Re: [tied] Re: trzymac'

On Sri, svibanj 31, 2006 1:47 pm, pielewe reče:

> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Mate Kapović <mkapovic@...> wrote:

> I suspect the complexity of the subject is an important reason. On
> the other hand I also suspect that there is a distinct tendency for
> historical linguistics (and in particular historical reconstruction)
> to attract people with communicative handicaps. This was less of a
> factor in the past when historical linguistic was the only type of
> linguistics that was taken seriously.

Hm, I don't know. In my experience, most of the work in, for instance, IE
linguistics is not written in such a manner.
What I particulary don't like is what MAS (i.e. Dybo) does when he quotes,
for instance, an unpublished Middle Bulgarian text and then he just gives
isolated forms and not the whole system.

> But there is a lot of Slovincian in "Slavic Accentuation", isn't
> there? And as I wrote in an earlier posting, I distinctly recall
> Kortlandt telling me at some point in the seventies that he regarded
> the Slovincian/Old Polish alternation we have been talking about as
> just about the only point or which his theory did not offer a clear-
> cut solution. I can assure you he was aware of those facts.

OK, so he knows about it, but he did not mention the problem in his works.
Of course, Slovincian and Old Polish data gain much more strength when
supported by South Slavic as well.

> On Croatian dialectology:

> Mate:
>
>> I wouldn't say it was up to courage. The main reasons were:
>> 1) the "authority" of the three academics
>> 2) the lack of knowledge of the majority of dialectologists
>> 3) that those who did have enough knowledge to criticize it just
> did not
>> care enough to do it
>
> Fair enough. In addition I have always wondered whether there were
> political factors involved. Pavle Ivic's lengthy review of the Susak
> description is extremely carefully worded and he lived in a different
> republic.

I am not sure, this was way before my time, but I don't see how politics
could get involved. I mean, it was just about wrong accents etc., I doubt
there was much more to it than fear that it will have negative outcome on
ones career or fear of the authors' authority.

>> For instance, who would dare
>> confront Kortlandt in Leiden? Or the Netherlands? Isn't it not
> funny that
>> his theories on Slavic accentuation are recognized only in Leiden?
>
> I have never understood why the persons immediately involved in this
> farce do not seem to be bothered by it and the impression they are
> making, and take no steps to remedy it.

Didn't get you, sorry... Do you mean that others (i.e. MAS) are ignoring
Kortlandt? Well, they practically ignore everybody, so that's no wonder.
It was funny, though, how Dybo feeled he needed to explain himself when
Derksen accused him of this last summer. He said that they cannot get the
literature. Actually, this might indeed be a big part of the problem.

> On the Vrgada dictionary:
>
>> I see you have a lot of insider knowledge...
>
> In the early seventies Ebeling's PhD student Hein Steinhauer spent
> some time with Blaz^ Juris^ic/. It is a heartrending story.
> Publication of the book became possible only with Hraste's death
> (1970). When the proofs arrived (in 1971 and 1972) Juris^ic^ was
> barely able to correct them because of failing eyesight. (Hein
> related the story somewhere in his "C^akavian Studies"). When the
> book, for which Juris^ic/ had struggled all his life, finally
> appeared (1973), he was blind. By the way, the entire tragical affair
> received some publicity after the break-up of Yugoslavia, I think
> Josip Bratulic/ wrote about it, perhaps others too.

Didn't know that. It's really a tragic story...

> I had written:
>
>> > Zvonimir Junkovic, who hailed from
>> > the most archaic section of the Kajkavian dialect area (at the
> time
>> > very poorly documented),
>
> Mate:
>
>> What part?
>
> If I'm correctly informed he came from somewhere in the narrow strip
> west and north-west of Zagreb which has not carried through stress
> retractions, I think from the surroundings of Zapres^ic/.

Oh, "donjosutlanski". Yes, that's a pretty archaic dialect (funny though,
it's only like half an hour away from the center of Zagreb). They have
unfortunately mostly lost the neo-acute in the last syllable (except in
idiolects and allophonically I think).
I am actually forcing a colleague of mine (a linguist but not an
accentologist) to describe her native dialect, which belongs to that
group, with my assistence. I hope it'll work :)

Mate