Table Of ContentINTERNATIONALE BIBLIOTHEK
FÜR ALLGEMEINE LINGUISTIK
INTERNATIONAL LIBRARY
OF GENERAL LINGUISTICS
Herausgegeben von
EUGENIO COSERIU
BAND 37 • 1975
JERZY KURY-LOWICZ
ESQUISSES LINGUISTIQUES II
WILHELM FINK VERLAG MÜNCHEN
r.
© 1975 Wilhelm Fink Verlag, München
Gesamtherstellung: Friedrich Pustet, Graph. Großbetrieb, Regensburg
Bayewriisscchhee A
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Staatsbsilbbllilootthheekk
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TABLE DES MATIÈRES
Avant-propos 7
Linguistics of To-Day 9
Le mécanisme différenciateur de la langue 30
The Evolution of Grammatical Categories 38
Extrapolation d'une loi linguistique 55
Einige Bemerkungen zur sog. generativen Transformations
grammatik 67
Phonologie und Morphonologie 73
Metaphor and Metonymy in Linguistics 88
On the Methods of Internal Reconstruction 93
The Role of Deictic Elements in Linguistic Evolution . . 121
Die Stelle des Verbalaspekts im Konjugationssystem . . . 131
La gemination consonantique dans les noms propres . . .135
Probleme der indogermanischen Lautlehre 143
Phonologisches zum indogermanischen Gutturalproblem . . 152
Phonologisches zum Problem der idg. stimmlosen Aspiraten 158
Über einige Fiktionen der vergleichenden Sprachwissenschaft 165
Un mirage de la grammaire comparée de l'indo-européen . 175
Indo-European Metrical Studies 185
The Quantitative Meter of Indo-European 197
Notes de conjugaison
1 207
II 223
Le gén. plur. en- (n) am en indo-iranien 242
Autour de v. ind. sâsti et sâdhati 251
Les adjectifs thématiques à féminin en -ï- 256
L'accentuation en vieil iranien 263
Le mètre des Gäthäs de l'Avesta (Y. 28-34) 268
L'origine de v èçeXxuaTixôv 289
Giec KT, X0, 00 = v. ind. ks, etc 296
Deux notes sur la conjugaison grecque 307
A Remark on Lachmann's Law 316
Ein altirisches Lautgesetz 321
Morphological Palatalization in Old Irish 323
La désinence verbale -r en indo-européen et en celtique . . 330
La rime en vieil irlandais 344
The Germanie Verschärfung 354
Die Flexion der germanischen schwachen Femininstämme . 361
Les thèmes en -/-, -u- du germanique 368
Zur Vorgeschichte des germanischen Verbalsystems . . . 376
Les verbes germaniques du type lûkan 382
A Problem of Germanie Alliteration 388
Die sprachlichen Grundlagen der altgermanischen Metrik . 395
A Remark on the Great Vowel Shift . . • 413
Les thèmes en -ë- du baltique 418
Die Flexionen des Adjektivs im Baltischen und im Sla vischen 426
Les présents lituaniens en -sta- 439
Das idg. Perfekt im Slavischen 447
L'intonation des voyelles allongées 454
Personal and Animate Genders in Slavic 458
Slavic damb : A Problem of Methodology 465
Sur une particularité de la conjugaison slave 470
Les itératifs en -eie/o- en slave et en baltique 475
Spécification des sources 481
AVANT-PROPOS
Le deuxième volume des „Esquisses linguistiques" contient de
brèves contributions à la linguistique générale et la linguistique
comparée publiées dans la décade passée. Tout comme dans le
premier volume l'intérêt de l'auteur se portait souvent plutôt sur
la méthode et les notions linguistiques générales que sur le pro
blème historique particulier. Des articles parus dans des journaux
ou des volumes peu répandus sont ainsi rendus accessibles au
lecteur.
Les contributions écrites en polonais ou en russe ont été tra
duites en allemand, les autres, publiées en allemand, français
ou anglais, restent sans changement. J. K.
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LINGUISTICS OF TO-DAY
The rise of modem functional (or « classical ») structuralism and the method of establishing
linguistic « values > are briefly sketched. The ultimate goal of linguistics, viz. the establishing of
a unirersals », which at the same time are a powerful instrument of historical reconstruction, is
then discussed. Finally, the bonds of common interest between linguistics and logic are pointed
out.
1. — If one were obliged to draw a line of chronological demarcation
between the present status of linguistics and the preceding stages of
its historical development, one would be well justified in looking for
it in the vicinity of 1930. It is towards the end of the twenties and
during the thirties of our century that certain axioms and principles,
up to then only unconsciously or tacitly followed and applied by pro
minent representatives of the science of language, were finally explicated
and foundations laid for linguistics as an autonomous and independent
branch of knowledge. In order to characterize it let us stress the
features which differentiate it from the linguistics of the nineteenth
century and the beginning of the twentieth.
2.1. — Up to now people have been inclined to use the terms
philology and linguistics {philologist and linguist) rather indiscriminately.
