From Plato to Aristotle—Investigating Early Australian English

Abstract

This paper identifies five questions about the possible origins and development of early Australian English and reviews the ways in which scholars have answered these questions so far. But the paper also argues that there are as yet too few empirical studies of early Australian English. Plato's use of reason needs to be followed and complemented by Aristotle's empirical approach. Despite the doubts of some scholars, it is possible to look at early written sources. The paper describes a corpus of early Australian English, the principles followed in building it, and the ways in which it can be used. A progress report on the study of lexis using the corpus is included.