Corpora and Representativeness: Where to go from now?

Abstract

Twentieth-century structuralist and generative linguists argued that the study of the language system (langue, competence) must be separated from the study of language use (parole, performance). For Saussure or Chomsky, no generalizations about language could be made based on the observation of patterns, regularities and rules of language performance. For Saussure, “Il n’y a donc rien de collectif dans la parole ; les manifestations en sont individuelles et momentanees. Ici il n’y a rien de p...