Schools of thought

Linguistics Schools of Thought

1. LINGUISTICS Instituto Superior “Josefina Contte” Ciencias del Lenguaje 2018

2. BRIEF HISTORY OF LINGUISTICS

3. -Before the 19th century , language in the western world was of interest mainly to philosophers: Greek philosophers Plato and Aristotle made major contributions to the study of language.

4. - 1786 regarded as birthdate of linguistics An Englishman, Sir William Jones pointed out that Sanskrit (the old Indian language) Greek, Latin, Celtic and Germanic all had striking structural similarities and concluded that these languages must spring from one common source.

5. Sir William Jones

6. Early 19 th century Four best known scholars in the linguistic science of the early 19 th century are: Dane r Rask J Grimm F .Bopp Von Humboldt

7. Wilhem von H umboldt The Prussian statesman, von Humboldt conceived a theory of “inner” and “outer” form in language. a structural conception … outer - the raw sounds the language ; inner - the pattern of grammar - meaning imposed upon the raw material and differentiated languages.

8. Another idea of Humboldt is language as dynamic - an activity…not the product of activity…not a set of actual utterances produced by speakers but the underlying principles or rules. These ideas influence - or emerge again in - Ferdinand de Saussure’s structuralism and Noam Chomsky’s transformational-generative grammar

9. In the mid 19 th century Darwin P ublished his famous Origin of Species , putting forward the theory of evolution. It seemed natural to attempt to chart the evolution of language alongside the evolution of species.

10. Modern linguistics Modern linguistics emerged in the late 19 th and early 20 th centuries with the shift of focus from historical concerns of changes in languages over time, to the idea that a language can be viewed as a self contained and structured system situated at a particular point in time. This forms the basis for structuralist linguistics.

11. I n the 20 th century The emphasis shifted from language change to language description. Linguists began to concentrate on describing single languages at one particular point in time, in a static or synchronic study of a given state of the language.

12. Ferdinand de Saussure A Swiss scholar ( 1857-1913) is labelled “the father of modern linguistics”

13. His students collected together his lecture notes after his death and published them under the title Course In General Linguistics (1915). His crucial contribution was his explicit and reiterated statement that all language items are essentially interlinked. He suggested that language was like a game of chess, a system in which each item is defined by its relationship to all the others.

14. STRUCTURALISM Historically de Saussure's ideas may be put under three heads. He formalized and made explicit the fundamental and indispensable dimensions of linguistic study synchronic\descriptive linguistics diachronic\historical linguistics.

15. Synchronic vs. diachronic Synchronic (linguistics)---languages are studied at a theoretic point in time: one describes a ‘ state ’ of language, disregarding whatever changes might be taking place. Diachronic ----languages are studied from point of view of their historical development – for example, the changes which have taken place between Old and Modern English could be described in phonological, grammatical and semantic terms.

16. Diachronic and synchronic Linguistics Synchronic study : exploring contemporary use Diachronic study : examining of a linguistic phenomena or describing the language change over time (Historical Linguistics) Synchronic- bvertical Diachronic- horizontal

17. 2 . He distinguished linguistic competence of the speaker and the actual phenomena or data of linguistic utterances as langue and parole.

18. LANGUE VS. PAROLE Langue--- the language system shared by a community of speakers ( French , meaning " language ") It describes the social, impersonal phenomenon of language as a system of signs Parole--- the concrete act of speaking in actual situations by an individual speaker. ( meaning " speech ") It describes the individual, personal phenomenon of language as a series of speech acts * made by a linguistic subject

19. Similar pairs of concepts have been developed by a number of theorists, such as Langue-system-code-language-competence-form and Parole-use-message-verbal behaviour -performance-function

20. 3. His theory of signs has been very influential . His linguistic sign is a union of the signifier (the form, sound) signified (the meaning, function ). THE RELATIONSHIP OF SOUND AND MEANING IS ARBITRARY.

21. The Prague school The Prague school is a tradition of linguistic thought that is associated with a group of C zech and other linguistic circle of P rague, established in 1926. The group held regular meetings and published a journal. The primary interest of the circle was phonological theory.

22. The Prague school… Prague school phonology succeed in placing the notion of the phoneme in the centre of linguistic theory, as one of the most fundamental units. They also made contributions to the field of syntax.

