bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
The grammatical doctrine of the Real Acadedemia Española (1854)
Authors: Sarmiento Ramón
Published: November 2010

The Grammar of the Real Academia Española (1713) constitutes one of the fundamental chapters of Spanish linguistic thought. It is a required point of reference for all grammarians and has decisively influenced the evolution of grammatical thought. Therefore, the continuing importance of theoretical contributions of Academic bodies is stressed precisely at the present historical moment, in which the most significant progress in linguistic theory may accrue from the process of permanent critical revision of the past. The Grammatical doctrine of 1854 has been chosen as the object of this study for two reasons, both of which derive from the fact that this doctrine constitutes a modification of that of 1771. On the one hand, two periods in the history of linguistics (the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th) can be compared. On the other hand, we may discover to what extent theoretical and practical aspects concur in the two texts. This factor is of great importance since the instrumental nature of all grammar depends on the adaptation of these two aspects. An attempt is made to illustrate both publications by locating historical-cultural points of reference of the period in order to arrive at an objective evaluation of the significance of this doctrine. However, to attain such a goal, the work is analyzed in terms of the work’s original setting, its nature and its aims. The formal structure of the grammar is analyzed and the contents corresponding to the theory are carefully examined. We may deduce from this study that the doctrine of 1854 may be considered ‘traditional grammar’, due to the normativism and logical-grammatical parallelism which underlie its contents as well as the rational method advocated as the criterion which determines the majority of the definitions. For these reasons, the doctrine of 1854 is far removed from the earlier theoretical position stated in the 1771 grammar; it can be inscribed in the category of philosophical grammars of the 19th century. Furthermore, it is argued that the complete edifice of current Spanish grammar is built upon these foundations. Then, the present state of grammar cannot be understood by a simple face-lifting. The grammatical mould is made of many centuries of reflection on the same subjects. To ignore it would be foolhardy. Therefore it is argued that we must return to the foundations where we will find the indelible data which will assist us in interpreting the ever ephemeral present on which future grammars will inevitably be erected, erected.
The prospects of a sapir renaissance in linguistics
Authors: Malkiel Yakov
Published: November 2010

This brief presentation reconstructed on the basis of a tape recording a quarter-century after the date of its original delivery is hardly more than an informal causerie, which the speaker never expected to see in print some day. However, it represents an interesting document in the history of American linguistics in that it mirrors the mood of the late 1950s, a decade marked by first attempts to revive interest in certain characteristic aspects of Sapir’s oeuvre. In addition, it exemplifies the particular appeal of Sapir’s thinking and style of scientific argumentation to younger intellectuals born, raised, and educated in Europe, whose careers later unfolded on New World campuses.
John Palsgrave’s ‘Lesclaircissement De La Langue Francoyse’ (1530)
Authors: Kibbee Douglas A.
Published: November 2010

John Palsgrave, an Englishman, wrote the first detailed grammar of the French language, Lesclaircissement de la langue francoyse (1530). This work is remarkable not only for its length but also for its quality. Palsgrave wrote a pedagogical text for his English readers, using a system which leads the learner from the development of passive skills (interpretation, both oral andintellectual, of written texts) to the development of active skills (expressing oneself in the target language). At the same time, he responded to the French Humanist desire to bring the vernacular languages under the control of ‘rules certayne’.

In its grammatical method, Lesclaircissement exemplifies a stage in the development of Humanist grammar, as the Renaissance grammarians moved from a method based on forms to a more abstract representation of linguistic facts. As such, Palsgrave’s work stands half-way between the early Renaissance calques upon Donatus and the later excursions into logical grammar. In phonetics, Palsgrave’s attention to detail leads him to a clear recognition of the importance of nasal vowels in French (even if his articulatory description of the nasal vowels leaves something to be desired). In phonology, he aspires to a greater level of abstraction through his attempts to link liaison and elision phenomena to French phonotactics. In morpho-syntax, he uses the notion of perfection in language to provide an underlying structure in which the syntactic and the logical structure are explicit. He then explains how the languages in question ‘circumlocute’ to express the underlying structures. In this way, he prefigures the work of Meigret in French grammar. For all of his accomplishments, however, Palsgrave’s work had little influence on his successors. It had only one printing of 750 copies, and Palsgrave himself restricted the sales. Still, the work deserves our attention because of its wealth of detail and because of the method it uses.
Theories du langage et theories du pouvoir en France, 1800-1848
Authors: Formigari Lia
Published: November 2010

