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I'm curious, why is it shameful for liking their research?


Among many linguists the whole study of the Pirahã language is sort of bogus because it goes against a few core ideas of Chomsky that they love so much, almost like a dogma. I've never heard a linguist describing Everett's work as anything other than "cute, but wrong". Personally, I think that's all sad scientifically speaking.


You must hear from relatively a lot of generativist linguists and syntacticians. The linguists at Language Log and elsewhere regularly praise Everett's scholarship in descriptive linguistics. And there is literally no important dispute left, except non-Pirahã specialists claiming Pirahã has subordinate clauses. Getting Everett banned from working with the Pirahã is just sad and pathetic.

http://www.chronicle.com/blogs/linguafranca/2012/03/28/poiso... http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=3857




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