The main functions of the language. Language as a social phenomenon
§ 12. Language as a social phenomenon, as the most important means of human communication, performs a number of social functions in people's lives.
The word "function" (from lat. . functio- "execution") is ambiguous. In general use, it can denote such concepts: meaning, purpose, role; duty, scope of duties; work, type of activity; a certain phenomenon that depends on another, basic phenomenon and serves as a form of its manifestation, implementation. This word is variously used as a scientific term, i.e. has a number of special meanings. As a linguistic concept, it is also used ambiguously. According to some linguists, recently in the science of language this term (along with the term "structure") has become the most ambiguous and stereotyped.
The compound linguistic term “language function”, or “language function”, denotes the purpose, purpose, or “purpose, potential orientation of the language system to meet the needs of communication (communication) and the needs of mental activity” . Following V. A. Avrorin, the concept of the function of language can be defined as "the practical manifestation of the essence of language, the realization of its purpose in the system of social phenomena, the specific action of the language, due to its very nature, something without which language cannot exist, just as matter does not exist." motionless" .
When speaking about language functions in general theoretical terms, we mean, first of all, the functions of language in general, language as a universal human phenomenon, i.e. features specific to different languages. They should not be confused with the specific functions of individual languages associated with the special conditions of their functioning. You can compare such functions of the Russian language as, for example: to be a means of interethnic communication between the peoples of Russia or the Soviet peoples (in the former USSR), to act as one of the international languages, etc. In general linguistics, including the course "Introduction to Linguistics ", usually consider those functions that appear in any language, are carried out or can be carried out by each language.
Sometimes, as language functions, varieties of the language are considered that serve different areas of human activity, i.e. talks about the performance by the language of the functions of the popular spoken language, the oral form of the literary language, the language of science and technology, the language of culture, art, the language of socio-political life, or the function of the language used in various areas of socio-political life, the function of the language of teaching in primary , secondary schools and universities, etc. In such cases, it would be more correct to speak not about the functions of the language, but about the areas of its application.
Speaking about language functions, one should distinguish between such language functions as a means of human communication, as an integral system, and the functions of the elements of this system - different language units, their types, for example, the functions of a word, sentence, speech sound, word stress, etc. Here we will focus only on the actual language functions.
The main, most important function of the language is considered to be communication function, or communicative(from lat. communication- "communication, message"). This function is understood as the purpose, the purpose of the language to serve as a means of communication between people, their transmission of messages, the exchange of information. In the process of communication with the help of language, people convey their thoughts, feelings, desires, moods, emotional experiences, etc. to each other.
The presence of a communicative function in a language is due to the very nature of the language; this function finds its expression in the generally accepted understanding of language as the most important means of human communication. The communicative function is "the original, primary, for the sake of which the human language appeared"; this idea is also expressed in the above statement by K. Marx and F. Engels that "language arises only from a need, from an urgent need to communicate with other people."
Language exists, functions insofar as it realizes its purpose - to serve as a means of communication between people. If, due to certain conditions, the language ceases to fulfill this purpose, it ceases to exist or (in the presence of writing) is preserved in the form of a dead language, as discussed above.
In order to exchange information, thoughts about the reality around us, about specific objects and phenomena, it is necessary to create, form, construct appropriate thoughts that do not exist in finished form, but appear only as a result of human mental activity, carried out (mainly or only) with language help, as discussed in the previous section. Recall that the units of thinking (concepts, judgments) are expressed by linguistic means (words and sentences). On this basis, a special function of the language is distinguished - thought-forming function, thought-forming, or constructive(from lat. constructio-"construction"), sometimes called the mental, or function of the tool of thinking. This function of language, in contrast to the communicative one, is not recognized by all linguists. According to some linguists, the constructive function belongs not to language, but to thinking.
Usually, thoughts are formed, constructed by a person with the aim of transmitting to others, and this is possible only if they have a material expression, a sound shell, i.e. expressed in linguistic terms. "In order for ... a thought to be transmitted to another, it is necessary to express this thought in a form accessible to perception, it is necessary that the thought receive a material embodiment. The most important means for this ... is human language." It is the language, being closely associated with abstract thinking, that provides the ability to "transmit any information, including general judgments, generalizations about objects that are not present in the speech situation, about the past and future, about fantastic or simply untrue situations" . Thus, it should be recognized that, along with the functions discussed above, the language also performs the function of expressing thought, or, more simply, expressive function, which is also called expressive(from lat. expressio– "expression"), or explicative(from lat. explicatio- "explanation, deployment").
Expressing his thoughts, judgments about the world around him, about various objects and phenomena of reality, the speaker can simultaneously express his attitude to the content of the speech, to the reported facts, events, etc., his feelings, emotions, feelings or empathy in connection with the reported information . This is most clearly manifested in artistic, poetic speech and is comprehended through special selection, the purposeful use of various means of the common language, "the specific artistic organization of language material." For this purpose, such linguistic means are used, such as, for example: introductory words and phrases, modal particles, interjections, significant words with emotional, expressive, stylistic coloring, figurative meanings of words, derivational affixes with evaluative meaning, word order in a sentence, intonation (for example , intonation of joy, admiration, anger, etc.). In this regard, a special function of language stands out - the function of expressing emotions, feelings, experiences and moods, or, more simply, "the function of expressing the feelings and will of the speaker", which in the special literature is usually called artistic, poetic, aesthetic, emotional, or emotive. This function of the language can be defined as "the ability of the language to act as a form of art, to become the embodiment of an artistic concept", "to serve as a means of embodying an artistic concept, a means of creating a work of art"; its essence lies in the fact that "language, acting as a form of verbal art, becomes the embodiment of artistic intent, a means of figurative reflection of reality, refracted in the mind of the artist" .
Language is not only a means of reflecting reality, objects and phenomena of the surrounding world, a means of expressing human thoughts, feelings, emotions, etc., but also the main means and the most important source of knowledge of the world, the processes and phenomena occurring in it. In other words, the language does cognitive function, or, otherwise, gnostic, epistemological(from Greek. gnosis-"knowledge, knowledge" and logos- "word, doctrine"), cognitive(cf. lat. cognoscere- "know, know" cognitum- "to know, to know").
The simplest way to cognize the external world is sensory perception, however, not all objects, their signs, properties, etc. are perceived and cognized by the senses. In particular, abstract concepts, such as space, movement, speed, etc., are completely inaccessible to sensory perception. Yes, and about specific objects with the help of the senses, you can get only a very superficial idea. Deep and comprehensive knowledge of the surrounding world is possible only with the help of language.
The participation of language in the cognition of reality is manifested, as is known, in the process of thinking, in the formation of concepts and judgments, which are expressed in words and sentences. Without the participation of language, linguistic means, the scientific, research activity of people is unthinkable, as a result of which our knowledge is constantly enriched with new information, new information about the world around us, about the phenomena being studied.
In the process of cognition, communication between people for the purpose of exchanging information and experience plays an extremely important role. Such an exchange is possible not only through direct oral communication, but also when reading books, newspapers, magazines, while listening to radio programs, watching television programs, movies, theater productions, etc. The process of cognition is especially intensive during study, in the classroom. All this is possible with the help of language.
As noted above, language is not only a means, but also a source of knowledge about the world. "Language itself carries information contained in its signs" . This or that information is contained in all significant units of the language - morphemes, words, phrases, sentences. "The content side of the meaningful units of the language, i.e. the meaning of words and word components, the meaning of phrases, the semantics of sentence structures, is a picture of the world processed by human thought (in each language in something different) that has developed as a result of a long analytical, cognitive activities of many previous generations.
The source of human knowledge is not only specific units of language, but also certain language categories, in particular grammatical ones. So, for example, a noun as a part of speech denotes an object (in the broad sense), or objectivity, an adjective is a sign of an object, a numeral is a number, a number of objects, a verb is an action, a process. The same can be said about the lexical and grammatical categories of nouns, adjectives and other parts of speech, about the categories of number, gender, animation, degree of comparison, tense, mood, etc.
It should be noted that the cognitive function of language (as well as the constructive function) is not recognized by all scientists. Some linguists believe that "this function is characteristic of human thinking, and language is only a tool that is used in the process of its implementation", that language does not perform a cognitive function, but only the function of a means of knowledge. It seems, however, that this difference is not fundamental. After all, language is not only a cognitive tool, but also a means of communication. It is generally accepted that language performs the function of communication, or communicative function, precisely because it is means communication of people; it can equally be argued that language, as a means of cognition, performs a cognitive function.
Closely related to the cognitive function of language accumulative function(cf. lat. accumulatio- "accumulation, dumping in a heap"), i.e. the function of accumulating, consolidating and transmitting social experience, or "a means of consolidating and transmitting the achievements of human thinking, human knowledge." The essence of this function is that "the language in a certain sense accumulates in itself the social experience of mankind and the knowledge acquired in the process of life", which "are deposited primarily in significant vocabulary, to a certain extent also in grammar, reflecting to a greater or lesser extent least indirect connection and relationship of reality. With the help of language, the acquired knowledge and experience are distributed among people, become the property of different peoples, are passed on from generation to generation, which ensures the accumulation and constant enrichment of experience and knowledge, the development of science, technology, etc. “If language did not make such a transfer of knowledge possible, then each generation would have to start in the development of knowledge from an“ empty place ”, and then there would be no progress in science, technology, or culture.”
Some linguists, along with the named functions of the language, also distinguish and describe such functions as regulatory, i.e. "a function that regulates relations between people in the process of communication"; phatic (or contact, contact-establishing), nominative (naming) and some others, which, in our opinion, are not of particular interest.
- Cm.: Jacobson R. Development of the target language model in European linguistics between the two wars // New in linguistics. 1965. Issue. 4. S. 377.
- Kiseleva L. A. Communicative Language Functions and the Semantic Structure of Verbal Meaning // Problems of Semantics. M., 1974. S. 67.
- Avrorin V. A. Language functions. S. 354; His own. ABOUT subject of sociolinguistics. S. 34.
- Cm.: Kostomarov V. G. The problem of social functions of language and the concept of "world language" // Sociolinguistic problems of developing countries. M., 1975. S. 241–242.
Continuation. Beginning in No. 42/2001. Printed in abbreviation
11. COMMUNICATION FUNCTION
The most important function of language is communicative. Communication means communication, exchange of information. In other words, language arose and exists primarily so that people can communicate.
Let us recall the two definitions of language given above: as a system of signs and as a means of communication. It makes no sense to oppose them to each other: these are, one might say, two sides of the same coin. Language also carries out its communicative function due to the fact that it is a system of signs: it is simply impossible to communicate in another way. And the signs, in turn, are designed to transmit information from person to person.
Actually, what does information mean? Does any text (recall: it is a realization of a language system in the form of a sequence of characters) carry information?
Obviously not. Here I am, passing by people in white coats, by chance I hear: "The pressure has dropped to three atmospheres." So what? Three atmospheres - is it a lot or a little? Should I rejoice or, say, run away to hell?
