LANGUAGE AS A SOCIAL PHENOMENON

The problem of language and society has not been sufficiently developed theoretically, although it would seem that it has long been in the attention of linguists, especially domestic ones.

Meanwhile, the study of this problem is very important for society and the state, since it most directly affects many aspects of people's lives. Without a scientific solution to this problem, it is impossible to carry out correct language policy in multinational and single-national states. The history of the peoples of the world, especially in the 20th century, has shown that the language policy of states needs scientific justification. First of all, this concerns the understanding by public and government figures, as well as, ideally, by all members of society of the phenomenon of language itself as one of the fundamental characteristics of a people. In addition, science is called upon to generalize the centuries-old experience of the existence of multinational states, the language policies pursued in them, and to give correct recommendations to ensure the free use and development of the languages ​​of the peoples living in one or another state.

In the previous and existing domestic literature on this problem there are many declarative, general provisions derived from the ideological, philosophical position of the authors, while the linguistic side of the problem itself remains insufficiently clarified. The social mechanism itself, which determines the formation of language as an objectively developing, self-regulating social phenomenon, independent of the will of its individual speakers, has not been revealed or explained. The genetic connection between society, work, thinking and language has not been unequivocally proven. The simultaneity of their appearance is entirely based on their interconnection and interdependence in modern society and on the assumption and belief that such a connection and mutual necessity have always existed, even during the period of language formation. However, with this formulation of the problem, a number of fundamental questions remain unanswered (see Chapter X about this).

In Russian linguistics, the relationship between language and society has been predominantly studied within the framework of the relations of society and those parts of the language that individual linguists attribute to its external structure. This is an obvious connection, and its study clearly proves that certain aspects of the language system are conditioned by the life and development of society (the presence in the language of functional styles, territorial and social dialects, scientific sublanguages, class and estate features of speech, thematic, semantic groupings of words, historicisms, etc.) . The study of the relationship between language and society was usually limited to these questions, undoubtedly important and necessary. In domestic linguistics in the 20-40s, based on the study of such facts, conclusions were made about the class character of the language, about its belonging to the superstructure above the economic basis of society, etc. Attempts to spread the direct conditionality of the internal structure of the language by social, production factors (phonetics, grammar, partly word formation) turned out to be untenable. It should be noted, however, that an indirect influence of social development on the internal structure of language cannot be ruled out. But this aspect of the relationship between language and society, in fact, has not been studied.

Many questions concerning the differentiation of language under the influence of class, estate, professional, age and other divisions of society have not received sufficient theoretical explanation. A language can serve different classes, estates, ideologies, professions, and age groups of people without violating its identity. The same language, also without violating its genetic and functional identity, can be a means of communication in different states with different ways of life of people, economic, government systems, ideology, etc. Of course, these differences are reflected in the elements of the external structure, but they are not violate the identities of language. The continuity of language preserves its identity in conditions of national social upheavals, upheavals, disasters, ensuring communication and a certain mutual understanding of speakers even in such exceptional conditions. Language as a form is capable of expressing various, including opposing contents; it, in the form of a “third being”, seems to rise above society, its division into classes, estates, professions, ages, etc., reflecting their differences with certain elements, but at the same time uniting them with its common system and structure, indicating that these differences are not violate his identities.

In the 60-70s, there was a tendency in Russian linguistics towards a purely internal, structural study of language. Under the influence of structural, mathematical, cybernetic techniques and research methods, language began to be considered by many linguists as a kind of generating device, which at the input has

a certain vocabulary and rules for operating it, and the output is sentences constructed according to these rules. These description procedures, in fact, did not talk about any connection between language and society, about the conditioning of language by reality in general. Thus, the idea of ​​complete spontaneity of his development, independence from reality and society was tacitly allowed. In their study of language, linguists followed Saussure’s behest: “...The only and true object of linguistics is language, considered in itself and for itself” (1, p. 269). For linguists of this direction, the main thing in language is the structure of the language, its elements and models of their relationships. There is no doubt that these aspects of language learning reflect its essential aspects. But limiting its study only to them and ignoring or completely denying others, also undoubtedly important, would lead to one-sidedness, a distortion of the actual state of affairs. Without connection with reality, it is impossible to understand the role, place and the very internal structure of language. Its abstract nature does not mean its complete separation from reality, but only speaks of its special role in reflecting the same reality.

Above, we have repeatedly emphasized that the connection of language with reality, the conditioning of reality does not deprive the language of its unique nature and originality. Both during the heyday of structuralism and in subsequent times, its extreme manifestations were subject to fair criticism. Despite the importance of studying the structure of language, it is necessary to take into account that language performs social functions, and therefore is influenced by society and, more broadly, by reality in general, which it reflects in its signs, their meanings and relationships.

The above proves that in language we have a very unique phenomenon, open in relation to society, serving as its necessary condition and attribute, but in its own way “processing” social and other reality. Language has its own “filters”, passing through which social processes and events, it refracts them in a unique way and consolidates them in its signs and their relationships. In these connections and interdependence of language and society, it is necessary to distinguish between the form and content of language. The form of language, like the internal structure (to a certain extent coinciding with it, see below), is a deep phenomenon of language. With its most abstract elements, it is capable of participating in the expression of various, including contradictory and mutually exclusive, concrete contents.

To understand the complexity and ambiguity of the relationship between language and society, one should keep in mind that language is not only a social phenomenon, but also a natural and psychological phenomenon (2, p. 47 et al.). Many scholars have written about the fact that language is not only a social phenomenon. So,

E.D. Polivanov emphasized the complex nature of language: “...Language is a mental and social phenomenon: more precisely, at the basis of linguistic reality there are facts of a physical, mental and social order; hence linguistics, on the one hand, is a natural-historical science (coming into contact here with acoustics and physiology), on the other hand, one of the disciplines that studies human mental activity, and, thirdly, a sociological science” (3, p. 182 ).

What social prerequisites can, for example, explain in the Russian language the fall of reduced vowels, 1st and 2nd softening of back-lingual ones, palatalization of consonants, reduction of vowels, deafening of voiced vowels at the end of a word, types of grammatical connections, models of syntactic constructions, etc., etc. etc. Meanwhile, all these are deep-seated distinctive features of the Russian language.

The social nature of language is revealed in the binding nature of its laws and rules for all speakers. The need to accurately express their thoughts for the purpose of mutual understanding forces speakers - spontaneously, and as they learn the language, consciously - to strictly adhere to the learned general laws and rules of the language. Such communication conditions objectively develop a language norm, and at a certain stage of development of language and society, as a consequence, a literary norm of the language (see below).

The general laws of language, mandatory for all speakers, are combined with the individuality of speech and its fundamentally creative character. Objectively, language as a social phenomenon exists in the form of “personal languages”, which represent language in different ways as a natural means of communication. The continuity of the language and its changes over time are ensured by the coexistence of different generations of native speakers and their gradual change at different times. Hence the importance of studying the language of an individual, since, as follows from the above, language actually exists and is embodied in the speech of speakers.

Linguistics cannot cover as the subject of its study the content of the language of individuals, relating to different areas of activity and knowledge, as well as to everyday life. But linguistics has its own approach to the study of personal language. However, until very recently, only certain aspects of this big problem were studied in linguistics. Thus, the formation of language in children, the language and style of writers are traditionally studied in linguistics; Currently, a new direction in the study of linguistic personality is being formed (Yu.N. Karaulov).