23. Phonetics and phonology Phonetics and phonology were dominant in early modern linguistics. The international phonetic association (IPA) was established in 1886 by a group of European phoneticians. The British phonetician Henry sweet was one of the leading figures in phonetics in 2 nd half of the 19 th century. Sweet and polish linguist Courtenay were independently instrumental in development of the notion of the phoneme or distinctive sound.

24. Around the beginning of the 20 th century - in America linguistics began as an offshoot of anthropology. anthropologists were eager to record the culture of the fast-dying American-Indian tribes, and the American-Indian languages were one aspect of this. There were no firm guidelines for linguists to follow when they attempted to describe exotic languages.

25. STRUCTURAL LINGUISTICS IN AMERICA Franz boas Edward Sapir Leonard Bloomfield

26. Franz boas Franz boas is considered the founder of American linguistics and A merican anthropology. A major concern for him was to obtain information as native American languages and cultures before they disappear.

27. Edward Sapir Edward Sapir (boas' student) was highly admired during is life and is still something of a hero to many linguists. He published extensively in both linguistics and anthropology, did first hand field work on many American Indian languages, contributed to historical linguistics and wrote theoretical works.

28. - Bloomfield and American structuralism - This state of affairs changed with the publication in 1933 of Leonard Bloomfield ’s comprehensive work entitled simply Language , which attempted to lay down rigorous procedures for the description of any language.

29. Blomfield’s predominant concern was to establish linguistics truly as a science of language . His main concern was to delimit the role of linguistics in relation to other sciences to develop the principles and concepts of linguistics into a well balanced and unified structure.

30. He restricted the object of linguistic enquiry to the formal characteristics of linguistic utterances . ” In the division of scientific labour , the linguist deals only with the speech signal”.

31. The data for a linguistic science: set of verbal utterances which constitutes a corpus. The task of the linguist is: to study the corpus of utterances and to discover regularities and structures , i.e. the langue in the specimen of parole . His thesis helped linguistics to establish itself as an autonomous field. Bloomfield wanted linguistics to become an empirical, descriptive science .

32. The principal value of Language lies in the closely argued and balanced presentation of the essential concepts which enable the linguist to analyse a language from sound to sentence. It is balanced in that it gives approximately equal weight to the different levels of the analysis: phonology, morphology and syntax. It omits however the semantic component.

33. CONSEQUENCES -Bloomfield had immense influence and the so-called “ Boomfieldian era “ lasted for more than twenty years . Linguists in the Bloomfieldian tradition continued to operate with the concepts developed by Bloomfield, to refine them and to use them for more rigorous descriptions of languages .

34. CONSEQUENCES The outcome was, in the forties and fifties, many well-ordered, objective , detailed and informative presentations of linguistics or of particular aspects of language.

35. THE ANTHROPOLOGIST MALINOWSKY stated that “ the real linguistic fact is the full utterance within its context of situation ”. He observed Language of the South Sea islanders which could only be understood associated with their culture

36. Firth (1890-1960) (British) , following Malinowsky argued that language must be studied at all levels in its context of situation and with emphasis on meaning.

37. The linguist has to study the “TEXT”, i.e ., the corpus of utterances in their linguistic environment or context, i.e., in relation to surrounding language items, in their context of situations , i.e., in relation to nonverbal constituents which have bearing on the utterance, such as persons, objects and events.

38. Neo- Firthian Theory A British linguist Michael Halliday elaborated and systematized the theoretical concepts originally suggested by Firth who had led the development of linguistics in Britain at about the same period during which structuralism made headway in America.

39. Michael Halliday (British) (1925) On the basis of Firthian ideas, presents a synthesis of concepts which aims at being theoretically powerful useful to apply in the description of natural languages.

40. A linguistic description is on three levels : 1) substance (phonic or graphic), phonetics and phonology examine the phonic substance, graphology the graphic 2) form grammar and lexicology 3) Context semantics studies the context which relates linguistic form to non-linguistic events .

41. THE DESCRIPTION OF ANY LANGUAGE REQUIRES FOUR FUNDAMENTAL THEORETICAL CATEGORIES 1) UNIT a stretch of utterance that carries a grammatical pattern e.g. sentence or phrase 2) STRUCTURE an arrangement of elements in relation to other elements e.g. subject and predicate .