Another example. Having opened the book, we come across, let’s say, the following passage: “Destruction of the hypothalamus and the upper part of the pituitary stalk as a result of neoplastic or granulomatous infiltration can cause the development clinical picture ND ... In a pathoanatomical study, the insufficiency of the development of supraoptic neurons of the hypothalamus was less common than that of paraventricular ones; a reduced neurohypophysis was also identified. Sounds like a foreign language, doesn't it? Perhaps the only thing we can take away from this text is that this book is not for us, but for specialists in the relevant field of knowledge. For us, it does not carry information.
Third example. Is the statement “Volga flows into the Caspian Sea” informative for me, an adult? No. I know it well. This is well known to everyone. Nobody doubts it. It is no coincidence that this statement serves as an example of banal, trivial, hackneyed truths: it is of no interest to anyone. It is not informative.
Information is transmitted in space and time. In space, it means from me to you, from person to person, from one people to another... In time, it means from yesterday to today, from today to tomorrow... And "day" here must not be understood literally , but figuratively, in a generalized way: information is stored and transmitted from century to century, from millennium to millennium. (The invention of writing, printing, and now the computer has made a revolution in this matter.) Thanks to language, the continuity of human culture is carried out, the accumulation and assimilation of the experience developed by previous generations takes place. But this will be discussed further below. In the meantime, let's note: a person can communicate in time and ... with himself. Really: why do you need a notebook with names, addresses, birthdays? It was you "yesterday" who sent a message to yourself "today" in tomorrow. And notes, diaries? Without relying on his memory, a person gives information "for preservation" to the language, or rather, to its representative - the text. He communicates with himself in time. Let me emphasize: in order to preserve oneself as a person, a person must communicate - this is a form of his self-affirmation. And in extreme cases, in the absence of interlocutors, he must communicate at least with himself. (This situation is familiar to people who have been cut off from society for a long time: prisoners, travelers, hermits.) Robinson in the famous novel by D. Defoe, until he meets Friday, begins to talk with a parrot - this is better than going crazy from loneliness. ..
We have already said: the word is also, in a certain sense, the deed. Now, in relation to the communicative function of language, this idea can be clarified. Let's take the simplest case - an elementary act of communication. One person says something to another: asks him, orders, advises, warns ... What dictated these speech actions? Concern for the welfare of your neighbor? Not only. Or at least not always. Usually the speaker has some personal interests in mind, and this is quite natural, such is human nature. For example, he asks the interlocutor to do something, instead of doing it himself. For him, in this way, the deed, as it were, turns into a word, into speech. Neuropsychologists say: a speaking person must first of all suppress, slow down the excitation of some centers in his brain that are responsible for movements, for actions (B.F. Porshnev). Speech turns out deputy actions. Well, is the second person the interlocutor (or, in other words, the listener, the addressee)? He himself, perhaps, does not need what he will do at the request of the speaker (or the reasons and grounds for this action are not entirely clear), and nevertheless he will fulfill this request, turn the word into a real deed. But in this you can see the beginnings of the division of labor, the fundamental principles of human society! This is how the largest American linguist Leonard Bloomfield characterizes the use of language. Language, he said, allows one person to perform an action (act, reaction) where another person feels a need (stimulus) for this action.
So, it is worth agreeing with the idea: communication, communication through language is one of the most important factors that “created” humanity.
12. THOUGHT FUNCTION
But a person who speaks is a person who thinks. And the second function of language, closely related to the communicative one, is the function mental(in other words - cognitive, from lat. cognition- 'knowledge'). Often they even ask: what is more important, what is more primary - communication or thinking? Perhaps this is not the way to put the question: these two functions of language determine each other. Speaking means expressing your thoughts. But, on the other hand, these thoughts themselves are formed in our head with the help of language. And if we remember that in the environment of animals, language is “already” used for communication, and thinking as such is not “yet” here, then we can come to the conclusion about the primacy of the communicative function. But it's better to say this: the communicative function educates, “cultivates” the mental. How should this be understood?
One little girl put it this way: “How do I know what I think? I'll tell you, then I'll know." Truly, the truth speaks through the mouth of a child. We come into contact here with the most important problem of the formation (and formulation) of thought. It is worth repeating once again: the thought of a person at his birth is based not only on universal content categories and structures, but also on the categories of a unit of a particular language. Of course, this does not mean that, apart from verbal thinking, there are no other forms of rational activity. There is also figurative thinking, familiar to any person, but especially developed among professionals: artists, musicians, artists ... there is technical thinking - the professional dignity of designers, mechanics, draftsmen, and again, to one degree or another, not alien to all of us. There is, finally, objective thinking – we are all guided by it in a mass of everyday situations, from tying shoelaces to unlocking the front door... But the main form of thinking that unites all people in the vast majority of life situations is, of course, thinking linguistic, verbal.
It is another matter that words and other units of language appear in the course of mental activity in some “not their own” form, they are difficult to grasp, to single out (of course: we think much faster than we speak!), and our “inner speech” (this is a term introduced into science by the remarkable Russian psychologist L.S. Vygotsky) is fragmentary and associative. This means that the words here are represented by some of their “pieces” and they are connected to each other not in the same way as in ordinary “external” speech, but plus, images are interspersed in the linguistic fabric of thought - visual, auditory, tactile, etc. P. It turns out that the structure of "inner" speech is much more complicated than the structure of "external" speech, accessible to observation. Yes it is. And yet the fact that it is based on the categories and units of a particular language is beyond doubt.
Confirmation of this was found in various experiments, especially actively carried out in the middle of our century. The subject was specially "puzzled" and while he - to himself - was thinking about some problem, his speech apparatus was examined from different angles. Then they shone through his throat with an X-ray machine and oral cavity, then weightless sensors removed the electric potential from the lips and from the tongue ... The result was the same: during mental (“dumb!”) activity, the human speech apparatus was in a state of activity. Some shifts, changes took place in it - in a word, work was going on!
Even more characteristic in this sense are the testimonies of polyglots, that is, people who are fluent in several languages. Usually they can easily determine at any given moment what language they are thinking in. (Moreover, the choice or change of the language on which the thought is based depends on the environment in which the polyglot is located, on the very subject of thought, etc.)
The famous Bulgarian singer Boris Hristov, who lived abroad for many years, considered it his duty to sing arias in the original language. He explained it this way: “When I speak Italian, I think in Italian. When I speak Bulgarian, I think in Bulgarian.” But one day at the performance of "Boris Godunov" - Hristov sang, of course, in Russian - the singer came up with some idea in Italian. And he unexpectedly continued the aria ... in Italian. The conductor was petrified. And the public (it was in London), thank God, did not notice anything ...
It is curious that among writers who speak several languages, authors who translate themselves are rarely found. The fact is that for a real creator to translate, say, a novel into another language means not only to rewrite it, but change mind, re-feel, write again, in accordance with a different culture, with a different "view of the world." Irish playwright Samuel Beckett, Nobel laureate, one of the founders of the theater of the absurd, created each of his pieces twice, first in French, then in English. But at the same time he insisted that we should talk about two different works. Similar arguments on this subject can also be found in Vladimir Nabokov, who wrote in Russian and English, and other "bilingual" writers. And Yu.N. Tynyanov once justified himself about the heavy style of some of his articles in the book “Archaists and Innovators”: “Language not only conveys concepts, but is also the course of their construction. Therefore, for example, the retelling of other people's thoughts is usually clearer than the retelling of one's own. And, consequently, the more original the thought, the more difficult it is to express it...
But the question arises by itself: if a thought in its formation and development is connected with the material of a particular language, then does it not lose its specificity, its depth when transmitted by means of another language? Is it then possible at all to translate from language to language, to communicate between peoples? I will answer this way: the behavior and thinking of people, with all their national coloring, obeys some universal, universal laws. And languages, with all their diversity, are also based on some general principles (some of which we have already observed in the section on the properties of the sign). So, in general, translation from language to language is, of course, possible and necessary. Well, some losses are inevitable. Just like acquisitions. Shakespeare in Pasternak's translation is not only Shakespeare, but also Pasternak. Translation, according to a well-known aphorism, is the art of compromise.
All of the above leads us to the conclusion: language is not just a form, a shell for thought, it is not even means thinking, but rather way. The very nature of the formation of mental units and their functioning largely depends on the language.
13. COGNITIVE FUNCTION
The third function of language is cognitive(its other name is accumulative, that is, accumulative). Most of what an adult knows about the world came to him with language, through language. He may never have been to Africa, but he knows that there are deserts and savannahs, giraffes and rhinos, the Nile River and Lake Chad ... He has never been to a smelter, but he has an idea about how iron is smelted, and perhaps about how steel is made from iron. A person can mentally travel in time, turn to the secrets of the stars or the microcosm - and he owes all this to language. His own experience gained by means of the senses constitutes an insignificant part of his knowledge.
How is the inner world of a person formed? What is the role of language in this process?
The main mental "tool" with which a person cognizes the world is concept. The concept is formed in the course of a person's practical activity due to the ability of his mind to abstract, generalize. (It is worth emphasizing: the lower forms of reflection of reality in consciousness - such as sensation, perception, representation, are also found in animals. A dog, for example, has an idea about its owner, about his voice, smell, habits, etc., but a generalized the dog does not have the concept of "owner", as well as "smell", "habit", etc.). This is a unit of logical thinking, the privilege of homo sapiens.
How is a concept formed? A person observes many phenomena of objective reality, compares them, identifies various features in them. Signs are unimportant, random, he “cuts off”, is distracted from them, and the essential signs add up, sum up - and a concept is obtained. For example, comparing various trees - tall and low, young and old, with a straight trunk and with a curved, deciduous and coniferous, shedding foliage and evergreen, etc., he singles out the following features as permanent and essential: a) these are plants (generic trait), b) perennial,
c) with a solid stem (trunk) and d) with branches forming a crown. This is how the concept of a “tree” is formed in the human mind, under which the whole variety of observed specific trees is summed up; it is fixed in the corresponding word: wood. The word is a typical, normal form of the concept's existence. (Animals have no words - and concepts, even if there were grounds for their emergence, have nothing to rely on, nothing to gain a foothold in ...)
Of course, some mental effort and, probably, considerable time are needed to understand that, say, a chestnut tree under the window and a dwarf pine in a pot, an apple tree twig and a thousand-year-old sequoia somewhere in America are all "tree". But this is precisely the main path of human knowledge - from the individual to the general, from the concrete to the abstract.
Let's pay attention to the following series of Russian words: sadness, grieve, admire, education, passion, treatment, understand, disgusting, openly, reservedly, hate, treacherous, justice, adore... Is it possible to find something in common in their meanings? Hard. Unless they all denote some abstract concepts: mental states, feelings, relationships, signs ... Yes, it is. But they also share the same story in a way. All of them are formed from other words with more specific - "material" - meanings. And, accordingly, the concepts behind them also rely on concepts of a lower level of generalization. sadness derived from bake(after all, sadness burns!); grieve- from bitter, bitterness; upbringing- from nourish, food; enthusiasm- from drag, drag(i.e. ‘drag along’); Justice- from right(that is, ‘located on the right hand’), etc.
