Formal Linguistics: Its main schools of thought

Generative Linguistics
Makes use of the concept of generative grammar which is a finite set of rules that can
be applied to generate all those and only those sentences that are grammatical in a
given language.
Chomsky's approach is characterized by the use of transformational grammar and by
the assertion of a strong linguistic nativism (and therefore an assertion that some set
of fundamental characteristics of all human languages must be the same).
Generative theory is modularist (lexicon, syntax are independent from each other) and
formalist (the focus is on the structural relationship between words) in character.
Everything is in our minds.
Generative theory of language says that the most basic form of language is a set of
syntactic rules universal for all humans and underlying the grammars of all human
languages. This set of rules is called Universal Grammar. For this reason the grammars
of individual languages are of importance to linguistics only insofar as they allow us to
discern the universal underlying rules from which the observable linguistic variability is
generated.
Chomsky didn’t believe that exposure to a language was enough for a young child to
become efficient at understanding and producing a language. He believed that humans
are born with an innate ability to learn languages. According to Chomsky’s theory, the
basic structures of language are already encoded in the human brain at birth.
This “universal grammar theory” suggests that every language has some of the same
laws. For example, every language has a way to ask a question or make something
negative. In addition, every language has a way to identify gender or show that
something happened in the past or present.
If the basic grammar laws are the same for all languages, a child needs to follow the
particular set of rules that his peers follow in order to understand and produce their
native language. In other words, his environment determines which language he will
use, but he is born with the tools to learn any language effectively.

✔ It makes use of the concept of Generative Grammar

✔ A generative grammar is a finite set of rules that are applied to generate

grammatical sentences in a given language.
✔ The term was coined by Noam Chomsky during the 1960's.
 ✔ According to this theory, the most basic form of the language is a set of
syntactic rules (Universal Grammar) that underlie the grammar of all languages.
Every language has a way to ask questions or make negative sentences.
✔ Exposure to the language is not enough for a young person to understand and
produce the language. Humans are born with an innate ability to learn
languages.
✔ The basic structures of the language are encoded in the human brain since
birth.

Structural Linguistics
De Saussure is the originator of the 20th century reappearance of structuralism. He
focused not on the use of language (parole, or talk), but rather on the underlying
system of language (langue) and called his theory semiotics. This approach focused on
examining how the elements of language related to each other in the present, (as a
static set of relationships independent of any changes that take place over time) that
is, 'synchronically' rather than 'diachronically' (as a dynamic system which changes
over time)
He argued that linguistic signs were composed of two parts, a signifier (the sound
pattern of a word, either in mental projection - as when we silently recite lines from a
poem to ourselves - or in actual, physical realization as part of a speech act) and a
signified (the concept or meaning of the word).
This was quite different from previous approaches which focused on the relationship
between words and the things in the world that they designated. By focusing on the
internal constitution of signs rather than focusing on their relationship to objects in the
world, Saussure made the anatomy and structure of language something that could be
analyzed and studied.
The clearest and most important example of Prague School structuralism lies in
phonemics. Rather than simply compile a list of which sounds occur in a language, the
Prague School sought to examine how they were related. They determined that the
inventory of sounds in a language could be analyzed in terms of a series of contrasts.
Thus in English the words 'pat' and 'bat' are different because the /p/ and /b/ sounds
contrast. The difference between them is that the vocal cords vibrate while saying a
/b/ while they do not when saying a /p/. Phonology would become the paradigmatic
basis for structuralism in a number of different forms.
According to Saussure, the relation between a signifier and a signified is arbitrary in at
least two ways. First, there is no absolute reason why these particular graphic marks
(p-e-a-r) should signify the concept pear. There is no natural connection or
resemblance between the signifier and the signified (as there would be in what
Saussure calls a symbol, i.e. an iconic representation such as a descriptive drawing of a
pear). After all, it's not as if the word "pear" looks or sounds anything like a pear. In
fact, a moment's reflection makes it clear that the connection between the signifier
and the signified is due to a contingent historical convention. In other words, the
relationship between a word and a concept is arbitrary in one sense (in terms of its
origin) but not in another sense (in terms of its use).
Saussure's interest is in the structure of language, not the use of language. Saussure
limited his investigation to the formal structure of language (langue), setting aside or
bracketing the way that language is employed in actual speech (parole). Hence, the
term structuralism. Saussure bracketed out of his investigation any concern with the
real, material objects (referents) to which signs are presumably related. This
bracketing of the referent is a move that enabled him to study the way a thing
(language and meaning) is experienced in the mind.
According to structuralist theory, a text or utterance has a "meaning", but its meaning
is determined not by the psychological state or "intention" of the speaker, but by the
deep-structure of the language system in which it occurs. In this way, the subject
(individual or "author") is replaced by language itself as an autonomous system of
rules. Thus, structuralism has been characterized as anti-humanistic in its claim that
meaning is not identical with the inner psychological experience of the speaker. It
removes the human subject from its central position in the production of meaning.