La manière dont les différentes coteries philosophiques en France abordent l’héritage de la linguistique des Lumières, la manière dont elles se confrontent sur ce terrain, trahissent leurs attitudes respectives face aux problèmes moraux et politiques qui accompagnent la formation de l’Etat bourgeois entre 1800 et 1848. Les auteurs de ces débats sont, d’une part, les ‘théistes’ (Louis-Gabriel-Ambroise de Bonald, Joseph de Maistre, Félicité Robert Lamennais), qui réfutent le matérialisme des ‘athées’ (’l’école de Locke’: notamment Condillac et les Idéologues), et développent une théorie du langage conforme à leur propre projet de restauration des valeurs et des pouvoirs d’ancien régime; d’autre part, les médiateurs (Victor Cousin, Jean-Philibert Damiron), qui visent à réaliser en philosophie aussi bien qu’en politique un grand compromis éclectique conforme a la ‘générale modération’ souhaitée par la classe sociale qui sera la protagoniste de la Révolution de Juillet. Des produits de cette philosophie médiatrice en linguistique sont encore l’essai de Pierre-Simon Ballanche sur les institutions sociales (1818), où il développe une théorie de la Parole qui suppose la nécessité historique de l’hégémonie bourgeoise, et celui d’Ernest Renan sur l’origine du langage (1848), où le spiritualisme français et la philologie d’école allemande se confirment réciproquement.
Al-Jurjānī
Authors: Rammuny Raji M.
Published: November 2010

Most of the early Arab grammarians were chiefly concerned with the description of language structure and particularly the problem of explaining the inflectional marks. Al-Jurjānī, in the fifth century AH/eleventh century AD, was the first among Arab grammarians to depart from earlier trend of linguistic analysis and to put forward a demonstrable theory for the study of language and grammar in terms of the interrelationships that bind the constituents of speech together. According to al-Jurjānī, there are three types of relationships: syntactic relationships, semantic relationships, and the relationship between syntax and semantics. This paper contains a systematic account of these syntactic-semantic interrelationships in particular, and al-Jurjānī’s approach and methodology to language and grammar in general. Our investigation is based on an intensive study of the concepts of naẓm (discourse arrangement) and taclīq (interrelationship) which al-Jurjānī discussed with ample evidence and cogent reasoning in his major work Dalā’il al-Icjāz (Illustrations of the Inimitability [of the Qur’ān]). A distinctive feature of this research is the effort made to show the connection between al-Jurjānī’s linguistic concepts and equivalent notions used in modern linguistics. The study concludes with an important fact; namely, that al-Jurjānī was one of the frontier scholars to call for the study of language on the basis of syntactic-semantic functions and as a discipline independent of grammatical regents.
Toward a religious-colonial linguistic model of early Hindi Grammars
Authors: Bhatia Tej K.
Published: November 2010

The aim of this paper is three-fold: to call for a re-examination of the early Hindi grammars; secondly, to demonstrate that the grammars in question follow a unique model of language which can best be characterized as the ‘religious-colonial’ model; and finally, to argue that the existing criteria used to evaluate the traditional grammars cannot be indiscriminately applied to the grammars in question and, therefore, a set of new evaluationary criteria is required to arrive at the satisfactory perception of the grammars. The grammars depart from the perception of language embodied in the traditional prescriptive grammars. Compromising between the sociological and a purely linguistic view of language, the grammars are sometimes delinquent in presenting an accurate description of the language. However, treated as socio-historical data, they constitute a rich storage of sociolinguistic information which awaits exploitation by linguists working in the area of socio- and psycholinguistics in general and Hindi linguistics in particular. The claims made in the paper are supported by the analysis of the data drawn from the three oldest grammars of Hindi, primarily, from the oldest grammar, namely, that by Joan Josua Ketelaar (1659–1785?) of 1698, and secondarily, from those of Benjamin Schultze (1689–1760) of 1745 and of Cassino Beligatti (1708–1785?) of 1771.
Stoic syntax and semantics
Authors: Egli Urs
Published: November 2010

The Stoic theory of loquia (lekta) contained a fairly explicit statement of formation rules. It is argued that one type of rule was called syntaxis (combination or phrase structure rule) by Chrysippus (e.g., “a subject in the nominative case and a complete predicate form a statement”). Two other types of rule were assignments of words to lexical categories (“Dion is a Noun Phrase”) and subsumption rules (“Every elementary statement is a statement”), often formulated in the form of subdivisions of concepts. A fourth type of rule seems to have been the class of transformations (enklisis, e.g., “A statement transformed by the preterite transformation is a statement”). Every syntactic rule was accompanied by a semantic interpretation according to a version of the compositionality principle familiar in modern times since Frege and elaborated by Montague and his followers. Though the concrete example of a syntax was a fairly elaborate version of some sort of Montague type or definite clause grammar, there was no effort to introduce a theory of grammar in the style of Chomsky. But the texts show awareness of the problem of the infinity of structure generated and of the concept of structural ambiguity. The Stoic system has been transformed into the formulation of the Word and Paradigm Grammar of the technical grammarians – “transformation” (enklisis) was the historical antecedent of paragôgê, declinatio, “inflection”, etc. Some formulations have survived into modern times, e.g., the notion of government, for which Stoic type formulations like “a deficient predicate can be combined with a subject in the accusative case to form a complete predicate” are a historical antecedent.
Islands in the stream
Authors: Kaster Robert A.
Published: November 2010

The Latin grammarians of late antiquity seem to personify the cultural stagnation and decline that have commonly been thought to typify the age. Resting upon conceptual foundations that had been laid centuries earlier and repeating the same doctrine from generation to generation, their texts appear by and large to be wholly untouched by originality. This paper addresses the question: why was this so? To suggest one answer to this question, the argument begins from the premise that the tradition remained as stable as it did because it continued to satisfy certain needs; the paper then goes on to consider these needs and their interaction.

