[Program updated 30 July 2013]
Do linguists measure anything?
Nick Riemer
University of Sydney and Laboratoire dâhistoire des thĂ©ories linguistiques, UniversitĂ© Paris-Diderot
Few questions in linguistics can be as hoary, fundamental or, perhaps, as unsatisfactorily handled, as that of the disciplineâs empirical status â a question typically presented as one of linguisticsâ âscientificityâ. Among the many issues needing attention from anyone who wants to make a serious epistemological effort to clarify the character of linguistic theory, one in particular has received strikingly little discussion: the presence (or nonpresence) in linguistics of measurement.
Measurement couldnât be more central to canonical sciences: theories are characteristically formulated in mathematical terms, and contain hypotheses about quantified data, a situation which naturally presupposes the measurement of the base phenomena (see Kuhn 1961 for a fascinating explosion of âmythsâ about measurement in physics). In linguistics â or, at least, in the core theoretical domains of phonology, morphology, syntax and semantics â measurement comparable to that observed in the empirical sciences plays no obvious role. That, presumably, is the reason for the ambient silence about the topic. But could there be some more subtle respect in which theoretical linguistics does, after all, involve something analogous to measurement?
This question isnât without interest, since it forms part of the comparatively neglected methodological side of the question of the scientificity of linguistics â taking âscienceâ, of course, in its typical English sense, and not in the broader sense captured by German Wissenschaft. As everyone now knows, thereâs no straightforward criterion of the âscientificâ: just what qualifies something as a science, in fact, is â fortunately â a subject of debate (see the useful Stanford Encylopedia of Philosophy entry). One thing, though, should be clear: itâs not enough for a discipline to count as a science that it simply have an empirical object. This, however, is typically the implicit grounds of linguistsâ protestations about the scientificity of their discipline: languages are empirical objects, and the linguist studies them in the same way that other scientists study other empirical objects.
Tagged with: philosophy of linguistics, science, scientificity, scientism, semantics
Posted in Article, Linguistics, Philosophy, Semantics
Posted in Article, Linguistics, Philosophy, Semantics
Early writing and printing in the Philippines
Rebeca FerndĂĄndez RodrĂguez
Universidade de TrĂĄs-os-Montes e Alto Douro
Printing and publishing began in the Philippines with the arrival of the Spanish in 1565. Encountering an enormous number of native languages, the Spaniards felt a pressing need to describe the languages most commonly spoken in the archipelago in order to communicate with the Filipinos. With the establishment of Spanish sovereignty over the Philippines, the Spanish Crown issued several contradictory laws regarding language. The missionaries were urged to learn the vernacular languages but were subsequently required to teach Spanish. For this reason, missionaries learnt the Philippine languages by writing vocabularies, grammars, and catechisms.
Philippine linguistic writing â grammars and vocabularies â is extensive and exhaustive. There was a pre-Hispanic writing system in the Philippines, baybayin, but it was used for personal communication and not for recording literature or history. For this reason missionaries had to start from the beginning. By describing the languages they contributed to their survival. In the last decades scholars have studied manuscripts and early editions of Tagalog, Bisaya and Ilocano texts and have been re-editing them. This is the case for Arte y reglas de la lengua tagala (1610) by Francisco Blancas de San JosĂ© (1560â1614) edited by Quilis in 1997; Bocabulario de lengua bisaya, hiligueyna y Haraya de la isla de Panay y Sugbu y para las demas islas (1632) by Alonso de MĂ©ntrida (1559â1637) edited by GarcĂaâMedall in 2004; and Arte de la lengua japona (1732), Tagalysmo elucidado (1742) and âArte chĂnicoâ (1742) by Melchor Oyanguren de Santa InĂ©s (1688â1747), edited by Zwartjes (2010). There is also an unpublished PhD dissertation about the Calepino ylocano (ca. 1797) of Pedro Vivar (1730â1771) and AndrĂ©s Carro (?â1806) by FernĂĄndez RodrĂguez (2012).
Tagged with: 16th century, history, Philippines, printing, Spain, writing
Posted in 16th century, 17th century, 18th century, Article, History, Philippines
Posted in 16th century, 17th century, 18th century, Article, History, Philippines
The creation of âparts of speechâ for Chinese: âtranslingual practiceâ across Graeco-Roman and Sinitic traditions
Edward McDonald
University of Sydney
The English term âparts of speechâ is actually a mistranslation of long standing of the Latin partÄs oratiĆnis, itself a translation of the Greek merÄ logou, in which the term oratiĆ / logos takes not its common meaning of âspeechâ but rather the technical sense of âsentenceâ (Halliday 1977/2003: 98). So the notion of âparts of speechâ, which may seem to suggest that these âpartsâ are natural classes somehow inherent to the language, should in fact be read âparts of the sentenceâ, in other words, constructs of language analysis. This confusion seems fitting as an epigraph to tracing the process of âtranslingual practiceâ (Liu 1995) whereby this category came to be introduced from the Graeco-Roman tradition of linguistic scholarship to its Sinitic counterpart by a multilingual Chinese scholar just over a century ago. This notion allows us to understand the complexity of an achievement which cannot be reduced to âexplaining change in terms of either foreign impact or indigenous evolutionâ (Liu 1995: xix, emphasis added), but rather allows us to recognise the scholar, deeply versed in both Chinese and European scholarly traditions, strategically deploying concepts from both traditions in the service of his scholarly and political project.