✔ Ferdinand de Saussure is the originator of the 20 th century reappearance of

structuralism.
✔ He focused on the use of the language (Parole) and on the underlying system of
language (Langue).
✔ The elements of language relate to each other in the present (synchronically)
rather than diachronically (as a dynamic system which changes over time).
✔ Linguistic signs (the basic units of language) are composed of two parts: a
Signifier (the sound pattern of a word) and a Signified the concept or meanings
of the word). Consider pear.
✔ The relation between a signifier and a signified is arbitrary. There is no natural
connection between the sound-image (signifier) and the concept or meaning
(signified).
✔ The meaning of a text or utterance is determined by the deep structure of the
language system (the underlying logical relationships of the elements of a
phrase or sentence), not by the speaker's intention.
Prescriptive or Traditional Linguistics
The term prescriptive linguistics refers to a set of norms or rules governing how a
language should or should not be used rather than describing the ways in which a
language is actually used. A person who says how people should write or speak is
called prescriptive linguist/grammarian
The term prescriptivism refers to the ideology and practices in which the correct and
incorrect uses of a language or specific linguistic items are laid down by explicit rules
that are externally imposed on the users of that language. This ideology and its
practices are now usually described to nonlinguists or nonacademic linguists, whereas
modern academic linguists, following Saussurean tenets, restrict themselves to the
study and description of the structure of language and its natural use.
The study of (English) prescriptivism is mainly a 21st-century phenomenon and has
predominantly been conducted by scholars from the fields of philology, historical
linguistics, and sociolinguistics. Although language had been prescribed for centuries, it
seems that the modern, linguistic concept of prescriptivism could only emerge when
descriptive linguistics had become established as a scientific discipline, notably in the
wake of the lectures of Ferdinand de Saussure in the early years of the 20th century.
And since the investigation of linguistic prescriptivism by linguists is a kind of meta-
study, the study of prescriptivism could possibly only arise when linguistics had
become sufficiently self-aware. Comments on prescriptive grammar seem to have
started with Bryan 1923 and Jespersen 2006. The strict separation between
prescriptivism and descriptivism as applied to works of grammar and usage has in
recent years been questioned and is increasingly seen as artificial and reductive.
DESCRIPTIVE: Describes the language
PRESCRIPTIVE: Established a standard language. Tell you how to speak.

✔ It makes reference to a set of norms or rules governing how a language should

or should not be used.
✔ It does not describe the ways in which a language is actually used.

✔ From ancient times until present, “purists” have believed that there are certain
“correct” forms that educated people should use.
 ✔ In 1762, Lowth prescribed a number of new rules for English: I don't have any,
singular you followed by plural were
✔ However, language is dynamic and constantly changing.

✔ What may be grammatically correct in one language may be ungrammatical in

another. Languages and dialects are rule-governed

WHAT IS GRAMMAR?
On the one hand, the term refers to the explicit theory constructed by the linguist and
proposed as a description of the speaker's competence. On the other hand, it refers to
this competence itself.
CHOMSKY AND HALLE, The Sound Pattern of English
DESCRIPTIVE GRAMMARS
The grammar of a language consists of the sounds and sound patterns, the basic units
of meaning such as words, and the rules to combine all of these to form sentences
with the desire meaning. To understand the nature of a language we must understand
the nature of grammar, in particular, the internalized, unconscious set of rules that is
part of every grammar of every language
When linguists wish to describe a language, they attempt to describe the grammar of
the language that exists in the minds of its speakers. There will be some differences
among speakers ́ knowledge, but there must be shared knowledge too. The shared
knowledge, the common parts of the grammar, makes it possible to communicate
through language. To the extend that the linguist’s description is a true model of the
speaker's linguistic capacity, it is a successful description of the grammar and of the
language itself. Such a model is called a DESCRIPTIVE GRAMMAR. It does not tell you
how you should speak; it describes your basic linguistic knowledge. It explains how it is
possible for you to speak and understand, and it tells what you know about sounds,
words, phrases, and sentences of your language.
We use the word GRAMMAR in two ways:

⮚ In reference to the mental grammar speakers have in their brains

⮚ As the model or description of this internalized grammar.

Grammar: which permits us either to speak a language or to speak about a language
Dionysius Thrax
Grammatical sentence: It means that it conforms to the rules of both grammars
Ungrammatical sentence: Deviates in some way from these rules
If, however, we posit a rule for English that does not agree with your intuitions as a
speaker, then the grammar we are describing differs in some way from the mental
grammar that represent your linguistic competence.
No language or variety of a language (called dialect) is superior to any other in a
linguistic sense. Every grammar is equally complex, logical, and capable of producing
an infinite set of sentences to express any thought.

PRESCRIPTIVE GRAMMARS
It is a rule with which we should not put
Winston Churchill

I don´t want to talk grammar. I want to talk like a lady

G.B Shaw, Pygmalion

“Purists” have believed that language change is corruption, and that there are certain
“correct” forms that all educated people should use in speaking and writing. They wish
to Prescribe rather to describe the rules of grammar, which gave rise to the writing of
prescriptive grammars.
In the renaissance a new middle class emerged who wanted their children to speak the
dialect of the “upper” classes. So Bishop Robert Lowth wrote a book in which
prescribes a number of new rules for English, many influenced by his personal taste. At
first it was not well coming. Many of these prescriptive rules were based on Latin
grammar. Because Lowth was influential and because the rising new class wanted to
speak “properly”, many of these new rules were legislated into English grammar, at
least for the prestige dialect.
Their goal is not to describe the rules people know, but to tell them what rules they
should know.
Prescritives are bound to fail. Language is vigorous, dynamic and constantly changing.
If sentences are muddled, it is not because of the language, but because of the
speakers. Prescriptives should be more concerned about the thinking of the speakers
than about the language they use.
We as linguists wish you to know that all languages and dialects are rule govern and
that what is grammatical in one language may be ungrammatical in another (equally
prestigious) language.
It is undeniable that the standard dialect may indeed be a better dialect for someone
wishing to obtain a particular job or achieve a position of social prestige. Linguistically,
prestige and standard dialects do not have superior grammars.
Writing, which is not acquired through exposure, but must be taught, follows certain
prescriptive rules of grammar, usage, and style that the spoken language does not, and
is subject to little if any dialectal variation.

