Wasow, T. & Arnold, J.
Intuitions in Linguistic Argumentation.
Lingua: International Review of General Linguistics, 2005, 1481-1496.
Generative grammarians have relied on introspective intuitions of well-formedness as their primary source of data. The overreliance on this one type of data and the unsystematic manner in which they are collected cast doubt on the empirical basis of a great deal of syntactic theorizing. These concerns are illustrated with examples and one more detailed case study, concerning the English verb-particle construction.
A satisfying exploration of the issue–frequently not even discussed–of the heavy reliance in the discipline on the intuition of a speaker on the well-formedness of an utterance. In addition to identifying the problem, they actually present research demonstrating its real implications.
While they are aggressively challenging the status quo of the discipline, they balance their criticism with suggestions for changes.
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