The âresponsible partyâ in this case, Chinese diplomat and scholar Ma Jianzhong 銏ć»șćż (1845-1900), was educated not only in Chinese but in Latin and French at a French Catholic school in Shanghai. In 1876 he went to France to study international law, becoming the first Chinese to achieve a baccalaurĂ©at, followed by a diploma in law in 1879. After a professional career as a diplomat, Ma transferred his energies to the scholarly arena, devoting the last decade of his life to writing the first grammar of Chinese produced by a native scholar, 銏æ°æé Mashi Wentong [Mr Maâs Compleat Grammar] (1898/1956).*
Tagged with: History of Chinese grammar, Ma Shi, Mashi Wentong
Posted in 19th century, 20th century, Article, China, History, Linguistics, Syntax
Posted in 19th century, 20th century, Article, China, History, Linguistics, Syntax
Analyses du fonctionnement sĂ©mantico-rĂ©fĂ©rentiel du nom propre dans lâInde ancienne
Ămilie Aussant
Laboratoire dâhistoire des thĂ©ories linguistiques (CNRS) â UniversitĂ© Paris Diderot
Introduction
La question du « sens » des noms propres a suscitĂ©, aussi bien en Occident quâen Inde, de nombreuses rĂ©flexions. Si les dĂ©bats ont longtemps concernĂ©, en Occident, la logique et la philosophie â la linguistique nây participant que de maniĂšre marginale â ce sont essentiellement les grammairiens (vaiyÄkaraáča) et les dialecticiens (naiyÄyika) qui, dans lâInde ancienne, se sont emparĂ©s du problĂšme. Les premiers ont majoritairement dĂ©fendu lâidĂ©e selon laquelle les noms propres dĂ©notent parce quâils connotent, alors que, parmi les seconds, câest lâidĂ©e dâune dĂ©notation directe, sans connotation, qui a Ă©tĂ© le plus souvent soutenue.
La prĂ©sente contribution, qui se fonde sur une recherche publiĂ©e en 2009 sous le titre Le nom propre en Inde. ConsidĂ©rations sur le mĂ©canisme rĂ©fĂ©rentiel (Aussant 2009), vise Ă donner un aperçu de ces deux types dâanalyses. Bien que leur contexte dâĂ©mergence soit diffĂ©rent, elles sâĂ©laborent toutes deux autour du concept de « cause dâapplication » (praváčtti-nimitta), auquel la premiĂšre section de cet article est consacrĂ©e. Jâexpliquerai, dans la deuxiĂšme section, en quoi consiste la premiĂšre analyse (les noms propres dĂ©notent parce quâils connotent) Ă travers la thĂšse de la propriĂ©tĂ© gĂ©nĂ©rique comme cause dâapplication des noms propres, la plus ancienne qui soit parvenue jusquâĂ nous et la plus frĂ©quemment Ă©voquĂ©e. La troisiĂšme et derniĂšre section de cette contribution sera consacrĂ©e au deuxiĂšme type dâanalyse (les noms propres dĂ©notent directement), analyse dĂ©fendue par plusieurs dialecticiens et dont les fondements sont posĂ©s dĂšs le VIes.
Tagged with: history of grammar, history of semantics, India, Sanskrit, semantics
Posted in Article, History, India, Linguistics, Semantics
Posted in Article, History, India, Linguistics, Semantics
Theoretical linguistics and artificial languages
Alan Reed Libert
University of Newcastle, New South Wales
Mainstream theoretical linguists have generally ignored artificial languages, apparently considering them unworthy of attention. This is true not only of “fictional languages” such as Klingon, but also of “serious” languages such as Esperanto. Much of the linguistic work which has been done on artificial languages has been carried out by Esperantists and is not concerned with structural aspects of these languages (see e.g. Schubert, ed. 1989). Serious languages have usually been designed to facilitate international communication and so are generally intended to be optimally designed for easy learning and use. Chomskyan linguists assume that there is a human language faculty, which sets limits on a possible human language. If this is the case, one might think that there would be limits even on languages which have been consciously created — unless one were trying to be perverse, which one presumably would not do in creating a language for international communication — or at least there would be limits on a usable artificial language.
The strangest, and perhaps the most interesting, artificial languages are the a priori languages, that is, those (supposedly) designed from scratch without reference to existing languages. These will seem exotic for various reasons, one being the total unfamiliarity of most of the vocabulary to speakers of any natural language. This is in contrast to another main type of artificial languages, a posteriori languages, which are based on one or more natural languages. Still other languages are called mixed languages, as they contain substantial material of both the a priori and a posteriori types (this way of classifying artificial languages has long been used, e.g. by Couturat and Leau 1903). Esperanto, the best known and most successful artificial language, is of the a posteriori type, and much of Esperanto will be familiar to someone who knows several major European languages (for a recent grammar of Esperanto in English, see Gledhill 2000). VolapĂŒk, a mixed language, was the most successful artificial language before Esperanto (see e.g. Post 1890 for more information on it).