First, there are the needs of the grammarians themselves. From the beginnings of the profession’s history in the first century B.C. and first century A.D., when the grammarians’ schools first emerged as distinct institutions at Rome, the grammarians’ doctrine, with its emphasis on the rational analysis of the language’s ‘nature’, provided them with the authority they needed to prescribe correct speech for the social and cultural elite that they served. Once this exercise of reason had made a place for the grammarians as relative newcomers to the world of liberal letters, the doctrine was something to be prized and defended: the vivid instruction of the late antique grammarian Pompeius shows us a man fortified and buoyed up by his profession’s tradition, eager to assert its soundness or to add an improving touch here or there – and without the least wish or incentive to attempt some fundamental innovation; for to do so would be to tamper with the honorable social position that the profession provided. At the same time, the mainstream of the educated elite – the second group whose needs must be considered – would themselves have had little reason to encourage innovation: since a liberal education, based of course on grammar, had come to be one of the most important marks of social – and even moral – status, the honorable position of the elite was as much tied as the grammarians’ to the maintenance of the traditional doctrine. As a result, when the interests of the grammarians and the educated elite met in the institution of patronage, on which all teachers depended, the stability of the tradition was reinforced: for patrons did not seek innovative brilliance in their dependents, nor did they even look primarily for technical competence; they rather looked first for traditionally valued personal qualities like modesty and diligence, and other such qualities that would tend to preserve the status quo.
Latinitas, Hellenismos, ‘Arabiyya
Authors: Versteegh Kees
Published: November 2010

The central thesis of this paper is that from the time of the Alexandrian conquests the Greek-speaking community was characterized by a diglossia in which the Attic dialect became the standard language, while a simplified version of this dialect served as the colloquial. On the basis of a comparison between the term ϰοινή in grammatical literature and the terms διάλεϰτος, συνήϑεια, and ἑλληνισμός, the following conclusions are drawn: 1) the grammarians used the expression ϰοινή διάλεϰτος for the Greek language in general; 2) this ϰοινή was for them their own language; 3) the ϰοινή contrasted with the dialects as regional varieties; and 4) the ϰοινή did not include the colloquial. From this it follows that the Classical language remained alive as the high variety of post-Classical diglossia, which was also used in a spoken form (the συνήϑεια of the grammarians). This means that the grammatical writings cannot be used as evidence of the development of the popular language in this period.
My recollections of Leonard Bloomfield
Authors: Despres Leon M.
Published: November 2010

As Leonard Bloomfield’s lawyer and personal friend of his family during the 1920’s and 1930’s, the author evokes memories of Bloomfield himself and his family, with emphasis on the character of his parents and the intellectual and artistic achievements of his relatives. Illustrations are given of his personality, his (often bitter), wit, and his shyness. Light is cast on hitherto little known aspects of his life, especially on his marriage, the adoption of his sons, and his wife’s mental break-down in the 1940’s. Bloomfield’s character is contrasted with that of Edward Sapir (1884–1939), whom the author also knew during the latter’s Chicago years.
Bloomfield and historical linguistics
Authors: Hoenigswald Henry M.
Published: November 2010

Bloomfield worked in both historical and synchronic linguistics. To the former, he contributed: (1) a large amount of work in specific fields; (2) scrutiny of the nature of historical linguistic investigation; and (3) an analysis of the phenomenon of linguistic change. In his Language (1933), he did not narrate the procedures involved in synchronic investigation, nor did he set forth the steps to be followed in analysis. In his exposition of the results of diachronic linguistics, his approach was one of respect and admiration for the achievements of nineteenth-century historical linguistics. Since he accepted the (often disputed) postulate of the regularity of sound-change, he defended it by indirect persuasion in setting forth the arguments by which it is confirmed. His view of the causation of phonological and morphological change is interpreted as an anticipation of later sociolinguistics. In so doing, he restated his predecessors’ and his own insights, thereby rescuing them from the ministrations of their would-be defenders.
Bloomfield and semantics
Authors: Hall Robert A.
Published: November 2010

Bloomfield’s position with regard to meaning and its importance in human use of language has been persistently misinterpreted. From a Wundtian, mentalistic psychology in his 1914 Introduction, he passed to a Weissian, non-mentalistic approach, as a result of which he considered it impossible to capture the totality of meaning because of its inaccessibility to scientific investigation by currently available techniques. Far from excluding considerations of meaning from our study of language, he regarded them as nevertheless essential. The author finds both Bloomfield’s and his critics’ views of the nature of meaning unsatisfactory, because they regard meaning as existent somewhere outside of the individual speaker. In this respect, Bloomfield’s point of view in his 1914 book was closer to reality than that which he expressed in his 1933 Language.
Bloomfield as an Austronesianist
Authors: Wolff John U.
Published: November 2010

