Snowclones seem to fit in here (www.snowclones.org). A "snowclone" is a generative cliche--you can take a formula and change out the main terms but it still recognizably fits the formula, like "X put Y in his/her/its/their place," or "X is the new black," or "X is a poor man's Y." The term was originally inspired by the phrase, "If Eskimos have N words for snow, X surely have Y words for Z." But the term also reminds me of snow globes . . . originally a snow globe was a snow scene filled with snow, but today you can buy a "snowglobe" that features a beach scene with "sand," a city scene with glitter, etc.
Beth
>>> Craig Hancock <[log in to unmask]> 12/9/2009 12:44 PM >>>
If you think of grammar as dynamic, then new uses for structures are not surprising. Frequency of use makes them more familiar. Construction grammar pays more attention to these lower level constructions, which sometimes have open slots. For example, X put Y in his/her/its/their place. We wouldn't continue to use them if we didn't find them useful.
a set phrase might seem inappropriate in some contexts. Judge to defendant: "Do you have anything to say before I sentence you?" Defendant: "Is the Pope Catholic?" She might add a month or two to the sentence.
It seems to me hard to talk about this without including grammar.
Craig
Robert Yates wrote:
I wish I knew why this is so important to note "is the Pope Catholic" a fixed expression.
I could have made the exchange:
Did the Yankees win the Pennant?
Do the Cubs play in Wrigley Field?
Is New York the largest city in the US?
Does champagne have bubbles?
Is it cold at the North Pole?
Is Rush Limbaugh a big fat idiot?
Did Sarah Palin resign her position as Governor of Alaska?
Substitute any of these examples in the exchanges I noted, and the actually meaning of those questions are different because of the context. Language is creative.
Bob Yates
Craig Hancock <[log in to unmask]> ( mailto:[log in to unmask] ) 12/08/09 12:03 PM >>> Just for fun, I googeled "Is the Pope Catholic?" and got 1,930,000
hits. It has obviously found wide distribution as a set phrase.
Craig>
Brian,
Thanks for the heads-up on the article. I wonder if that kind of
article was more likely in the 60's when public knowledge about
grammar was greater. Thanks for bringing it up. I will definitely take
a look at it.
As for your question: "Robert and Craig, I wonder if you would both
agree that grammar is necessary but not, by itself, sufficient to
produce meaning in language."
I agree.
Craig
There's an argument on how the grammar of "A Modest Proposal" relates to
its rhetoric. This argument appears in Charles Kay Smith's "Towards a
Participatory Rhetoric," College English, Nov. 1968, and it's also
incorporated in Smith's first-year writing textbook, "Styles and
Structures: Alternative Apporaches to College Writing." Smith doesn't
argue that grammar alone tells us us how to read "A Modest Proposal,"
but
he does suggest that the interaction of gramamr (specifically, sentence
structure) with diction and rhetoric helps create meaning by prompting
readers not to trust the narrator.
For example, Smith observes that there are many sentences in the essay
(including the opening sentence) which feature a short main clause
followed by heavily modifed subordinate clauses. He then points out that
those short main clauses feature a lot of abstract and general words
(e.g., "It is a melancholy object," at the beginning of the opener),
while
the subordiante clauses are loaded with concrete, specific words (e.g.,
"beggars," "all in rages," "importuning," in the subordinate clauses).
The
grim details in the subordinate clauses give readers reasons to distrust
the lofty assurance of the essay's narrator (or "projector") in the main
clauses.
I'm probably not doing justice to the argument, but it's worth reading
if
you're not familiar with it--and I think it could be used to support the
claim, as summarized by Craig, that 'grammar is inherntly discourse
oriented, inherently tied to cognition." For me, this claim doesn't at
all
imply that grammar alone determines meaning, but only that grammar plays
a
critical rolein determining meaning. Robert and Craig, I wonder if you
would both agree that grammar is necessary but not, by itself,
sufficient
to produce meaning in language.
Brian
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