By looking at artificial languages, in particular at the a priori ones, we may be able to explore the limits of language universals: perhaps universals will constrain even language creation. In fact, there may not be any truly a priori artificial languages, since we cannot create — or at least cannot fluently use — a language which lacks properties that natural languages must have.
Tagged with: artificial languages, constructed languages, Esperanto, government and binding, international languages, Klingon
Posted in Article, Linguistics
Posted in Article, Linguistics
The notion of stereotype in language study
Elena L. Vilinbakhova
St. Petersburg State University
1. Introduction
Originally, the word stereotype derives from two Ancient Greek roots: ÏÏΔÏΔÏÏ âsolidâ and ÏÏÏÎżÏ âimpressionâ. It was first used by the French printer Firmin Didot in 1796 as a typographical term. Later, it became a part of everyday language (in the beginning, it was used mostly in the form of an adjective stĂ©rĂ©otypĂ© âstereotypedâ) to describe repetitive situations that lacked originality or spontaneity.
In 1922, it was introduced into the social, cultural and psychological studies by the American writer Walter Lippmann in his book âPublic Opinionâ. He saw stereotypes as pictures in our heads which simplify reality: â[stereotypes] may not be a complete picture of the world, but they are a picture of a possible world to which we are adaptedâ (Ibid.).
Nowadays, the notion of stereotype is widely used in different areas, and even in linguistics, there are two major traditions of understanding it. The first approach defines stereotype as a fixed form, fixed expression, or even fixed text. According to the second approach, stereotype is seen as a fixed content, a fixed mental image of a person, an object or an event. Both definitions of stereotype share the same characteristic of stability, but it is either the stability of form or the stability of content (Ńf. the terms formal vs. semantic stereotype (BartmiĆski 2005), Sprachstereotype âstereotype of speechâ vs. Denkstereotype âstereotype of thoughtâ (GĂŒlich 1978), stĂ©rĂ©otype de langue âstereotype of languageâ vs. stĂ©rĂ©otype de pensĂ©e âstereotype of thoughtâ (Schapira 1999), etc. My focus here will be on semantic, rather then formal, stereotypes.
Tagged with: Hilary Putnam, linguistics, prototype, semantics, stereotype
Posted in Article, Linguistics, Semantics
Posted in Article, Linguistics, Semantics
Otto Jespersen and progress in international language
James McElvenny
University of Sydney
When it comes to expressing the ideas of our own day, the deficiencies of classical Latin appear with ruthless clarity: telephones and motor-cars and wireless have no room in Ciceronian Latin, and it will be of little use to coin Neolatin words for these and other inventions, for the whole structure of the language with its intricate forms and complex syntax, which tempts the writer to twisted sentences, has become so utterly antiquated that we of the twentieth century wince at the idea of having to clothe our thoughts in that garb.
(Jespersen 1928:19)
Otto Jespersen (immediate source: University of Warwick)
These are the words with which Danish linguist Otto Jespersen (1860–1943) rejected contemporary proposals to revive Latin as a language of international communication. Overcoming the curse of Babel was a problem that greatly exercised Jespersen, as it did numerous other scholars, scientists and enthusiastic amateurs in this period. Jespersen’s eventual solution, NOVIAL (Nov [= new] International Auxiliary Language; Jespersen 1928:52), was a design for a new, constructed language, optimised for ease of learning and efficiency in expression, the embodiment of his well-known views on ‘Progress in language’.1
Tagged with: 19th century, 20th century, aesthetics, constructed languages, Couturat, Gabelentz, grammar, history, international language, Jespersen, linguistics, Ogden, Peano, philosophy, Sapir
Posted in 19th century, 20th century, Article, History, Linguistics
Posted in 19th century, 20th century, Article, History, Linguistics
Greetings from the Orient: H.W. Ludolf as a central figure in 17th-cent. language study
Han Lamers (Leiden) & Toon Van Hal (Leuven)
Leiden University and University of Leuven
This post takes the reader to Ottoman Smyrna (Izmir in present-day Turkey) and Constantinople (now Istanbul) about 1700 A.D. Almost 250 years before, the Eastern-Roman, or Byzantine, empire had fallen into the hands of the Ottoman Turks. Sources about the socio-cultural and linguistic situation of the Greeks during this period of Tourkokratia or âTurkish ruleâ (1453â1821) are fairly scarce. Hence, historians are much indebted to western archives and travel reports of westerners who visited the Greek world during this period.
It is, therefore, of some interest to read through a small bunch of letters written at the end of the 17th century about the linguistic situation of Smyrna and Constantinople. The letters suggest that Smyrna is dominantly Greek and Turkish linguistically speaking. Constantinople, on the other hand, is a Babel of different voices:
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Tagged with: 17th century, Anatolia, Germany, history, Ludolf
Posted in 17th century, Anatolia, Article, Germany, History
Posted in 17th century, Anatolia, Article, Germany, History
