.Think Least of Death: Spinoza on How to Live and How to Die - Steven Nadler
23. Vuelta Skelter: Riding the Remarkable 1941 Tour of Spain - Tim Moore
24. Cognitive Linguistics: An Introduction - David Lee
25. Space in Language and Cognition: Explorations in Cognitive Diversity - Stephen C. Levinson
26. An Immigrant's Love Letter to the West - Konstantin Kisin
27. Explorations of Language Transfer - Terrence Odlin
28: A war on Two Fronts: Steven Spielberg's Saving Private Ryan and Terrence Malik's The Thin Red Line- Tibe Patrick Jordan
29. Grammars of Space: Explorations in Cognitive Diversity - Stephen C. Levinson and David Wilkins (Eds.) (Partial re-read)
30. Rethinking linguistic relativity - John J. Gumperz & Stephen C. Levinson (Eds.) Partial re-read.
31. A History of the World in 6 Glasses - Tom Standage
32. Cross-linguistic Study of the Principle of Linguistic Relativity: Cross-linguistic Research to Examine the Principle of Linguistic Relativity: Evidence from English, Mandarin and Russian - Ronan Grace
33. An Introduction to Linguistic Typology - Viveka Vellupillai
34. Mysteries of English Grammar: A guide to the complexities of the English Language - Andreea S. Calude & Laurie Bauer
35. Against a Dark Background - Iain M. Banks (Reread)
36. The Linguistics Delusion - Geoffrey Sampson
221. pp
The author is a retired academic with a very extensive history of respected academic work. In this book he takes aim at some of the nonsense that underlies the academic discipline known as 'linguistics'. His basic idea is that since the 1960's there has been an intellectual current that has held that language can be rigorously studied by applying the scientific method. But language is not physics or chemistry and the approach to the study of language using the scientific method ( which he describes as 'scientism') is inadequate and wrongheaded.
I'm in agreement with several of his core arguments here. The tendency of the some schools of 'the scientific study of language' to rely entirely on data from one language (usually English) and then make sweeping statements and propose grand theories that apply to all languages is a central point of critique by Sampson. Added to this is the realization that the 'data' that often underpin these grand theories are almost always concocted John and Mary sentences summoned up in the mind of the 'researcher'. Hardly the scientific method as STEM practitioners would understand it. The baleful influence of a certain former MIT professor is spelt out with some fairly forceful language.
That is not to say that I agreed with everything in this book. I would have liked the author to have discussed cognitive linguistics in a bit more detail. The field of conversation analysis, (which has a reputation for being the most austere in its reliance on carefully collected real-life data and for rigorously eschewing grand theorizing about what is going on 'in the head' of participants in talk) was not mentioned at all.
Still, a valuable and interesting book. For those outside linguistics the name of that former MIT professor probably springs to mind as an unquestioned genius and great thinker who has basically invented the modern discipline of linguistics. This is very far from the case and there is widespread disagreement and even contempt for the turn that the study of human language has taken since the 1960's under the influence of the "linguisticians" as Sampson calls them.
2. Cynical Theories: How Activist Scholarship Made Everything About Race, Gender And Identity- And Why This Harms Everybody – Helen Pluckrose and James Lindsay
