Recent publications in the history and philosophy of the language sciences — October 2022

Janette Friedrich, ed. 2022. Karl BĂŒhler und das Wiener Psychologische Institut. Dokumente und FundstĂŒcke. Herausgegeben, zusammengestellt und kommentiert von Janette Friedrich. Lausanne: sdvig press. BĂŒhleriana 1. 390 p. ISBN: 9782970082958
Publisher’s website

Mit dem Band Karl BĂŒhler und das Wiener Psychologische Institut. Dokumente und FundstĂŒcke beginnen wir die Veröffentlichung der Forschungsreihe BĂŒhleriana, die in das Website-Projekt BĂŒhler Digital (http://karlbuehler.org) integriert ist. Damit bieten wir den Leserinnen und Lesern nicht nur eine Buchreihe, sondern zusĂ€tzlich auch einen Raum, ein Feld, wie BĂŒhler sagen wĂŒrde, in dem die in den BĂŒhleriana formulierten Erkenntnisse, Thesen, Hypothesen und Fragen mit schon existierenden WissensbestĂ€nden in Beziehung gesetzt werden können. Ein wichtiges Instrument dazu stellen die auf der Website vorhandenen Bibliographien zu den Arbeiten Karl BĂŒhlers wie auch zu den Forschungen ĂŒber ihn dar. FĂŒr den vorliegenden Band besonders interessant erscheint uns die ebenfalls auf der Web-site veröffentlichte Zeittafel. Sie integriert einen großen Teil der bisher gefundenen Informationen zu den wissenschaftlichen TĂ€tigkeiten Karl BĂŒhlers, seiner Frau Charlotte und einiger der Mitarbeiterinnen und Mitarbeiter am Wiener Psycho-logischen Institut. Die damit zur VerfĂŒgung stehenden Daten und ihre je nach Forschungsinteresse mögliche Strukturierung werden bestimmte Momente in den TĂ€tigkeitsfeldern BĂŒhlers sichtbar machen, die bisher vernachlĂ€ssigt wurden. Dabei kann es sich um institutionelle Faktoren handeln, wie z.B. den großen Frauenanteil am Wiener Psychologischen Institut – fĂŒr die Wissenschaften Anfang des 20. Jahrhunderts nichts SelbstverstĂ€ndliches. Oder um BĂŒhlers Projekt einer Theoretischen Psychologie, das er in den 1930er Jahren begann und bis an sein Lebensende nicht aufgegeben hat. Wir hoffen, dass auf diese Weise neue Fragen und Erkenntnisse nicht nur im Rahmen der BĂŒhler-Forschung, sondern auch fĂŒr die Rekonstruktion der Geistesgeschichte der Psychologie im 20. Jahrhundert formuliert werden können.

Read more ›
Posted in Publications

Podcast episode 28: Franz Boas and the Boasians

Franz Boas

In this episode, we begin our exploration of American linguistics by looking at the innovative contributions of Franz Boas (1858–1942) and his circle of students.

Read more ›
Posted in Podcast

Interview 3 : Le Moyen Âge est une sociĂ©tĂ© de langage, interview with IrĂšne-Rosier-Catach

Inverview with IrĂšne Rosier-Catach, prepared by Émilie Aussant, ChloĂ© Laplantine and Rafaello Pisu.
Recorded in Paris, on June 30, 2021 at Université Paris Cité by Thomas Zoritchak.
Tranlation by Andrew Eastman and Amanda Murphy.
Music extracted from Luciano Berio & Cathy Berberian. Recital 1 For Cathy / Folk Songs / Weill-Berio Songs. RCA Gold Sea. 1973.

Bonjour IrĂšne, merci Ă  toi d’avoir acceptĂ© cet entretien. Nous allons aujourd’hui parler de ton parcours, de ta carriĂšre, des sujets auxquels tu t’es intĂ©ressĂ©e. Pourrais-tu nous dire comment tu en es venue Ă  t’intĂ©resser aux conceptions du langage au Moyen Âge, quels sont les auteurs qui t’ont intĂ©ressĂ©e et pour quelles raisons ?

Read more ›
Posted in Interviews

Recent publications in the history and philosophy of the language sciences – September 2022

Mariana MĂŒnning. 2022. Sound, Meaning, Shape. The Phonologist Wei Jiangong (1901-1980) between Language Study and Language Planning. Heidelberg Asian Studies Publishing. 312 p. ISBN: 9783948791292
Publisher’s website.

One of the leading proponents of the radical linguistic reforms in 20th century China, Wei Jiangong remains hardly known in the West. This book describes how Wei, who was rooted in traditional philology and conceptualizing language as a tool, helped to promulgate a standard language, led the compilation of the world’s most popular dictionary, and helped to drive script reform. While these measures were characterized as violent intervention in the Chinese language sphere, Wei’s careful negotiating of linguistic description and political prescription illustrates how they also may have been steps that helped to achieve linguistic self-determination.