A born person “finds” the language formed, ready; with the help of other people, he masters language in society in early childhood, thereby becoming familiar with the existing forms of reflection and understanding of the world around him, enshrined in social

consciousness, to a general linguistic picture of the world. Having mastered language as a means of reflecting and cognizing reality, forming thoughts and transmitting them to others, the speaker thereby connects to the general movement of language and the collective cognition of reality with its help.

The content of the speech expressed externally becomes the property of the interlocutor, a certain circle of people, or - in certain cases - the entire speaking group. Moreover, its impact may not be limited to the moment of its utterance. Its content, assimilated by other participants in communication, can then be transmitted in the community, thereby expanding the perception of it by others in space and time. Participation in the communication of many speakers, the mutual exchange of information and its assimilation creates a certain social experience in the perception and knowledge of the surrounding world. Language consolidates this experience in its signs and their meanings. Language, therefore, is a means of storing and transmitting social experience from generation to generation. This role of language increases with the invention of writing, as it significantly expands the temporal and spatial boundaries of information transfer. These boundaries are expanding even further in our time with the use of electronic media, which incomparably increases the possibilities of accumulating, storing and transmitting information.

From the above, the conclusion suggests itself that the two main functions inherent in language - communicative and significative - reflect the inherent contradiction in ontological and epistemological terms. These two functions make language a tool for both individual and social reflection and knowledge of the world. And this, one must think, is the key to the progress of knowledge, its forward movement.

The general (social) and the individual (individual) are found in every fact of language, in any of its sentences. The dialectical unity of these sides reflects the nature of the language, its essence. Let's take the sentence as an example:

That year, the autumn weather stayed for a long time...

A sentence expresses a certain meaning, denoting the corresponding extra-linguistic situation. The general meaning of a sentence is made up of the meanings of the phrases and words used in it. All sentence units belonging to different levels of language participate in the expression and designation of meaning, each performing its inherent functions, which forms the sentence as a grammatical and semantic unity, correlated with the designated situation. However, being the constitutive units of language, each of them - phoneme, morpheme, word, phrase and sentence (the latter as models) - is applied in accordance with its inherent

them by syntagmatic and paradigmatic rules, not only in this sentence. Reflecting and denoting an infinite number of possible situations, language units remain free from these situations. And this freedom is a fundamental property of both them and the language as a whole. If units of all levels of language were associated only with a directly reflected specific situation, then the use of language as a means of communication, divided in time and space and at the same time representing a unity, would be impossible. Language is a subjective and relatively independent means of communication and reflection of reality and, as such, it is capable of reflecting and denoting changing contents about extra-linguistic reality due to the presence of its stable mechanisms that, to a certain extent, are independent of changing contents. Even words that, it would seem, are directly related to actual facts with their meanings, are used not only to designate objects of one or another situation, but thanks to their abstract meanings they are able to be used in an open number of situations.

The infinite variety of phenomena in the external and internal world of a person is reflected by an infinite chain of combinations of a finite number of language units at each level, starting with the combination of phonemes to form words and ending with combinations of words to form statements. Of course, not all theoretically possible combinations of units at different levels of language are realized in its use. The syntagmatic capabilities of linguistic units, their valence and distribution at each level have their own rules and restrictions, determined by both intralingual and extralinguistic factors, which are not possible to discuss here. We will only point out the fundamental difference in the compatibility of significant units of language, on the one hand, words at the syntactic level and, on the other, morphemes at the morphemic-morphological level.

At the syntactic level, phrases and sentences are formed by a free combination of words, governed, however, by grammatical rules for connecting words of certain parts of speech, as well as subject-logical relations.

New words are formed according to a similar principle. In a word teacher the root is found in other words of this word-formation nest (teach, student, student, study, teaching, scientist, student etc.), just like the suffix -tel - in many other words (writer, reader, layman, guarantor, rescuer and so on.). Combination of word-forming elements teacher forms a new word with a new meaning. The difference between a word and phrase and a sentence formed with the help of these word-forming elements is that the word and its meaning are fixed in the language,

becomes a permanent element of it, while a sentence and a phrase are formed by a free combination of words taken to designate a specific phenomenon or situation. Words created in this way constitute a finite number of units, while sentences and free phrases are practically endless in the speech of speakers.

The sound shells of the words of a language are also formed from a limited number of phonemes, which together represent a strictly constructed, closed system.

In each case, the compatibility of various language units (words - in the formation of phrases and sentences, morphemes and phonemes - in the formation of words) is subject to its own syntagmatic rules and patterns. The compatibility of morphemes and phonemes is fixed in a word, in contrast to the compatibility of words in phrases and sentences, where it is each time created under specific speech conditions. But even in speech conditions, the connection of words, reflecting a unique situation and forming the individual meaning of a phrase or sentence, includes elements (grammatical forms of words, models of phrases and sentences, their typical meanings) that are characteristic of the language system in general and formulate many other words and syntactic structures.

The above facts indicate that language, presupposing society as a necessary prerequisite for its emergence and functioning, nevertheless, in relation to it, as to reality in general, remains a relatively independent entity with its own special laws and rules for reflecting reality.

We call language a social phenomenon primarily because society participates in its formation; the speaker acquires language only in society; the objective nature of language development also stems from the fact that language performs social functions; finally, with its semantics, and to a certain extent also with its structure, language in its “removed” form reflects society and its structure. But all this does not deprive the language of its special status as an independent sign system in relation to the reflected reality, including society.

Thus, the condition for the existence and development of language as a means of communication, education and expression of thought is the dialectical unity of the individual and the social in it. This nature of it unites and uses the achievements and energy of the linguistic personality and the entire linguistic community.

Any human activity that is creative in nature leads to certain new results. The peculiarity of speech activity is that it performs not only the well-known functions of communication (formation of a thought, communication of a thought to another, perception and understanding of it by the latter, etc.). In this activity that is constantly taking place in society, historically and functionally

but there is a constant systematization and creation of the very instrument of this activity - language. Moreover, despite the seemingly general need and necessity of language formation, each language remains an original and unique phenomenon in its nature. Languages ​​amaze with their diversity of phonetic, grammatical, and lexical systems. Why, as a result of speech activity that is social in nature, exactly such a composition of phonemes, such a grammatical structure, etc., is formed in each language - modern linguistics cannot answer this question. And first of all, because the origins of language, and therefore the beginning of the formation of its levels, are hidden by a layer of time of several tens or hundreds of millennia. In the historical era accessible to observation, science notes on the surface of the language only individual movements of its already ready, functioning system and structure; however, modern science has not yet been able to trace and understand the control of the mechanism of this system as a whole.

Language arises, develops and exists as a collective property. Its main purpose is to ensure communication between members of a social group, as well as the functioning of the collective memory of this community.

Society- this is not just a set of human individuals, but a system of diverse relationships between people belonging to certain social, professional, gender and age, ethnic, ethnographic, religious groups, to that ethno-sociocultural environment where each individual occupies his specific place and due to This acts as a bearer of a certain social status, social functions and roles as an individual. An individual as a member of society can be identified on the basis of a large number of relationships that connect him with other individuals.