This is, in principle, the path of semantic evolution of all languages of the world: generalized, abstract meanings grow in them on the basis of more concrete meanings, or, so to speak, mundane ones. However, in every nation, some areas of reality are divided in more detail than others. It is well known that in the languages of the peoples inhabiting the Far North (Lapps, Eskimos), there are dozens of names for different types snow and ice (although there may not be a generalized name for snow at all). The Bedouin Arabs have dozens of names for different types of camels - depending on their breed, age, purpose, etc. It is clear that such a variety of names is caused by the conditions of life itself. Here is how the famous French ethnographer Lucien Levy-Bruhl wrote about the languages of the indigenous inhabitants of Africa and America in the book “Primitive Thinking”: only in relation to all objects, whatever they may be, but also in relation to all movements, all actions, all states, all properties expressed by language). Therefore, the vocabulary of these "primitive" languages must be distinguished by such richness, of which our languages give only a very distant idea.
One should not only think that all this diversity is due exclusively to exotic living conditions or the unequal position of peoples on the ladder of human progress. And in languages belonging to the same civilization, let's say European, one can find any number of examples of different classifications of the surrounding reality. So, in a situation in which a Russian would simply say leg(“Doctor, I hurt my leg”), the Englishman will have to choose whether to use the word leg or word foot- depending on which part of the leg is in question: from the thigh to the ankle or the foot. A similar difference is Das Bein And der Fu?- presented in German. Next, we will say in Russian finger regardless of whether it is a toe or a finger. And for an Englishman or a German, this is "different" fingers, and each of them has its own name. The toe is called in English toe, finger on the hand - finger; in German - respectively die Zehe And der Finger; at the same time, however, the thumb has its own special name: thumb in English and der Daumen in German. Are these differences between fingers really that important? It seems to us, the Slavs, that there is still more in common ...
But in Russian, blue and blue colors are distinguished, and for a German or an Englishman, this difference looks as insignificant, secondary, as for us, say, the difference between red and burgundy: blue in English and blue in German, this is a single concept of “blue-blue” (see § 3). And it makes no sense to raise the question: which language is closer to the truth, to the real state of affairs? Each language is right, because it has the right to its own "vision of the world."
Even languages that are very close, closely related, now and then reveal their "independence". For example, Russian and Belarusian are very similar to each other, they are blood brothers. However, in Belarusian there are no exact matches to Russian words communication(translated as adnosins, that is, strictly speaking, ‘relationships’, or as wear and tear, i.e. ‘intercourse’) and connoisseur(translated as connoisseur or how amatar, that is, ‘amateur’, but this is not quite the same thing) ... But it is difficult to translate from Belarusian into Russian shchyry(this is both ‘sincere’, and ‘real’, and ‘friendly’) or captivity('harvest'? 'success'? 'result'? 'efficiency'?)... And such words are typed into a whole dictionary.
Language, as we see, turns out to be a ready-made classifier of objective reality for a person, and this is good: it, as it were, lays the rails along which the train of human knowledge moves. But at the same time, the language imposes its classification system on all participants in this convention - it is also difficult to argue with this. If we were told from an early age that a finger on a hand is one thing, and a toe is completely different, then by adulthood we would probably already be convinced of the justice of just such a division of reality. And it would be nice if it was only about the fingers or about the limbs - we agree "without looking" with other, more important points of the "convention" that we sign.
In the late 60s, on one of the islands of the Philippine archipelago (in the Pacific Ocean), a tribe was discovered that lived in the conditions of the Stone Age and in complete isolation from the rest of the world. Representatives of this tribe (they called themselves tasadai) did not even suspect that, besides them, there are still intelligent beings on Earth. When scientists and journalists came to grips with the description of the Tasadai world, they were struck by one feature: in the language of the tribe there were no words at all like war, enemy, hate... Tasadai, in the words of one of the journalists, "learned to live in harmony and concord not only with nature, but also among themselves." Of course, this fact can be explained as follows: the original friendliness and goodwill of this tribe found its natural reflection in the language. But after all, the language did not stand aside from public life, it left its mark on the formation of the moral norms of this community: how could the newly minted tasadai learn about wars and murders? We have signed a different information "convention" with our languages...
So, language educates a person, forms his inner world - this is the essence of the cognitive function of language. Moreover, this function can manifest itself in the most unexpected specific situations.
The American linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf gave such examples from his practice (he once worked as a fire safety engineer). In a warehouse that stores gasoline tanks, people behave carefully: do not make fire, do not click lighters ... However, the same people behave differently in a warehouse that is known to store empty (in English empty) gasoline tanks. Here they show carelessness, they can light a cigarette, etc. Meanwhile, empty gasoline tanks are much more explosive than full ones: gasoline vapors remain in them. Why do people behave so carelessly? Whorf asked himself. And he answered: because the word calms them, misleads them empty, which has several meanings (for example, such: 1) 'containing nothing (about vacuum)', 2) 'not containing something'...). And people unconsciously, as it were, substitute one meaning for another. A whole linguistic concept has grown out of such facts - the theory of linguistic relativity, which states that a person lives not so much in the world of objective reality, but in the world of language ...
So, language can be the cause of misunderstandings, mistakes, delusions? Yes. We have already spoken about conservatism as the original property of a linguistic sign. The person who signed the "convention" is not very inclined to change it later. And therefore, linguistic classifications quite often diverge from scientific classifications (later and more accurate). For example, we divide the entire living world into animals and plants, but systematologists say that such a division is primitive and incorrect, because there are still at least fungi and microorganisms that cannot be attributed to either animals or plants. Our "everyday" understanding of what minerals, insects, berries are does not coincide with the scientific one - to be convinced of this, it is enough to look into the encyclopedic dictionary. Why are there private classifications! Copernicus proved in the 16th century that the Earth revolves around the Sun, and language still defends the previous point of view. After all, we say: "The sun rises, the sun sets ..." - and we do not even notice this anachronism.
However, one should not think that language only hinders the progress of human knowledge. On the contrary, he can actively contribute to its development. One of the largest Japanese politicians of our time, Daisaku Ikeda, believes that it was the Japanese language that was one of the main factors contributing to the rapid revival of post-war Japan: the role belongs to the Japanese language, the flexible word-formation mechanism contained in it, which allows you to instantly create and easily master that truly huge number of new words that we needed to assimilate the mass of concepts pouring in from outside. The French linguist Joseph Vandries once wrote about the same: “A flexible and mobile language, in which grammar is reduced to a minimum, shows thought in all its clarity and allows it to move freely; inflexible and ponderous language constrains thought. Leaving aside the controversial question of the role of grammar in the processes of cognition (what does “grammar is reduced to a minimum” mean in the above quote?), I hasten to reassure the reader: you should not worry about this or that particular language or be skeptical about its capabilities. In practice, each means of communication corresponds to its “view of the world” and satisfies the communicative needs of a given people with sufficient completeness.
14. NOMINATIVE FUNCTION
Another extremely important function of the language is nominative, or naming. In fact, we have already touched on it, reflecting in the previous paragraph on the cognitive function. The fact is that naming is an integral part of knowledge. A person, generalizing a mass of specific phenomena, digressing from their random signs and highlighting the essential ones, feels the need to consolidate the knowledge gained in the word. This is how the name comes about. If not for it, the concept would have remained an incorporeal, speculative abstraction. And with the help of a word, a person can, as it were, “stake out” the surveyed part of the surrounding reality, say to himself: “I already know this,” hang up a name plate and move on.
Consequently, the whole system of concepts that modern man possesses rests on a system of names. The easiest way to show this is with proper names. Let's try to throw out all proper names from the courses of history, geography, literature - all anthroponyms (this means the names of people: Alexander the Great, Columbus, Peter I, Moliere, Athanasius Nikitin, Saint-Exupery, Don Quixote, Tom Sawyer, Uncle Vanya...) and all toponyms (these are the names of localities: Galaxy, North Pole, Troy, City of the Sun, Vatican, Volga, Auschwitz, Capitol Hill, Black River...), what will be left of these sciences? Obviously, the texts will become meaningless, the person reading them will immediately lose their orientation in space and time.
But names are not only proper names, but also common nouns. Terminology of all sciences - physics, chemistry, biology, etc. are all names. Even that atomic bomb could not have been created if the ancient concept of "atom" * had not been replaced by new concepts - neutron, proton and other elementary particles, nuclear fission, chain reaction, etc. - and all of them were fixed in words !
There is a characteristic confession by the American scientist Norbert Wiener about how the scientific activity of his laboratory was hampered by the lack of an appropriate name for this line of research: it was not clear what the employees of this laboratory were doing. And only when Wiener’s book Cybernetics was published in 1947 (the scientist came up with this name, taking as a basis the Greek word meaning ‘helmsman, helmsman’), the new science rushed forward with leaps and bounds.
So, the nominative function of language serves not only to orient a person in space and time, it goes hand in hand with the cognitive function, it participates in the process of cognition of the world.
But a person is by nature a pragmatist, he seeks, first of all, practical benefits from his affairs. This means that he will not name all the surrounding objects in a row, in the expectation that these names will someday come in handy. No, he uses the nominative function intentionally, selectively, naming first of all what is closest to him, most often and most importantly.
Recall, for example, the names of mushrooms in Russian: how much do we know them? White mushroom (boletus), boletus(in Belarus it is often called grandma), boletus (red-headed), mushroom, camelina, oiler, chanterelle, honey agaric, russula, volnushka... - at least a dozen will be typed. But these are all useful, edible mushrooms. And the inedible ones? Perhaps we only distinguish two types: fly agaric And toadstools(well, apart from some other false varieties: false mushrooms etc.). Meanwhile, biologists say that there are much more varieties of inedible mushrooms than edible ones! It’s just that a person doesn’t need them, they are uninteresting (except for narrow specialists in this field) - so why waste names and bother yourself?
From this follows one regularity. Every language must have gaps, that is, holes, empty spaces in the picture of the world. In other words, there must be something not named- something that a person (yet) is not important, does not need ...
Let's take a look in the mirror at our own familiar face and ask: what is this? Nose. And this? Lip. What is between the nose and lip? Mustache. Well, if there is no mustache - what is the name of this place? In response - a shrug of the shoulders (or the sly "Place between the nose and the lip"). Okay, one more question. What is that? Forehead. And this? back of the head. What is between the forehead and the back of the head? In reply: head. No, the head is everything as a whole, but what is the name of this part of the head, between the forehead and the back of the head? Few remember the name crown, most often the answer will be the same shrug ... Yes, something should not have a name.
And another consequence follows from what has been said. In order for an object to receive a name, it is necessary for it to enter into public use, to step over a certain “threshold of significance”. Until some time, it was still possible to get by with a random or descriptive name, but from now on it is no longer possible - a separate name is needed.
In this light, it is interesting, for example, to observe the development of the means (tools) of writing. Word history pen, pen, fountain pen, pencil etc. reflects the development of a "piece" of human culture, the formation of relevant concepts in the minds of a native speaker of the Russian language. I remember how the first felt-tip pens appeared in the USSR in the 1960s. Then they were still a rarity, they were brought from abroad, and the possibilities of their use were not yet entirely clear. Gradually, these objects began to be generalized into a special concept, but for a long time they did not receive their clear name. (There were names “plakar”, “fibrous pencil”, and there were variants in writing: felt-tip pen or felt-tip pen?) Today, a felt-tip pen is already a “settled” concept, firmly entrenched in the corresponding name. But quite recently, in the late 80s, new, somewhat excellent writing tools appeared. This, in particular, is an automatic pencil with an ultra-thin (0.5 mm) stylus, retractable by clicks to a certain length, then a ballpoint pen (again with an ultra-thin tip), which writes not with paste, but with ink, etc. What are their names? Yes, so far - in Russian - nothing. They can be characterized only descriptively: approximately as it is done in this text. They have not yet entered widely into everyday life, have not become a fact of mass consciousness, which means that for the time being it is possible to do without a special name.
