From: Peter_Constable@sil.org
Date: Thu May 29 2003 - 14:56:09 EDT
Brian on 05/29/2003 09:37:31 AM:
> Why is Ethnologue flawed?
Because:
1. research that has gone into it has only been going on for 50 years with
limited manpower, not 150 with unlimited manpower;
2. linguistic and sociolinguistic change is on-going, and it is difficult
to keep research current on all of the change that occurs (see 1); and
especially
3. language as a phenomenon does not occur in discrete, sharply defined
categories, but involves a large number of possible parameters of
variation; hence, any attempt to enumerate "languages" must be the result
of a process of analytical abstraction that merely approximates reality
(but is still useful, and is done because in practical terms organisations
must conduct their business in terms of a finite list of entities rather
than an all-but-endlessly variable continuum).
As John Cowan said, any aspiration of a flawless catalogue of languages is
a pipe-dream; and I'd also add, it's naive.
- Peter
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Peter Constable
Non-Roman Script Initiative, SIL International
7500 W. Camp Wisdom Rd., Dallas, TX 75236, USA
Tel: +1 972 708 7485
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