donald@utcsrgv.UUCP (Don Chan) (02/17/84)
For a secular (and disinterested) view of glossolalia ("speaking in
tongues") I'd recommend
William J. Samarin
Tongues of Men and Angels (The Religious Language of Pentecostalism)
1972, Macmillian Co., New York, N.Y.
A bit dry, but contains some interesting info. Apparently glossolalia is
not unknown in other cultures, and is a moderately researched phenomenon.
Analysis of recorded tonguespeak reveals it to be randomly jumbled phonemes
chained into pseudo-language syntax.
The book often cited by pro-tonguespeakers, Sherrill's "They Speak in
Other Tongues", is most charitably described as highly uncritical.
In any pentecostal church you'll find some variant of the story
"one service person X started speaking in tongues and person Y, a
newcomer to the church, recognized it as High Slobovian. Person X
has never even hear of Slobovia."
Needless to say, nobody can ever offer more than that. Usually the
person telling the story got it second or third-hand.
To be fair, most tonguespeak is not claimed as xenoglossia (speaking of
actual foreign language), but just as a sign to believers.
If tonguespeak can produce xenoglossia, do formal languages count as well
as natural ones? Imagine attending a febrile fundamentalist rally and
noticing that the tonguespeaker next to you is reciting C code!
--
Don Chan, University of Toronto Department of Computer Science
{ utzoo linus ihnp4 floyd allegra uw-beaver
ubc-vision cornell watmath hcr decwrl }!utcsrgv!donald