Siberian Federal University

Issue

Journal of Siberian Federal University. Humanities & Social Sciences. 2020 13 (8)

Authors

Boroday, Sergey Yu.

Contact information

Boroday, Sergey Yu.: Institute of Philosophy, Russian Academy of Sciences Moscow, Russian Federation;

Keywords

philosophy of language; cognitive linguistics; linguistic typology; word; reference

Abstract

This article attempts to rethink the understanding of language as a “set of words” that correspond to the “objects” of external reality, which is characteristic of Western philosophy and lay perception. The following arguments are offered against this approach: the concept of “word” (like the actual division into morphology and syntax) has no metalinguistic status; the classification of parts of speech is languagespecific, so that the prototypical referential function of a “noun” cannot lay claim to the status of a universal linguistic function; and the idea of language as a “set of words” only reflects the specific metapragmatic awareness of speakers of European languages. Through examining the facts of linguistic diversity and linguistic functions in light of grammatical typology, the author shows that the most adequate interpretation of the relationship between language and reality is an understanding that characterizes language as a large-scale device for forcing its users towards a specific depiction of events. The author also emphasizes the fundamental specificity of the grammatical structure and usage models of each concrete linguistic system. In order to promote a philosophical understanding of language, it is necessary to move from a naïve model that operates with “word – reference – object” to a more realistic model involving “language (as a set of morphosyntactic patterns of conceptualization) – correspondence – event (as a complex situation involving meaning).”

Pages

1275–1288

DOI

10.17516/1997-1370-0641

Paper at repository of SibFU

https://elib.sfu-kras.ru/handle/2311/135921

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0).