Read more ›
Posted in Publications

Raymond de Saussure’s Freudian appropriation of Antoine Meillet’s historical and general linguistics

Cover of Imago 1922

John Joseph
University of Edinburgh

One hundred years ago, Raymond de Saussure (1894-1971), the second son of Ferdinand and Marie de Saussure, published a review of a collection of papers by his father’s most famous and devoted student, Antoine Meillet (1866-1936). Saussure (henceforth the surname used alone will designate Raymond) was not a linguist, but a psychologist who had become attached to Freudian psychoanalysis. He was personally psychoanalysed by Freud, who contributed a preface to Saussure’s first book in 1922, the same year as the review of Meillet. Saussure was a founding member of the SociĂ©tĂ© Psychanalytique de Paris in 1926, and his important role in establishing psychoanalysis in France and Geneva is chronicled in Roudinesco (1982).

Read more ›
Posted in Article

Recent publications in the history and philosophy of the language sciences-July-August 2022

Didier Samain & Pierre-Yves Testenoire, ed. 2022. La linguistique et ses formes historiques d’organisation et de production. Paris: SHESL. HEL Livres 1. 336 p. ISBN : 979-10-91587-16-7. DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.6675029
Publisher’s website

La production et la transmission des savoirs scientifiques s’effectuent par des instances dĂ©diĂ©es (exemplairement l’UniversitĂ©), mais aussi par la mĂ©diation de multiples structures, qui se sont agrĂ©gĂ©es autour d’une thĂ©matique (acadĂ©mies, sociĂ©tĂ©s savantes), d’une affiliation (dans le cas notamment des « Ă©coles »), ou encore d’un projet (comme la grammatisation – l’individuation et la description – d’une langue vernaculaire). Quoique bien identifiĂ©es dans leurs aspects sociaux, ces structures sont moins souvent apprĂ©hendĂ©es dans toute la complexitĂ© de leurs apports spĂ©cifiques. Tel Ă©tait donc l’enjeu du colloque consacrĂ© Ă  « la linguistique et ses formes historiques d’organisation et de production » (Paris, 24-26 janvier 2019), Ă  l’occasion du quarantiĂšme anniversaire de la SociĂ©tĂ© d’histoire et d’épistĂ©mologie des sciences du langage.
La plupart des contributions au prĂ©sent volume portent sur des pĂ©riodes contemporaines de l’organisation moderne du savoir et montrent comment ces structures se sont positionnĂ©es par rapport aux institutions dĂ©jĂ  existantes. Mais le lecteur y puise Ă©galement des perspectives plus larges, grĂące Ă  des analyses consacrĂ©es Ă  d’autres espaces culturels et aussi aux empans temporels abordĂ©s, de la microhistoire aux temporalitĂ©s longues. Sous la diversitĂ© des contextes et des situations, certains mĂ©canismes se rĂ©vĂšlent alors Ă©tonnamment rĂ©currents, qu’ils concernent l’émergence et la disciplinarisation de nouveaux objets d’étude ou les comportements cognitifs des acteurs.

Book in open access

Read more ›
Posted in Publications

Podcast episode 27: Interview with Peter Trudgill on sociolinguistic typology

John Sell Cotman – Mousehold Heath (1810)

In this interview, we talk to Peter Trudgill about how the structure of speaker communities may influence the structure of languages.

Read more ›
Posted in Podcast

Podcast episode 26: Interview with Philipp KrĂ€mer on creoles and creole studies

Street sign

In this interview, we talk to Philipp KrÀmer about the history of the study of creole languages and present-day efforts to standardise creoles around the world.

Read more ›
Posted in Podcast

Recent publications in the history and philosophy of the language sciences-June 2022

Giuseppe Cosenza, Claire A. Forel, Genoveva Puskas & Thomas Robert, ed. 2022. Saussure and Chomsky. Converging and Diverging. Lausanne: Peter Lang. 172 p. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3726/b19300
Publisher’s website

Saussure and Chomsky, the two major figures in linguistics of the twentieth century and beyond, have often been compared. The collection of bilingual English and French papers of this volume offers different perspectives, defended by two generations of researchers, on what brings together and distinguishes the Saussurean and Chomskyan theories. The papers all highlight that the two theories offer points of convergence, as they are interested in the same human manifestation, while divergence emerges from the fact that they build on two different premises about the nature of their object of study. The authors do not always reach similar conclusions but offer thoughts and material that will definitely help readers form their own opinion.

Read more ›
Posted in Publications

Podcast episode 25: Interview with Felicity Meakins on contact linguistics

Gurindji kids

In this interview, we talk to Felicity Meakins about Pidgins, Creoles, and mixed languages. We discuss what they are, and how they are viewed in both linguistic scholarship and in speaker communities.

Read more ›
Posted in Podcast

Upcoming events

28-30 June 2023
Faro, Portugal
International Inter-association (History of Language Teaching) Conference
Language teachers, methodologies and teacher training in historical perspective

4-6 September 2023
Universidade de TrĂĄs-os-Montes e Alto Douro, Portugal
2023 Annual Colloquium of the Henry Sweet Society
What counts as scientific in the History of Linguistics?

6-9 September 2023
Universidade de TrĂĄs-os-Montes e Alto Douro, Portugal
XXXII. International Colloquium of the “Studienkreis ‘Geschichte der Sprachwissenschaft'” (SGdS)
Controversies in the history of linguistics