3. A History of the World in 12 Maps – Jerry Brotton
4. Origins of the Specious: Myths and Misconceptions of the English Language – Patricia T. O’Connor & Stewart Kellerman
5. Peer Interaction and Second Language Learning - Jenefer Philip, Rebecca Adams & Noriko Iwashita
6. Eugene Onegin - Alexander Pushkin
7. Found in Translation: How Language Shapes Our Lives and Transforms the World - Nataly Kelly & Jost Zetzche
8. English Words: A Linguistic Introduction - Heidi Harley
9. Questions: Formal, Functional and Interactional Perspectives Jan P. de Ruiter (Ed.)
10. Persepolis Rising - James S.A. Corey
11. English Prepositions: Their meanings and uses - R.M.W. Dixon
12. Draußen vor der Tür - Wolfgang Borchert
13. Metonymy: Hidden Shortcuts in Language, Thought and Communication - Jeannette Liitlemore
14. Tiamat's Wrath - James S.A. Corey
15. Leviathan Falls - James S.A. Corey
16. The Horse, the Wheel and Language: How Bronze-Age Riders from the Eurasian Steppes Shaped the Modern World - David W. Anthony
17. The Unfortunate Traveler and Other Works - Thomas Nashe
18. A Qualitative Approach to the Validation of Oral Language Tests (Studies in Language Testing, Series Number 14) - Anne Lazarton
19. Are Some Languages Better than Others? - R.M.W. Dixon.
20. The Expedition of Humphry Clinker - Tobias Smollet
21. Body Part Terms in Conceptualization and Language Usage - Iwona Kraska-Szlenk (Ed.)
22.Think Least of Death: Spinoza on How to Live and How to Die - Steven Nadler
23. Vuelta Skelter: Riding the Remarkable 1941 Tour of Spain - Tim Moore
24. Cognitive Linguistics: An Introduction - David Lee
25. Space in Language and Cognition: Explorations in Cognitive Diversity - Stephen C. Levinson
26. An Immigrant's Love Letter to the West - Konstantin Kisin
27. Explorations of Language Transfer - Terrence Odlin
28: A war on Two Fronts: Steven Spielberg's Saving Private Ryan and Terrence Malik's The Thin Red Line- Tibe Patrick Jordan
29. Grammars of Space: Explorations in Cognitive Diversity - Stephen C. Levinson and David Wilkins (Eds.) (Partial re-read)
30. Rethinking linguistic relativity - John J. Gumperz & Stephen C. Levinson (Eds.) Partial re-read.
31. A History of the World in 6 Glasses - Tom Standage
32. Cross-linguistic Study of the Principle of Linguistic Relativity: Cross-linguistic Research to Examine the Principle of Linguistic Relativity: Evidence from English, Mandarin and Russian - Ronan Grace
33. An Introduction to Linguistic Typology - Viveka Vellupillai
34. Mysteries of English Grammar: A guide to the complexities of the English Language - Andreea S. Calude & Laurie Bauer
35. Against a Dark Background - Iain M. Banks (Reread)
36. The Linguistics Delusion - Geoffrey Sampson
221. pp
The author is a retired academic with a very extensive history of respected academic work. In this book he takes aim at some of the nonsense that underlies the academic discipline known as 'linguistics'. His basic idea is that since the 1960's there has been an intellectual current that has held that language can be rigorously studied by applying the scientific method. But language is not physics or chemistry and the approach to the study of language using the scientific method ( which he describes as 'scientism') is inadequate and wrongheaded.
I'm in agreement with several of his core arguments here. The tendency of the some schools of 'the scientific study of language' to rely entirely on data from one language (usually English) and then make sweeping statements and propose grand theories that apply to all languages is a central point of critique by Sampson. Added to this is the realization that the 'data' that often underpin these grand theories are almost always concocted John and Mary sentences summoned up in the mind of the 'researcher'. Hardly the scientific method as STEM practitioners would understand it. The baleful influence of a certain former MIT professor is spelt out with some fairly forceful language.
That is not to say that I agreed with everything in this book. I would have liked the author to have discussed cognitive linguistics in a bit more detail. The field of conversation analysis, (which has a reputation for being the most austere in its reliance on carefully collected real-life data and for rigorously eschewing grand theorizing about what is going on 'in the head' of participants in talk) was not mentioned at all.
Still, a valuable and interesting book. For those outside linguistics the name of that former MIT professor probably springs to mind as an unquestioned genius and great thinker who has basically invented the modern discipline of linguistics. This is very far from the case and there is widespread disagreement and even contempt for the turn that the study of human language has taken since the 1960's under the influence of the "linguisticians" as Sampson calls them.