A two-way exchange between syntax and corpora

In his contribution, Geoffrey Sampson, Professor Emeritus at the University of Sussex (United Kingdom) and currently Research Fellow at the University of South Africa, highlights the relationship between Corpus Linguistics and Syntax. He shows how this bond has a two-way nature. In his view, the use of corpora in language research allows one to better understand syntactic issues and the development of language complexity. However, the other way is also true in Sampson’s view since he believes the focus on syntax is one of the major factors contributing to the growth of interest in Corpus Linguistics. From a more general perspective, Sampson argues in favor of linguistics remaining a creative activity which develops in unexpected ways. As for the prospects of Corpus Linguistics, he predicts its death – not of this approach itself, but of the term. He believes the label ‘corpus linguistics’ will disappear when corpora become just another resource available to linguists.