Linguistic units and their systems

2019 ◽  
Vol 43 (2) ◽  
pp. 281-300
Author(s):  
Ross Krekoski
Keyword(s):  
Social Action ◽  
Philosophy Of Mind ◽  
Language Use ◽  
Theoretical Explanation ◽  
Linguistic Theory ◽  
Rule Based ◽  
Fundamental Properties ◽  
Formal Systems ◽  
Linguistic Units ◽  
Self Reference

Abstract A theoretical discussion of units in linguistic theory would be, in a sense, incomplete without a discussion of the systems, whether overt or implied, that the units are associated with. This paper traces conceptualizations of units and their accompanying systems in several disciplines. We identify some important problems with rule-based accounts (Parsons 1937) of social action and discuss the transition to non-rule-based theory afforded by ethnomethodology (e.g. Garfinkel 1963, 1967; Heritage 1984, 2011). We draw direct parallels between these issues and analogous developments in mathematical logic (Gödel 1992) and philosophy of mind (Fodor 1968, 1983; Lucas 1961; Putnam 1960, 1967 etc.), and argue that these stem directly from fundamental properties of a class of all formal systems which permit self-reference. We argue that, since these issues are architectural in nature, linguistic theory which postulates that linguistic units are the outputs of a consistent, self-referential, rule-based formal systems (e.g. Hauser, Chomsky & Fitch 2002) will inevitably run into similar problems. This is further supported by examples from actual language use which, as a class, will elude any theoretical explanation grounded in such a system.

scholarly journals Contrastive Pragmatics: Apologies & Thanks in English and Italian

2016 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 73
Author(s):  
Cuneyt Demir ◽  
Mehmet Takkac
Keyword(s):  
Social Action ◽  
Speech Acts ◽  
Language Use ◽  
Speech Act ◽  
American English ◽  
The Status ◽  
Language Competency ◽  
Different Cultures ◽  
Remedial Strategies

<p>Awareness of language or language competency has greatly changed from the focus of language itself as form and structure to language use as pragmatics. Accordingly, it is widely accepted that different cultures structure discourse in different ways. Moreover, studies have shown that this holds for discourse genres traditionally considered as highly standardized in their rituals and formulas. Taking inspiration from such studies, this paper employs a corpus-based approach to examine variations of the apology and thanking strategies used in English and Italian. First the apology itself as a form of social action is closely analyzed and then thanking. This study also pays special attention on analyzing and contrasting apology and thanking strategies in American English and in Italian in terms of Marion Owen’s remedial strategies (Owen, 1983), and Olshtain &amp; Cohen’s semantic formulas in the apology speech act set (Olshtain &amp; Cohen, 1983). The purpose of the study is not only to compare apology and thanking speech acts but to also learn their contextual use. The findings suggest that the status and role of the situation affect the speakers’ choice of apology and thanking strategies, and semantic formulas are of great importance.</p>

Dispositions

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen Mumford
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Mind ◽  
Causal Power ◽  
General Criterion ◽  
Power Capacity ◽  
Specific Kind ◽  
Counterfactual Conditional ◽  
Kind Terms ◽  
Fundamental Properties

‘Disposition’ is a term used in metaphysics usually to indicate a type of property, state or condition. Such a property is one that provides for the possibility of some further specific state or behaviour, usually in circumstances of some specific kind. Terms such as ‘causal power’, ‘capacity’, ‘ability’, ‘propensity’, and others, can be used to convey the same idea. The general criterion for something to be a disposition is that the appropriate kind of behaviour, the so-called manifestation, need not be actual. Thus, something can be disposed to break though it is not broken now. The disposition is thought to be a persisting state or condition that makes possible the manifestation. Because dispositions make other events or properties possible, they are often understood in relation to counterfactual conditional sentences. Something being fragile is somehow related to the conditional that if it is dropped, it will break. The antecedent of the conditional identifies the stimulus for the disposition. The consequent identifies the manifestation of the disposition. Philosophers are increasingly interested in dispositions because many properties seem to be essentially dispositional in nature. Thus, to say that something is soft means that it is disposed to deform when put under pressure. It is difficult to identify a property that does not have some dispositional aspect. Even the fundamental properties of physics, such as spin, charge and mass, appear to be dispositional. This has led some to the conclusion that all properties are dispositions, or at least that they bestow dispositions. In the philosophy of mind, many mental ascriptions carry dispositional implications. For example, to have a belief is to be disposed to behave in an appropriate way in certain circumstances. There are a number of philosophical problems that arise about dispositions, however. Are they real properties in their own right or are they in some way derived from other elements? How are dispositions distinguished from other things? What is the precise relation a disposition bears to its manifestation?