Language performs the following social functions in society:

1) communicative / informative (transmission and receipt of messages in the form of linguistic / verbal statements carried out in acts of interpersonal and mass communication, exchange of information between people as participants in acts of linguistic communication);

2) cognitive / cognitive (processing and storage of knowledge in the memory of the individual and society, the formation of a conceptual and linguistic picture of the world),

3) interpretive / interpretative (discovering the deep meaning of perceived linguistic statements / texts);

4) regulatory / sociative / interactive (linguistic interaction of communicants with the goal of exchanging communicative roles, asserting their communicative leadership, influencing each other, organizing a successful exchange of information due to compliance with communicative postulates and principles);

5) contact-establishing / phatic (establishing and maintaining communicative interaction);

6) emotional-expressive (expression of one’s emotions, feelings, moods, psychological attitudes, attitude towards communication partners and the subject of communication);

7) aesthetic (creation of works of art);

8) magical / “spellcasting” (use in religious ritual, in the practice of spellcasters, psychics, etc.);

9) ethnocultural (unification into a single whole of representatives of a given ethnic group as speakers of the same language as their native language);

10) metalinguistic / metaspeech (transmission of messages about the facts of the language itself and speech acts in it).

Language and society is one of the central problems of modern linguistics; this problem is formed on the basis of more specific ones: the social nature of the emergence, development and functioning of language; the nature of his connections with society; social differentiation of language in accordance with the division of society into classes, layers and groups; social differences in the use of language due to the diverse areas of its application; relationships between languages ​​in bi- and multilingual societies; conditions for one of the languages ​​to acquire the functions of a means of interethnic communication; forms of conscious influence of society on language.

The problems of society's influence on language began to be considered by ancient philosophers. However, we can talk about the formation of sociolinguistics as a science starting from the 19th century. The first purely sociolinguistic study is considered to be P. Lafargue’s book “Language and Revolution” (“French language before and after the revolution”, 1894), in which the social variants of the French language (“aristocratic Versailles” and “bourgeois Paris”) of the late 18th - beginning of the 19th century were explained by the social and political reasons that caused the French Revolution of 1789. The French literary language of that time intensively reflected the changes taking place in society not only in vocabulary, but also in grammar.

At the end XIX - early XX centuries in France, the French school of social linguistics is being formed, the most important representative of which is the student and follower of F. de Saussure, a prominent linguist Antoine Meillet(1866–1936). A. Meillet, in his scientific worldview, was primarily a representative of classical comparative studies.

1) Language exists only insofar as there is society, and human societies could not exist without language.” Accordingly, Meillet also classified linguistics itself as a social science, from which it logically followed that one of the tasks of linguistics should be to establish the relationship between the structure of society and the structure of language, on the one hand, and the reflection of changes in the former in the latter, on the other.

2) “Reconstruction does not restore the language as it was in life; no reconstruction can represent the “common language” as it was in living speech. Schleicher's reconstruction of the Indo-European proto-language using the historically attested languages ​​of this family was a brilliant innovation; but composing the text in this reconstructed proto-language was a grave mistake. Comparison provides a system of comparisons on the basis of which the history of a language family can be constructed; however, this comparison does not give us a real language with all its inherent means of expression.”

Domestic linguistics, starting with M.V. Lomonosov, represented by its best representatives, has always considered language as a social phenomenon, inextricably linked with society. The defining thesis was the close connection between the history of language and the history of society.

F.I. Buslaev understood language not only as an expression of “folk mentality,” but also of the entire way of life, morals, and traditions of the people. The tradition of studying language in connection with the history of the people, outlined by F. I. Buslaev, was further developed by A. A. Potebney, A. A. Shakhmatov and others. Thanks to this approach, the foundations of modern science - linguoculturology - were laid. A deeper study of the social nature of language in our linguistics is associated with the name of I. A. Baudouin de Courtenay. He pointed to the social nature of individual speech acts, but also in a very original form put forward the idea of ​​​​social differentiation of language.

Interest in sociolinguistic issues in Russian linguistics especially intensified in the post-revolutionary years - in the first third of the 20th century. Specific material showed those changes in vocabulary that are caused by major social phenomena, changes that are reflected in various classes of society. In principle, the question of the reasons and conditions for the formation of national languages ​​was resolved, the problem of studying the language of the city with its various social varieties that distinguished it from local dialects and the literary language was posed.

As a result, the main problems of Russian sociolinguistics were formulated:

1) study of the nature of language as a social phenomenon;

2) the role and place of language in social development;

3) development of methods for sociolinguistic research;

4) clarification of the role of social factors in language development;

5) study of social differential language;

6) research into problems of development of social functions of language;

7) gender problems.

The development of language is influenced by both internal (determined by the language system) and external (in particular, social) factors. Social factors, as a rule, influence language not directly, but indirectly (social changes are most directly reflected only in vocabulary); they can speed up or slow down the course of linguistic evolution, but cannot change its direction (E. D. Polivanov).

Forms of social influence on language:

1) Social differentiation of language due to the social heterogeneity of society. Such is the differentiation of many modern developed national languages ​​into territorial and social dialects, the identification of the literary language as the socially and functionally most significant linguistic formation, the existence in some societies of “male” and “female” variants of the language, etc.

2) The use of linguistic means is determined by the social characteristics of native speakers (age, level of education, profession, etc.), the social roles of the participants in communication, and the communication situation. Since the areas of language use are diverse and specific (cf. science, media, everyday life), functional styles are developed in the language - evidence of the dependence of language on the needs of society.

3) Linguistic life of multilingual societies. The relationship between society and the languages ​​functioning in it, the relationship between different languages, the processes associated with the promotion of one of the languages ​​to the role of the state language, the means of interethnic communication, and the acquisition of the status of international languages ​​by some languages ​​are studied.

4) Language policy is the conscious, purposeful influence of society and its institutions on the functioning of language in various spheres of its application. Recently, the sphere of language policy has come to include a set of political and administrative measures aimed at giving language development the desired direction.

Speech activity, i.e. the process of speaking and understanding, has two sides: individual mental and objective social. Speech activity is a communicative act. It is complex in nature, since it includes not only the relationship between the interlocutors, but also their perception of the situation of speech, language and transmitted information.

The social conditioning of the speech act and speech activity is manifested in the following:

1) Speech activity and speech act presuppose the presence of typical speech situations and cultural contexts that are common to all speakers or a group of speakers. The structure of a speech act presupposes not an individual speaker, but a typical speaker. An indispensable component of the speech act and speech activity of the speaker is the real language and the general structure of the content of information; they are social, since they belong to society. In linguistics, this problem took shape in the theory of speech genres.

2) The social nature of the speech act and speech ability consists in the social conditioning of the activity of the speaker’s speech activity. People do not speak in order to reproduce or demonstrate their speech abilities, as, for example, parrots do, but in order to convey extralinguistic information. People use language to express their thoughts, feelings, expressions of will, and this socially determined information affects the listener (or reader).

3) Speakers cannot be indifferent to the form of expression of their thoughts and feelings, to the preservation and change of linguistic norms.

Speech activity is an integral part of the social activity of a person and the whole society, for which language serves as a tool of development.
Language is a necessary condition for the emergence of an ethnic community. A nationality is formed primarily as a linguistic group, so the names of the people and the language coincide. The ethnographic nature of the language is associated with the so-called sense of native language, since for all peoples the language is closely correlated with national identity.

Each nation has its own associations of imaginative thinking that constitute national specificity. And it is always based on the native language.

The relationship between language and ethnicity determined the emergence of ethnolinguistics.