The attitude of a person to a name is generally not easy.
On the one hand, over time, the name becomes attached, “sticks” to its subject, and in the head of a native speaker there is an illusion of the originality, “naturalness” of the name. The name becomes the representative, even the substitute, of the subject. (Even ancient people believed that a person’s name is internally connected with himself, is part of it. If, say, the name is harmed, then the person himself will suffer. Hence the prohibition, the so-called taboo, on the use of the names of close relatives.)
On the other hand, the participation of the name in the process of cognition leads to another illusion: "if you know the name, you know the subject." Suppose I know the word succulent– therefore, I know what it is. The same J.Vandries wrote well about this peculiar magic of the term: “To know the names of things means to have power over them ... To know the name of a disease is already half to cure it. We should not laugh at this primitive belief. It lives even in our time, since we attach importance to the form of diagnosis. "My head hurts, doctor." "It's cephalalgia." "My stomach is not working well." – “This is dyspepsia”... And the patients already feel better just because the representative of science knows the name of their secret enemy.”
Indeed, often in scientific discussions you become a witness of how disputes on the essence of the subject are replaced by a war of names, a confrontation of terminologies. The dialogue follows the principle: tell me what terms you use, and I will tell you which school (scientific direction) you belong to.
Generally speaking, the belief in the existence of a single correct name is more widespread than we realize. Here is what the poet said:
When we refine the language
And we will name the stone as it should,
He himself will tell you how it came to be,
What is its purpose and where is the reward.When we find a star
Her only name is
She, with her planets,
Stepping out of silence and darkness...
(A.Aronov)
Isn't it true, it reminds the words of an old eccentric from a joke: “I can imagine everything, I can understand everything. I even understand how people discovered planets so far from us. I just can’t figure it out: how did they know their names?
Of course, do not overestimate the power of the name. And even more so, you can not put an equal sign between a thing and its name. Otherwise, it won’t take long to come to the conclusion that all our troubles stem from the wrong names, and as soon as we change the names, everything will immediately get better. Such a delusion, alas, also does not bypass a person. The desire for wholesale renaming is especially noticeable during periods of social upheaval. Cities and streets are renamed, instead of some military ranks others are introduced, the police become the police (or, in other countries, vice versa!), technical schools and institutes in the blink of an eye intersect into colleges and academies ... This is what the nominative function of language means, this is faith person in the title!
15. REGULATORY FUNCTION
Regulatory the function combines those cases of using the language when the speaker aims to directly influence the addressee: to induce him to some action or forbid him to do something, to force him to answer a question, etc. Wed statements such as: What time is it now? Do you want some milk? Please call me tomorrow. Everyone to the rally! I don't want to hear it again! You take my bag with you. No extra words needed. As can be seen from the examples already given, the regulatory function has at its disposal a variety of lexical means and morphological forms (the category of mood plays a special role here), as well as intonation, word order, syntactic constructions, etc.
I note that various kinds of motives - such as a request, an order, a warning, a ban, advice, persuasion, etc. - are not always formalized as such, expressed using "own" linguistic means. Sometimes they act in someone else's guise, using language units that usually serve other purposes. Thus, a mother’s request to her son not to come home late can be expressed directly, using the form of the imperative (“Don’t come late today, please!”), Or she can disguise it as a question (“What time are you going to return?”), And also under reproach, warning, statement of fact, etc.; let's compare such statements as: “Yesterday you came late again...” (with a special intonation), “Look, now it gets dark early”, “Metro works until one, do not forget”, “I will be very worried”, etc. .
Ultimately, the regulatory function is aimed at creating, maintaining and regulating relationships in human microcollectives, that is, in the real environment in which a native speaker lives. Targeting the addressee makes it related to the communicative function (see § 11). Sometimes, together with the regulatory function, they also consider the function phatic*, or contact-setting. This means that a person always needs to enter into a conversation in a certain way (call out to the interlocutor, greet him, remind him of himself, etc.) and exit the conversation (say goodbye, thank you, etc.). But does establishing contact come down to an exchange of phrases like “Hello” - “Goodbye”? The phatic function is much wider in its scope, and therefore it is not surprising that it is difficult to distinguish it from the regulatory function.
Let's try to remember: what do we talk about during the day with others? What, is all this information vital for our well-being or directly affecting the behavior of the interlocutor? No, for the most part, these are conversations, it would seem, “about nothing”, about trifles, about what the interlocutor already knows: about the weather and about mutual acquaintances, about politics and football among men, about clothes and children women; now they have been supplemented with comments on television series ... There is no need to treat such monologues and dialogues ironically and arrogantly. In fact, these are not talks about the weather and not about “rags”, but about each other, about us, about people. In order to occupy and then maintain a certain place in the micro-collective (and such is the family, circle of friends, production team, housemates, even companions in the compartment, etc.), a person must necessarily talk with other members of this group.
Even if you happen to be together with someone in a moving elevator, you may feel some awkwardness and turn your back: the distance between you and your companion is too small to pretend that you do not notice each other, and start a conversation too in general, it doesn’t make sense - there’s nothing to talk about, and it’s too short to go ... Here is a subtle observation in the story of the modern Russian prose writer V. Popov: “In the mornings, we all went up in the elevator together ... The elevator creaked, went up, and everyone was silent. Everyone understood that it was impossible to stand like that, that they had to say something, say something faster, in order to defuse this silence. But it was too early to talk about work, and no one knew what to talk about. And there was such silence in this elevator, even jump out on the go.
In collectives, on the other hand, the establishment and maintenance of speech contacts is the most important means of regulating relations. Here, for example, you meet a neighbor, Maria Ivanovna, on the landing and tell her: “ Good morning, Marya Ivanna, something you are early today ... ". This phrase has a double bottom. Behind its “external” meaning is read: “I remind you, Maria Ivanovna, I am your neighbor and would like to continue to remain on good terms with you.” There is nothing hypocritical, deceitful in such greetings, these are the rules of communication. And all these are very important, simply necessary phrases. Figuratively, we can say this: if today you don’t praise the new beads on your girlfriend, and she, in turn, tomorrow doesn’t take an interest in how your relationship with a certain mutual acquaintance is developing, then in a couple of days a slight chill will run between you, and in a month you may lose your girlfriend altogether... Do you want to experiment? Take my word for it.
Let me emphasize: communication with relatives, friends, neighbors, companions, colleagues is necessary not only to maintain certain relationships in micro-collectives. It is also important for the person himself - for his self-affirmation, for the realization of him as a person. The fact is that the individual plays in society not only a certain permanent social role (for example, "housewife", "student", "scientist", "miner", etc.), but all the time trying on different social " masks”, for example: “guest”, “passenger”, “sick”, “advisor”, etc. And all this "theater" exists mainly thanks to the language: for each role, for each mask, there are speech means.
Of course, the regulative and phatic functions of language are aimed not only at improving relations between members of the microcollective. Sometimes a person, on the contrary, resorts to them for "repressive" purposes - in order to alienate, alienate the interlocutor from himself. In other words, the tongue is used not only for mutual “strokes” (this is the term accepted in psychology), but also for “pricks” and “blows”. In the latter case, we are dealing with expressions of threat, insults, curses, curses, etc. And again: the social convention - that's who establishes what is considered rude, insulting, humiliating for the interlocutor. In the Russian-speaking criminal world, one of the most powerful, deadly insults is “goat!”. And in the aristocratic society of the century before last, words scoundrel was enough to challenge the offender to a duel. Today, the language norm is “softening” and the level of the repressive function is raised quite high. This means that a person perceives as offensive only very strong means ...
In addition to the language functions discussed above - communicative, mental, cognitive, nominative and regulatory (to which we "added" phatic), one can single out other socially significant roles of language. In particular, ethnic the function means that the language unites the ethnos (people), it helps to form national self-consciousness. aesthetic the function turns the text into a work of art: this is the sphere of creativity, fiction - it has already been discussed before. Emotionally expressive function allows a person to express in language his feelings, sensations, experiences ... magical(or incantation) function is realized in special situations when the language is endowed with a kind of superhuman, "otherworldly" power. Examples are incantations, deifications, oaths, curses, and some other types of ritual texts.
And all this is not yet the full "circle of duties" of the language in human society.
Tasks and exercises
1. Determine which language functions are implemented in the following statements.
a) Kryzhovka (sign on the building of the railway station).
b) Accounting (placard on the shop door).
c) Hello. My name is Sergey Alexandrovich (teacher entering class).
d) An equilateral rectangle is called a square. (from textbook).
e) “I won’t come to training on Wednesday, I won’t be able to.” - "You must Fedya, you must" (from a conversation on the street).
f) May you fail, you damned drunkard! (From apartment squabble).
g) I learned the science of parting In the simple-haired complaints of the night (O. Mandelstam).
2. In one film "from foreign life" the hero asks the maid:
Is Mrs. Mayons at home?
And gets the answer:
Your mother is in the living room.
Why does the questioner call his mother so formally, "Mrs. Mayons"? And why does the maid choose a different name in her answer? What language functions are implemented in this dialog?
3. What language functions are implemented in the following dialogue from V. Voinovich's story "The Life and Extraordinary Adventures of a Soldier Ivan Chonkin"?
They were silent. Then Chonkin looked at the clear sky and said:
– Today, you can see everything, there will be a bucket.
“There will be a bucket if it doesn’t rain,” Lesha said.
“It doesn’t rain without clouds,” Chonkin remarked. - And it happens that there are clouds, but there is still no rain.
“It happens that way,” Lesha agreed.
On this they parted.
4. Comment on the following dialogue between two characters in M. Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.
- ...But if a person comes up to you and asks: "Parlet vu français?" – what do you think?
- I won’t think anything, I’ll take it and crack it on the head ...
Which language features "do not work" in this case?
5. Very often a person starts a conversation with words like listen (you), you know (you know) or by addressing the interlocutor by name, although there is no one next to him, so this appeal also does not make much sense. Why is the speaker doing this?
6. Physics teaches: the primary colors of the solar spectrum seven: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, blue, purple. Meanwhile, the simplest sets of paints or pencils include six colors, and these are other components: black, brown, red, yellow, green, blue. (With the "expansion" of the set, blue, orange, purple, lemon and even white appear ...) Which of these pictures of the world is more reflected in the language - "physical" or "everyday"? What linguistic facts can confirm this?
7. List the names of the fingers on the hand. Do all names come to your mind equally quickly? What is it connected with? Now list the names of the toes. What is the conclusion from this? How does this fit in with the nominative function of language?
8. Show on yourself where the person's lower leg, ankle, ankle, wrist are located. Was this task easy for you? What conclusion follows from this about the relationship between the world of words and the world of things?
