Old Professor Hockett came to our school one day,
To teach us some linguistics and earn a little pay.
More accurately, history was what he taught us all
In 1989, as the leaves began to fall;
And all us graduate students, when the clock struck one,
We’d gather in the classroom and have the mostest fun
A-listening to the stories that Hockett told about
And the Chomskyans that gets you
           If you
                 Don’t
                       Watch
                             Out!

Once there was a linguist wasn’t biunique
So when he went out to the field, he was up the creek.
His colleagues heard him holler, his informants heard him bawl,
And when they tried to find him, he wasn’t there at all!
And they looked at his phonology and found it was a mess,
And looked at his morphology and found the same, I guess,
And then they realized what had happened to the lout—
And the Chomskyans’ll get you
           If you
                 Don’t
                       Watch
                             Out!

And one time a student would always grin and laugh
And make fun of everyone, and all the teaching staff
And once, at a colloquium, when old folks was there,
She mocked them, and shocked them, and said she didn’t care!
And just as she turned away, her expression very snide,
There was two great Black Things a-standing by her side
And they snatched her through the ceiling ’fore she knowed what she’s about!
And the Chomskyans’ll get you
           If you
                 Don’t
                       Watch
                             Out!

And old Professor Hockett says, when the blaze is blue,
And the lamp-wick sputters, and the wind goes woo-oo!
And you hear the crickets quit, and the moon is gray,
And the lightning-bugs in dew is all squenched away—
You better mind your mentors, and your teachers fond and dear,
And cherish them that grades you, and buy them lots of beer,
And watch out for the disrespect that clusters all about,
Or the Chomskyans’ll get you
           If you
                 Don’t
                       Watch
                             Out!