Linguistics

(Aglyamova)

Noting the uniqueness of language as a social phenomenon, we can say that language is not similar to anything what other science about society? Language differs from all social phenomena in a number of significant ways, such as:

a) a necessary condition for the existence of society throughout the history of mankind is language. The existence of any social phenomenon is limited in time: it is not originally in human society and is not eternal. Unlike non-primary and/or transitory phenomena of social life, language is primordial and exists as long as society exists;

b) a necessary condition for material and spiritual existence in all spheres of social space is the presence of language. Being the most important and basic means of communication, language is inseparable from any manifestations of human social existence;

c) language is dependent and independent of society. The globality of language, its universality, its inclusion in all forms of social existence and social consciousness give rise to its supra-group character. However, this does not mean that he is non-social;

d) language is a phenomenon of the spiritual culture of humanity, one of the forms of social consciousness (along with everyday consciousness, morality and law, religious consciousness and art, ideology, politics, science). It is a means of communication, a semantic shell of social consciousness. Through language, a specifically human form of transmission of social experience (cultural norms and traditions, natural science and technological knowledge) is carried out;

e) the development of language regardless of the social history of society, although it is conditioned and directed precisely by social history. The connection between the history of language and the history of society is obvious: there are features of language and linguistic situations that correspond to certain stages of ethnic and social history. Thus, we can talk about the uniqueness of languages ​​or linguistic situations in primitive societies, in the Middle Ages, and in modern times. Language preserves the unity of the people in the historical change of generations and social formations, despite social barriers, uniting the people in time, in geographical and social space;

f) the role and position of language in human society is the source of its duality (stability and mobility, statics and dynamics). Adapting to the new needs of society, language changes. On the other hand, all changes must be socially motivated and not violate mutual understanding.

The essence of language, its nature, purpose and social predilection the purpose of the manifestation of vegofunctions. Depending on the background of which external factor the nature of language is considered, the functions it performs are also distinguished. We can talk about functions such as:

Communicative (function of a means of communication), carried out in acts of communication between people, consisting in the transmission and receipt of messages in the form of linguistic / verbal statements, in the exchange of information between people - communicants as participants in acts of linguistic communication. The communicative purpose of language in general was, of course, understood in ancient times. In particular, the ancient Greek philosopher Plato (c. 428-348 BC), describing the extremely general model of the speech act “someone to someone about something by means of language,” places language in it, indicating at the same time on its role as a means of transmitting information. The very need for communication in society was explained in general terms only in the 19th century, and explained in detail in the late 80s of the 20th century. Then it was believed that the urgent need for communication was historically caused by two circumstances: a) rather complex work activity (Ludwig Noiret “The Origin of Language” - 1877) and b) the phenomenon of apprenticeship, which involves the transfer of experience and knowledge from one being to another. The need for communication is thus considered as a factor that brought to life its technical solution - language. A thorough study of language as a means of communication subsequently showed that, in principle, language can and does satisfy a wide variety of communication goals determined by cultural and historical factors. Thus, the communicative function of language has an extensive system in which it realizes its needs.

Expressive, consisting in the expression of thoughts (according to V. Avrorin). Sometimes it is called cognitive, educational, epistemological, which consists in the processing and storage of knowledge in the memory of the individual and society, in the formation of a picture of the world. This function is revealed as a conceptual, or thought-formative function. This means that language is in a certain way connected with human consciousness and thinking. The basic units of consciousness and thinking are ideas, concepts, judgments and inferences. The cognitive function is directly related to such a category of consciousness as a concept, and indirectly, implicitly implies its correlation with other forms of mental operations. The largest linguist and thinker of the first half of the 19th century. Wilhelm von Humboldt (1767-1835) called language “the formative organ of thought.” Therefore, in addition to the term “cognitive function,” there is also another, namely, “thought-formative function.” Nevertheless, there is complete certainty in the definition of the cognitive function of language, which considers language as an instrument of cognition, as a means of mastering knowledge and socio-historical experience, and as a way of expressing the activity of consciousness. This function of language is clearly and directly related to research, the search for truth.

Constructive, which consists in the formation of thoughts. In the most general form, the constructive function of language can be imagined as a thought-forming function: linguistic units, linguistic categories, as well as the types of operations with them, “provided for” by the language system, are the matter and the form in which human thought itself flows. In order for an elementary thought to take place about some fragment of reality, we must first segment this reality into at least two “parts”: what will serve as the subject of our thought, and what we will think about this object (and then report) . In this case, the segmentation of reality is carried out in parallel with the process of naming, naming, nominating it.

Accumulative, which consists in a person’s reflection of the surrounding world, which occurs through thinking, when information is formed, generated and stored. The entire store of human knowledge, as a rule, is recorded, stored and distributed in written and book forms: scientific articles, monographs, dissertations, encyclopedias, reference books, as well as in educational and methodological literature. The ability of language to serve as a means of information is presented as its accumulative function - the function of accumulating and storing information. Without this function of language, humanity would always have to start from scratch in everything; the cognitive activity of humanity would not be so rapid, since comprehension of the world presupposes mandatory reliance on what has already been discovered, already known and experienced. Without the accumulative function of language, it would be impossible to accumulate, store, and then transmit socially important information: humanity would not have or know its history. Without the cumulative function of language, the formation and development of civilizations would not have occurred. LES adds emotional and metalinguistic functions to the two basic functions of language - communicative and cognitive (expressive - V.Kh.), which are attributed by many, like the others discussed below, to the secondary functions of language.

Emotional or emotive (expressive) function. Linguistic means (morphological, lexical and intonation) can and are the form in which a variety of human emotional states are expressed - joy, delight, anger, surprise, annoyance, disappointment, fear, irritation, etc. Thus, in many languages, a special class of words has developed - the class of interjections - specializing in the expression of emotions - expressions of regret, disappointment, fatigue, surprise, doubt, mistrust, as well as words with emotionally expressive connotations. It should be noted that the expression of emotions in language is historically and ethnically determined. The culture itself and the “scenarios” themselves for verbal experiences of emotions are different among different peoples (which Polish researcher Anna Wierzbicka draws attention to in one of her studies). Therefore, the arsenal of linguistic means intended to express feelings varies among different peoples, both in its volume and in its quality. Certain ethnic groups experience certain emotions in verbally restrained forms (Japanese, Koreans, Chinese, Scandinavians), others - in more “uninhibited” forms (Americans, Russians, Spaniards, Italians). For example, among Russians there is a hypertrophy of swearing as a means of expressing emotions - and not even always negative ones. Such a “tradition”, naturally, cannot decorate speech and language. This problem is especially acute these days. It is no coincidence that they write about the pejorative dominant of Russian emotionality as a serious sociolinguistic problem. There are also actual lexical means focused on representing emotions in speech. For example, pejorative or abusive language is one of the ways of expressing negative emotions; Beneficial, or complimentary-enthusiastic vocabulary conveys a wide range of positive experiences of a person. The most powerful means of explicating emotional states is intonation. Research has shown that phonoprosodic (intonation-accentological) patterns of a particular language allow a person, even in early childhood, to recognize the emotive type of speech addressed to him. The emotive function of language (which is partly “mixed” with the function of influence) realizes itself in such speech genres as scolding, cursing, reproach, admiration, praise, verbal thanks, and mimicking.