TEACHING GRAMMARS
The teaching grammar is used to learn another language or dialect. It state explicitly
rules of the language, list the words, and their pronunciations, and aid in learning a
new language or dialect.
Teaching grammars assume that the student already knows one language and
compares the grammar of the target language with the grammar of the native
language.
The rules on how to put words together to form sentences also refer to the learners´
knowledge of their native language
WHAT IS LINGUISTICS?
It is the field that is concerned with the nature of language and (linguistic)
communication.
Linguists examine the structure of language and the principles that underlie those
structures. They study human speech as well as written documents.
Different linguists study language in different ways. “Some study the design features
that the grammars of all the world's languages share. Some study the differences
among languages. Some linguists focus on structure, others on meaning. Some study
language in the head, some study language in society”
FORMAL LINGUISTICS
It is the study of the structures and processes of language, how language works and is
organized.
It studies the structures of different languages, and by identifying and studying the
elements common among them, it seeks to discover the most efficient way to describe
language in general.
It includes five main areas of study: Phonetics, phonology, morphology, syntax and
semantics.
PHONETICS
It is the study of the sounds of language and their physical properties.
It describes how speech sounds are produced by the vocal apparatus (the lungs, the
vocal cords, the tongue and the teeth) and provides a frame for their classification.
PHONOLOGY
It involves analysing how sounds function in a given language or dialect. For
instance, /p/ has two possible sounds in English depending on its position in a word.
Consider pin and spin

MORPHOLOGY
It is the study of the structure of words. Morphologists study minimal units of meaning
(phonemes) and investigate the possible combinations of these units in a language to
form words.
E.g. Imperfections= im + perfect + ion + s
SYNTAX
It is the study of structures of sentences and it describes how words combine into
phrases and clauses and how these combine to make sentences.
SEMANTICS
It is the study of meaning in a language. The goal of semantic study is to explain how
sequences of language are matched with their proper meanings and placed in certain
environments by the speakers of the language
The importance of meaning can be revealed in the example proposed by Chomsky:
“Colourless green ideas sleep furiously” in grammatical, though it is meaningless in
ordinary usage.
 SOCIOLINGUISTICS AND PSYCHOLINGUISTICS

SOCIOLINGUISTICS

Sociolinguistics is one area of study of linguistics that studies language in its social
context. Sociolinguistics is the study of language as a social and cultural phenomenon.

Sociolinguistics studies the social factors that influence how people use language,
including their grammar, accents, and lexical choices. The main social factors are:

· Geographical location

· Occupation

· Gender

· Our parents/carers

· Age

· Socioeconomic status- class and education level

· Ethnicity

GEOGRAPHICAL LOCATION

Where you grew up can significantly impact how you speak. Linguistics refer to these
variations in language as dialects. In the UK, dialects vary from region to region and
often have different pronunciation, grammar, and vocabulary compared to Standard
British English. E.G: Geordie, Scouse and Cockney.

OCCUPATION
It can impact how you use language. Jargon is a kind of slang specifics to a workplace
or small group and is often difficult for people outside the group to understand. E.G:
the tech jargon “unicorn” refers to a start-up company valued at over $1billion.

GENDER

It may affect or impact on how individuals speak. It is a controversial aspect. Some

researchers suggest that differences in speech are due to genetics, while others
believe that women´s lower status in society has had an impact on their use of
language. It is argued that women tend to be more expressive, whereas men are more
direct.

AGE

New words are added to the dictionary every year, and many words that were once
common fall out of use. This is because language is constantly changing.

SOCIOECONOMIC STATUS

This typically refers to a person´s class. The language someone uses will likely differ
significantly depending on their socioeconomic status. This can all be linked to the
education they received, the people they choose to spend time with (or can afford to
spend time with), the job that they do, among others.

ETHNICITY

It refers to the identification of a group of people based on a perceived cultural

distinctiveness. This distinctiveness is believed to be expressed in language, music,
values, art, styles, literature, family, life, religion, rituals, among others. Sociolinguistics
have long argued that there is a relationship between ethnicity and language uses.
Language is a primary and an always present characteristic of ethnicity. Without
language, you would have an incomplete description of ethnicity.

ELEMENTS OF SOCIOLINGUISTICS

LANGUAGE VARIATION: An umbrella term for all the variations in a language. Varieties
of language can develop for various reasons, such as social background, geographical
location, age, class, etc. Language varieties are often referred to as `lects´:

DIALECT: A language variety based on geographical location.

SOCIOLECT: A language variety based on social factors, such as age, gender, or class.

IDIOLECT: A language variety that is specific and unique to an individual. Idiolects are
dependent on social factors (just like sociolects), current environments, education,
friendship groups, hobbies and interests, and so much more.
ETHNOLECT: A language variety specific to a particular ethnic group. It is commonly
used to describe the variation of English that non-native English-speaking immigrants
use in the USA.

ACCENT: How our voices sound, usually due to where we live.

REGISTER: How we change the language we use depending on our circumstances, Eg:
formal vs casual speech.

SUBFIELDS OF SOCIOLINGUISTICS

PRAGMATICS: Studies how context affects meaning. The intended meaning of an

utterance is often different from its literal meaning.

DISCOURSE: It is the analysis of both written and spoken language (discourse) in its
social context. Discourse analysis examines the way in which sentences relate in larger
linguistic units, such as conversational exchanges or written texts. Matters of cohesion
(the relationship between linguistic forms and propositions) and coherence (the
relationship between speech acts) are also investigated.

PSYCHOLINGUISTICS

Psycholinguistics is the study of the psychological and neurobiological factors that

enable humans to acquire, use, comprehend and produce language. Psycholinguists
study first and second language acquisition and how humans store and retrieve
linguistic information, referred to as "verbal processing”.

“The use of language and speech as a window to the nature and structure of the
human mind is called psycholinguistics”. Thomas Scovel.

AREAS OF STUDY OF PSYCHOLINGUISTICS:

LANGUAGE ACQUISITION: It is the process by which humans acquire the capacity to

perceive and comprehend language. It may refer to the study of how individuals
acquire the first language (native language) or a second language (Spanish individuals
acquiring English). The study of how humans acquire language begins with the study of
child-language acquisition. Two theories have been put forth: Behaviourist approach
and innateness hypothesis.

BEHAVIOURISM: A school of psychology. Skinner was one of the founders of

behaviourist psychology, according to which behaviour can be directly observed. It
claimed that children learn through imitation, reinforcement, analogy and similar
processes.

Principles:

• People's behaviours are directly observable, rather than the mental system
underlying these behaviours
 • Children are born with a mind that is like a blank state. This state is called
Tabula Rasa.

• Language is a verbal observable behaviour.

• Chunking theory: language is learned in parts, then linked together. 1 st words-

2nd phrases- 3rd sentences.

INNATISM:

Noam Chomsky showed that language is a complex cognitive system that could not be
acquired by behaviourist principles.