Bloomfield’s contribution to Austronesian linguistics was quantitatively small, but qualitatively of high importance. He published only one book and one article on Philippine languages. His gigantic Tagálog Texts with Grammatical Analysis (1917) is still, after seventy years, the best single source of information in existence for an Austronesian language. It exemplified a successful application of descriptive analytical method to material dictated by an informant, and as such was an important step in the development of Bloomfield’s principles of linguistic analysis. As such, it represents a major advance over his 1914 Introduction to the Study of Language. The importance and value of his Tagálog Texts have never been given fully adequate recognition. His other contribution, the short “Outline of Ilocano Syntax” (1942) is a tour de force in demonstrating the possibility of making so economical statement as to cover in less than seven pages the entire taxonomic syntax of a language.
The historiography of Dutch linguistics a diachronic introduction
Authors: Schultink H.
Published: November 2010

At the end of the 19th century one had, for a summarizing survey of the historiography of Dutch linguistics, to make do mainly with German sources, namely von Raumer (1870), and, explicitly based on this, Hermann Paul (1891).

In the decade immediately preceding the First World War the later Utrecht professor Cornells G. N. de Vooys discussed the history of Dutch in a series of papers. It was his opinion that the practice of historical linguistics in the Netherlands fell far short of its counterpart abroad. He indicated two causes for this: a distinction which he considered dogmatic between written and spoken Dutch, and an insufficient understanding of language as a social phenomenon. Nevertheless it was not until 1931 that the first edition of de Vooys’ monographGeschiedenis van de Nederlandse taal, in hoofdtrekken geschetst(‘History of the Dutch language, an outline’) was published. In this study he also gave ample attention to the Dutch grammarians and their works. Quite rightly de Vooys’ book was reissued several times.

However, after his death in 1955 the need arose for a study in which the historiography of Dutch linguistics was described in its own right. This resulted in aGeschiedenis van de Nederlandse taalkunde(‘History of Dutch linguistics’), published in 1977. This was a cooperative project of eleven authors from the Netherlands and Flanders, with Dirk M. Bakker and Gerardus R. W. Dibbets as editors. Although this book, too, has many merits, it has been remarkably little influenced by changing views with regard to the historiography of linguistics.
Über die verbreitung lexikographischer werke in den Niederlanden und ihre wechselseitige beziehungen mit dem ausland bis zum jahre 1600
Authors: Claes Frans M. W.
Published: November 2010

The earliest Netherlandic lexicographical works were not only strongly influenced by foreign vocabularies and dictionaries, but they also strongly influenced lexicography abroad. Adaptations of the earliest vocabularies, which mainly aimed at the learning of Latin, were produced in various countries, with the vernacular language adapted to the idiom of each country. In German speaking regions originated for instance theVocabularius Ex quo(ca. 1400), theLiber Vagatorum>(ca. 1509) and theSynonymorum Collectanea(1513) of Hieronymus Cingularius (ca. 1464–1558), and in Italian speaking regions the polyglotDilucidissimus Dictionarius(1477Introito e porta), which afterwards in the Netherlands were provided with a Netherlandic text. In the middle of the 16th century Netherlandic lexicography was strongly influenced by the already modern looking, in a humanistic spirit fashioned and very copious dictionaries of the Italian Ambrosius Calepinus (ca. 1440–1510) and the Frenchman Robert Estienne (1503–1559).

But it is also true that several Netherlandic lexicographical works were adapted into other languages. There are for instance German adaptations of the Latin-Netherlandic vocabulariesGemmula Vocabulorum(1484),Vocabularius Optimus(1495),Dictionarium Gemmagemmarum(1511) andCuria Palacium(ca. 1477–85), of the topical dictionary of Petrus Apherdianus (ca. 1520–1580) and of the conversation book of Simon Verepaeus (1522–1598), there are German and Czech adaptations of the topical dictionary of Johannes Murmellius (1480–1517) and German and English adaptations of the synonym dictionary of Simon Pelegromius (ca. 1507–1572). In the Netherlands originated polyglot works, such as the Vocabulare (ca. 1530) of Noel de Berlaimont (died 1531), the Nomenclator (1567) of Hadrianus Junius (1511–1575), as well as theCalepinus Pentaglottos(1545), experienced a large international diffusion.

This survey suggests that the initial phase of lexicography in Western and Central European languages can only be adequately understood if seen within an international context.
Dutch philology in the 16th and 17th century
Authors: Dibbets Geert R. W.
Published: November 2010

Within a hundred years the first Dutch vernacular orthographies and grammars were published in the Netherlands, as contributions to the cultivation of the language. In a number of these books the authors assumed the independence of the several Dutch dialects; in other publications we find the tendency towards a cultivated language, or we see that the authors started from the existence of a Refined Standard Dutch. However that may be the orthographists and grammarians aimed at the cultivation of written and spoken Dutch.

