Notions sur la Linguistique Anglaise

1- What is Language?

Language is an invaluable tool of the human race. Language is a system of conventional

spoken, manual (signed), or written symbols by means of which human beings, as members
of a social group and participants in its culture, express themselves.

a- As a semiotic system, language is a means to communicate. By that, we simply

mean that it is a set of signs. A sign is a pair consisting of a signifier and a
signified. (We prefer to call signifier the exponent and the signified, the meaning.)
b- According to the Longman Dictionary of applied Linguistics, Language is a system
of human communication by means of structured arrangement of sounds to form
larger units such as morphemes, words, sentences.
c- For American linguists Bloch and Trager, Language is a system of arbitrary vocal
symbols by means of which a social group cooperates.

Important: Signs systems are ubiquitous. Clocks, road signs, pictograms, etc; are all parts
of signs system. Language differs from them only in its complexity.
In linguistics, language signs are constituted of four different levels: phonology, morphology,
syntax and semantics…

2- What are origins of language?

Talking about origins of language, we can identify :

- Divine source
- Natural sound source or bow-wow theory
- Social interaction source or yo-he-lo theory
- Physical adaptation source
- Tool making source
- Genetic source

 The Language Acquisition Device (LAD) is an innate predisposition, a tool in the brain
that helps children to quickly acquire linguistic structure and understand language.
 3- What are the properties of language?
All creatures can communicate with other members of their species. Yet, there are some
properties of language that are unique to human beings.

a- Reflexivity: It is the property that enables human to use language, to think and talk
about language itself.
b- Displacement: Animal communication is mostly designed for the present moment,
the “here and now”. There is no possibility to relate intentionally to events that took
place before or after the present moment. Displacement allows us to refer to the
past, present and future and to other locations.
c- Arbitrariness: By this property, there is no natural connection between the linguistic
form (signifier) and its meaning (signified). The linguistic form has no natural or iconic
relation with the object or the situation that is being referred to.
There is an evident relationship of resemblance between an onomatopoeic
word and the object that is being referred to. Then we speak of
Onomatopoeia when there is a direct link between a signifier and a signified.
d- Productivity or creativity: Also called open-endednesss, this property deals with the
fact that human language offers unlimited possibilities of creating and expressing
new forms and sets of meaning, new expressions, new sentences, various ways of
expressing the same message. The potential number of utterances in human
language is infinite.
e- Cultural transmission: Here, we have to know that there are no genes for words, or
for other specific language features. Language is not something that a person can
inherit from his/her parents. Children learn language through socialization and
engagement with those around them…. Language acquisition is then non-biological,
it is non-genetic.
f- Discreteness: Language consists of small, separable units of sounds (phonemes) each
of which has an identity and can be combined to form larger units (morphemes)…
The fact that the pronunciation of the forms back and back leads to a distinction in
meaning can only due to the difference between the “p” and “b” sounds in English.
Each sound in language is treated as discrete.
g- Duality or double articulation: Language is organized at two different levels
simultaneously: distinct sounds and distinct meanings. At the first level, humans are
able to produce different sounds (phonemes) like /e/; /t/; and /n/. In isolation, none
of these phonemes carries meaning. At the second level, when the sounds are
meaningfully combined, the phonemes can carry specific meanings: /ten/ or /net/…
Duality makes it possible to produce innumerable numbers of meanings with a
limited number of sounds.
 4- What is Linguistics?

Linguistics is the scientific study of language as knowledge system available for speakers to
communicate with one another.It involves how this knowledge system is structured, how it
is acquired, how it is used in the production and comprehension of messages, and how it
changes over time.

5- Theoretical approaches of linguistics

a- Diachronic versus Synchronic study of language.

Diachronic linguistics is the same as historical linguistics. It studies changes n language over
time. It can be the general evolution of all languages or the evolution of a particular or
dialect.
Synchronic linguistics is the study of the linguistic elements and usage of a language at a
particular moment.

b- Ferdinand de Saussure (1857-1913):

He is a swiss linguist who brings a revolution in the field of linguistics. Before him linguistics
was only about historical and comparative studies. But with him, there was a shift in the
overall approach to language studies. That was focused on diachronic analysis is now
focused on synchronic study of language.
Ferdinand de Saussure believed in language as a system of signs, which consists of two parts:
“signified and signifier”. He also distinguished “langue and parole” on the one hand and
that “syntagmatic and paradigmatic relationship” on the other hand.

- Langue: the abstract system. It is the whole system of language that precedes an makes
speech possible.
- Parole: the actual, concrete use of language by individual speakers. It is an external
manifestation of langue.
- Syntagmatic: also a relation of succession, it is about the ways in which elements are
combined/string together…
- Paradimatig: also a relation of substitution, it is a relation that holds between elements
of the same category (elements that ccan be substituted for each other)
 c- Noam Chomsky (1928):

By his approach called Transformational generative Grammar (TGG), the American Noam
Chomsky is one of the famous in the world of English linguistics. In his approach to language,
he developed the idea of “competence and performance” making clear distinction between
them.

- Competence: is as an idealized capacity that is located as a psychological or mental

property… (e.g. knowing the language)
- Performance: is most with the production of actual utterances… (e.g. doing
something with the language

d- Michael Alexender Kirwood Halliday (1925):

His linguistic approach to language studies is link to a functionalism approach. He views

language as a system of choices at different levels, and each choice provides an aspect of
meaning in context.
- Interpersonal function
- Ideational function
- Textual function