Limitations of behaviourist view of language acquisition led in the 1960´s to the

alternative account of language.

Main argument: Children must be born with an innate capacity for language
development.

Children are born with an innate propensity for language acquisition, and that this
ability makes the task of learning a first language easier than it would otherwise be.

LAD & UG

Chomsky theorized that children were born with a hard-wired language acquisition
device (LAD) in their brains.

LAD is a set of language learning tools, intuitive at birth in all children.

He later expanded this idea into that of universal grammar, a set of innate principles
and adjustable parameters that are common to all human languages.

The child exploits its LAD to make sense of the utterances heard around it, deriving
from this primary linguistic data- the grammar of the language

The LAD (language acquisition device) is a pre-programmed box.

The LAD is a function of the brain that is specifically for learning language. It is an
innate biological function of human beings just like learning to walk.

LAD explain human acquisition of the syntactic structure of language.

It encodes the major principles of a language and its grammatical structures into the
child's brain.

It enables the children to analyze language and extract the basic rules.

UG: Universal grammar or Generative grammar

We are born with a set of rules about language in our brains.

Children are equipped with an innate template or blueprint for language and this
blueprint aids the child in the task of constructing a grammar for their language.

This is known as “innateness hypothesis”

NEUROLINGUISTICS

It is the study of the neutral mechanisms in the brain that control the comprehension,
production, and acquisition of language.

It also focuses on how damage affects language and cognition.

VERBAL PROCESSING

It refers to how humans store and retrieve linguistic information.

It involves speaking, understanding, reading, and writing, and includes the production
of verbal output and the reception of the output of others.

The human brain is capable of:

• Acquire and store vocabulary and grammar.

• Access its storehouse to speak and comprehend language in real time.

Language:

• Is open-ended and creative.

• Is accessed when we produce speech and when we interpret another speaker´s

words.

• Speaking and comprehending are processed through five levels: linguistic,

physiological, acoustic, physiological and linguistic.

Language processing:

A spoken utterance (output) starts in the brain of the speaker.

It is put into linguistic form (linguistic level) and interpreted as articulation commands
(physiological level), it emerges as an acoustic signal (acoustic level). The signal is
processed by the listener´s ear (physiological level) and sent to the brain, where it is
interpreted (linguistic level).
When we speak, we access our lexicon to find the words, and use the rules of grammar
to construct novel sentences and to produce the sounds that express the message we
wish to convey. When we listen to speech and understand what is being said, we also
access the lexicon and grammar to assign a structure and meaning to the sounds we
hear.

The grammar relates sounds and meaning, and contains the units and rules of the
language that make speech production and comprehension possible. However, other
psychological processes are used to produce and understand utterances. There are
mechanisms that enable us to break the continuous stream of speech sounds into
linguistic units such as phonemes, syllables, and words in order to comprehend, and to
compose sounds into words in order to produce meaningful speech. Other
mechanisms determine how we pull words from the mental lexicon, and still others
explain how we construct a phrase structure representation of the words we retrieve.

Comprehension involves the ability to segment the continuous speech signal into
phonemes, morphemes, words, phrases and sentences; to construct a mental model of
the discourse of which the sentence is a part; and to do all that more or less is parallel.
STRUCTURALISM

Ferdinard de Saussure is considered to be the founder of Structuralism

Structuralism is a system in which each element in a group can only be understood by

its relation to other elements as part of a larger structure.

The term structural linguistics can be used to refer to the European movement and can
be characterized as post-Saussurean, since Saussure is generally regarded as its
inspiration. The central claim of this movement is that terms of a language of all kinds
(sounds, words, meanings) present themselves in Saussure’s phrase “as a system”, and
can only be identified by describing their relations to other terms of the same
language; one cannot first identify the terms of a language and then ask which system
they belong to. Moreover, because a language is a system of signs, one cannot identify
expression-elements (sounds, words) independently of the content-elements
(meanings), so that a study of language cannot be divorced from one of meaning.

Before Saussure language was generally seen as a way to name things. Saussure
argued that language was a way to help people understand things not just to define
them.

Saussure’s work focused on the way language is made.

Saussure’s definition of language:

● All language is made of signs. Each sign has two parts: Signifier and signified.
● It is possible to create complex messages by putting signs together.
Saussure considered that the purpose of language is to connect thoughts and sounds.
Once this process is completed and the signifier and the signified are joined, they are
inseparable.

Signs are arbitrary

I.E: There is no natural connection between the signifier and the signified. It is because
of their arbitrariness that signs must be agreed on by a group of people to be effective.
As a consequence, some languages have words for concepts that do not exist in other
languages.

Onomatopoeic words have a definite relationship to what they represent, thus they
are not entirely arbitrary.

However, different languages represent the same natural sounds in slightly different
ways, meaning that they are not completely non arbitrary either. (if so, every language
would have to have precisely the same word to represent the same natural sound).

By stringing signs together, we can create a more complex message. This is what
Saussure called Syntagm.

A syntagm is a group of signs where each sign makes sense only because of the
position it holds relative to the other signs in the group.
Saussure dichotomies of language: He not only distinguished between the signified
and the signifier, but also between langue and parole; synchrony and diachrony.
LANGUE AND PAROLE
LANGUE: Encompasses the abstract, systematic rules and conventions of a signifying
system that exists in the mind of the speakers. It involves the principles of language,
without which no meaningful utterance, or parole, would be possible.
It is a complete system of linguistics signs that allows to configure and determine the
use of grammar, phonology and vocabulary. This system is conventionalized according
to the communicative needs of a society.
PAROLE: Refers to the concrete instances of the use of the langue, including texts
which provide the ordinary research material for linguistics. Parole is physical, it makes
use of the physiological mechanism (speech organs).
It is a physical manifestation of speech through individual use of language (langue)
each person creates a particular style that characterizes it in the process of
communication in a society.
Langue represents the “work of a collective intelligence”, which is both internal to
each individual and collective, in so far as it is beyond the will of any individual change.
Parole, on the other hand, designates individual acts, statements and utterances,
events of language use manifesting each time a speaker´s ephemeral individual will
through his combination of concepts and his “phonation”- the formal aspects of the
utterance.