42. THE DESCRIPTION OF ANY LANGUAGE REQUIRES FOUR FUNDAMENTAL THEORETICAL CATEGORIES 3) CLASS is illustrated by such paradigmatic concepts as noun and, verbs 4) SYSTEM is applied to closed sets of items as personal pronouns, tenses, or aspects. “ With these four basic categories…it is possible to describe the grammar of all languages”.

43. His scheme was an ambitious attempt to develop a theory of a high degree of universality .   IN GRAMMAR morpheme word phrase or group clause Sentence IN PHONOLOGY the rank scale has the units Phoneme syllable foot tone group .

44. Noam C homsky and linguistic theory since 1957 The main stream of linguistics since 1957, the year in which Chomsky's ‘Syntactic S tructures’ appeared, has been dominated by Noam Chomsky. It is difficult to overestimate his impact on both linguistics and contemporary ideas in general.

45. Chomsky’s Tranformational Generative Grammar Early sixties to about 1967 transformational generative grammar widened its scope in his second major work Aspects of the Theory of Syntax 1967 to the early seventies shift of emphasis from syntax to semantics (generative semantics )

46. Chomsky’s Tranformational Generative Grammar He introduced the notion of deep and surface structure and the difference between competence and performance and he recognized the existence of common elements , the universals , underlying all natural languages.

47. Unlike the bloomfieldians , Chomsky brought back Mentalism . For him the goal of grammar is to account for the native speaker’s competence, defined as what a native speaker knows of his\her language.

48. A generative grammar is a system of formal rules, principles and parameters which makes explicit the finite mechanism available to the brain to produce infinite sentences .

49. He pointed out that a Linguistics Analysis could be done without reference to MEANING. He investigated an area which had a little progress: SYNTAX (a new look was necessary).

50. He pointed out that as all humans are rather similar, their internalized language mechanisms are likely to have important common properties . In his view, a grammar must be designed so that “by following its rules and conventions we could produce all or any of the possible sentences of the language”.

51. Human beings may be well pre-programmed with a basic knowledge of what languages in general are like, and how they work. Chomsky has given the label UNIVERSAL GRAMMAR (UG) to this inherited core, and he regards it as a major task of linguistics to specify what it consists of. He also introduced the idea of LANGUAGE ACQUISITION DEVICE (LAD).

52. In his review of skinner’s verbal behavior he refuted the behaviorist psychology. He believed that language is rooted in the biology, not behavior.

53. Transformational Generative Grammar He developed new directions giving emphasis from SYNTAX to SEMANTICS

54. What is LINGUISTICS? The scientific or logical examination of any aspect and property of language. Lyons(1968): “Linguistics is the scientific study of language by means of controlled and emprically verifiable observations with reference to some general theory oflanguage structure”.

55. Linguistics is a theoretical science . It formulates explanations which are designed to account for the phenomena of language. Theories in Linguistics as in other discipline, demand verification: do the statements made about language explain the phenomena encountered in natural languages? Linguistics is not only theoretical . It is also an empirical science making detailed observations on particular languages to confirm or refute generalizations. Linguistics , therefore, observes and analyzes data found in natural languages . Linguistics is accordingly not only a theoretical but also a descriptive discipline.

56. Characterization of Linguistics today Linguistics as an independent field of study, a university discipline with different specializations within it and areas of application, with its own professional organizations, journals and scholarly meetings is a creation of the 20th century, and more specially a phenomenon of the period after World War II.

57. H ow does linguistics work? W hat steps does it follow to be scientific? How does it reach its findings and conclusions? 1. Introspection: intuition 2. Observation 3. Descrition 4. Hypothesizing 5. Experimentation 6. Modeling 7. Theorizing

58. Important distinctions in linguistics Speech and writing Descriptive vs. prescriptive Synchronic vs. diachronic langue vs. parole Competence and performance Functionalism and formalism

59. Oral Language Vs Written Language Language was first in spoken mode Speech is not the same as writing or vice versa. Carefully organising ideas in mind while writing. Ideas bore in mind instantly and spontaneously in speech Hovewer oral language is richer than written language.

60. Descriptive vs. Prescriptive They represent two different types of linguistic study. Descriptive ---to describe the fact of linguistic usage as they are, and not how they ought to be, with reference to some real or imagined ideal state. Prescriptive ---a term used to characterize any approach which attempt to lay down rules of correctness as to how language should be used.