The metalinguistic function (explanatory), which is also considered secondary to the communicative function, has as its main content a speech commentary of speech - an explanation, interpretation, description of something in the language itself or in the extra-linguistic world by means of the language itself. A metalanguage is a language in which some other language is described, in this case called an objective language or an object language. So, if the grammar of the English language is written in Russian, then the object language in such a description will be English, and the metalanguage will be Russian. Of course, the object language and the metalanguage can coincide (for example, English grammar in English). Apparently, languages ​​can differ in the nature and variety of their metalinguistic means. The ability to think and speak about language using its own lexical and grammatical means (i.e., the reflectivity of language) is one of the characteristics of language development that distinguishes the language of people from the language of animals. In the ontogenesis of modern man, facts of metalinguistic reflection are possible in the third or fourth year of life and are common starting from the fifth or sixth. This attention to language is manifested in comparing words, correcting someone else’s and one’s own speech, in language games, and in commenting on speech. The use of language in a metalinguistic function is usually associated with some difficulties in verbal communication - for example, when talking with a child, a foreigner who is not fully proficient in a given language or style. Hearing an unfamiliar word modem, a person may ask: What does modem mean? Let's say his interlocutor answers: This is a computer attachment that can send messages. In this case, the question about the word modem and the explanation in response are specific manifestations of the metalinguistic function of language. As a means of interpretation, language manifests itself in such speech genres as a dictionary definition, a commentary on a document or a work of fiction. This function of language is also demonstrated by literary criticism and the genre of explaining new material in educational communications. There are special programs in the media that interpret, explain and clarify certain political steps, decisions, declarations, statements, etc. a wide variety of political figures, parties, organizations or governments. Such programs are called analytical or information-analytical.

The epistemic function of language is one of the varieties of the basic expressive (cognitive) function. When they say that language performs an epistemic function, then, first of all, they mean that the content of its units, categories and intralingual divisions has a reflective nature, since thinking, i.e. A person’s reflection of the world around him is carried out mainly in linguistic form. Thus, the verbal units of language in their content reflect all aspects of the objective world in which a person lives, as well as the most diverse aspects of his social and internal, spiritual

existence: - this is also the space of its habitat (cf.: continents, continents, countries, plains, mountains, rivers, lakes, seas, oceans, cities, villages, villages, auls, palaces, houses, huts, huts, plagues, yurts, huts, apartments, rooms, kitchens, etc.); - these are also temporal sections of human existence (cf.: antiquity, the Middle Ages, the Renaissance, modernity, yesterday, today, tomorrow, past, future, present, etc.), each of which entails a number of words that have a pstoric-temporal markedness (cf.: Troubles, boyars, oprichnina; or: tax in kind, surplus appropriation, collectivization, electrification, industrialization, etc.); - these include social class, caste, ethnic, religious, etc. divisions in society (cf.: elite - plebs; presidents, governments-people, citizens, subjects; boyars - nobles - philistines; Christians-Muslims, etc.; Africans - Europeans - Asian-Americans, etc.); - these are also forms of organization of society (tyranny, despotism, monarchy, democracy, anarchy, theocracy, etc.); ― this is the world of all living things in which man exists (all nominations related to flora and fauna); - this is both the world of material life and the spiritual existence of a person (cf.: the names of food, drink, household items; the name of the spiritual values ​​and passions by which a person lives; the name of his blood and spiritual ties with other members of the community, etc.). Grammatical categories also have a reflective nature: they reflect the relationships that exist in the objective world. For example, the grammatical category of number reflects the relations of singularity and plurality in the world of things (cf.: table - tables, tree - trees, lake - lakes, etc.), the category of degrees of comparison reflects the relations of graduality that exist in the world of signs (cf. : sweet - sweeter - the sweetest), etc. So, we can be convinced that the content of linguistic signs, categories and various intralingual divisions is of a reflective nature. In other words, the language system takes on the function of reflection. However, this is not a direct, dispassionate reflection of reality. All linguistic reflections are “scrolled” in a person’s mind from his point of view. And when they want to say that language does not simply reflect the world in its content, a certain point of view on the world, they say that language performs an epistemic function. The reflection itself, “attached” to one or another linguistic form, is formed from one point of view or another. “Viewing angle” in linguistics is designated by the term episteme. The world interpreted by a person is reflected by him as already comprehended and interpreted. He models the outside world, reflecting it using the means of his psyche. The fact that a person reflects the world he has interpreted is explained by the fact that linguistic reflections are anthropocentric: a person masters and comprehends this world from a human point of view and interprets it from the point of view of his time, his culture, his knowledge. In ontogenesis, i.e. individual development, a person acquires knowledge about the world, about external reality - he reflects external reality to a very large extent not directly, but “through” language. Let's give a textbook example: the emission and absorption spectrum of light waves, which determines color, is, of course, the same everywhere, and the physiological abilities of representatives of different ethnic groups for color perception do not differ; however, it is known that some peoples have, for example, three colors, while others have seven, etc. It is natural to ask the question: why, say, every African Sango (Ubanguian group of languages ​​of the Niger-Congo family) learns to distinguish exactly four primary colors, no more and no less? Obviously, because in his language there are names for these four colors. Here, therefore, language acts as a ready-made tool for one or another structuring of reality when it is reflected by man. Thus, when the question arises why in general in a given language there are so many names for colors, types of snow, etc., the answer is that the Russians, French, Indians, Nenets, etc. for their practical activity during the previous centuries (possibly millennia), roughly speaking, it was “necessary” to distinguish precisely the varieties of the corresponding objects, which was reflected in the language. Another question is: why does each member of a linguistic community distinguish so many colors? Here the answer is that this or that way of perceiving external reality is to a certain extent “imposed” on a specific individual by his language, which in this regard is nothing more than the crystallized social experience of a given people. From this point of view, the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, according to which a person’s thinking is determined by the language he speaks and cannot go beyond this language, is quite reasonable. One more example. For example, such an animal as a horse was not known to the aborigines of Melanesia, and when the Europeans brought the horse there, they saw it and called it a “ridable pig.” In different ethnic groups, the understanding of the same pig turns out to be different. For a Russian, it is an animal kept for meat, but for a Tatar, Turk, or Uzbek, it is an unclean animal and its meat cannot be eaten. The above, of course, does not mean in any way that a person is generally incapable of cognizing something for which there is no designation in his language, which is what B. Whorf was inclined to believe. The entire experience of the development of various peoples and their languages ​​shows that when the production and cognitive evolution of society creates the need to introduce a new concept, the language never prevents this - to denote a new concept, either an already existing word is used with a certain change in semantics, or a new one is formed according to the laws of the given language. Without this, in particular, it would be impossible to imagine the development of science. This is what happened with the word “horse” in the neo-Melanesian Tok Pisin language: it was borrowed from English and entered the Tok Pisin dictionary as “hos” (English horse).

Contact-making or phatic function (<лат. fateri «выказывать»), заключающаяся в установлении и поддержании коммуникативного взаимодействия. Иногда общение как бы бесцельно: коммуникантам не важна та информация, которую они сообщают друг другу, они не стремятся выразить свои эмоции или воздействовать друг на друга. Пока им важен только контакт, который подготовит дальнейшее более содержательное общение. В таких случаях язык выступает в своей фатической функции (ассоциативная функция, функция контакта), как например, англичане в разговоре о погоде. Фатическая функция является основной в приветствиях, поздравлениях, в дежурных разговорах о городском транспорте и других общеизвестных вещах. При этом собеседники как бы чувствуют своего рода нормы допустимой глубины или остроты таких разговоров: например, упоминание о вчерашней телевизионной передаче не перерастает в разговор по существу содержания или художественного решения программы. Иными словами, общение идет ради общения, оно сознательно или обычно неосознанно направлено на установление или поддержание контакта. Содержание и форма контактоустанавливающего общения варьируются в зависимости от пола, возраста, социального положения, взаимоотношений говорящих, однако в целом такие речи стандартны и минимально информативны. Ср. клишированность поздравлений, начальных и конечных фраз в письмах, избыточность обращений по имени при разговоре двоих и вообще высокую предсказуемость текстов, выполняющих фатическую функцию. Однако информативная недостаточность таких разговоров отнюдь не означает, что эти разговоры не нужны или не важны людям и обществу в целом. Сама стандартность, поверхностность, легкость фатических разговоров помогает устанавливать контакты между людьми, преодолевать разобщенность и некоммуникабельность. Характерно, что детская речь в общении и с родителями и с ровесниками выполняет вначале именно фатическую функцию, т.к. дети стремятся к контакту, не зная еще что бы такое им сказать или услышать друг от друга.

