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Theories of Linguistics Practical points about the course • web site with syllabus, required and Theories of linguistics recommended readings, ppt’s uploaded (under my personal page) • consultation: sign up for time slots, read some of the required readings András Cser • exam: a few paragraphs to write on two or BMNEN-01100A three questions, based on topics covered in class • mock exam on last week if possible What is this course about? What is this course about? • the history of linguistics ― actually a studying Language as such, series of chapters from intellectual history that is, Language as a general human and • Ancient Greeks, Romans, Medieval cultural phenomenon (biological? Europeans, Humanists, Early Moderns, cognitive? social? historical?) 19th century scholars, early 20th century • with occasional connections to related studying Language in and for itself is fields such as philosophy, literature, LINGUISTICS rhetoric (with potential practical applications, of course) The beginning: Ancient civilisations The beginning: Ancient civilisations • Having language (=speaking) has been a → the performative aspect of language very universal experience for a very long time clearly present in several ancient • Also meeting speakers of other languages civilisations (creation narratives in Bible, or varieties also India, Egypt) • The "powers" of language (one can make someone happy or sad or angry, impress For Jews, names are of great importance: others, convince someone of one’s point, – new names given by God (Jacob → Israel) one can invoke deities, God/gods can – explanation of names (site of Jacob’s dream create by uttering certain words...) of the ladder & God’s promise → Bethel) Both stories in Genesis, 32:22–32 and 28:10–19, resp. The beginning: Ancient civilisations The beginning: Ancient civilisations (Sumerian cuneiform writing, c. 3000 BC) Also, writing appears in the 3rd–2nd millennia in some places (China, Mesopotamia, Egypt) → some sort of reflection on language (words, sounds, meanings) Phonographic writing (= the marking of sounds rather than words) involves an unconscious phonological analysis! The beginning: Ancient civilisations The beginning: Ancient civilisations The Gezer But none of these actually led to the Calendar, an ancient Hebrew emergence of anything like linguistics! record of the agricultural cycle, 10th c. BC The systematic study of language (though not always in and for itself) emerged only (images taken from F. in India and Greece. Coulmas The Blackwell Encyclopedia of Writing Systems) (Of these, India will not be discussed here.) Ancient Greece Ancient Greece 4th–5th centuries BC exceptional period in Interest in language manifests itself in two Western intellectual history: directions: • inquiry into everything in ways not seen in other contemporary cultures (Near East, Egypt) • Language as a key to knowledge & truth – the structure of the material world, human nature and the nature of society, the origins of knowledge etc. → philosophy • in three generations, the agenda is set for future • Language as effective speech European science, philosophy and arts → rhetoric Ancient Greece: Plato (429–347 BC) Ancient Greece: Plato (429–347 BC) Important issue for him: where does our This is discussed in the context of the knowledge come from? what are its physis–nomos dichotomy: are things the foundations? how do we know that it is way they are by nature or by convention? reliable? how does it relate to truth? Physis: innate, inevitable, intrinsic Nomos: externally imposed, arbitrary And: what is the role of language in acquiring and passing on knowledge? (social organisation, ethical norms, even religion) Ancient Greece: Plato (429–347 BC) Ancient Greece: Plato’s Kratylos Kratylos: dialogue on the "rightness" of names Two extreme positions between which Socrates mediates: Why do words mean what they mean? Do they have a necessary inner connection to Words intrinsically connected to reality what they denote? vs. The underlying agenda: is language a reliable path to knowledge and wisdom? Words arbitrary, like naming a slave Ancient Greece: Plato’s Kratylos Ancient Greece: Plato’s Kratylos Socrates points out that both are untenable But Socrates initially appears to favour the if taken to logical extreme: physis view: If words were strongly connected to reality, If a sentence can be true, then words must one cannot say anything untrue (physis) have the same property (Later Plato confines truth to sentences) If this relation was arbitrary, chaos would be Instruments must be intrinsically appropriate inevitable (nomos) for the goals of their use Ancient Greece: Plato’s Kratylos Ancient Greece: Plato’s Kratylos So what is the rightness of names? But there are many counterexamples, e.g. sklērōtēs ‘rigidity’ ― why? Socrates: sounds show the original elements of meaning, e.g. r : motion, e.g. The original "name-giver" (nomothetēs, a trekhein ‘run’, tromos ‘tremble’, rhymbein demi-god or superman, who had access