Distributional Structure

1.2 Reality of the structure

1. Does the distributional structure “really exist”? Harris separates two questions.
   (1) In the language: yes, as much as any scientific structure exists in the data it describes, since the relations it states really hold there. (2) In the speakers: a question of fact not settled by the analysis itself, though some behaviour (e.g. “repeating” utterances of one’s own language with one’s own variants) shows perception along distributional lines.
   • Harris, 1954, Distributional Structure (Word), §1.2, p. 149
2. How can the speakers’ “habits” be measured, according to Harris (after Hockett)?
   By new utterances not used in building the structural description, both truly productive new formations and held-out data: essentially, testing how well the structure predicts new data.
   • Harris, 1954, Distributional Structure (Word), §1.2, p. 150
3. What does the coining of analyticity illustrate?
   A new formation can conform to a distributional pattern (cf. periodic/periodicity, simplicity) without showing the habit existed in speakers beforehand: the readiness to combine elements may arise only when needed, by association of partially similar words.
   • Harris, 1954, Distributional Structure (Word), §1.2, p. 150
4. How is the speaker’s position “similar to that of the linguist”?
   Speakers have heard many utterances, perceive partial similarities among their parts, and produce new combinations along the lines of those heard; new utterances are formed from the distributional relations among parts of previously heard utterances.
   • Harris, 1954, Distributional Structure (Word), §1.2, p. 150