On 04/12/2006, at 8:14 PM, MJ Ray wrote:
Clytie Siddall <clytie@riverland.net.au> wrote:[...] The way people speak, and what they say when they do, is the real data. [...]However, I already don't write as I speak, either formally or usually. My spoken English is somewhere between Oxford and http://desboroughtown.co.uk/arfer/arfer2.htm Dropped consonants, missing pronouns, overlong vowels and so on. Consider yourself lucky!
I didn't say it was pretty. ;)I was talking about the source of data for "expert opinion" on language. Like in any research situation, it's all too easy to focus on the theory, and especially on written examples, rather than on the ever-changing data source.
Real data is a moving target, and sometimes it's easier to stop chasing it so closely, and just estimate its position; even, after a while, argue with conviction that it should actually be somewhere else.
from Clytie (vi-VN, Vietnamese free-software translation team / nhóm Việt hóa phần mềm tự do)
http://groups-beta.google.com/group/vi-VN
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