The magical or “spellcasting” function of the tongue is used in religious ritual, in the practice of spellcasters, psychics, etc. Manifestations of the magical function include taboos, taboo substitutions, and vows of silence in some religious traditions; conspiracies, prayers, oaths, including deification and oath; in religions, the Scriptures are sacred texts, that is, texts to which a divine origin is attributed: they may be considered, for example, to have been inspired, dictated or written by a higher power. A common feature of the attitude towards a word as a magical force is the unconventional interpretation of a linguistic sign, i.e. the idea that a word is not a conventional designation of some object, but a part of it, therefore, for example, pronouncing a ritual name can evoke the presence of someone who it is named, and to make a mistake in a verbal ritual is to offend, anger or harm higher powers. Often the name acted as a talisman, i.e. as an amulet or spell that protects against misfortune. In ancient times, when choosing a name for a born child, a person often seemed to play hide and seek with the spirits: then he kept the “real” name secret (and the child grew up under a different, not “secret” name); then they named the children the names of animals, fish, plants; then they gave it a “bad name” so that evil spirits would not see its bearer as valuable prey. The future prophet, founder of Zoroastrianism Zarathushtra (Zarathustra) received this amulet name at birth: in the Avestan language the word Zarathustra meant “old camel.”

The aesthetic function of language is a function of aesthetic influence, an aesthetic attitude towards language. This means that speech (namely the speech itself, and not what is being communicated) can be perceived as beautiful or ugly, i.e. as an aesthetic object. The aesthetic function of language is most noticeable in literary texts, but the scope of its manifestations is wider. An aesthetic attitude to language is possible in colloquial speech, friendly letters, in journalistic, oratorical, popular scientific speech - to the extent that for speakers speech ceases to be only a form, only a shell of content, but receives independent aesthetic value. In Chekhov’s story “Men”, a woman reads the Gospel every day and does not understand much, “but the holy words touched her to tears, and she uttered words such as “asche” and “dondezhe” with a sweet sinking heart.” The aesthetic function of language is usually associated with an organization of text that in some way updates and transforms the usual usage of words and thereby disrupts the automatism of everyday speech (colloquial, business, newspaper). The transformation may affect lexical and grammatical semantics (metaphor, metonymy and other types of figurative use of words and forms); further, the syntactic structure of utterances can be updated. The aesthetic function of language expands the world of human aesthetic relations. At the same time, speech transformations that can make a text aesthetically significant disrupt the automatism and erasure of speech, renew it and thereby open up new expressive possibilities in the language. Sometimes the functions of language are divided into social functions and intrastructural ones, which are a manifestation of the essence and nature of language. The latter include the nominative function, determined by the ability of a word to serve as a means of naming objects and phenomena. The name of a thing becomes its sign, which allows you to operate with the thought of a thing: to derive concepts about objects, reflect their essential properties, and build judgments and conclusions. There is also a division of the functions of language into two leading ones - communicative with its private representations and significative, or cognitive also with its private representations (N.V. Solonik). As can be seen from the characteristics of the functions of language, many of them are in one way or another connected with thinking. For example, the cognitive function connects language with human mental activity; the structure and dynamics of thought are materialized in units of language. F. de Saussure compares language to a sheet of paper, where thought is its front side and sound is its back. You cannot cut the front side without cutting the back. In the same way, in language it is impossible to separate thought from the sounds of speech, which are the natural material side of language. The study of the problem of the relationship between language and thinking in science takes place from different points of view and this problem is solved in different ways. The only thing that can be considered generally accepted to one degree or another is that language and thinking do not form an identity or unity, but are relatively independent phenomena that are connected by complex dialectical relationships. These relationships manifest themselves when considering this problem from genetic, psychophysiological and epistemological points of view. Thus, the leading function of language - communicative (communication function) - follows from the social nature of language, cognitive, constructive and accumulative - from the connection of language with thinking, nominative - from the connection of language with the surrounding reality.

Agafonova

Linguistics Ticket No. 2

Lecture No. 2

I. Social essence of language.

II. The difference between language and other social phenomena.

III. Functions of the language.

IV. Language and speech.

V. Language and thinking.

I. The question of the essence of language has several mutually exclusive solutions in the history of linguistics:

1. language is a biological, natural phenomenon that does not depend on humans. This point of view was expressed, for example, by the German linguist A. Schleicher.

Recognizing language as a natural (biological) phenomenon, it should be considered on a par with such human abilities as eating, drinking, sleeping, etc. and consider it inherited, inherent in human nature itself. However, this contradicts the facts. Language is acquired by a child under the influence of speakers.

2. language is a mental phenomenon that arises as a result of the action of the individual spirit - human or divine.

A similar opinion was expressed by the German linguist W. Humboldt.

This statement is hardly true. In this case

humanity would have a huge variety of individual languages.

3. language is a social phenomenon that arises and develops only in a collective. This position was substantiated by the Swiss linguist F. de Saussure. Indeed, language arises only in a collective due to the need for people to communicate with each other.

Different understandings of the essence of language gave rise to different approaches to its definition: language is thinking expressed by sounds(A. Schleicher); language is a system of signs in which the only essential thing is the combination of meaning and acoustic image(F. de Saussure); language is the most important means of human communication(V.I. Lenin); language is a system of articulate sound signs that spontaneously arises in human society and develops, serving for the purposes of communication and capable of expressing the entire body of knowledge and ideas about the world(N.D.Arutyunova).

Each of these definitions emphasizes different points: the relationship of language to thinking, the structural organization of language, the most important functions, etc., which once again demonstrates the complexity of language as a system that works in unity and interaction with consciousness and thinking.

II. From the point of view of the science of society, language has no analogues. It is not only unique, but in a number of significant ways it differs from all social phenomena:

1. language, consciousness and social nature of work activity

form the foundation of human identity.

2. the presence of language is a necessary condition for the existence of society throughout the history of mankind. Any other social phenomenon in its existence is limited in chronological terms: it is not originally in human society and is not eternal. So, for example, the family did not always exist, there was not always private property, the state, money, etc. Language originally will exist as long as society exists.

3. the presence of language is a necessary condition for material and spiritual existence in all spheres of social space. Any social phenomenon in its distribution is limited to a certain space, for example, science does not include art, and art does not include production, etc. Language is used in all spheres; it is inseparable from all manifestations of human existence.

4. language is dependent and independent of society. On the one hand, the social division of society is reflected in language, i.e. the national language is socially heterogeneous. But, on the other hand, social dialects of a language do not become special languages. Language preserves the unity of a people in its history.

5. The uniqueness of language as a form of social consciousness is that through language a specifically human form of transmission of social experience is carried out.

6. language does not relate to ideological or ideological forms of social consciousness, in contrast to law, morality, politics, religion and other types of consciousness.

III. Being a social phenomenon, language has the properties of social purpose, i.e. certain functions.

The most important functions of the language are the functions communicative And cognitive.