61. Competence and performance Competence ---- a person ’ s knowledge of his language, the system of rules which he has mastered so that he is able to produce and understand an indefinite number of sentences, and to recognize grammatical mistakes and ambiguities. Performance ---the actual realization of language knowledge, language seen as a set of specific utterances produced by language speakers, as encountered in a corpus.

62. Functionalism and formalism FUNCTIONALISM OR FUNCTIONAL LINGUISTICS refers to the study of the form of language in reference to their social function in communication. It considers the individual as a social being and investigates the way in which she/he acquires language and uses it in order to communicate with others in her or his social environment. Representative: M. A. K. Halliday , Systemic functional grammar

63. FORMALISM OR FORMAL LINGUISTICS is the study of the abstract forms of language and their internal relations. It fixes on the forms of languages as evidence of the universals without considering how these forms function in communication and the ways of social life in different communities. Representative: Noam Chomsky, Transformational-generative grammar

64. Contemporary approaches to linguistics Formal approach Functional approach In formal approach linguistic structures are independent of their functions and meaning.(syntactic) In functional approach Linguistic structure are motivated by functional and cognitive forces.(semantic)

65. How does linguistics differ from traditional grammar ? Linguistics is descriptive not prescriptive: do not prescribe rules of “correctness”. Language changes all the time: linguist do not judge but observe this: different to ----- different from Linguists regard the spoken language as primary not the written. Writing systems are derived from the vocal sounds

66. Who is a linguist ? Anyone who studies a language with a purpose to describe and explain any topic related to language. Not always need to form a theory. But it will be sufficient to produce a body of observations that are systematic, or even to systematically state what is already known for description or pedagogical purposes. Observers rather than participants

67. The linguist is also interested in the language of the people who, by a rigid conception of a standard language, do not talk ”properly”: the language of small children and foreigners . His interest can be focused, without condescension or condemnation, on non-prestigious as well as prestigious varieties . Another language variety that is examined is the interlanguage or the variety that second language learners develop, as well as the variety native speakers adopt when talking to babies and to foreigners: baby talk and foreigner talk .

68. Misconceptions about linguists: Capable of speaking many languages Confused with translators and interpreters But they can write a grammar of a language she cannot speak. A linguist is interested in all languages of the world.

69. CORE FIELDS OF LINGUISTICS -THE COMPONENETS OF MICROLINGUISTICS- MICROLINGUISTIC INVESTIGATION –an analytic approach to the language- Phonetics: production and perception of sounds Phonology: use of sounds in language Morphology: word formation Syntax: sentense structure Semantics: meaning of words and how they combine into sentences.

70. MACROLINGUISTIC INV E STIGATION - a holistic approach to the language- Pragmatics : which link language with external world Sociolinguistics : the study of language and society Historical linguistics : the study of language change:2Ds: diachronic and synchronic change. Till F.De Sausser, diachronic approach Psychological linguistics : the study of language and mind First language acquisition SLA

71. MACROLINGUISTIC INV E STIGATION - a holistic approach to the language- Applied linguistics (Educational linguistics, speech pathology, application of linguistics to language teaching) Anthropological linguistics: the study of language in cross-cultural setting. Compuatational Linguistics : the use of computers to simulate language and its workings=fuzzy logic, artificial intelligence Stylistics: the study of language and literature= text linguistics Philosophical linguistics : the link between language and logical thought. Linguistics typology: the study of different language types. For ex: isolating(analytic) chinese: one morpheme one word, no affiixes, agglutinating, inflecting: Latin, Greek, English. Deep/depth change according to the function in a sentence.

72. Pedagogical Grammar/Linguistics Designed for language teaching purposes For sy l labus designers and language teachers Based on usefullnes and ease of learning Exercises, explanations, descr i ptions. The contents and the priorities c ha nges from one context to the next as different fiel ds arise. It presc r ibes the teaching of the most learnable aspects of grammar, pronunciation and vocabulary.

73. Still an open question today was there an original single language ? (monogenesis) or did language come about independently in a number of places?

74. and related to this... are similarities among the languages of the world evidence of a single ultimate source, due to genetic factors (innate language system) or due to certain preferences naturally arising independently?

75. Bibliography: Aichitson , J. Linguistics Stern,H.H . Fundamental concepts of language teaching . Chapter 7