Generally the grammarians did not pay much attention to two traditional areas of the grammar: orthographia and prosodia, but the etymologia was stressed: the theory of the parts of speech, and – to a lesser degree – the syntaxis.

The influence of Latin grammar on Dutch was enormous, but could not prevent particularly van Heule (1633) and Leupenius (1653) from following their own course, for the most part within the traditional framework. In doing so the grammarians based themselves on the language usage, in which the nature of the language was given a concrete form.
Gerardus Joannes Vossius (1577–1649) and the study of Latin grammar
Authors: Rademaker Cornelis S. M.
Published: November 2010

Gerardus Joannes Vossius (1577–1649) published his De arte grammatica libri septem in 1635. From the second edition in 1662 the work became known as Vossius’s Aristarchus. This important Latin grammar of Vossius, and also his other publications devoted to Latin, have their particular place in the evolution of grammatical studies in the 17th century. Vossius’s works were used in the first place because in them he had given a complete survey and systematization of all the scholarly information concerning Latin existing up to his own days. Neoscholastic Aristotelism was the philosophical basis of his treatment with Latin language and grammar. However, we find at the same time in Vossius’s work sometimes hints at a new approach to the study of Latin grammar. He followed in many respects the new directions pointed out by men like Scaliger and Sanctius. Thus, on the one hand, Vossius stood in the Humanist tradition of his day while, on the other, his work could be used profitably also by the Port-Royal grammarians and other philologist of the late 17th and 18th centuries. Following an appraisal of Vossius’s place in the Humanist tradition and of the contribution he made in his Aristarchus, the paper deals at some length with the analogy principle as used by Vossius and his successors. It concludes with sections on the evolution of grammatical ideas in the 17th and early 18th centuries marked especially by the tradition associated with the works of Sanctius, Vossius, and Port-Royal.
Anglo-Dutch linguistic scholarship
Authors: Salmon Vivian
Published: November 2010

Although political, social and cultural relationships between 17th-century England and the Netherlands have inspired several books and articles, no general account has yet been produced of the linguistic achievements, academic and applied, which resulted to a large extent from the common personal interests of English and Dutch scholars of the period. This brief survey attempts to present such an account, beginning with the linguistic problems which beset religious refugees in both countries, and their attempted solutions – more especially for the Dutch in England. This and other topics referred to here have already been discussed elsewhere on an individual basis; by considering them together in a single paper, it is hoped to demonstrate that the results of Anglo-Dutch linguistic collaboration were worthy to be compared with achievements in other and better-known fields.
Tenses in 19th-century Dutch sentence-grammar
Authors: Loux-Schuringa J. A. Le
Published: November 2010

In this paper some theories on tenses are described. These theories appeared in the Netherlands in the first half of the 19th century. The purpose is not just describing the different tense-systems of P. Weiland (1805), W. Bilderdijk (1826), W. G. Brill (1846) and L. A. te Winkel (1866). In the first half of the 19th century some fundamental changes took place. It is shown that these changes are based upon continuity of research of time and tense in the Dutch tradition. This continuity is found on three levels: (a) The research was concentrated on the verbal forms, no other information from the sentence was used. (b) The grammarians took the relationship between linguistic forms and logical categories as a one-to-one relation. (c) The morphological form of the Dutch language determined the grammatical representation of the tense-systems more and more.
Hoogvliet Versus Van Ginneken
Authors: Noordegraaf Jan
Published: November 2010

In the last two decades of the 19th century the Dutch linguist Jan Marius Hoogvliet (1860–1924) developed an individual approach to non-historical linguistics, in which he sought to take expressly into account data from non-Indo- European languages. His linguistic views prompted him to attack the ideas of the proponents of the ‘world language’ Volapük, which was popular in the Netherlands in the 1880s. In 1903 his major work, Lingua, appeared. This book can aptly be characterized as a specimen of a universal grammar with psychological underpinnings; it was intended as a grammar for all languages in the world.

Hoogvliet’s main opponent, Jacobus van Ginneken (1877–1945) considered Lingua ‘a good book’, but he found various serious shortcomings in it. First, he thought the empirical bases too narrow; second, whereas Hoogvliet had based his thinking on rational psychology, van Ginneken preferred pathological psychology as put forward by Pierre Janet (1859–1947) in his L’automatisme psychologique (1889). Van Ginneken’s Principes de linguistique psychologique (1907) can be regarded as an elaboration on his Lingua review from 1903. However, the works of Hoogvliet and van Ginneken do have several points in common: both start from the psyche of the speaking individual and both take into account data from non-Indo-European languages. The controversy that arose between them can be traced back to their different views of language. Hoogvliet considered an unconscious and invariable ‘Normallogik’ to be the kernel of language, whereas van Ginneken regarded feeling as the innermost essence of language.

