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Are rules and entries enough? Historical reflections on a longstanding controversy

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 December 1999

Brigitte Nerlich  and
David D. Clarke
Brigitte Nerlich
Affiliation:
School of Psychology, University of Nottingham, Nottingham NG7 2RD, [email protected] www.le.ac.uk/psychology/metaphor/
David D. Clarke
Affiliation:
School of Psychology, University of Nottingham, Nottingham NG7 2RD, [email protected] www.le.ac.uk/psychology/metaphor/
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Abstract

For language to function we clearly need two formal ordering principles: lexical entries and rules. Clahsen's target article provides multiple empirical evidence for this distinction, but this may be simply to overconfirm the undeniable and to overlook the hidden motor of language use and language development, namely, function. Since at least 1859, linguists have argued for the primacy of function, and these arguments are worth rediscovering today.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 22 , Issue 6 , December 1999 , pp. 1032 - 1033
Copyright
© 1999 Cambridge University Press

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