9. The following law operates in the language: the more often a word is used in speech, the wider its meaning in principle (or, in other words, the more meanings it has). How can this rule be justified? Show its effect on the example of the following Russian nouns denoting parts of the body.
Head, forehead, heel, shoulder, wrist, cheek, collarbone, hand, foot, leg, waist, temple.
10. A tall and large person in Russian can be called something like this: atlas, giant, giant, bogatyr, giant, colossus, Gulliver, Hercules, Antey, big man, tall, ambal, elephant, closet... Imagine being tasked with coming up with a name for a new plus size ready-to-wear store (52 and up). What name(s) would you choose and why?
11. Try to determine what concepts historically underlie the meanings of the following Russian words: guarantee, antediluvian, literally, proclaim, disgusting, restrained, liberated, collate, distribution, inaccessible, patronage, confirmation. What pattern can be seen in the semantic evolution of these words?
12. Below is a number of Belarusian nouns that do not have one-word matches in Russian (according to I. Shkraba's dictionary “Imaginary words”). Translate these words into Russian. How to explain their "originality"? To what function of the language (or to what functions) does the presence of such - non-equivalent - words correspond?
Vyray, paint, glue, gruz, kaliva, vyaselnik, garbarnya.
13. Can you accurately determine the meaning of such words in Russian as brother-in-law, brother-in-law, sister-in-law? If not, why not?
14. In the book “Wild Useful Plants of the USSR” (M., 1976), one can find many examples of how the scientific (botanical) classification does not coincide with the household (“naive”) classification. So, chestnut and oak belong to the beech family. Blueberries and apricots belong to the same family, the Rosaceae. Walnut (hazel) belongs to the birch family. The fruits of pear, mountain ash, hawthorn belong to the same class and are called an apple.
How to explain these discrepancies?
15. Why does a person, in addition to his own name, also have a variety of “second names”: nicknames, nicknames, pseudonyms? Why should a person, when he becomes a monk, give up his worldly name and take on a new, spiritual one? What language functions are implemented in all these cases?
16. There is such an unwritten rule that students adhere to when preparing for exams: “If you don’t know yourself, explain to a friend.” How can one explain the operation of this rule in relation to the main functions of the language?
* In ancient Greek a-tomos literally meant "indivisible".
(To be continued)
Language as a whole, and language with two opposite parts - language and its opposite speech. Language is the property of the entire linguistic community, it is a social phenomenon. A social language is in the sense that all forms of language belong to the whole community. But language exists only in speech. On the one hand, speech is individual, because it is generated by a specific individual in a specific situation. On the other hand, it is social because it is determined by the rules of a particular language. Each person has his own indialect (individual style of speech), but it cannot be exclusively individual, since we draw all individualities in the language. When we hear a certain style of speech, we can imagine who we are talking to, we can make an individual description of this person. Speech is also social because, by the speech of people, we can imagine the social context in which this speech takes place.
Language is code. Human speech is understandable when we know this code (units of this code). Speech is a message on this code.
Language is abstract, it is not perceived by the senses. Speech is always concrete and material.
Language features- this is the purpose, the role of language in human society. The language is multifunctional. The basic, most important functions of the language are communicative(to be a means of communication) and cognitive(serve as a means of forming and expressing thoughts, activities of consciousness). The third important function of language is emotional(to be a means of expressing feelings, emotions). Basic functions are primary. In addition to basic functions, derivatives, private functions of the language are also distinguished.
Communicative function consists in the use of linguistic expressions for the purpose of transmitting and receiving messages in interpersonal and mass communication, with the aim of exchanging information between people as participants in acts of linguistic communication.
cognitive function is to use language expressions to process and store knowledge in the memory of the individual and society, to form a picture of the world. The generalizing, classifying and nominative functions of language units are connected with the cognitive function.
Interpretive function is to reveal the deep meaning of perceived linguistic statements.
To the number derivative functions of the communicative function of language include the following functions: phatic(contact-setting), appellative(appeals), voluntarily(impact), etc. Among private communication functions can also be identified regulatory(social, interactive) function, which consists in the use of linguistic means in the linguistic interaction of communicants in order to exchange communicative roles, assert their communicative leadership, influence each other, organize a successful exchange of information due to the observance of communicative postulates and principles.
The language also has magical(incantation) function, which consists in the use of linguistic means in a religious ritual, in the practice of shamans, psychics, etc.
Emotionally expressive function language is the use of linguistic expressions to express emotions, feelings, moods, mental attitudes, attitudes towards communication partners and the subject of communication.
Allocate also aesthetic(poetic) function, which is realized mainly in artistic creativity, when creating works of art.
Ethnocultural function of language- this is the use of a language with the aim of uniting into a single whole the representatives of a given ethnic group as native speakers of the same language.
Metalanguage function consists in the transmission of messages about the facts of the language itself and about speech acts in it.
14 Question. Language as a system of signs. System organization of the language. The concept of language levels.
With the development of systemic language learning and the desire to understand the internal properties of linguistic phenomena, there is a tendency to a meaningful distinction between the concepts of "elements" and "units" of the language as part and whole. as constituent parts units language (their plan of expression or plan of content), the elements of the language are not independent, since they express only some properties of the language system. The units of the language have all the properties of the language system and, as integral formations, are characterized by relative independence (ontological and functional). Language units form the first system-forming factor.
The concept of "system" in linguistics is closely related to the concept of "structure". The system is understood as the language as a whole, since it is characterized by an ordered totality its units, while the structure is structure systems. In other words, consistency is a property language, and structure is a property systems language .
Language units differ and quantitatively, And qualitatively, And functionally. Aggregates homogeneous language units form subsystems, called tiers or levels.
Structure language - this is a set of regular connections and relationships between linguistic units, depending on their nature and determining the qualitative originality of the language system as a whole and the nature of its functioning. The originality of the linguistic structure is determined by the nature of the connections and relationships between linguistic units.
Attitude - it is the result of a comparison of two or more units of a language on some common basis or feature. This is mediated addiction language units, in which a change in one of them does not lead to a change in the others. The following fundamental relations for the linguistic structure are distinguished: hierarchical, established between heterogeneous units (phonemes and morphemes; morphemes and lexemes, etc.); oppositional, according to which either language units or their features are opposed to each other.
Connections language units are defined as private the case of their relationship, suggesting a direct dependence of language units. At the same time, a change in one unit leads to a change in others. The structure of the language appears as law connections of these elements and units within a certain system or subsystem of the language, which implies the presence, along with dynamism And variability, and such an important structure property as sustainability. In this way, stability And variability- two dialectically related and “opposing tendencies of the linguistic structure. In the process of functioning and development of the language system, its structure manifests itself as a form of expression sustainability, but function as a form of expression variability. The structure of the language, due to its stability and variability, acts as the second most important system-forming factor.
The third factor in the formation of a system (subsystem) of a language is properties language unit, namely: the manifestation of its nature, internal content through relation to other units. The properties of linguistic units are sometimes considered as functions of the subsystem (level) formed by them.
What is the structure of the language system? To answer this question, it is necessary to reveal the essence of those connections and relationships due to which linguistic units form a system. These connections and relationships are located along two system-forming axes of the language structure: horizontal(reflecting the property of language units to be combined with each other, thereby performing the communicative function of the language); vertical(reflecting the connection of language units with the neurophysiological mechanism of the brain as the source of its existence). vertical axis language structure is paradigmatic relations, and horizontal - relations syntagmatic, designed to activate two fundamental mechanisms of speech activity: nomination And predication. Syntagmatic all kinds of relations between linguistic units in the speech chain are called. They implement the communicative function of the language. Paradigmatic are called associative-semantic relations of homogeneous units, as a result of which language units are combined into classes, groups, categories, that is, into paradigms. This includes variants of the same language unit, synonymic series, antonymic pairs, lexico-semantic groups and semantic fields, etc. Syntagmatics and paradigmatics characterize the internal structure of the language as the most important system-forming factors that presuppose and mutually condition each other. By the nature of syntagmatics and paradigmatics, language units are combined into superparadigms, including homogeneous units of the same degree of complexity. They form levels (tiers) in the language: the level of phonemes, the level of morphemes, the level of lexemes, etc. Such a multi-level structure of the language corresponds to the structure of the brain, which “controls” the mental mechanisms of verbal communication.
Units of language and speech
Speech communication is carried out through language as a system of phonetic, lexical and grammatical means of communication.
Language, therefore, is defined as a system of elements (language units) and a system of rules for the functioning of these units, common to all speakers of a given language. In turn, speech is a concrete speaking, flowing in time and clothed in sound (including internal pronunciation) or written form. Speech is understood as the process of speaking itself (speech activity) and its result (speech works fixed by memory or writing).
The language is systemic, that is, the organization of its units. Language units (words, morphemes, sentences) constitute the language inventory. The system of units is called the language inventory; the system of rules for the functioning of units - the grammar of this language. In addition to units, the language has rules, patterns of functioning of these units. Both the units and the rules of functioning are common to all speakers of a given language.
The basis for the distinction between language and speech was the general objectively existing in the language and specific cases of using this general in speech acts. The means of communication taken outside a specific utterance (for example, a dictionary, grammar) are called language, and the same means in the utterance are called speech. External differences between language and speech are manifested in the linear nature of speech, which is a sequence of units built according to the rules of the language.
In language and speech, minimal meaningful units are distinguished, clearly characterized by the very sign of minimality, indecomposability into smaller meaningful parts. Such a unit is in speech, in the text the so-called morph, and in the language system, respectively, the morpheme. A word in a text and a morph are two-sided units of speech, while a lexeme and a morpheme are two-sided units of a language.
Both in speech and in language, in addition to bilateral units, there are one-sided units. These are the sound units that are singled out in terms of expression and are only indirectly related to the content. Phonemes correspond to the backgrounds distinguished in the flow of speech in the language system. Phonemes are specific instances of phonemes. So, in the word mom pronounced by someone, there are four backgrounds, but only two phonemes (m and a), each represented in two copies.
The individual in speech is manifested in the selection of units from which the statement is built. For example, any word can be selected from the synonymic series to walk, step, pace, step, act, march, shuffle, stomp when constructing an utterance.
When functioning in speech, language units may acquire some features that are not characteristic of the entire language as a whole. This can manifest itself in the creation of new words, built according to the rules of the language, but not fixed by the practice of using it in the dictionary.
Language and speech differ in the same way that the rules of grammar and the phrases in which this rule is used, or the word in the dictionary and the countless uses of this word in different texts. Speech is a form of the existence of language. Language functions and is "immediately given" in speech. But abstracted from speech, from speech acts and texts, every language is an abstract entity.
Speech units: syntax, gram, lex, morph, background, phonomorph, derivative, phrase
Language units: syntaxeme, gramme, lexeme, morpheme, phoneme, phonomorpheme, derivative, phraseme
Language is a complex mechanism, not just a mechanical one. set of languages elements.: phonemes, morphemes, words, prepositions. Language can be compared to clockwork, where all the wheels are interconnected to produce acc. action: show time. Therefore, the terms "system" and "structure" are used. system called an owl. connections and rel. between the composition its elements, i.e. its units. To language. It is customary to represent language as a unity of system and structure. Development and use language for communication involves fasting. interaction structure and system, their self-regulation. structure language called-Xia cumulative. its inherent units, categories, tiers, cat. real-Xia into a single whole on the basis of lang. rel. and dependencies. The system is an object as a whole, comp. from department relationship parts, cat. constitute unity and integrity, and structure is an analytical concept, it is an attribute or element of the system.