While van Ginneken still tried to incorporate the results of German historical comparative grammar into a grand, historically coloured synthesis, Hoogvliet’s writings were characterized by very sharp anti-German tones. The universal, logical classification of the parts of speech expounded in Lingua must be regarded as a direct reaction to Hermann Paul’s (1846–1921) Prinzipien der Sprachgeschichte (1880). Moreover, Hoogvliet defended the scientific character of a non-historical approach of language against Paul. With that he is the most remarkable Dutch synchronic linguist of the last quarter of the 19th century. Hoogvliet’s theory, however, was highly idiosyncratic and many a reader was also repelled by his new and unconventional terminology. Only few linguists, among whom the Dutch structuralist Hendrik J. Pos (1898–1955), have studied Hoogvliet’s views thoroughly later on.
Dutch dialectology
Authors: Hagen Anton M.
Published: November 2010

This paper presents an historical sketch of Dutch dialectology in a twofold perspective: the national perspective, in which dialectology is an integral part of the study of Dutch, and the international perspective, in which Dutch dialectology participates in international developments in the field. The period until 1880 has a clearly self-centered orientation; especially in the 19th century, dialects are viewed as a part of the national heritage. The German and French schools in linguistic geography are used as examples in the period of the emergence of scientific Dutch dialectology (1880–1930); after pioneering work at the turn of the century, it takes until the twenties before a good infrastructure for dialect research is built up. Two of the promotors from that period, Jac. van Ginneken (1877–1945) and Gesinus G. Kloeke (1887–1963), receive special attention for their remarkable sociolinguistic contributions to dialectology. The period 1930–1960 is one of consolidation and of fundamental reflections upon the history and the differentiation of Dutch, as can be seen from different types of studies (basic projects, regional dialect studies, diffusion studies, contact studies). The most recent period since 1960 again displays a more international character as is demonstrated with reference to structural, generative, and sociolinguistic dialect studies.
Also Ran
Authors: Salmon Paul B.
Published: November 2010

Johann Gottfried Herder’s (1744–1803)Abhandlung über den Ursprung der Sprachewas published in 1772 after winning a prize competition instituted by the Berlin Academy of Sciences for an essay to determine whether or how man, left to his own devices, could devise language for himself. The work was hastily written in the last weeks of 1770 in order to meet the closing date, and its diction and form bear the marks of hurried composition. Alhough it is generally considered to be a seminal work on its subject, it is anything but academic, and some critics have even gone so far as to regard it as a lampoon at the expense of the Academy by showing its question to be a ‘non-question’. At all events, the argumentation of theAbhandlungis not without its weak points; and it is interesting in this light to examine the work of others of the 30 entrants to the competition, who published their essays anonymously about the time when Herder’s work appeared, or a little later.

The present paper traces the main lines of the arguments of three of these essays; and it emerges that Herder’s was not the only one to establish the importance of the distinctive feature(Merkmal)in identifying an object. The more cautious contestants, however, looked upon theMerkmalas an indispensable first step in creating a name; this in turn was to become an initial stage in language. They portrayed the origin of language as a continuous process rather than a sudden discovery by emphasizing the progressive development of abstraction or by examining the means by which the association between words and objects was established within communities. Herder’s rivals, however, do not take account of views expressed before their time, as Herder does in the prize-winning essay, nor do they stress, as he does, that language is necessarily a product of human ingenuity. Nevertheless, Herder was not the only competitor to make an original and positive contribution to the debate, and the essays examined here, too, throw valuable light on a problem which exercised scholars in the 18th century, and in which the 20th has shown renewed interest in the light of enhanced knowledge of linguistics, physiology and ethology.
Some remarks on the origin of ‘assimilation’ and ‘dissimilation’ in linguistic terminology
Authors: Grotsch Klaus
Published: November 2010

The paper attempts to reconstruct when and by whom the terms ‘assimilation’ and ‘dissimilation’ were used for the first time in an expressly linguistic context, and thus became part of the scientific nomenclature. In the case of ‘dissimilation’, it may be said that it received wide currency through A. F. Pott’s use of the term in volume II of his Etymologische Forschungen in 1836. However, Pott used ‘dissimilation’ as early as 1832 and it appears that he was the introducer of the term into linguistics. The history of the term ‘assimilation’ goes further back than has thus far been assumed. Franz Bopp made use of it in 1824, and Jacob Grimm used it earlier in the second edition of volume I of his Deutsche Grammatik (1822) and even two years earlier in a letter to Karl Lachmann. It would appear, however, that the original source of ‘assimilation’ was Rasmus Rask’s Vejledning til det Islandske eller gamle Nordiske Sprog (1811), in which the term is frequently used. Grimm reviewed the book in 1812. Yet there is no indication in Rask’s writings that he considered himself the coiner or first user of ‘assimilation’ in linguistics.
CONSIGNIFICARE and ΠPOƩƩHMAINEIN
Authors: Rosén Hannah
Published: November 2010