The former has several current meanings, the technical and most impor
tant one being: occupation with texts, preparing texts for utilization
(collation of manuscripts or printed editions, emendation, commentary,
publication). Such an activity does not presuppose scientific investi
gation of the given language, although it postulates a good knowledge
of linguistic facts. Philology, as regards written or printed texts, is
an indispensable preliminary condition of a correct linguistic analysis
of such texts. But the requirements necessary for successful philological
work are not sufficient to form a competent linguist. To apply the
knowledge of an individual language in order to determine the genui
neness or correctness of written tradition is not the same as to investi
gate linguistic phenomena. The misunderstanding of the proper goals
of philology and of those of linguistics gave rise to conflicts, chiefly
during the nineteenth century. The dispute was settled by the linguistic
school of « neogrammarians » (in the seventies), only sporadically flaring
up during the later period.
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2.2. — But let us add that this epistemological gulf between the
two disciplines, one of them envisaging individual and the other ge
neral phenomena, is not always a gulf in practice. Many hard-boiled
linguists have a soft spot for philology (besides making use of its re
sults), especially for philology concerned with old texts. There is a
keen human interest in historical things which are individual, excep
tional, never to occur again, for what is a hapax in a very general sense.
The French mathematician and philosopher Henri Poincaré once wrote
that a statement of historians such as John Lackland passed through
this place (on a certain date) only means « John Lackland will never
pass through this place again » and therefore does not interest science
in the strict sense of the term. We know better now as regards the
general laws of the history of language, and not only of language. On
the other hand the phenomena described e.g. in a history of earthquakes
or eclipses of the sun, though subject to general physical laws, are at
the same time unrepeatable qua historical phenomena. But Poincaré's
remark aptly illustrates the human interest in the nevermore. Let us
take de Saussure, the father of modern linguistics himself, whose cor
respondence with Meillet has been recently published. He was deeply
interested as a « philologist » in the classical texts of Greek and Latin,
but was prevented from a study of their peculiar features by the
general linguistic considerations and concepts forcing themselves upon
his mind.
It may, however, be stated in all fairness that in practice the dif
ference between the philologist establishing the peculiarities and idiosyn
crasies of individual texts, applying to them his knowledge of the given
language, and the linguist looking for specific laws within the language,
is at present generally recognized.
3.1. — It is an interesting fact that the greatest difficulty in de
fining human language was the determination of its function. From
the very beginning of a theoretical approach towards this prob
lem the function of communication has been considered as an essential
ingredient of the definition. Already Plato considered language as a
tool (ßpyavov) used by the speaker in order to inform the hearer about
something. There is no doubt that nowadays this would be also the
opinion of « the man in the street ». But curiously enough modern
science has returned to this point of view after certain detours caused
by the changing trends in psychology, introspection on the one hand,
behaviourism on the other.
Two secondary functions of speech, expression and appeal, have
been brought to the fore by different schools of linguistics. To take
relatively recent examples, Vossler and Croce regarded the expressive
function of speech as the fundamental one, thus confusing the origin
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of linguistic forms with their usage once they have been incorporated
into the system of language. It was partly an aftermath of the pre
dominantly historical outlook of the nineteenth century, only gradually
replaced by the functional approach. Also in the nineteenth century
dictionaries were considered as « collections of faded metaphors »,
thus recognizing expressiveness as the driving force of linguistic innova
tions.
According to the behaviouristic school (e.g. L. Bloomfield) speech
functions as a verbal stimulus or a verbal reaction, parallel to other
physical phenomena (including human activities).
3.2. — Both theories have been dealt with by the psychologist
K. Bühler (1934). Any human activity may offer features which are
merely expressive (i.e. it may have expressive connotations)1, and any
human activity may be a reaction or function as a stimulus. Therefore
these traits characterize speech in the same degree as in the case of
any other human activity and cannot be considered as its differentia
specifica. There is no social pattern of behaviour corresponding to a
given (oral or written) act of communication. Eeaction depends not
only on the contents of the text, but also on the situation and on the
individual, i.e. on numerous and various circumstances. To include
all of them in the analysis of the oral or written « message » in order
to establish its function would be equal to a general study of human
reaction to different stimuli. But this is a task for psychology, not
for Unguis tics.
The chief objection against behaviourism in linguistics is the fact
that it confuses the communication mediated by the text with informa
tion from outside. The communication conveyed by the sentence your
brother is coming will be always the same within a given linguistic commu
nity, i. e. its linguistic value is a constant, whereas its « meaning » as
interpreted by a behaviourist will be different with a hearer accustomed
to such visits and another whose brother is seriously ill or lives abroad.
Behaviourists seem to ascribe the greatest importance to what
may be called the stimulative effect of the contents of the text. They
often do not seem to understand the fact that this is not at all the
proper function of language but a phenomenon entailed by the contents
of the text communicated to the hearer, therefore a phenomenon con
ditioned by the previous performance of the communicative function of
speech (of the text). To put it crudely, the text must be understood
before it can stimulate the hearer.
In much the same way a text representing an expressionistic
treatment of a given subject is possible only owing to the communica-
1 The fact that e.g. in lyric poetry it is Just the expressive function which is essential,
does not contradict the basic exigency of intelligibility (i.e. of the communicative function).
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