SYNCHRONIC AND DIACHRONIC LINGUISTICS

SYNCHRONIC LINGUISTICS:
Compares languages (or dialects) to:
- Description of the rules of a language in a specific time period without
references to other stages.
- Understanding of the inner functioning of a language.
It encompasses the study of a language at a given point in time. The time studied may
be either the present or a particular point in the past; synchronic analysis can also be
made of dead languages, such as Latin.

DIACHRONIC LINGUISTICS:
It is focused on the development and evolution of languages through different time
periods. It studies and observes the phonological, grammatical and semantic changes
that occur during early stages in languages.
It demonstrated many relations and common points among languages. It also
reconstructs and groups languages of the world into families and analyzes the story of
speech communities.
SEMIOTICS
It is the analysis of signs and symbols and how meaning is created, interpreted and
communicated by such signs. Which is to say that it is the study of meanings,
communication, interpretation and significance.
It was defined by one of its founders, Ferdinand de Saussure, as the study of “the life
of signs within society.” The idea of semiotics as an interdisciplinary field of study
emerged only in the late 19th and early 20th centuries with the independent work of
Saussure and of the American philosopher Charles Sanders Peirce.
What is a sign?
The basic unit of semiotics is the sign. A sign is a unit of meaning.
Signs combine to form texts. A text can be thought of as a message recorded in some
medium so that it is independent of a sender or a receiver.
PEIRCE AND HIS TRIADIC MODEL
When Sassure was formulating his two part ‘dyadic’ model of the sign, Pierce was
theorizing his own model of semiotics and signs, he expanded on Saussure's
perspective.
He added a third part to Saussure’s model- the interpretant or what the audience
makes of the sign or the sense of what’s actually communicated.
The representamen is the form which the sign takes (not necessarily material, though
usually interpreted as such), called by some theorists the “sign vehicle”. In other
words, how the sign is represented.
The interpretant is the sense made of the sign, how the sign is interpreted.
The object (referent) is something beyond the sign to which is refers-what is
represented.
For example:
An apple (representamen) it represents education (object) to the teacher who keeps it
on her desk, but to the hungry student, it represents food. Two different interpretants
(education, food)
The sign/representamen is very much like Saussure’s signifier. It stands for something
and is interpreted.
This produces the Interpretant, which is close to Saussure’s signified. It is what is
represented or meant by a sign.
Both the sign/representamen and the interpretant together stands for something else:
The object.
E.g:
Representamen: the red light.
Interpretant: signifies the need to stop.
Object: you stop the car.
For Peirce logic and semiotics are exactly the same thing. Like Saussure, Peirce
believed that signs allow coded access to an object, but in Peircean semiotics signs can
be material as well as mental/psychological.
Why do the two models exist?
The schools of thought represent two different assumptions:
- One tells us that X always means Y. There is no room for reinterpretation. The
sign will always mean the same thing.
- The other tells us that X can best be interpreted as Y. Leaving room for
reinterpretation. It begs the question of how these relationships of meaning
form.
Peirce’s seminal work in the field was anchored in pragmatism and logic. He defined a
sign as “something which stands to somebody for something”, and one of his major
contributions to semiotics was the categorization of signs into three main types:
1) An icon, which resembles its referent (signified) the thing being represented
(such as a road sign for falling rocks).
2) An index, which is associated with its referent (as smoke is a sign of fire). Shows
evidence of what’s being represented.
3) A symbol, which is related to its referent only by social convention (as with
words or traffic signals). It has no resemblance between the signifier and the
signified. The connection between them must be culturally learned. Numbers
and alphabets are good examples, there’s nothing inherent in the number 9 to
indicate what it represents. it must be culturally learned.
The main difference between each broad category of signs is the quality of the physical
relationship between the signifier and signified.
Peirce also demonstrated that a sign can never have a definite meaning, for the
meaning must be continuously qualified.
In contrast to Saussure’s model, Pierce formulated a three part triadic model
consisting of an interpretant, representament and an object. Having an interpretant as
part of his semiotic model was Peirce’s new and distinctive addition to understanding
and defining signs.
Saussure believed that a sign could only be the simplest form whereas Peirce believed
that anything was a sign no matter how complex.
Peirce believed that a sign was formed from a three part triadic model whereas
Saussure believed that there were only two components to this form double entity
linguistic unit.

We can think of the sign as the signifier, for example, a written word, an utterance,
smoke as a sign for fire, etc. The object, on the other hand, is best thought of as
whatever is signified, for example, the object to which the written or uttered word
attaches, or the fire signified by the smoke. The interpretant, the most innovative and
distinctive feature of Pierce’s account, is best thought of as the understanding that we
have of the sign/object relation. The importance of the interpretant for Peirce is that
signification is not a simple dyadic relationship between sign and object: A sign
signifies only in being interpreted. This makes the interpretant central to the content
of the sign, in that, the meaning of a sign is manifest in the interpretation that it
generates in sign users.
CHOMSKY AND GENERATIVE GRAMMAR
According to Chomsky, every language is a grammar and if we learn the grammar, we
can understand that language; eg: grammar is the key to learn any language.
So, his Universal Grammar is the basis of Generative Grammar; which refers to any
theory capable of producing well-formed sentences and rejecting ill-formed ones.
Observations that support the Chomskyian view of language
Until Chomsky propounded his theory of universal grammar in the 1960s, the
empiricist school that had dominated thinking about language since the
Enlightenment, held that when children came into the world, their minds were like a
blank slate.
Subsequent research in the cognitive sciences, which combined the tools of
psychology, linguistics, computer science, and philosophy, soon lent further support to
the theory of Universal Grammar. For example, researchers found that babies only a
few days old could distinguish the phonemes of any language and seemed to have an
innate mechanism for processing the sounds of the human voice.
Thus, from birth, children would appear to have certain linguistic abilities that
predispose them not only to acquire a complex language, but even to create one from
whole cloth if the situation requires.
Chomsky and the evolution of language
Chomsky, for his part, does not see our linguistic faculties as having originated from
any particular selective pressure, but rather as a sort of fortuitous accident. He bases
this view, among other things, on studies which found that recursivity—the ability to
embed one clause inside another, as in “the person who was singing yesterday had a
lovely voice”—might be the only specifically human component of language.
According to the authors of these studies, recursivity originally developed not to help
us communicate, but rather to help us solve other problems connected, for example,
with numerical quantification or social relations. According to Chomsky and his
colleagues, this might simply be the result of some other kind of neuronal
reorganization.
Noam Chomsky was an American linguist who focused on the effortless language
learning of young children.
Chomsky didn’t believe that exposure to a language was enough for a young child to
become efficient at understanding and producing a language. He believed that humans
are born with an innate ability to learn languages. According to Chomsky’s theory, the
basic structures of language are already encoded in the human brain at birth. This
theory is known as “Universal Grammar.”

