Syntax Grammars
Steven Craig Miller
scmiller at www.plantnet.com
Wed Dec 8 09:55:51 EST 1999
To: Paul Zellmer,
<< While Brooks and Winbery is an appropriate book for the second year
course of studies, it is, in fact, a "beginning syntax" which should be
followed by an advanced syntax study/studies. >>
Each to their own, I guess. But it seems silly to me to try to reduce
everything to one of two extremes so that the only categories one has to
work with are either "beginning" or "advanced." In addition, I would take
exception to the notion that one does not learn any syntax in most first
years courses. In my opinion, it is more descriptive to refer to
Brooks-Winbery as an intermediate text. While you might personally feel
that the two categories ("beginning" and "advanced") are sufficient to
describe all the grammars which have been published, I, on the other hand,
do not believe that even three categories ("beginning," "intermediate", and
"advanced") are sufficient to describe all the grammars, but at least it is
a start in the right direction. Of course, one doesn't want too many
categories, I think five would be about right, perhaps three could be
tolerated, but just two seems insufferable. Why try to collapse everything
into a bipolar world?
-Steven Craig Miller
Alton, Illinois (USA)
scmiller at www.plantnet.com
Disclaimer: "I'm just a simple house-husband (with no post-grad degree),
what do I know?"
More information about the B-Greek
mailing list