The New Word Grammar Richard Hudson
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Word Grammar1 Richard Hudson Contents 1 a Brief Overview of The
Word Grammar1 Richard Hudson Contents 1 A brief overview of the theory 2 Historical background 3 The cognitive network 3.1 Language as part of a general network 3.2 Labelled links 3.3 Modularity 4 Default inheritance 5 The language network 6 The utterance network 7 Morphology 8 Syntax 9 Semantics 10 Processing 1 A brief overview of the theory Word Grammar (WG) is a general theory of language structure. Most of the work to date has dealt with syntax, but there has also been serious work in semantics and some more tentative explorations of morphology, sociolinguistics, historical linguistics and language processing. The only areas of linguistics that have not been addressed at all are phonology and language acquisition (but even here see van Langendonck 1987). The aim of this article is breadth rather than depth, in the hope of showing how far-reaching the theory's tenets are. Although the roots of WG lie firmly in linguistics, and more specifically in grammar, it can also be seen as a contribution to cognitive psychology; in terms of a widely used classification of linguistic theories, it is a branch of cognitive linguistics (Taylor 1989, Lakoff 1987, Langacker 1987; 1990). The theory has been developed from the start with the aim of integrating all aspects of language into a single theory which is also compatible with what is know about general cognition. This may turn out not to be possible, but to the extent that it is possible it will have explained the general characteristics of language as `merely' one instantiation of more general cognitive characteristics. -
Word Grammar and Construction Grammar 1
Word Grammar and Construction Grammar 1 Richard Hudson Construction Grammar (CG) as defined by Adele Goldberg’s recent work and Word Grammar (WG) are very similar to each other, and together form a bridge between cognitive and generative approaches to language structure. For example, like other cognitive theories CG and WG claim that language is usage-based, but like generative theories they recognise a separate level of syntax. However, I also recognise four general differ- ences between CG and WG, all of which can be illustrated from the analy- sis of ditransitives. First, sentence structure consists of dependency struc- ture in WG, whereas CG is somewhat agnostic about sentence structure. Second, CG appears to assume a rather simple kind of semantic structure whereas WG offers a rich network analysis of the entire semantic frame. Third, CG appears to recognise a single level of “form” which includes phonology, morphology and syntax, whereas these are related hierarchi- cally in WG. The fourth difference is that WG spells out a theory of proc- essing somewhat more fully than CG does. In each case, I show that the extra structure and theory available in WG would improve the CG analy- sis. Finally, I suggest that the notion of “construction” is problematic. 1. Overview Word Grammar ( WG ) has so much in common with Construction Gram- mar ( CG ) that similarities are a lot easier to find than differences. These similarities are partly a case of independent parallel development, but I have always been a great admirer of the work of the CG group, especially Charles Fillmore (Fillmore and others 1988, Fillmore 1986, Fillmore 1982, Kay and Fillmore 1999), George Lakoff (Lakoff 1987, Lakoff 1977) and Adele Goldberg (Goldberg 1995, Goldberg and Bencini 2005, Goldberg 2002, Goldberg 2006, 1995; Goldberg and Bencini 2005). -
Interview with Richard Hudson
Interview with Richard Hudson by Joseph Hilferty Richard Hudson is Professor of Linguistics at University College London. He did his doctoral thesis on the grammar of Beja, a Semitic language spoken in north- eastern Africa. He has done extensive work in the area of syntax and is the author of the classic textbook, Sociolinguistics (Cambridge University Press). He is currently hard at work on his own theory of language structure, word grammar. On Linguistics Ever since the mid-1960s, the field of theoretical linguistics has slowly frag- Q: mented into many different schools while at the same time being dominated by the figure of Noam Chomsky. How you would you assess the current state of linguistics? Is it in a healthy state? It was already pretty fragmented in the early 1960s, when I was a research A: student in London. I was faced there with a choice for syntactic theories between Halliday and Chomsky, and within a few years I was learning about Lamb’s Stratificational Grammar, Hjelmslev’s Glossematics, Pike’s Tagmemics and a few others. I did my PhD at the School of Oriental and African Studies, so I did quite a bit of phonology, and there I was very much aware of the difference between Firth’s prosodic theory and phoneme theory—or rather, between it and the various phoneme theories, including the Joneme of Daniel Jones, in UCL (just round the corner). Morphology had Item-and-Arrangement, Item-and-Process and Word-and- Paradigm approaches. And don’t forget that historical linguistics was a much bigger part of linguistics than it is now, so we heard quite a bit of the big debate about whether sound changes were blindly regular or not. -
Theories of Syntax
Theories of syntax The linguistic landscape is littered with literally hundreds if not thousands of theories of syntax, many with no more than a handful of adherents, a smallish number with considerable numbers of practitioners; just a few theories dominate over the rest, and account for the majority of syntacticians. Syntactic theories are commonly grouped into two broad types, formal and functional (see §1.4). Formal theories of syntax focus on linguistic form, relegating meaning to a peripheral position. Functional theories by contrast tend to focus on the functions language serves, and the ways that syntax is organised to serve these functions; meaning plays a central role. Within both camps can be found an enormous range of variation in the extent to which theories are formal or functional. In extreme versions of formal syntax, grammar tends to be conceptualised as an abstract algebraic system specifying the acceptable strings of symbols making up a language. Meaning is considered irrelevant, and syntax (in whole or part) is seen as constituting an autonomous system. Extreme functional syntaxes by contrast recognise only meanings or functions, and deny the existence of structure in syntax. The majority of theories fall somewhere between the two poles. Where does the approach outlined in Chapter 5 fit? It is formal in that syntactic form is accorded a central place. At the same time it is heavily functional: not only are grammatical relations (sometimes also called functions) recognised, but they are linked to general functions (uses) of language, in terms of three types of meaning, experiential, interpersonal, and textural. The division into formal and functional theories obscures a more fundamental point. -
—018 Schools, Theories, Methodologies —018 1 Structural
T4 T4 —014 301 Philosophy and theory Notation —01 from Table 1 as modified below Do not use for schools and theories of semantics; class in —0143018 —014 301 8 Schools, theories, methodologies —014 301 82 Formal linguistics Including generative semantics —014 301 83 Functional linguistics —014 301 835 Cognitive semantics Class here frame semantics —018 Schools, theories, methodologies For works on schools, theories, methodologies that stress semantics, see —0143018; for works on schools, theories, methodologies that stress phonology, see —15018; for works on schools, theories, methodologies that stress syntax, or syntax and phonology, see —5018 —018 1 Structural linguistics —018 2 Formal linguistics —018 22 Generative linguistics —018 3 Functional linguistics —018 33 Systemic functional linguistics —018 35 Cognitive linguistics —018 4 Dependency linguistics —018 42 Meaning-text theory —150 1 Philosophy and theory Notation —01 from Table 1 as modified below Do not use for schools and theories of phonology; class in —15018 —150 18 Schools, theories, methodologies —150 182 Formal linguistics Including generative phonology —150 183 Functional linguistics Including cognitive phonology —501 8 Schools, theories, methodologies —501 81 Structural linguistics Class theories combining elements of structural linguistics and functional linguistics in —50183 —501 82 Formal linguistics 1 T4 Dewey Decimal Classification T4 —501 822 Generative grammar Class here transformational grammar, government and binding theory, minimalist program —501 823 Constituency