On 4 Sep 2002, David Dyer-Bennet wrote: [Mark M] #> But then I thought about the great-great-grandparent effect (so to #> speak). That could make a difference. Possibly, just barely enough of a #> difference, even if gg-grandma normally raises baby, which seems very #> unlikely!: # #Another point, perhaps very relevant, is that the "grandparent" and #"great-grandparent" generations *aren't that old*. In our culture, #grandparents tend to be retired, and often somewhat frail and limited #in what they can do. And great-grandparents nearly *always* are. #That means they mix less in society. # #On Dragera, for contrast, many grandparents might still be an active #soldier. # #That probably means there's a wider range of ages mixing in lots of #social and professional situations. # #That means that any hypothetical resistance to linguistic change #provided by the older people might have more effect there than here. Yeah, that is a possibility, and one that I've thought about. It would have more effect on the adults than on the children, but restraining the adults' language change could well affect the way they speak to their children, *if* the restraining effect of generation-mixing starts to take hold while the parents are still raising the kids. ISTM that we've introduced enough variables here to give Steve a fair bit of Watsonian wiggle room. Of course, if he wants to apply the same principles to language as he does to food, he has to work on it. I'll be happy to be his consultant. :-) -- Dr. Whom, Consulting Linguist, Grammarian, Orthoepist, and Philological Busybody a.k.a. Mark A. Mandel