The following language levels are distinguished as the main ones:
phonemic;
morphemic;
lexical (verbal);
syntactic (sentence level).
The levels at which two-sided (having a plan of expression and a plan of content) units are distinguished are called the highest levels of the language. Some scholars tend to distinguish only two levels: differential (language is considered as a system of distinctive signs: sounds or written signs that replace them - distinguishing units of the semantic level) and semantic, on which two-sided units are distinguished.
In some cases, units of several levels coincide in one sound form. So, in Russian and the phoneme, morpheme and word coincide, in lat. i "go" - phoneme, morpheme, word and sentence.
Units of the same level can exist in abstract, or "emic" (for example, phonemes, morphemes), and concrete, or "ethical" (backgrounds, morphs), forms, which is not the basis for highlighting additional levels of the language: rather, it makes sense to talk about different levels of analysis. Qualitative features of the tiers of the language show that, in addition to the general sign of decomposability and synthesis, which characterizes the units of each tier, there are phenomena of the language that cannot be attributed to a particular tier. In addition, there are phenomena in the language that cannot be covered by the concept of a tier. These are such phenomena as the tact-syllabic organization of oral speech, the tonal organization of speech, the graphic-spelling and artistic organization of written speech, the phenomena of phraseology, the lexicalization of phrases, the phenomena of standard sentence formulas (such as formulas of greeting, scolding, etc.), forms word formation, etc. Such phenomena are classified as extra-tiered and are invariantized and classified separately.
The functions of a natural human language are a purpose, a role in human society. The idea of the functions of language changes historically in accordance with the change in views on the nature of language, on its relationship with being, consciousness:
Initially, language was seen as a means of designating things;
Then, as a means of expression and transmission of universal thought;
As a means of generating ideas;
As a means of division and perception of being, and each nation has its own [Zubkova 2003, p.19].
At present, all scientists are unanimous in recognizing the multifunctionality of the language, but unity on the question of which functions to single out. The functions of language are understood as all kinds of functioning of linguistic phenomena.
Understanding the function as the intended purpose of the object used by the subject, many researchers distinguish between:
Functions of language as a social phenomenon;
Functions of language as a system of signs;
Private functions in specific communication situations.
We will proceed from the fact that the functions of the national (ethnic) language (Language) or its variants (dialects, sociolects, etc.) and the functions of the signs of the language system are phenomena of different orders. So, for any ethnic language, important functions are:
Ethnic, consisting in the formation of ethnic identity,
National-cultural (accumulative, fixation and transfer of cultural experience).
We can talk about the functioning of one or another ethnic language as a means of international, interethnic communication, about the performance of the function of the state language by the language, about the functioning of languages in various fields of human activity - scientific, everyday, etc., as well as in private situations of communication - in situations of appeal, request, promise, etc.
The study of the essence of natural human language is impossible without considering its functions, because it is in the functioning that the nature of such a complex phenomenon as human language is manifested. The functions of human language are the basic, essential universal functions inherent in any ethnic language.
Language is a necessary condition for the formation and development of human society and the person himself, therefore Edward Sapir (1884 - 1939) named the creative function as the main function of language.
The basic functions of the human language and specific ethnic languages usually include the functions of:
Communicative (to be a means of communication, information exchange),
Cogitative (to serve as a means of forming and expressing thoughts, the activity of consciousness);
Expressive (express feelings, emotions).
Basic functions find their manifestation in private functions.
The main purpose of human language as a means of communication is the transmission of information in space and time. People communicate, interact in all kinds of activities - practical, cognitive, spiritual. Communication is social process. It serves the formation of society, performs a binding function. Communicative activity is the most important aspect of human social behavior. Socialization, mastery of experience, language is carried out in communication. Thanks to the language, the continuity of human culture is carried out, the accumulation and assimilation of the experience developed by previous generations takes place.
Specific manifestations of the communicative function are particular functions. The private functions of the language include the following functions:
Phatic (contact-setting),
Appellative (appeals),
Voluntary (expression of will),
Directive (impact function),
Suggestive (impact on the psyche of another person),
Regulatory (creation, maintenance and regulation of relations in the human micro-collective),
Interactive (the use of linguistic means in the linguistic interaction of communicants in order to influence each other);
Magic (incantation), the use of linguistic means in the practice of shamans, psychics, etc.
Other private communicative functions can be distinguished.
The mental function of language is associated with the formation, expression and transmission of mental content. Language is not just a form, a shell for thought, but also a way of human thinking.
Cognitive (cognitive) function is to use language expressions to process and store knowledge in the memory of the individual and society, to form a picture of the world.
The language has an interpretive (interpretative) function, which consists in revealing the deep meaning of perceived linguistic statements (texts).
There is also an aesthetic (poetic) function, which is realized mainly in artistic creativity, when creating works of art.
The metalinguistic (meta-speech) function is to convey messages about the facts of the language and speech acts in it.
In addition to the functions of the language mentioned above, it is possible to single out the functions of language units as components of the language system. So, the main function of the word is the nominative function, the function of naming objects of the objective and spiritual world. Generalizing, classifying functions of nominative units are connected with the cognitive function.
A.A.Leontiev distinguishes between the functions of language and the functions of speech.
Regulatory (communicative), any communication can be seen as an attempt to regulate the behavior of others. There are three variants of the regulatory function: individually-regulatory, collective-regulatory and self-regulatory.
Cognitive, which has two aspects - individual (a means of mastering the socio-historical experience and social (construction, accumulation and organization of the socio-historical experience of mankind);
National-cultural function, the language captures the realities specific to a given culture.
The functions of speech, according to A.A. Leontiev, include:
Magic function;
Diacritical, associated with reduction, compression of a message in a certain communicative situation;
Emotional and aesthetic function. Emotional and aesthetic experiences are evoked in the addressee not at the level of a dictionary, but due to the combination of these means in a speech work.
3. FROM THE HISTORY OF LINGUISTICS
General linguistic problems are realized gradually. The centers of interest of linguistic thought are changing.
Linguistics, like any other science, stands on a foundation laid in the distant past. In the history of linguistics, one can find examples of correct guesses about language that laid the foundations of modern linguistics.
In antiquity, three so-called "traditions" developed: Greco-Roman, Indian and Chinese. European science has as its origins the first tradition, the ideas of ancient Greek philosophers. Those ancient sources that have survived allow us to trace the development of the doctrine of language, starting from Plato (428-348 BC). One of the most important questions of Greek philosophy was the question of whether the language is arranged "by nature" or "according to custom." Arranged "by nature" were considered those phenomena, the essence of which, eternal and unchanging, lies outside of man. Arranged "according to custom" were those phenomena that were accepted due to certain customs and traditions, i.e. by virtue of an implied agreement among the members of society. As applied to language, antinomy "by nature" vs. "according to custom" was reduced to the question of the nature of the name, whether there is a connection between the thing denoted by the word and the sound form of the word. Adherents of the "natural" view of language claimed the existence of such a connection. The existence of various ways of "natural" communication was recognized: the imitation of animal sounds, natural phenomena, etc. with words. It was believed that certain sounds express certain properties of objects and phenomena. Among the sounds, gentle, sharp, liquid, courageous, etc. stood out. So, the sound [r] was considered sharp, therefore, the presence of [r] in such words as cut, tear, roar, growl and others, naturally (by nature) is explained (motivated) by those phenomena that are denoted by these words. Motivated names were considered "correct names" because they allegedly reflected the signs inherent in things. The correct names were given by the Gods, and the Gods could not give wrong names, because they knew the essence of the named thing. And if the name was given by people (“by establishment”), then these were random names that did not reflect the nature of the named thing.
In the II century. BC. there has been a debate about how "regular" a language is. In language, while most word changes follow regular rules or patterns, there are numerous exceptions. regularity (cf. table–tables, pole - poles) the Greeks called analogy, and irregularity (cf .: man - people, child - children) is an anomaly. Analogists have focused their efforts on identifying various models by which words can be classified. Anomalists, without denying certain regularities in the formation of words, pointed to numerous examples of irregular word forms.
The teachings of the Greeks were based on written texts. Oral speech was considered dependent on written language. It was believed that literate people keep the purity of the language, and illiterate people spoil the language. This idea of the language lasted more than 2 thousand years.
In addition to the Greco-Latin tradition, an Indian tradition arose in antiquity. Classical texts were also studied here, dictionaries of obsolete words, comments on texts were compiled. Ancient Indian grammarians studied ancient sacred texts - Vedic hymns written in Sanskrit. Scientists paid great attention to the study of phonetics, since it was necessary to create rules for the exact oral reproduction of the Vedic hymns. The ancient Indian classification of speech sounds is more developed and accurate than all the classifications known to us that were proposed in Europe until the 18th century. Grammar Panini (IV century BC), according to Lyons, in its completeness, consistency, conciseness, far exceeds all grammars written up to the present. This grammar is generative. By following the rules of grammar in the prescribed manner, it was possible to generate certain speech works.
The Romans in all areas of science, in art, literature were strongly influenced by Greek culture. Latin grammarians almost completely adopted the Greek samples. The similarity of the Greek and Latin languages approved the point of view according to which the grammatical categories, by the ancient Greeks, are universal for the language in general. The Latin grammars of Donatus and Priscian were used as Latin textbooks until the 17th century.
In medieval Europe, Latin occupied an exceptionally important place in education. A good knowledge of Latin was essential for both secular and ecclesiastical careers. Latin was not only the language of the Holy Scriptures and the Catholic Church, but also the international language of diplomacy, science, and culture.
The Renaissance is characterized by an interest in national languages and literature. The literature of classical antiquity was seen as the source of all cultural values of civilization. During this period, grammars of national languages appeared. The classical teaching was transferred to new European languages.
Scientific linguistics of modern times seeks to rationally explain the laws of language construction. In 1660 in France appeared "General Rational Grammar" (Grammar of Port-Royal) A. Arno and C. Lanslo. The purpose of this grammar is to prove that the structure of the language is based on logical foundations, and different languages are variants of one logical rational system.
It is sometimes believed that the scientific study of language originated only in the 19th century. Only in the XIX century. the facts became the subject of careful and objective scrutiny [Lyons 1978]. Scientific hypotheses began to be built on the basis of carefully selected facts. A special method of researching facts was developed - the comparative historical method.
The promotion of historical justifications was typical at that time not only for linguistics, but also for other sciences, both natural and humanitarian.
At the end of the XVIII century. it has been proven that Sanskrit, the sacred language of India, is related to ancient Greek, Latin and other languages. In 1786, W. Jones noted that Sanskrit reveals such a similarity in roots and grammatical forms with the named languages, which cannot be explained by a coincidence. This similarity is so striking that one cannot help but conclude that these languages share a common source that may no longer exist. This discovery required a scientific explanation. Reliable methodological principles were needed to identify the relationship of languages.
Related languages are descended from one common base language and belong to the same family of languages. The further we go into antiquity, the less differences are found between the compared languages.
