Conscious of the need to improve the positive social impact of our organization, we’ve decided it was time to branch out further into studies that could improve the lot of the average linguistic researcher. We thus had our interns submit 10,000 funding proposals each to different funders around the world. We could have carefully analysed the content of successful and unsuccessful proposals and highlighted specific words, sentences and phrases linked with rejection. Instead, we gave the interns the weekend off and here present part 2 of 2 of a hodgepodge of disastrous, fruitless and ill-
In addition to the woeful snippets, the final two of a trio of fuller examples are included at the end of the collection, should your will to live hold out that far.
It is well-
Research on the post-
While it is well known that country music is marked by several salient phonological characteristics, no studies to date have analyzed them taking into account the latest findings on language deficits caused by multigenerational inbreeding.
The main goal of this proposal is to study subtleties in usage differences of the aorist among ancient Greek communities. As preparation to conduct this research, in the first year I intend to learn the Greek alphabet. (I already know some of the letters, but the squiggly ones are hard.)
Prior results: Our proposal builds on a previous study in which we raised children as monoglot Dothraki speakers. The results of this pilot study were mixed. Language acquisition proceeded as predicted, though the participants experienced social issues in their attempts to interact with non-
The study will establish, once and for all, the correct plural of wug.
Aim: to demonstrate that pharyngeal nasals and velar trills are not only possible articulatorially, but are also part of the child’s innate linguistic hard-
Theorists have said this effect is impossible, but what do they know?
This proposal has previously been submitted to 16 funding agencies who are much less open-
Aim: to study the relevance of pragmaticists, the meaning of semanticists and the constituency of syntacticians. If time/
I wouldn’t be submitting this proposal if I could think of anything else to do.
Data will be gathered from a purposeful sample of Hawai’ian beaches.
Data will be inscribed on solid gold and platinum tablets with a diamond stylus; funding must be sufficient to cover these expenses.
All personally identifiable information will be archived on a public library computer marked with a Post-It note reading “plz don’t open the files kthx!”
Methodology: linguistically isolate some children and expose them only to the relevant (currently) shaded spaces on the IPA via wall-
Data collected from survey respondents will include age, gender, blood type, and bank account details.
Participants who agree to undertake the interaction clothes-
To preserve subject confidentiality, at the close of the study, all recordings will be wiped clean, all metal surfaces will be wiped clean, and all participants will be buried in an undisclosed location.
Annotation of data prior to analysis will be performed by simians of an as-yet-
Analysis will be performed in R and/or Python, depending on what’s easier to find and jerry-
Something something Chomsky yada yada.
The proposed fellow will contribute to the life of the department by introducing several new species of parasite.
We are only requesting one year of funding instead of the usual three because we are confident that we can finish cracking the Voynich manuscript in less than 12 months.
If you don’t fund me, I won’t have enough food for my soft toys.
The Rolex is necessary because the Hopi famously have no conception of time.
The number of armed mercenary soldiers employed for this project will be kept to the absolute bare minimum necessary to ensure success in data collection.
The Provost has graciously offered to personally oversee our field research, relying on the vehicle included for this purpose on line 427 of the proposed budget.
If you don’t fund me, I’ll send the boys round. Damian is itching to use his new crowbar.
I have little hope that data obtained by these methods will be of any significance, but the largesse of your agency’s funding will more than adequately compensate for that inevitable disappointment.
A subcontractor will be employed to write up the data for publication. Initial competitive bids have been successfully solicited from HuffPost and Fox News.
Excluded reviewer: Please do not let the program manager make any decisions regarding this proposal. He will be unfairly biased against me when he figures out that his wife is leaving him for me.
Results of this study will be written up in such a way as to make them publishable.
As your criticism appears not to be malicious but merely reflective of a profound failure of comprehension, let us rephrase our comments in simple words of one syllable.
With very few exceptions (e.g. George Soros), it is known that most Esperantists live on or near the breadline (Bread & Line 1972, 2015). The study aims to address the as-yet unanswered question: what is the causal relationship between Esperantism (Eo) and socio-
economic non- attainment (SENA)? Five possible options will be considered following Zam & Hof (1887): Eo causes SENA; SENA causes Eo; both are caused by some independent third variable (e.g. loser- ness); there is no causal relationship; who cares? Primary data will be gathered using a semi-
structured interview technique and think- alouds. The study will interview 1,009 Esperantists from 12.8 countries first in Esperanto, then for control purposes in Georgian about a) causes of the First World War and b) (if time allows) the participant’s individual socio- economic history and engagement with Esperanto. Impact: We’re working on this.
Building on recent work by Hengest & Horsa (2013), O’Fa (2004) and Al-Fre & de Greyed (2017), the study will seek to validate Kay Newt’s six-
point typology of ‘Old English’: Just- Got- Off- the- Longboat, Very Old, Old, Nearly New, Brand New and About- to- Be- William- the- Conquered. Methodology: Research team will disembark a set of longboats from Kent, UK, and fight their way westwards across England for around half a millenium. All interactions will be narrowly transcribed and coded for relevant morphosyntactic properties and pragmatic exponents after which a validatory six-
fold division will be imposed on the resultant corpus. Proposed location: Winchester then London.
* We also could have presented a smorgasbord of effective, productive and successful models from our corpus, but we’ve got to hold on to some sort of edge over the competition.
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