Kolloquium Geistes- und Sozialwissenschaften - Robert Mailhammer
How does the mind respond to extreme variation? Clues from English on Croker Island, Australia
Dr. Robert Mailhammer
Languages
Western Sydney University
Wann |
06.02.2017 von 11:15 bis 12:45 |
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Wo | FRIAS, Albertstr. 19, Seminarraum |
Name | Lena Walter |
Kontakttelefon | +49 (0)761 203-97362 |
Teilnehmer |
universitätsöffentlich / open to university members |
Termin übernehmen |
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One fundamental problem of any academic discipline is how to deal with variation in the data. A general approach is to find conditioning factors that enable us to predict the occurrence of a particular variant. In linguistics, the problem of variation is not just a theoretical problem, but it is also a problem for our concept of the mind. If we aren't able to account adequately for the variation - i.e. in a non-random way -in a description, how can our minds navigate between seemingly isofunctional variants and ensure successful communication? My project investigates variation in English spoken on Croker Island, Australia. In this multilingual and multidialectal environment finding conditioning factors to account for variation has proven difficult. I will show data suggesting that variants may not belong to one system but to several system, and that these variants are then recruited for other purposes.