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From: gmb@natcorp.ox.ac.uk (Glynis Baguley)
Subject: Re: Serbo-Croatian
Message-ID: <1995Feb24.105636.5639@skeatnatcorp.ox.ac.uk>
Originator: gmb@skeat.natcorp
Organization: British National Corpus, Oxford University, GB
References: <rharmsen.259.000C5488@knoware.nl> <3ia8cc$p1a@surz03.HRZ.Uni-Marburg.DE> <3ihieg$lea@hermod.uio.no>
Date: Fri, 24 Feb 1995 10:56:36 GMT
Lines: 27

In article <3ihieg$lea@hermod.uio.no> svein.lie@inl.uio.no (Svein Lie) writes:
> 
> If mutual intellibility does not play a role in distingusihing dialect
> from language, why do most intoductory books in linguistic say so?
> (See e.g. Hockett: A course in modern linguistics, 1967:322, 
> Bolinger: Aspects of language, 1975:345,
> Trudgill: Dialectology, 1980:3.)
> Most authors say that the notion and the matter itself is problematic, 
> but mutual int. is the starting point for all of them.
> 

I have faint memories of being taught in my degree course (1972-5)
that it USED to be said that mutual intelligibility distinguished
dialects from languages, but that it was now recognised that such
things as political and social factors came into it (`A language is a
dialect with an army'). So I was a bit surprised to see, in the FAQ
for this group I think, this criterion stated as though it were the
received view.

I'm sure mutual intelligibility is one of the factors, though. We
probably shouldn't be looking for just one criterion.

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