GENERATIVE GRAMMAR
Generative Grammar is a linguistic theory that considers grammar to be a system of
rules that is intended to generate exactly those combinations of words which form
grammatical sentences in a given language.
The term was originally used in relation to the theories of grammar developed by
Noam Chomsky, beginning in the late 1950s.
Linguists who follow the generative approach, originated by Chomsky, have been
called generativists. The generative school has focused on the study of syntax, but has
also addressed other aspects of a language’s structure, including morphology and
phonology.
Early versions of Chomsky’s theory were called transformational grammar, and this is
still used as a general term that includes his subsequent theories.
⮚ Central to Chomsky’s approach is the notion of the well-formed sentence.
The number of sentences in a language is infinite. Can you imagine why? Two
principles are responsible for this.
● The first one is called CREATIVITY. Grammaticality judgments do not only apply to
sentences we have heard before but also to ‘new’ utterances. This remarkable ability is
referred to as CREATIVITY. Any native speaker is capable of understanding and
producing new sentences. This characteristic of language shows that languages cannot
simply be learned by imitation; rather, languages are acquired by principles of
abstraction. Moreover, some linguists may also argue that these principles are even
innate.
● The second principle, beyond creativity, is referred to as RECURSION. Natural
languages typically allow constructions that involve the repetitive occurrence of
elements. This phenomenon is defined as RECURSION. Any attempt to describe such
growing structures by enumerating the elements in them, faces the problem that there
is no upper limit to the length of such sentences. You can embed structures within
structures. For example, the flowers were on the table near the window in the living
room.
⮚ A central notion of generative Grammar is the notion of COMPETENCE.
As a native speaker of language we are able to make numerous intuitive judgments
about our language. We do not have to consult grammar books, on the contrary, by
virtue of knowing a language we know that some sentences are fine and some others
are not. This is referred to as Native Speaker Competence.
COMPETENCE AND PERFORMANCE
A comparable distinction to that of Saussure, designed to idealize language data, and
to define the scope of linguistic enquiry, is made by Noam Chomsky. He distinguishes
competence, the knowledge that native speakers have of their language as a system of
abstract formal relations, and performance, their actual behaviour. Although
performance must clearly be projected from competence, and therefore be referable
to it, it does not correspond to or in any direct way. As with other aspects of human
life, we do not necessarily act upon what we know, quite simply because actions are
inevitably caught up in particular circumstances which set constraints and conditions
on what we do. So it is that actual linguistic behaviour is conditioned by all manner of
factors other than a knowledge of language as such, and these factors are, according
to Chomsky, incidental, and irrelevant to linguistic description. Performance is
particular, variable, dependent on circumstances. It may offer evidence of
competence, but it is circumstantial evidence and not to be relied on. Abstract
concepts of competence and actual acts of performance are quite different
phenomena and you cannot directly infer one from the other. What we know cannot
be equated with what we do.
Chomsky's distinction obviously corresponds in some degree to that of Saussure. It
represents a similar dichotomy of knowledge and behaviour and a similar demarcation
of the scope of linguistic enquiry. There are, however, differences. To begin with, there
is no ambivalence in Chomsky as to the status of the distinction. It is not that
competence is presented as a convenient construct and therefore a useful principle for
language study: It is presented as a valid construct, as the central principle of language
itself. To focus on competence is to focus on what is essential and primary.
Performance is the residual category of secondary phenomena, incidental, and
peripheral.
A second point to be made is that though langue and competence can both be glossed
in terms of abstract knowledge, the nature of knowledge is conceived of in very
different ways. Saussure thinks of it as socially shared, common knowledge: his image
is of langue as a book, printed in multiple copies and distributed throughout a
community. It constitutes, therefore, a generality of highest common factors. But for
Chomsky competence is not a social but a psychological phenomenon, not so much
printed as imprinted, not a shared generality but a genetic endowment in each
individual. Of course, individuals are not innately programmed to acquire competence
in any particular language, but competence in any one language can nevertheless be
taken as a variant in respect to universal features of language.
Langue, then, is conceived of as knowledge which is determined by membership of a
social community, and so it follows that the focus of attention will naturally be on what
makes each langue different. In this definition of linguistic knowledge, the main
question of interest is: what is distinctive about particular languages as social
phenomena? Competence, on the other hand, is conceived of as knowledge which is
determined by membership of the human species and it follows that the interest here
will naturally be not on what makes individual competences different but what makes
them alike. In this definition of knowledge the main question of interest is: what is
distinctive about language in general, and as specific to the human species?
⮚ Two components constitute the core of Generative Grammar:
The first is called the PHRASE-STRUCTURE (PS) component. Its central task is the
structure description of all well-formed sentences of a language. To achieve this goal
we need a well defined rule system. So, we need rules that combine all categories into
successive larger units.
The second component is called LEXICON. The lexicon interacts with the PS component
and contains information about the lexemes of a language. This includes: phonological,
morphological, syntax and semantic aspects.
To recap, the whole system works as follows: the Phrase Structure Component
contains a limited set of rules with which basic sentence structures can be generated.
These structures are licensed by means of lexical information.
Generative Grammar explains: language processing, language acquisition and language
variation; and, as a result of the treatment of these 3 phenomena, it seems plausible to
claim that language is like an instinct we acquire and we use subconsciously.
Conclusion
Because of the fact that language acquisition is one of the most important functions of
the mind, the human being has always been eager to know how we learn languages,
how we acquire languages and how we use it in our day to day life.
Generative Grammar not only provides a description of the structure of a language,
but it seems to explain -among others- the following phenomena: it wants to explain
language processing, that is, how the human beings understand and produce speech;
language acquisition, that is, what occurs in an infant’s mind when he/she acquires
his/her mother tongue; and language variation, that is, why languages change and
what is going on under the surface of language variation.

