Lingvistkredsens årsmøde samt foredrag ved Jan Rijkhoff, Aarhus Universitet: "A unified approach to functional (interpersonal) categories in linguistics"

Mødet starter med Lingvistkredsens årsmøde (dagsorden for årsmødet udsendes til medlemmerne). Derefter følger foredrag ved Jan Rijkhoff fra Aarhus Universitet

A unified approach to functional (interpersonal) categories in linguistics

Linguistic units have formal, semantic and functional (i.e. interpersonal - a.k.a. ‘communicative’ or ‘discourse’) properties (Rijkhoff 2015). Since categorization is regarded as a defining characteristic of human cognition (Harnad 2005: ‘to cognize is to categorize: cognition is categorization’), one might expect linguists to employ formal, semantic and functional categories. But whereas formal categories such as Verb Phrase, Noun Phrase / Determiner Phrase or Prepositional Phrase take pride of place in formal, syntactocentric approaches to grammar, functional and semantic categories do not play a conspicuous role in functional theories of grammar. For example (Rijkhoff 2014: 130), “…, the term ‘functional category’ … is not employed in Functional Discourse Grammar (FDG). The only categories that are explicitly mentioned in FDG are semantic categories (Hengeveld & Mackenzie 2008: 130–8), which, however, are not so much concerned with meaning as coded in linguistic forms or constructions (‘linguistic semantics’), but rather with ontological categories to the extent that they are reflected in grammar (a.k.a. ‘philosophical semantics’; cf. Lyons 1995; Jackendoff 1983: 51)”.

     Currently interpersonal phenomena are referred to by a variety of names (e.g. ‘acts’, ‘functions’, ‘forces’). This talk puts forward a unified approach to functional (interpersonal) categories in linguistics (esp. in grammatical theory and linguistic typology), aiming for a function-based classification of all linguistic units.

References

Harnad, Steven. 2005. To cognize is to categorize: cognition is categorization. In H. Cohen and C. Levebvre (eds), Handbook of Categorization in Cognitive Science, 20‑44. Amsterdam: Elsevier.

Hengeveld, Kees and Mackenzie, J. Lachlan. 2008. Functional Discourse Grammar. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Jackendoff, Ray. 1983. Semantics and Cognition. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.

Lyons, John. 1995. Linguistic Semantics: An introduction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Rijkhoff, Jan. 2014. Modification as a propositional act. In María de los Ángeles Gómez González, Francisco José Ruiz de Mendoza Ibáñez and Francisco Gonzálvez-García (eds.), Theory and Practice in Functional-Cognitive Space (Studies in Functional and Structural Linguistics, 68), 129-150. Amsterdam: Benjamins.

Rijkhoff, Jan. 2015. Word order. In James D. Wright (editor-in-chief), International Encyclopedia of the Social & Behavioral Sciences (Second Edition), Vol. 25, 644–656. Oxford: Elsevier.