Language Wars
November 12, 2020
The two major camps in linguistics consist of formalists and functionalists (NB, not the humanistic functionalists). 1
Formalists
While postulated in the 1930s (?), formalist approaches to language dominate linguistics post Chomsky’s Syntactic Structures (1957). Chomsky effectively reduces language to grammar, “system of principles, conditions, and rules that are elements or properties of all human language.” Basically stuff you know from automata and PL theory.
Human language is a system for free expression of thought, essentially independent of stimulus control, need-satisfaction or instrumental purpose.
I(nternal)-language is the object of study. E(xternal)-language is just its communicative externalization.
Chomsky’s inateness argument is based on the observation that children manage to learn language from less-than-adequate external stimuli.
Functionalists
Lakoff (1995) summarizes functionalists’ view:
It is an open empirical question for us just what is and is not innate. In general, we assume a great deal of innate conceptual structure and processing capacities, and we take these as forming the basis for linguistic universals.
Dik formulated the Theory of Functional Grammar.
According to Butler (2003), functionalist characteristics:
- Language is a means of communication in social and psychological contexts;
- The language system is not arbitrary and self-contained, but better explained in terms of cognitive, socio-cultural, physiological and diachronic factors;
- Semantic (what words mean) and pragmatic (what speakers mean) patterning is central. Syntax is not a self-contained system, but one means for the expression of meanings (at least partially motivated by those meanings);
- Non-discreteness in linguistic classification and of the cognitive dimension;
- Concern for the analysis of texts and their contexts of use;
- Strong interest in typological matters;
- A constructionist, rather than an adaptationist, view of language acquisition.
There is a huge further categorization within functionalists’ views, but I need to read a bit more about that.
1 Note that the dichotomy formalist/functionalist is overly simplistic. Entire books are written to disambiguate the distinctions. Kind of meta. ↩