scholarly journals Paradigma Kritis Dalam Penelitian Wacana

2018 ◽  
Vol 13 (3) ◽  
pp. 482
Author(s):  
Suharyo Suharyo
Keyword(s):  
Discourse Analysis ◽  
Critical Discourse Analysis ◽  
Social Action ◽  
Cultural Background ◽  
Critical Discourse ◽  
Economic Power ◽  
Analysis Model ◽  
Linguistic Research ◽  
Political Economic ◽  
Linguistic Units

So far, linguistic research, especially discourse research, is still focused on aspects of the linguistic structure as forming the discourse. Discourse is examined for the existence of cohesiveness and coherence of the discourse. What are the linguistic units that form cohesiveness and cohesiveness both lexical and grammatical coherence. This is different from discourse research using critical discourse paradigms. Critical discourse holds that discourse-forming structures are not in a social "vacuum". Because, discourse is basically a (social) action that is loaded with political, economic, power, cultural background etc. To conduct discourse research using critical paradigms, it is necessary to know the research characteristics of critical discourse analiysis, which includes (1) discourse is (social) action, (2) context, (3) historical, (4) power, (5) ideology, and ( 6) (diction) vocabulary basically (a) limits classification, (b) limits the views of a person / group, and (c) marginalizes certain people / groups. Among the available models, the critical discourse analysis model of the van Dijk model is a well-known model in Indonesia.

‘Simple Codes’ and the Source of the Second Language Learner's Initial Heuristic Hypothesis

1978 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-10 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. P. Corder
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Language Use ◽  
Communicative Competence ◽  
Linguistic Theory ◽  
Restricted Range ◽  
Technical Description ◽  
Communicative Functions ◽  
Verbal Behaviour ◽  
Referential Function

Linguistic theory must be sufficiently rich and comprehensive to be able to account for the structure of the most complex or elaborate manifestation of language. In consequence any structurally less complex verbal behaviour is typically explained as a use of some ‘reduced’ or ‘simplified’ code or register. Many languages, if not all, are said to possess such reduced registers and it is said to be part of a native speaker's competence to be able to use such ‘reduced registers’ where appropriate. It is part of his total communicative competence to know when it is appropriate to use such registers. These reduced or simplified registers are associated with more or less well defined situations of language use or types of discourse. Telegraphese is obviously restricted by the medium of transmission as well as the restricted range of communicative functions it is used for, e.g. orders, reports and announcements of plans. Technical description in botanical and ornithological reference books have a purely referential function, while the so-called language of instructions has clearly restricted rhetorical functions.

Overruling rules?

1996 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 347-366 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonathan Yovel
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Social Action ◽  
Direct Action ◽  
Rule Based ◽  
Present Discussion ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Normative Discourse

This paper discusses issues relating to the normativity of prescriptive rules: what does it mean for a rule to be able to direct action, and what are the implications for the desirability of rule-based decision-making? It is argued that: (a) cognitively, one must allow for more than a single answer to the first question (the two interpretations of rules discussed here are based alternately on the concepts of exclusion and presumption); and (b) normatively, these different structures typically serve for different purposes in allocation of power and discretion. The next issue is the connection between rule-based decision-making and semantic theories of language. On a meta-discursive level, the paper makes a twofold claim: that normative discourse is possible only on the basis of a sound cognitive inquiry, while cognitive inquiry alone is not sufficient to explain social action and interaction, lacking tools to deal with the contingent normative demands from decision-making systems, such as adjudication. The discussion of prescriptive rules serves as a case-study for this claim. These and related topics have been dealt with by Frederick Schauer(1991a, 1991b). His model of rules as entrenched generalizations and mediators between "justifications " and action is the starting point of the present discussion, which, on most of the issues mentioned above, results in conclusions quite different from Schauer's.