Communicative ( lat. communicatio"communication" ) function– the purpose of language to serve as the main means of human communication. The derivatives of this function are the following:

contact-making (phatic) function– the function of attracting the attention of the interlocutor and ensuring successful, effective communication;

appellative(lat. appellatio"appeal, appeal" )function – function of calling, incitement to action;

conative(lat. conatus"tension, effort") function – function of assessing the communication situation and focusing on the interlocutor;

voluntary(lat . volens"willing") function – influence function associated with the will of the speaker;

epistemic(ancient Greek) episteme"knowledge") or cumulative (lat. cumulare"accumulate") function - the function of storing and transmitting knowledge about reality, cultural traditions, history of the people, national identity.

Cognitive(lat. cognoscere"to know") or epistemological(Greek gnoseos"cognition") function– the function of being a means of obtaining new knowledge about reality and consolidating the results of knowledge in language, the function of thinking. This function of language connects it with human mental activity; the structure and dynamics of thought are materialized in units of language.

Derivatives of this function:

axiological(Greek axios"valuable") function – the function of forming an assessment of objects in the surrounding world and expressing them in speech;

nominative(lat. nominatio"naming") function – function of naming objects of the surrounding world;

predicative(lat. praedicatio"utterance") function – function of correlating information with reality, etc.

In addition to the main functions of language, they sometimes distinguish emotional or expressive function - purpose of being a means of expressing human feelings and emotions; poetic function - the function of creating an artistic image using language; metalinguistic function - function of being a means of exploring and describing language in terms of the language itself.

IV. Extremely important for the development of linguistics was the distinction between the concepts of “language - speech - speech activity”. As the history of linguistics shows, these concepts were often not distinguished. W. Humboldt also spoke about the need to differentiate them: Language as a set of its products differs from individual acts of speech activity.(Humboldt von W. On the differences in the structure of human languages ​​and its influence on the spiritual development of mankind // W. von Humboldt. Selected works on linguistics. M., 1984, pp. 68-69).

The theoretical justification for this position was given by F. de Saussure and L.V. Shcherba.

A Swiss linguist wrote about it this way: In our opinion, the concept of language does not coincide with the concept of speech activity in general; language is only a certain part – indeed, the most important part – of speech activity. It is a social product, a set of necessary conventions adopted by the team to ensure the implementation and functioning of the ability for speech activity that exists in every native speaker...(F. de Saussure. Works on linguistics // Course of general linguistics. M., 1977, p. 47).

According to Saussure, in their existence these phenomena are interconnected, but not reducible to each other.

L.V. Shcherba proposed to distinguish three aspects of language: speech activity (i.e. the process of speaking and understanding), the language system (i.e. the grammar of the language and its dictionary) and linguistic material (i.e. the totality of everything spoken and understood in the act of communication) .

Language and speech, forming a single phenomenon of human language, are not identical to each other. Language is a system of signs used by humans to communicate, store and transmit information. Speech- specific speaking, occurring over time and expressed in audio or written form. Speech is the embodiment, the realization of language.

Language and speech each have their own characteristics:

1. language is a means of communication, speech is the type of communication produced by this means;

2. the language is abstract, formal; speech is material, it concretizes everything that is in language;

3. language is stable, passive and static, while speech is active and dynamic, characterized by high variability;

4. language is the property of society, it reflects the “picture of the world of the people speaking it,” while speech is individual;

5. language has a level organization, speech – linear;

6. language is independent of the situation and setting of communication, while speech is contextually and situationally determined.

7. speech develops in time and space, it is determined by the goals and objectives of speaking and the participants in communication; language is abstracted from these parameters.

Concepts language And speech are related as general and particular: the general (language) is expressed in the particular (speech), while the particular is the form of existence of the general.

Speech activity – a type of human activity that is the sum of the acts of speaking and understanding. It - in the form of speech actions - serves all types of activities, being part of work, play and cognitive activities.

V. The problem of language and thinking is one of the most complex and controversial in the theory of linguistics. In different periods of the history of the science of language, it was solved differently: representatives of some directions (for example, logical) identified these concepts; supporters of others (psychological) tried to resolve this issue on a hierarchical plane, justifying the primacy of either thinking in relation to language, or language in relation to thinking; representatives of structuralism believed that the structure of language determines the structure of thinking and the way of knowing the external world.

A scientific solution to the question of the relationship between language and thinking gives reflection theory, according to which thinking is the highest form of active reflection of objective reality, carried out in various forms and structures (concepts, categories, theories), in which the cognitive and socio-historical experience of mankind is fixed and generalized.

This theory considers language and thinking in a dialectical unity: the tool of thinking is language, as well as other sign systems.

Attitude "language - thinking" studies cognitive linguistics. Cognitive scientists consider a single mental-lingual complex as a self-organizing information system that functions on the basis of the human brain. This system provides perception, understanding, evaluation, storage, transformation, generation and transmission of information. Thinking within the framework of this system is a process of thought generation that constantly occurs in the brain, based on the processing and transformation of information received through various channels. In order for thinking to take place, it must have certain tools that would ensure the division of the flow of impulses coming to the brain from the senses. Language acts as such a tool. The main function of language in relation to thinking is to separate information, i.e. in the form of subject images and meanings.

When studying the thought processes of speech formation, relationships are established between logical and linguistic categories in speech: “concept (representation) – word, phraseological unit”; “judgment (inference) - proposal.”

Concepts how a form of abstract thinking is realized in speech through words and phrases (phraseologisms), and such forms of thought as judgments and inferences have as their material shell various types of sentences of human speech.

Nominative units of language (words and phrases) are not just a way of materializing ideas and concepts, but reflect specific, standardized forms of knowledge about objects and phenomena of the objective world, accumulated as a result of social practice. These types of knowledge are called concepts. Concepts are the smallest units of information based on objective images of the surrounding world.

The centuries-old process of formalizing and expressing thoughts through language also determined the development in the grammatical structure of languages ​​of a number of formal categories, partially correlated with logical categories (categories of thinking). For example, the formal categories of a noun, adjective, numeral correspond to the semantic categories of an object or phenomenon, process, quality, quantity.

Thus, language as a sign system is the material support of thinking; it materializes thoughts and ensures the exchange of information. Thinking reflects reality, and language expresses it. The connection between these phenomena allows language to carry out communicative and cognitive functions: language not only conveys messages about objects and phenomena of the external world, but also organizes knowledge about the world in a certain way, dividing and consolidating it in consciousness.

If language is not a natural phenomenon, then, consequently, its place is among social phenomena. This decision is correct, but in order for there to be complete clarity, it is necessary to clarify the place of language among other social phenomena. This place is special due to the special role of language in society.

What does language have in common with other social phenomena and how does language differ from them?

What language has in common with other social phenomena is that language is a necessary condition for the existence and development of human society and that, being an element of spiritual culture, language, like all other social phenomena, is unthinkable in isolation from materiality.

But the functions of language and the patterns of its functioning and historical development are fundamentally differ from other social phenomena.

The idea that language is not a biological organism, but a social phenomenon, was expressed earlier by representatives of “sociological schools” both under the flag of idealism (F. de Saussure, J. Vandries, A. Meillet) and under the flag of materialism (L. Noiret, N.Ya. Marr), but the stumbling block was a lack of understanding of the structure of society and the specifics of social phenomena.

In social phenomena, Marxist science distinguishes between the basis and the superstructure, that is, the economic structure of society at a given stage of its development and the political, legal, religious, artistic views of society and the institutions corresponding to them. Each base has its own superstructure.