Consignificare is used in Modistic writings to express both the concept of signifying only in context and that of signifying in addition to another element. This fusion of meanings, distinct and unassociated in the corresponding Greek terms of συσσημαίνειν and ποσσημαίνειν, had come about already in the sixth century, when – as is evident from Boethius’ commentaries on Aristotle – πϱοσσημαίνειν was radically reinterpreted: while it originally meant “to mark with” or “to indicate”, this compound came to be understood as “to indicate additionally”, having been used exclusively in conjunction with accidental properties. However, a literal translation of πϱοσσημαίνειν, reflecting exactly Aristotle’s purport of the term, is extant in Varronian adsignificare.
Rasmus Kristian Rasks Konzeption Einer Welthilfssprache
Authors: Rück Heribert , Sakaguchi Alicja
Published: November 2010

Apart from his numerous works in comparative linguistics, Rasmus Kristian Rask (1787–1832) is also the author of a manuscript in which he sets forth in detail his conception of a universal auxiliary language. Written during 1819–1820, this 72-page treatise, entitledOptegnelser til en Pasigraphie,has been neglected by linguistic research up to the present, in part because it remained in manuscript form. Rask’s draft of a planned language is divided into three sections: (1) The grammatical system and basic vocabulary; (2) numerous examples of word-formation, morphology etc. and (3) samples of texts. Rask deplores the waste of energy resulting from the multiplicity of languages in international communication. In his opinion, many intellectual achievements are lost or cannot be further developed owing to lack of exchange facilities. Instead of having to learn words and structures, people should be placed in a position to tackle the subject matter. The practical aim of linguistic studies should therefore be the creation of an international means of communication to be used in the field of science as well as in every-day life. Important postulates of such a conception would be: improved learnability by means of simplification of grammatical structures, consistency in word-formation and easy articulation for people of different language communities. To conform to these aims, Rask decided to create a system mainly on the basis of romance languages, i.e., Latin, Spanish, French and Portugese, complemented by Greek and English. Rask’s essay presents a hitherto unknown type of planned language, commonly described as ‘naturalistic’. Whereas other aposterioric systems like Esperanto give priority to regularity and logic and are therefore called ‘autonomous’, Rask tries to remain faithful to the results of historical evolution. In that respect, Rask’s project resembles Otto Jespersen’s ‘Novial’, which was to be conceived a century later.
Rhetoric as a methodological basis for 17th-century linguistics
Authors: Vagle Wenche
Published: November 2010

The purpose of this paper is to throw light on the role of rhetoric as a methodological basis for 17th-century linguistics through a Danish case study. After a presentation of the Danish grammarian Peder Syv (16311702) and the main ideas of his text Nogle Betenkninger om det Cimbriske Sprog (Some Reflections on the Cimbric Language), of 1663, a brief characterization of the rhetorical tradition is given with special emphasis on invention and its topical method of inquiry. Through an analysis of the argumentation in Syv’s text it is found that the author employs topic inquiry as his fundamental method of investigation, and that his line of argument relies on rhetorical evidence of all three kinds: ethos, pathos, and logos. In conclusion, it is suggested that the sociological theory of rationalization offers an explanation as to why we as modern readers have difficulties appreciating the rhetorical method.
Greenlandic in comparison
Authors: Plank Frans
Published: November 2010

The first descriptive grammar of Greenlandic Eskimo was published in 1760 by Paul Egede, continuing the work of his father, Hans, and his missionary collaborator, Albert Top. Curiously, however, the comparative study of Greenlandic had already been inaugurated in 1745, when Marcus Wöldike (1699–1750), professor of theology at the University of Copenhagen, read a remarkable paper to the Kiøbenhavnske Selskab af Lœrdoms of Videnskabers Elskere, published next year in the proceedings of that Society. Based on information obtained from the Egedes, Wöldike presented a grammar of Greenlandic in summary form and compared Greenlandic to about two dozen other languages on some sixty phonological, morphological, and syntactic criteria. As it turned out, Greenlandic was rather similar to Hungarian, sharing with it a great many features (especially such as Hungarian did not share with European languages such as Icelandic, Norwegian, Danish, English, German, Irish, Welsh, Breton, Latin, Italian, French, Ancient Greek, and Slavonic) and showing preciously few differences. American languages, represented by Tupi, Carib, Huron, Natick, and Algonkin, were found to differ considerably from Greenlandic; and Hebrew, Arabic, and Turkish did not much better. Lapp and Finnish came out as close structural relatives of Hungarian – which amounted to the first published demonstration of the Finno-Ugric hypothesis, antedating Saj-novics’s of 1770 and Gyarmathi’s of 1799. For Wöldike the large-scale agreements especially between Greenlandic and Hungarian were no inexplicable chance coincidences. The explanation he suggested was not typological, drawing on necessary correlations of the structural features shared, but historical. Rather than positing a common Ursprache, as was and continued to be the fashion, however, he invoked diffusion within a Sprachbund, localized, somewhat vaguely, in Tartary, from where the Greenlanders and Hungarians (and Lapps and Finns too) had supposedly migrated to their present habitats.
Sir George Cornewall Lewis
Authors: Posner Rebecca
Published: November 2010