HALLIDAY AND THE SYSTEMIC FUNCTIONAL LINGUISTICS

Systemic Functional Grammar or Linguistics, first introduced by Michael Halliday
(1985), refers to a new approach to the study of grammar that is radically different
from the traditional view in which language is a set of rules for specifying grammatical
structures. In this view, language is a resource for making meanings and hence
grammar is a resource for creating meaning by means of wording. Halliday &
Matthiessen (1999, p.3) clarify their position with respect to SFL as follows:
For the task of constructing such a meaning base, we shall use a systemic grammar. A
systemic grammar is one of the class of functional grammars, which means (among
other things) that it is semantically motivated, or ‘natural’, In contradistinction to
formal grammars, which are autonomous, and therefore semantically arbitrary, in a
systemic grammar every category (and ‘category’ is used here in the general sense of
an organizing theoretical concept, not in the narrower sense of ‘class’ as in formal
grammar) is based on meaning: it has a semantic as well as a formal, lexico-
grammatical reactance.
According to SFL, Grammar is an economy-based system to make multiple meanings.
It’s a resource to create an infinite number of meanings (Saying “open the door” to a
stranger –vs to a family member).
To capture the essence of the distinction between grammar and theories of grammar,
Halliday and Matthiessen (1997, 1999) call the latter ‘grammatics’. They further
underscore the need for a richer theory of grammar (i.e. SFL), claiming that the
traditional ‘grammar as rule’ type of theory falls far short of the demands that are now
being made on grammatical theories.
In Halliday’s (1985, p.xiv) terms:
The theory behind the present account is known as ‘systemic’ theory. Systemic theory
is a theory of meaning as choice, by which a language, or any other semiotic system, is
interpreted as networks of interlocking options… whatever is chosen in one system
becomes the way into a set of choices in another, and go on as far as we need to, or as
far as we can in the time available, or as far as we know how.
In Systemic Functional Linguistics, ‘clause’ rather than ‘sentence’ is the unit of analysis.
In Systemic theory, a clause is a unit in which meanings of three different kinds are
combined.
"According to Halliday (1975), language has developed in response to three kinds of
social-functional 'needs.' The first is to be able to construct experience in terms of
what is going on around us and inside us. The second is to interact with the social
world by negotiating social roles and attitudes. The third and final need is to be able to
create messages with which we can package our meanings in terms of what is New or
Given, and in terms of what the starting point for our message is, commonly referred
to as the Theme. Halliday (1978) calls these language functions metafunctions and
refers to them as ideational, interpersonal and textual respectively.
"Halliday's point is that any piece of language calls into play all three metafunctions
simultaneously."
These three distinct structures, each expressing one kind of semantic organization, are
mapped onto one another to produce a single wording.
(i) The interpersonal meta-function is concerned with the interaction between
speaker and addressee, the grammatical resources for enacting social roles in general,
and speech roles in particular, in dialogic interaction, i.e. for establishing, changing,
and maintaining interpersonal relations. The building blocks of this semantic function
configure as Subject, Finite, Predicator, and Complement.
(ii) The ideational meta-function is concerned with ‘ideation’, grammatical resources
for construing our experience of the world around and inside us. This meta-function is
analyzed in terms of the Transitivity system, i.e. a choice between the six processes
and the participants and circumstances associated with those processes. A clause in its
ideational function is a means of representing patterns of experience, i.e. to build a
mental picture of reality. This is what people employ to make sense of their experience
of what goes on around them and inside them: these goings- on (processes) are sorted
out in the semantic system of the language and expressed through the grammar of the
clause. The system that works out the types of process and hence participants in the
process and circumstances associated with the process is known as the Transitivity
system. In English, the processes are of the following types (Halliday, 1985, 1994,
2004):
(iii) The textual meta-function is concerned with the creation of text with the
presentation of ideational and interpersonal meanings as information that can be
shared by speaker and listener in text unfolding in context.
In functional approaches to grammar, MEANING is essentially equated with FUNCTION.
This idea of matching meanings and wordings is central. Because we are concerned
with FUNCTIONAL GRAMMAR (the study of linguistic forms in relation to the meanings
that they express) rather than only semantics (the study of meaning).
Halliday uses the term LEXICOGRAMMAR to capture his view that lexis and grammar
form a continuum of linguistic resources for the expression of meaning, with LEXIS as
the most delicate set of choices and GRAMMAR as the most general.
How can we relate the functions performed by speakers to the wordings that they
choose? Some of the more specific types of meanings/functions are:
● The meanings/functions related to what the speaker expects the hearer to do (E.g.:
giving information vs. asking for information. She bought a CD on Friday. vs. Did she
buy a CD on Friday?)
● The meanings related to the speaker’s assessment of the validity of his/her
proposition. (These are typically expressed by the use of modality resources of the
language. E.g.: ‘may’, ‘possibly’, etc. She bought the CD on Friday vs. She may have
bought the CD on Friday.)
● The meanings related to signaling how the message fits in with (makes sense in
relation to) what else is said around it. These meanings are expressed for example, by
the ordering of the constituents of the clause. (E.g.: She bought the CD on Friday. vs.
On Friday she bought the CD.)