Comparatives relied mainly on grammatical correspondences. We considered the words of the main vocabulary, since "cultural" words are often borrowed. Languages that are in geographical or cultural contact easily borrow words from each other. Often certain realities or concepts adopted by one people from another retain their original names.
Comparative scientists study not just the similarity of linguistic elements, but regular correspondences. Regular correspondences between the sounds of words similar in meaning in different languages are formulated in the form of sound laws.
The development of linguistic science took place in close connection with the general cognitive work of man. The formation of the subject of the science of language went through myths, philosophy, grammar, rational grammar. Milestones in the history of linguistic thought are the concepts of V. von Humboldt, F. de Saussure.
W. von Humboldt (1767 - 1835) is sometimes recognized as the founder of general linguistics, the creator of the philosophy of language in the 19th century. Humboldt's concept is a turning point in the development of the theory of linguistics. On the basis of Humboldt's ideas, many subsequent concepts were developed in the 20th century. Humboldt put forward fruitful ideas in many areas of theoretical linguistics: language and people, language and thinking, language and languages, etc. He warned against the absolutization of his ideas, but descendants did not always take this into account.
Humboldt noted that spoken language played a decisive role in the development of man as a new biological species and as a thinking social being. The creation of a language is due to the internal need of mankind. Language is not only an external means of human communication, but it is embedded in the very nature of man [Humboldt 1984, p. 51]. Language is not just a passive tool for the representation of thought, but it participates in the formation of thought itself. The representation transformed into a word ceases to be the exclusive property of one subject. Passing on to others, it becomes the property of the entire human race. According to Humboldt, the structure of the languages of the human race is different, because the spiritual characteristics of peoples are different. Language, according to Humboldt, turns into a special world lying between the world of external phenomena and the inner world of a person. It is a system of meanings fixed in the language. Humboldt emphasizes the unity of all languages, the existence of common laws of development and actual functioning. This unity is due to the influence of the universal characteristics of thinking. Humboldt's idea of the universality of human languages is complemented by the idea of their ethnic determinism.
According to Humboldt, thinking is not just dependent on language, it is to a certain extent conditioned by each individual language. Each language describes around the people to which it belongs, from which it is given to a person to go out only insofar as he enters the circle of another language ibid., p. 80]. Mastering a foreign language could be likened to gaining a new position in the old vision of the world.
Revealing the essential characteristics of the language, Humboldt used the dialectical way of presenting them in the form of antinomies. Antinomy is a contradiction between two mutually exclusive objects or qualities, the regularity of each of which is rationally provable. Such a complex phenomenon as language cannot be described without resorting to this method. Thus, when describing a language, the following antinomies are established: objective and subjective, individual and collective, social and psychological, activity and static, understanding and misunderstanding, etc.
In the XIX-XX centuries. linguistics was dominated by the scientistic model, introduced by the natural sciences into linguistic comparativeism, structuralism, and generativism.
For most linguistic theories of the twentieth century. characteristic is the principle of the priority of the synchronous description of the language, which assumes that historical considerations are not essential for the study of a certain state of the language. This approach to the analysis of language was proclaimed by F. de Saussure (1857-1913). Saussure draws an analogy with the game of chess. In a chess game, positions on the board are constantly changing. However, at any given moment in time, the position is fully described by indicating the places occupied by the chess pieces. How the participants of the game came to this position (specific moves, their number, order, etc.) is completely unimportant for describing the position itself. It can be described synchronously, without reference to previous moves. The same, according to Saussure, is true of language.
All languages are constantly changing, but the states of a language can be described independently of each other. Each state of language can and must be described by itself, without regard to what it has developed from or what may develop from it.
The concept of the historical development of a language (language change) is most fruitfully used on a macroscopic scale, i.e. when comparing time states that are sufficiently distant from each other [Lyons 1978]. On a microscopic scale, i.e. when comparing two fairly close language states of a language, it is impossible to draw a clear line between diachronic and synchronic variability.
F. de Saussure drew the attention of linguists to the systematic nature of the language. Each language is a set of interconnected subsystems that form a system of language, a system of relations. Elements of the language system - sounds, words, etc. - have significance only insofar as they are with each other in a relationship of equivalence and opposition. Saussure contrasted language and speech and urged linguists to first describe language as the most stable in linguistic activity. This was done within the framework of the system-structural paradigm in the 20th century.
Linguistics, starting from Saussure, set the task of choosing something stable and orderly from the fluid linguistic experience. System-structural linguistics sought to reveal the integrity and discreteness of its object. The task of the study was to extract virtual language units (phonemes, morphemes, etc.) from the text based on the method of opposition and accounting for distribution (environment, context).
In the second half of the 20th century, there is an expansion of the ideas and approaches of American linguistics, primarily the idea of generativism, developed under the influence of the ideas of Noam Chomsky. N. Chomsky included a description of the linguistic intuition of a native speaker in the scope of the linguist's research. Linguistic theory began to be understood as the study of the workings of human thinking and its relationship with language. The idea of innate grammar, deep and surface structures was put forward, the technique of generative grammar was developed.
In the last decades of the last century, the interests of linguists were increasingly concentrated on the study of the role of man in language, on the use of language by man (pragmalinguistic aspect).
Postmodern science of recent times fundamentally renounces any objective criteria, proclaiming the unlimited subjectivity of each act of linguistic interpretation, unlimited reading of the same text. In a fluid continuum, one must look for a pattern. Aspirations to discard tradition and build a "different linguistics" often lack a foundation. The analysis of language forces one to turn to positivism. Linguistics continues to go its own way. Individual "fluid" associations remained outside of linguistic analysis, because it is not known by what methods to study them.
The function of language as a scientific concept is a practical manifestation of the essence of language, the realization of its purpose in the system of social phenomena, the specific action of language, due to its very nature, something without which language cannot exist, just as matter does not exist without movement.
Communicative and cognitive functions are the main ones. They are almost always present in speech activity, therefore they are sometimes called language functions, in contrast to other, not so mandatory, speech functions.
The Austrian psychologist, philosopher and linguist Karl Buhler, describing in his book "Theory of Language" the various directions of the signs of the language, defines 3 main functions of the language:
) The function of expression, or expressive function, when the state of the speaker is expressed.
) The function of calling, addressing the listener, or appellative function. 3) The function of presentation, or representative, when one says or tells something to another.
Functions of the language according to the Reformed. There are other points of view on the functions performed by the language, for example, as Reformatsky A.A. understood them. 1) Nominative, that is, the words of the language can name things and phenomena of reality. 2) Communicative; proposals serve this purpose. 3) Expressive, thanks to it the emotional state of the speaker is expressed. Within the framework of the expressive function, one can also single out a deictic (pointing) function that combines some elements of the language with gestures.
Communicative function Language is connected with the fact that language is primarily a means of communication between people. It allows one individual - the speaker - to express his thoughts, and the other - the perceiver - to understand them, that is, to somehow react, take note, change his behavior or his mental attitudes accordingly. The act of communication would not be possible without language.
Communication means communication, exchange of information. In other words, language arose and exists primarily so that people can communicate.
The communicative function of the language is carried out due to the fact that the language itself is a system of signs: it is simply impossible to communicate in another way. And the signs, in turn, are designed to transmit information from person to person.
Linguistic scholars, following the prominent researcher of the Russian language, Academician Viktor Vladimirovich Vinogradov (1895-1969), sometimes define the main functions of the language in a slightly different way. They distinguish: - a message, that is, a presentation of some thought or information; - influence, that is, an attempt to change the behavior of the perceiving person with the help of verbal persuasion;
communication, that is, the exchange of messages.
Message and influence are related to monologue speech, and communication - to dialogic speech. Strictly speaking, these are, indeed, functions of speech. If we talk about the functions of the language, then the message, and the impact, and communication are the implementation of the communicative function of the language. The communicative function of language is more comprehensive in relation to these functions of speech.
Linguistic scientists also single out sometimes, and not unreasonably, the emotional function of language. In other words, signs, sounds of language often serve people to convey emotions, feelings, states. As a matter of fact, it is with this function, most likely, that the human language began. Moreover, in many social or herd animals, it is the transmission of emotions or states (anxiety, fear, appeasement) that is the main way of signaling. With emotionally colored sounds, exclamations, animals notify their fellow tribesmen about the found food or the approaching danger. In this case, it is not information about food or danger that is transmitted, but the emotional state of the animal, corresponding to satisfaction or fear. And even we understand this emotional language of animals - we can quite understand the alarmed barking of a dog or the purring of a contented cat.
Of course, the emotional function of human language is much more complex, emotions are conveyed not so much by sounds as by the meaning of words and sentences. Nevertheless, this ancient function of language probably dates back to the pre-symbolic state of human language, when sounds did not symbolize, did not replace emotions, but were their direct manifestation.
However, any manifestation of feelings, direct or symbolic, also serves to communicate, transfer it to fellow tribesmen. In this sense, the emotional function of language is also one of the ways to implement the more comprehensive communicative function of language. So, various types The implementation of the communicative function of the language is the message, impact, communication, as well as the expression of feelings, emotions, states.
cognitive, or cognitive, The function of language (from the Latin cognition - knowledge, cognition) is connected with the fact that human consciousness is realized or fixed in the signs of the language. Language is a tool of consciousness, reflects the results of human mental activity.
Scientists have not yet come to an unambiguous conclusion about what is primary - language or thinking. Perhaps the question itself is wrong. After all, words not only express our thoughts, but the thoughts themselves exist in the form of words, verbal formulations, even before their oral pronunciation. At least, no one has yet been able to fix the pre-verbal, pre-linguistic form of consciousness. Any images and concepts of our consciousness are realized by ourselves and those around us only when they are clothed in a linguistic form. Hence the idea of the inseparable connection between thinking and language.
The connection between language and thought has been established even with the help of physiometric evidence. The subject was asked to think over some difficult task, and while he was thinking, special sensors took data from the speech apparatus of a silent person (from the larynx, tongue) and detected the nervous activity of the speech apparatus. That is, the mental work of the subjects "out of habit" was reinforced by the activity of the speech apparatus.
Curious evidence is provided by observations of the mental activity of polyglots - people who can speak well in many languages. They admit that in each case they "think" in one language or another. An illustrative example of the intelligence officer Stirlitz from the famous movie - after many years of work in Germany, he caught himself "thinking in German."
The cognitive function of language not only allows you to record the results of mental activity and use them, for example, in communication. It also helps to understand the world. A person's thinking develops in the categories of language: realizing new concepts, things and phenomena for himself, a person names them. And in doing so, he organizes his world. This function of the language is called nominative (naming objects, concepts, phenomena).
nominative the function of language follows directly from the cognitive one. Known must be called, given a name. The nominative function is associated with the ability of language signs to symbolically designate things. The ability of words to symbolically replace objects helps us create our second world - separate from the first, physical world. The physical world does not lend itself well to our manipulations. You don't move mountains with your hands. But the second, symbolic world - it is completely ours. We take it with us wherever we want and do whatever we want with it.