Formalizing Cognitive Grammar by Introducing Analogical-Operatorial (A-O) Mode of Language Use and its Implications for Audience Analysis

1997 ◽  
Vol 27 (2) ◽  
pp. 163-175 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dorota Zielinska
Keyword(s):  
Language Use ◽  
Cognitive Grammar ◽  
Present Formulation ◽  
Semantic Meaning ◽  
Audience Analysis ◽  
Conceptual Structures ◽  
Linguistic Units

Formalization of cognitive grammar depends in an important way on modeling the process of assessing similarity. This article points out that such formalization is difficult to achieve within the present formulation [1] of the grammar and introduces a modification that will allow modeling the process of similarity. Next, it is suggested that the mechanism of assessing similarity in the modified analogical-operatorial version of cognitive grammar be that of analogical modeling presented in Skousen [2]. Finally, it indicates some consequences of the proposition for the practice of communication. The modification, the analogical-operatorial mode of language use, allows linguistic units, in addition to their function of representing the semantic meaning of these units, to serve as operators differentiating among semantic or other conceptual structures. This introduces inhomogeneity to the content purported with linguistic units and leads to preserving linguistic compositionality understood in a new sense. It also allows one to treat the pragmatic meaning in the same way as the semantic one, and accounts for a compact use of linguistic units. Using linguistic units to differentiate allows one to convey information not contained in the encoded meaning of these structures. This can be utilized to communicate more efficiently but also poses the danger of purporting unwanted meaning.

scholarly journals From Word to Scenario: The Influence of Linguistic Theories upon Models of Translation

2005 ◽  
Vol 1 (3) ◽  
pp. 29-67
Author(s):  
Kenneth A. McElhanon
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Cognitive Linguistics ◽  
Relevance Theory ◽  
Linguistic Theory ◽  
Code Model ◽  
Late Twentieth ◽  
Linguistic Units ◽  
Late Twentieth Century ◽  
Kuhnian Revolution

In the late twentieth century any given model of translation was constrained by the code model of communication and by the theory of linguistics upon which it was based. Whereas the code model supplied the notion of equivalence as the standard by which a translation was evaluated, the linguistic theory supplied what was regarded as the minimal unit of translation. Accordingly, as linguistic theories were formulated to account for increasingly larger units of text, translation models were redesigned so that the notion of equivalence mirrored the size of these linguistic units. Ultimately, the notion of equivalence became so broad that attempts to achieve it were regarded as illusionary. The result was a Kuhnian revolution of sorts, with two claimants: relevance theory and cognitive linguistics. The remainder of the paper highlights how recent insights of cognitive linguistics are important in the translation praxis.

Introduction

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kasia M. Jaszczolt
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Mind ◽  
Cutting Edge ◽  
The Other ◽  
Interdisciplinary Perspective ◽  
Contrastive Linguistics ◽  
The One ◽  
Self Reference

The introduction presents the cutting-edge linguistic and philosophical problems with self-reference. It justifies the need for an unprecedented interdisciplinary perspective that allows the method of theoretical and contrastive linguistics on the one hand, and philosophy of mind and language on the other, to enrich their respective fields of enquiry. It concludes with a summary of the contributing chapters.

Deontic authority in intervention discourse: Insights from bystander intervention

2019 ◽  
Vol 21 (5) ◽  
pp. 540-560
Author(s):  
Yongping Ran ◽  
Xu Huang
Keyword(s):  
Data Analysis ◽  
Social Action ◽  
Language Use ◽  
Bystander Intervention ◽  
Social Phenomenon ◽  
Video Recordings ◽  
Naturally Occurring ◽  
Deontic Authority ◽  
Recurrent Patterns ◽  
The Continuum

Our study offers a linguistic–pragmatic examination of instances of bystander intervention, a social action that takes place when a bystander or a group of bystanders intervenes when a wrongdoer abuses a victim or behaves outside socially acceptable norms. We approach this social phenomenon by analyzing data drawn from a database of 11 video-recordings that all involve naturally occurring interactions in public settings in China. The notion of intervention discourse is tentatively introduced in this study to distinguish it from those used to achieve other communicative purposes and to disclose some recurrent patterns of language use in bystander intervention. The data analysis summarizes six categories of intervention discourse along the continuum of strong to weak intervention: terminating, consequence-stating, advising, judging, appealing and stance-taking. Our study demonstrates that the skillful exercise of deontic authority embodied in intervention discourse might have a tangible influence on the outcome of the intervention.

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