SFL
Systemic Functional Linguistics
-It was developed in the 20th century and it continues to evolve in this century.
-It is a social theory of language developed by Halliday.
-It is the study of the relationship between language and its functions in social settings.
-It explores how people use language in different contexts and how language is
structured as a semiotic system.
-It provides the tools to analyze written and spoken texts with particular attention
given to the context in which they are produced.
-There are 5 basic principles of SFL: 1) Social Semiotics; 2) Language as a resource; 3)
Text rather than sentences; 4) Texts and social context; and 5) Construing meaning.
1. Social Semiotics: SFL sees language as a system of signs which are used for social
purposes.
2. Language as a resource: SFL sees language as a resource for making meaning rather
than a system of rules.
3. Text rather than sentences: SFL concerns text as the basic unit through which
meaning is negotiated. A text is anything that conveys or produces meaning effectively.
4. Texts and Social context: SFL focuses on close relations between text and social
contexts.
5. Construing meaning: SFL concerns language as a system for construing meaning
rather than as a conduit through which thoughts and feelings are poured.
Whenever we use language we are doing 3 things at the same time:
We’re conveying experiential/ideational meaning. Language helps us construct human
experience. It refers to how the individual sees the world .
We’re conveying textual meaning. Language allows us to bring structure to our
interactions and organize the language system itself.
We’re conveying interpersonal meaning. Language allows us to express the
interactions and complex relations with other speakers in society.
These 3 metafunctions of language have correlations with the 3 variables of the
context of the situation (field, tenor and mode).
Experiential meanings are realized by means of the variable of field.
Interpersonal meanings are realized by the contextual variable of tenor.
Textual meanings are realized by means of the contextual notion of mode.
Systemic, or Systemic-functional, theory has its origins in the main intellectual
tradition of European linguistics that developed following the work of Saussure. Like
other such theories, both those from the mid-20th century (e.g. Prague school, French
functionalism), it is functional and semantic rather than the sentence as its object, and
defines its scope by reference to usage rather than grammaticality.
SYSTEMIC FUNCTIONAL LINGUISTICS
- Language is seen as SYSTEMS OF CHOICES
- Halliday was NOT interested in the kind of formalities that happened in
Chomsky's grammar and traditional grammar.
- He was concerned about the ways in which one`s functional purposes in
communicating SHAPE the form of communication.
LANGUAGE
1. Always occurs as a text (in any form: spoken or written).
2. Is used to express MEANING.
3. Is FUNCTIONAL.

SFL then treats language and social context as complementary levels of semiosis,
related by the concept of realisation.
The interpretation of social context includes two communication planes:
- GENRE: Context of culture
- REGISTER: Context of situation.
It refers to specific lexical and grammatical choices as made by speakers
depending on the situational context.
3 dimensions characterize register:
- Field
- Tenor
- Mode
THREE METAFUNCTIONS OF LANGUAGE
Three principal functions of language (all of which happen all the time together in
language)
- FIELD-IDEATIONAL: What the speaker is talking about, he/she is doing
something that has a referent in the world. (a doctor-doctor talk-a student
writing a narrative text).
- TENOR- INTERPERSONAL: The function in which language expresses a
relationship between speaker and listener.
- MODE-TEXTUAL: Texts have a certain structure, form (written, spoken),
coherence (given vs new information).
GENRE
 - It includes BOTH register and the communicative purpose.
- It serves a social purpose that enables us to interact.
- For Martin, “virtually everything we do involves some kind of genre”.

TEXT AND DISCOURSE. COHESION AND COHERENCE.

COHESION
It is like glue that holds the paragraph together. When there’s cohesion, ideas flow
from one sentence to another smoothly. The end of one sentence is related to the
beginning of the next sentence.
E.g: “she took dance classes, she had no natural grace or sense of rhythm. She
eventually gave up the idea of becoming a dancer”
COHERENCE
It is how clear and logical ideas are. When there’s coherence, the reader can
understand the sentence well. When a paragraph is choppy or the ideas are hard to
follow it’s because it is not COHESIVE.
E.g: “she took dance classes, she had no natural grace or sense of rhythm. She
eventually gave up the idea of becoming a dancer”.
When a paragraph is hard to understand or it is confusing it’s because it is not
COHERENT.
In order for a passage to be coherent, readers need to identify the topic of each
sentence and to recognize how topics connect to each other and to the main idea.
We can say that COHESION is achieved by the use of COHESIVE DEVICES (words and
phrases like conjunctions, synonyms, pronouns, and transitional phrases).
One key step to achieving cohesion is the REPETITION of key ideas, specially the main
subject in a given paragraph. However, it is important not to repeat non-essential
words or phrases too much in that paragraph thus giving it VARIETY.
To achieve this we can use several kinds of devices, particularly synonyms. We can also
achieve variety by using pronouns. Some pronouns can also be used as adjectives.
Another common form of cohesive device is TRANSITIONAL WORDS or PHRASES.
There is a large variety of transitional devices which indicate different kinds of possible
relationships between ideas. For example, “similarly” = to express similarity between
ideas; “furthermore” = to express addition between ideas, etc.
Moreover, in some pieces of writing it is needed not only to show how ideas connect
to each other but also what order they will be presented in. A common way for us to
understand this order is through CHRONOLOGICAL SEQUENCING.
It is important to be consistent with the use of these devices (sequencing
words/phrases) and to think about what order our ideas should be presented in.
Here are some tips that may help you checking your written productions.
> When proofreading, do it going from BIG to SMALL:
1. Organization and content.
Read the passage from beginning to end without stopping and ask yourself the
following questions:
- Is the organization of the passage easy to follow?
- Can you identify the main ideas and the supporting details easily?
- Is the passage saying something meaningful about the topic?
- Is the passage coherent?
2. Sentence structure. Examine the sentence structure of the passage:
- Did you use a variety of simple, compound, and complex sentences?
- Are the sentences organized in a cohesive way?
3. Word choices.
- Did you use words that develop thought?
- Do the words fit into the passage?
- Are the words appropriate for the topic?
4. Spelling and punctuation
-Check for misspelled words.
- Each sentence begins with a capital letter and ends with a period.
- Commas and quotation marks are used correctly