It never occurred to anyone to identify language with the base, but the inclusion of language in the superstructure was typical of both Soviet and foreign linguistics.

The most popular opinion among anti-biologists was to classify language as an “ideology” - in the realm of superstructures and to identify language with culture. And this entailed a number of incorrect conclusions.

Why is language not a superstructure?

Because language is not a product of a given basis, but a means of communication of the human collective, which develops and persists over the course of centuries, even though at this time there are changes in the bases and the corresponding superstructures.

Because the superstructure in a class society belongs to a given class, and language belongs not to one class or another, but to the entire population and serves different classes, without which society could not exist.

N. Ya. Marr and the followers of his “new doctrine of language” considered the class character of language one of their main positions. This reflected not only a complete misunderstanding of language, but also of other social phenomena, since in a class society, not only language, but also economics is common to different classes, without which society would fall apart.

This feudal dialect was common to all levels of the feudal ladder “from prince to serf,” and during the periods of capitalist and socialist development of Russian society, the Russian language served Russian bourgeois culture just as well before the October Revolution as it later served the socialist culture of Russian society.

So, there are no class languages ​​and there never were. The situation is different with speech, as discussed below (§4).

The second mistake of linguists was to identify language and culture. This identification is incorrect, since culture is an ideology, and language does not belong to ideology.

The identification of language with culture entailed a whole series of incorrect conclusions, since these premises are incorrect, i.e., culture and language are not the same thing. Culture, unlike language, can be both bourgeois and socialist; language, being a means of communication, is always popular and serves both bourgeois and socialist culture.

What is the relationship between language and culture? The national language is a form of national culture. It is connected with culture and is unthinkable without culture, just as culture is unthinkable without language. But language is not an ideology, which is the basis of culture.

Finally, there were attempts, in particular by N. Ya. Marr, to liken language to tools of production.

Yes, language is a tool, but a “tool” in a special sense. What language has in common with the instruments of production (they are not only material facts, but also a necessary element of the social structure of society) is that they are indifferent to the superstructure and serve different classes of society, but the instruments of production produce material goods, while language produces nothing and serves only as a means of communication between people. Language is an ideological weapon. If the tools of production (axe, plow, combine, etc.) have a structure and structure, then language has a structure and systemic organization.

Thus, language cannot be classified as either a base, a superstructure, or an instrument of production; language is not the same as culture, and language cannot be class-based.

Nevertheless, language is a social phenomenon that occupies its own special place among other social phenomena and has its own specific features. What are these specific features?

Since language, being a tool of communication, is also a means of exchanging thoughts, the question naturally arises about the relationship between language and thinking.

There are two opposing and equally incorrect tendencies regarding this issue:

1. separation of language from thinking and thinking from language and
2. identification of language and thinking.

Language is the property of the collective; it communicates between members of the collective and allows them to communicate and store the necessary information about any phenomena in the material and spiritual life of a person. And language as a collective property has been evolving and existing for centuries.

Thinking develops and is updated much faster than language, but without language thinking is only a “thing for itself”, and a thought not expressed in language is not that clear, distinct thought that helps a person comprehend the phenomena of reality, develop and improve science, it is , rather, some kind of foresight, and not actual vision, this is not knowledge in the exact sense of the word.

A person can always use ready-made language material (words, sentences) as “formulas” or “matrices” not only for the known, but also for the new. Chapter II (“Lexicology”) will show how one can find means of expression for new thoughts and concepts in language, how one can create terms for new objects of science (see § 21). And it is precisely by finding the right words for oneself that a concept becomes understandable not only to other members of society, but also to those who want to introduce these new concepts into science and into life. The Greek philosopher Plato once spoke about this ( IV century BC e.). “It seems funny to me, Hermogenes, that things become clear if you depict them through letters and syllables; however, this is inevitably so” (“Cratylus”).

Every teacher knows: only then can he affirm what he teaches when it is clear to him - when he can tell it to his students in words. No wonder the Romans said: Docendo discimus (“By teaching, we learn”).

If thinking cannot do without language, then language without thinking is impossible. We speak and write while thinking, and we try to express our thoughts more accurately and clearly in language. It would seem that in those cases when the words in speech do not belong to the speaker, when, for example, a reciter reads someone’s work or an actor plays a role, then where is the thinking? But it is hardly possible to imagine actors, readers, even announcers as parrots and starlings who pronounce but do not speak.

Not only artists and readers, but also everyone who “speaks someone else’s text” interprets it in their own way and presents it to the listener. The same applies to quotes, the use of proverbs and sayings in ordinary speech: they are convenient because they are successful and laconic, but their choice and the meaning embedded in them are a trace and consequence of the speaker’s thoughts.

In general, our ordinary speech is a set of quotations from a language known to us, the words and expressions of which we usually use in our speech (not to mention the sound system and grammar, where “new” cannot be invented).

Of course, there are situations when a given speaker (for example, a poet) is not satisfied with ordinary words “worn out like dimes” and creates his own (sometimes successfully, sometimes unsuccessfully); but, as a rule, new words of poets and writers most often remain the property of their texts and are not included in the common language - after all, they were formed not to convey the “general”, but to express something individual related to the figurative system of a given text; These words are not intended for mass communication or for conveying general information.

This idea was expressed in a paradoxical form by the Greek philosopher of the 2nd century. n. e. Sextus Empiricus, who wrote:

“Just as a person who loyally adheres to a well-known coin that is in circulation in a city according to local custom can easily carry out monetary transactions taking place in that city, another person who does not accept such a coin, but mints some other, new coin for himself and pretending to its recognition will do it in vain, so in life that person is close to madness who does not want to adhere to a speech accepted like a coin, but (prefers) to create his own.”

When we think and want to convey to someone what we have realized, we put our thoughts into the form of language.

Thus, thoughts and born based on language and are fixed in him. However, this does not mean at all that language and thinking are identical.

The laws of thinking are studied by logic. Logic distinguishes concepts with their characteristics, judgments with their members, and inferences with their forms. There are other significant units in the language: morphemes , words , offers, which does not coincide with the specified logical division.

Many grammarians and logicians of the 19th and 20th centuries. tried to establish parallelism between concepts and words, between judgments and sentences. However, it is easy to see that not all words express concepts (for example, interjections express feelings and desires, but not concepts; pronouns only indicate, and do not name or express the concepts themselves; proper names do not express concepts, etc.) and not all sentences express judgments (for example, interrogative and incentive sentences). In addition, the members of the judgment do not coincide with the members of the sentence.

The laws of logic are universal laws, since people all think the same way, but express these thoughts in different languages ​​in different ways. The national characteristics of languages ​​have nothing to do with the logical content of a statement; the same applies to the lexical, grammatical and phonetic form of an utterance in the same language; it can be varied in the language, but correspond to the same logical unit, for example: This is a huge success And This is a huge success. This is their home And This is their home, I wave the flag And I'm waving the flag and so on.

With regard to the connection between language and thinking, one of the main issues is the type of abstraction that permeates the entire language, but is different in its structural tiers, lexical, grammatical and phonetic, which determines the specificity of vocabulary, grammar and phonetics and the special qualitative difference between their units and the relationships between them.

Language and thinking form a unity, since without thinking there can be no language and thinking without language is impossible. Language and thinking arose historically simultaneously in the process of human labor development.

Reformatsky A.A. Introduction to Linguistics / Ed. V.A. Vinogradova. - M., 1996.