to ‘whirl’... higher reality, ideas) may have made Plus there are composite words, e.g. mistakes; also, changes were later anthrōpos ‘man, human’ ← anathrōn ha introduced out of laziness, etc. opōpe ‘who looks up on what he has seen’ Ancient Greece: Plato’s Kratylos Ancient Greece: Plato’s Kratylos Thus both physis and nomos play a part in Conclusion: how words mean: originally created in • language is not a reliable way to truth & harmony with reality, they were knowledge, though it can give hints; subsequently changed by convention • words are inferior imitations of reality; • it is better to have immediate access to reality to achieve knowledge without the mediation of words After resolving this epistemological question, language is no longer interesting! Ancient Greece: Aristotle (384–322) Ancient Greece: Aristotle and rhetoric Like Plato, Aristotle was not interested in Why was rhetoric important? language in itself Unlike nowadays, in Athenian direct democracy government and public He discusses language in various contexts: business was conducted orally in public assemblies; there were no trained judges and lawyers in law courts • rhetoric → power of persuasion was crucial for • logic success! • poetics Ancient Greece: Aristotle and rhetoric Ancient Greece: Aristotle and rhetoric Before Aristotle: speech-writers Skills needed: (logographoi), sophists (professional • construction of syllogisms teachers of rhetoric & logic) • knowledge of character & emotions • appropriate expression Some also write short treatises, handbook- like treatment Only the last concerns language directly; Originally rhetor anyone who makes a public discusses prose style, metaphor, mistakes speech in prose composition Language is an instrument wrt a goal Ancient Greece: Aristotle and poetics Ancient Greece: Aristotle and poetics Treatise on poetics, poetic style, devices like • stoikheion (letter/sound) metaphor • syllabē (syllable) but also includes list of linguistic elements • syndesmos (~ conjunction, preposition?) (merē tēs lexeōs) ― the first listing of • arthron (~ pronoun, article?) something like parts of speech • onoma (noun in nominative) • rhēma (verb) • ptōsis (inflected forms) • logos (sentence [also certain phrases]) Ancient Greece: Aristotle and poetics Ancient Greece: Aristotle and poetics Formal definitions given, e.g.: But again language not in focus, it is a means to an end, scil. the composition and analysis of poetry rhēma: has meaning, parts have no meaning, has time [=tense] onoma: has meaning, parts have no meaning, does not have time [=tense] logos: has meaning, parts also have meaning Ancient Greece: Aristotle and logic Ancient Greece: Aristotle and logic Six books collected under the (later) title Premises: Organon Every man is mortal Socrates is a man Aristotelian logic is propositional logic, i.e. it Conclusion: is basically an analysis of how statements Socrates is mortal can relate to each other → valid syllogism Ancient Greece: Aristotle and logic Ancient Greece: Aristotle and logic Faulty syllogism: Faulty syllogism: Premises: Premises: Every man is mortal Some men are mortal Socrates is mortal Socrates is a man *Conclusion: *Conclusion: Socrates is a man Socrates is mortal Ancient Greece: Aristotle and logic Ancient Greece: Aristotle and logic Ultimately it all boils down to the analysis of Place of language in his intellectual universe: statements into a subject phrase and a predicate phrase ― unfortunately also called onoma and rhēma, resp. world (out there) Lot of discussion of what can be predicated impressions (in soul) universal ― is Aristotle listing categories of being or spoken signs (in lang.) particular linguistic categories of predicates? written signs (in lang.) Analysis of sentences into subject and predicate not incorporated into grammar cf. no level of concept until late Middle Ages relation conventional bw signs & impressions! Ancient Greece: Aristotle ― summary Ancient Greece: Stoicism Aristotle studied language in different • Very influential school of philosophy in contexts, but always as a means to a centuries following Aristotle, in Rome too different end • Hardly any writings survive ― (a disaster!) Instrumental view of philosopher/scientist • Our knowledge fairly sketchy (also in Plato): what do we use language • Very important for development of for? why is is important? grammar as a discipline → to convince • Issues of language discussed under → to please rhetoric and dialectic (≈ logic) → to argue Ancient Greece: Stoicism Ancient Greece: Stoicism Basic theory of linguistic forms: Some theory of the meaning relation and the nature of signs ― details unclear phōnē any sound/noise sēmainon ‘signifier’ ↔ sēmainomenon ‘signified’ lekton ‘what may be put into words’ Precise meaning not clear, but seems to be lexis writable (=articulated) sound precursor to classification of sentence types and propositions logos meaningful sound Best Stoic discussion of sign theory is St Augustine’s De dialectica! .
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