There is an important difference between the world of physical realities and our symbolic world, which reflects the physical world in the words of the language. The world, symbolically reflected in words, is a known, mastered world. The world is known and mastered only when it is named. The world without our names is alien, like a distant unknown planet, there is no man in it, human life is impossible in it.
The name allows you to fix what is already known. Without a name, any known fact of reality, any thing would remain in our minds as a one-time accident. Naming words, we create our own - understandable and convenient picture of the world. Language gives us canvas and paints. It is worth noting, however, that not everything, even in the known world, has a name. For example, our body - we "face" with it daily. Every part of our body has a name. And what is the name of the part of the face between the lip and nose, if there is no mustache? No way. There is no such name. What is the top of the pear called? What is the name of the pin on the belt buckle that fixes the length of the belt? Many objects or phenomena seem to be mastered by us, used by us, but do not have names. Why is the nominative function of the language not implemented in these cases?
This is the wrong question. The nominative function of the language is still implemented, just in a more sophisticated way - through description, not naming. With words, we can describe anything, even if there are no separate words for this. Well, those things or phenomena that do not have their own names simply “did not deserve” such names. This means that such things or phenomena are not so significant in the everyday life of the people that they were given their own name (like the same collet pencil). In order for an object to receive a name, it is necessary for it to enter into public use, to step over a certain “threshold of significance”. Until some time, it was still possible to get by with a random or descriptive name, but from now on it is no longer possible - a separate name is needed. The act of naming is of great importance in a person's life. When we encounter something, we first of all name it. Otherwise, we can neither comprehend what we meet ourselves, nor convey a message about it to other people. It was with the inventing of names that the biblical Adam began. Robinson Crusoe first of all called the rescued savage Friday. Travelers, botanists, zoologists of the times of great discoveries were looking for something new and gave this new name and description. Approximately the same is done by the type of activity and innovation manager. On the other hand, the name also determines the fate of the thing named.
accumulative the function of the language is connected with the most important purpose of the language - to collect and store information, evidence of human cultural activity. Language lives much longer than a person, and sometimes even longer than entire nations. The so-called dead languages are known, which survived the peoples who spoke these languages. Nobody speaks these languages, except for specialists who study them. The most famous "dead" language is Latin. Due to the fact that for a long time it was the language of science (and earlier - the language of a great culture), Latin is well preserved and widespread enough - even a person with a secondary education knows a few Latin sayings. Living or dead languages keep the memory of many generations of people, the evidence of centuries. Even when oral tradition is forgotten, archaeologists can discover ancient writings and use them to reconstruct the events of bygone days. Over the centuries and millennia of mankind, a huge amount of information has been accumulated, produced and recorded by man in different languages of the world.
All gigantic volumes of information produced by mankind exist in linguistic form. In other words, any fragment of this information can in principle be spoken and perceived by both contemporaries and descendants. This is the accumulative function of language, with the help of which mankind accumulates and transmits information both in modern times and in a historical perspective - along the relay race of generations.
Various researchers highlight many more important functions of the language. For example, language plays an interesting role in establishing or maintaining contacts between people. Returning from work with a neighbor in the elevator, you can say to him: “Something was out of season today, huh, Arkady Petrovich?” In fact, both you and Arkady Petrovich have just been outside and are well aware of the state of the weather. Therefore, your question has absolutely no information content, it is informationally empty. It performs a completely different function - phatic, that is, contact-establishing. With this rhetorical question, you are actually once again confirming to Arkady Petrovich the good neighborly status of your relations and your intention to maintain this status. If you write down all your remarks in a day, then you will see that a considerable part of them are pronounced for this very purpose - not to convey information, but to certify the nature of your relationship with the interlocutor. And what words are said at the same time - the second thing. This is the most important function of the language - to certify the mutual status of the interlocutors, to maintain certain relations between them. For a person, a social being, the phatic function of language is very important - it not only stabilizes people's attitude towards the speaker, but also allows the speaker himself to feel "one of his own" in society. It is very interesting and revealing to analyze the implementation of the main functions of the language on the example of such a specific type of human activity as innovation.
Of course, innovation activity is impossible without the implementation of the communicative function of the language. Setting research tasks, working in a team, checking research results, setting implementation tasks and monitoring their implementation, simple communication in order to coordinate the actions of participants in the creative and work process - all these actions are unthinkable without the communicative function of the language. And it is in these actions that it is realized.
The cognitive function of language is of particular importance for innovation. Thinking work, highlighting key concepts, abstracting technological principles, analyzing oppositions and contiguity phenomena, fixing and analyzing an experiment, translating engineering tasks into a technological and implementation plane - all these intellectual actions are impossible without the participation of the language, without the implementation of its cognitive function.
And special tasks are solved by the language when it comes to fundamentally new technologies that have no precedent, that is, they do not have, respectively, operational, conceptual names. In this case, the innovator acts as the Demiurge, the mythical creator of the Universe, who establishes connections between objects and comes up with completely new names for both objects and connections. In this work, the nominative function of the language is realized. And the further life of his innovations depends on how literate and skillful an innovator will be. Will his followers and implementers understand it or not? If new names and descriptions of new technologies do not take root, then the technologies themselves are likely not to take root either. No less important is the accumulative function of the language, which ensures the work of the innovator twice: firstly, it provides him with the knowledge and information accumulated by his predecessors, and secondly, it accumulates his own results in the form of knowledge, experience and information. Actually, in a global sense, the accumulative function of language ensures the scientific, technical and cultural progress of mankind, since it is thanks to it that every new knowledge, every bit of information is firmly established on a wide foundation of knowledge obtained by its predecessors. And this grandiose process does not stop for a minute.
language communication cognitive dialogic
The subject of phonetics. Aspects of the study of speech sounds and sound units of the language. Phonology. Phonetics (from other Greek phone sound, voice) is the science of the sound material of a language, the use of this material in meaningful units of language and speech, and history. changes in this material and in the methods of its use. Sounds and other sound units (syllables) and phenomena (stress, intonation) are studied by phonetics from different aspects: 1) with "." their physical (acoustic) features 2) with "." work, production by the person who uttered them. and auditory perception, i.e. in biological aspect 3) with "." their use. in the language, their role in ensuring the functioning of the language as a means of communication.
The last aspect, cat. can be called functional, stood out in a special region-t-phonology, cat. yavl. an inseparable part and organizing core of phonetics.
^ 10. Acoustic. aspect of the study of speech sounds.
Each sound uttered in speech is an oscillatory movement transmitted through elastic. environment (air) and perceive. hearing. This is fluctuation. movement is characterized by def. acoustic cv-you, review. cat. and is acoustic. aspect.
If the vibrations are uniform, periodic, then the sound is called a tone, if unequal, non-periodic, then noise. Vowel-tones, deaf. acc.-noises, in sonatas tone prevails over noise, in a call. noisy - noise over tone.
Sounds character. height, hovering on the frequency of oscillations (the more oscillations, the higher the sound), and the force depending on the amplitude of the oscillations. Naib. important for language yavl. timbre difference, i.e. their specific coloration. It is the timbre that distinguishes from a, etc. Spec. the timbre of each sound is created by the resonant characteristics. Spectrum - decomposition of sound into tones with selection of frequency concentration bands (formants)
^ 11. The biological aspect of the study of speech sounds. The device of the speech apparatus and the functions of its parts.
The biological aspect is subdivided into pronunciation and perceptual.
Pronunciation- to pronounce this or that sound it is necessary: 1) def. an impulse sent from the motor center of speech (Broca's area) head. brain, find. in the 3rd frontal gyrus of the left hemisphere 2) transmission of this impulse along the nerves to the organs, performed. this command 3) in large. cases-difficult work of the respiratory apparatus (lungs, bronchi and trachea) + diaphragm and the entire chest. cells 4) difficult. the work of the pronunciation organs in narrow. sense (ligaments, tongue, lips, palatine curtain, pharyngeal walls, movement of the lower jaw) - articulation.
^ Pronunciation functions. organs( divided into assets. and passive.)
2) supraglottic cavities (cavity of the pharynx, mouth, nose) perform functions. a movable resonator that creates resonator tones. When images. according to an obstacle (gap, bow).
3) language is able to take different positions. Changes the degree of lifting, is pulled back, compressed into a ball in the rear. parts, served with the whole mass forward, approaching decomp. passive organs (sky, alvioli), forming either a bow or a gap. The tongue creates the phenomenon of palatalization.
4) lips (especially the lower one) - protruding forward and rounding, lengthen the total. the volume of the cavity, change its shape, creating labialized sounds; when pronouncing labial consonants. create an obstacle (labio-labial occlusive and fissured, labio-tooth fissured).
5) palatine curtain - takes a raised position, closing the passage into the nasal cavity, or, conversely, falls, connecting the nasal resonator.
6) tongue - when pronouncing a burry consonant
7) the back wall of the pharynx - when pron. pharyngeal acc. (English h).
^ 12. Articulatory (anatomical and physiological) classification of speech sounds (vowels and consonants).
1. vowels and consonants. when pronouncing. ch. there are no obstacles for air, they have no def. places of education, typical common. muscle tension pron. apparatus and relation. weak air flow. acc.-an obstacle arises, def. place image., muscular tension in the place image. barriers and stronger air. jet.
2. vowels according to the work of the tongue - a series (front, back, mixed + more fractional divisions), the degree of elevation of the tongue (open and closed ch.) Vowels according to the work of the lips - ogubl. and indestructible According to the work of the palatine curtain - non-nasal, nasal
In longitude, long and short.
4.Accord. according to the method arr. noise, by the nature of the barrier, are stop (explosive (n, t), affricates (s), implosive (there is neither an explosion, nor a transition to a gap, the pronunciation ends with a bow (m, n))), slot, trembling.
5.Accord. by actively articulating org.-labial (both lips, only the lower one), anterior lingual (active separate sections of the anterior part of the tongue), middle language, back language, uvular, pharyngeal, guttural.
6.Dr. signs according to - palatalization, velarization, labilization.
Phonemes
–these are the minimum units of the sound structure of a language that perform a certain function in a given language: they serve to fold and distinguish between the material shells of significant units of the language - morphemes, words.
Some functions of phonemes are already named in the definition. In addition, scientists call several more functions. So to the main functions of the phoneme
include the following:
1. constitutive (building) function;
2. distinctive (significative, distinctive) function;
3. perceptual function (identifying, that is, the function of perception);
4. delimitative function (delimiting, that is, capable of separating the beginnings and ends of morphemes and words).
As already mentioned, phonemes are one-sided units that have a plan of expression (exponent - according to Maslov), while they are not meaningful, although, according to L.V. Bondarko, phonemes are potentially associated with meaning: they refer to semantics. At the same time, it must be borne in mind that there are one-phonemic words or morphemes, for example, prepositions, endings, etc.
For the first time, the concept of a phoneme was introduced into linguistics by the Russian scientist I. A. Baudouin de Courtenay. Using the term used by the French. linguist L. Ave in the meaning of "sound of speech", he connects the concept of a phoneme with its function in a morpheme. Further development he finds the doctrine of the phoneme in the works of N. V. Krushevsky, a student of I. A. Baudouin de Courtenay. A great contribution to the development of this issue was made by N. S. Trubetskoy, a St. Petersburg scientist, in the 20s of the twentieth century. emigrated abroad.