George Cornewall Lewis (1806–1863) was a Liberal statesman who attained high office, but whose interest in the ‘new philology’ was maintained throughout his life, although he also wrote extensively on politics and history. His most interesting philological work is an Essay on the For- mation of the Romance Languages (1835) which predates the more famous 4-volume Grammar, by Friedrich Diez (1794–1876), which appeared during 1836–1844, and which advances the hypothesis that a creolization process was responsible for the change of Latin to Romance, rejecting as unsubstantiated Diez’s suggestion that a popular Latin was at the origin of the Romance languages. Lewis’s work on Romance is placed in the context of the development of the study of modern languages at Oxford University, and of the ‘new philology’ which was gaining ground in intellectual circles in 19th-century Britain.
Langue and parole or only parole?
Authors: Antal László
Published: November 2010

Inspired by an excellent article of J. Hewson (1976), this short paper points out some negative consequences of the fact that the Saussurean dichotomy of langue and parole has never received wider acceptance in American linguistics. The negligence of this important distinction has culminated in Chomsky’s astonishing proposition (1986) according to which the notion of ‘language’ is unimportant and dispensable. Such a view would in effect lead to the elimination of the proper object of linguistics. Language (langue) cannot be defined as the totality of utterances, in the same way, as human legs cannot be defined as the totality of the steps, which will be made by them. The understanding of important phenomena (e.g., language learning and linguistic change) is impossible without the notion of a social code (langue) and its individual use (parole). Necessarily, the denial of langue results in an increased proposition of ‘explanations’, that are empirically unverifiable. The notion ‘natural language’ cannot be derived from the speakers’ subjective knowledge of this language; every attempt to this effect must remain incurably circular.
The first quarter century of the Linguistic Society of America, 19240–1949
Authors: Murray Stephen O.
Published: November 2010

The Linguistic Society of America was founded in 1925 by scholars trained in traditional philological methods but more interested in building a science of linguistics than in literary studies.Language, the official journal of the new society became an organ for structural descriptions of sound systems of diverse languages. The Linguistic Institute, a summer training program, speeded diffusion of the new structuralist methods. Focus on native speech rather than on literary texts was a hallmark of the ‘application’ of structuralist linguistics to the teaching of languages in military intensive language programs during the Second World War, and in some academic programs (notably at Cornell University) after the war. After the warLanguageexpanded, and a number of other linguistics journals began publishing. The extent to which these other journals were complements and the extent to which they were rivals remains controversial. Patterns of publications follow lines of theoretical divergence within what is sometimes mistakenly regarded as a neo-Bloomfieldian monolith. It is argued that the self-annuling prestige of the linguistic analyst in the process of language learning contributed to the difficulty of establishing a profession based on ‘the science of language’ in the late 1940s and through the 1950s. The analytical role of native speakers in the Bloomfieldian tradition is contrasted with that in the Sapirian tradition.
The Linguistic Society of America and North American Linguistics, 1950–1968
Authors: Hill Archibald A.
Published: November 2010

The author, Secretary-Treasurer of the Linguistic Society of America during the crucial phase of the post-World War II growth of linguistics as an autonomous academic speciality, 1950–1968, reports on the events that shaped the LSA and the discipline in North America in general. Whereas the Society counted only 829 members, individual and institutional, in 1950, the total number had risen to 4,375 by 1968. The author narrates, in a year-by-year manner, the acitivities that held the Society together during this period and furthered the exchange of ideas among the different generations of linguists, namely, (1) the annual meetings, traditionally held at the end of December, at which both established scholars and fledgling researchers presented papers and had them discussed; (2) the annual summer institutes, first held for a number of years in a row at the University of Michigan and subsequently at several other campuses in the United States, and (3) the publication of Language, the Society’s organ, ably edited by Bernard Bloch from 1941 until his death in 1965.
Bloomfield’s revisions of Language (1933)
Authors: Smith Sidney R.
Published: November 2010

Leonard Bloomfield’s Language (1933), a milestone in 20th-century linguistics, was revised for the British edition of 1935 to accommodate British English readers. A slightly revised American edition also appeared beginning in 1941. However, no edition following the original publication fully reflects Bloomfield’s wish for more extensive additions and corrections, no doubt because the publishers did not want any resetting of type that would alter pagination and require considerable revision of the whole book. But Bloomfield’s extensive additions and corrections are recorded in notes which he wrote in the margins of a copy owned by his student and junior colleague, John G. Kunstmann (1894–1988). The present article, based on these notes, presents those changes and additions which the author deems of greatest value as improvements in Bloomfield’s treatise. Purely stylistic changes are not included. In general, the modifications amount to clarification of concepts and correction of flawed examples rather than a shift in theoretical positions.