Lesson 1

Methods of comparison of languages

Some sort of comparison of languages follows as an early consequence of any

study or even
awareness of languages. Linguists have studied and compared languages for
years in attempt
to find similarities and differences among them. More recently, comparison of
languages has
given rise to the branch of linguistic science referred to as comparative
linguistics, sometimes called comparative filology. According to
Britannica, comparative linguistics is the study of the relationships and
correspondences between two or more languages and the techniques used to
discover whether the languages have common ancestor. Some linguists
(Lančarič) distinguish between comparative and contrastive linguistics,
setting up the difference in that the comparative linguistics is the study of
those languages which are genetically related whereas contrastive linguistics,
on the other hand, is the study of genetically unrelated languages.

Regardless of being comparative or contrastive, this linguistic branch gave

rise to two main
methods of comparison of languages being the genetic and analytic
comparison of languages.

1. Genetic Comparison of Languages

Even though some attempts to compare and contrast languages had been
made earlier, the real research was delayed until late 18 th century when, in
1786, Sir William Jones brought up the idea of Sanskrit, the ancient Hindu
language and its similarities to Latin and Greek. A solid base for his linguistic
research was given by his previous studies. He studied Greek, Latin, Hebrew,
Persian and Arabic. As an orientalist and jurist, he even took up Sanskrit to
equip himself for studying Hindu and Muslim law. While studying Sanskrit, he
developed the idea of a common source
for languages which proved to be his greatest achievement. In The Sanskrit
Language Jones wrote
of how he observed that Sanskrit had strong resemblance to Greek and Latin
which led him to suggest that the three languages not only had a common
root but they were related to Gothic, Celtic and Persian languages. The
extensive knowledge of Sanskrit, the member of the family of Indo-European
languages, nurtured the idea of a common ancestor to all Indo-European
languages. Using Sanskrit, Jones (and other linguists afterwards) traced back
the idea of the ancestor language and restored the hypothetical ancestor
language so-called Proto Indo European. Proto Indo European language is
believed to have been spoken in a great part of the world from 4500 to 2500
B.C even though there is no direct evidence of Proto Indo European being a
real language. It only was restored from its present-day descendants using
comparative method.
Another famous linguist who contributed to and is considered the father of
comparative linguistics is Franz Bopp, the professor of Oriental literature and
general philology at the University of Berlin.
His masterpiece Uber das Conjugationssystem der Sanskritsprache (On the
system of Conjugation in Sanskrit) published in 1816, foreshadowed his major
achievement. He traced the common origin of Sanskrit, Persian, Greek, Latin
and German. First he compared the grammatical category of verb and then he
added more grammatical categories and all his work grew into an elaborated
analysis of the above mentioned languages.
The Danish linguist Rasmus Rask completed his Investigation of the Origin of
the Old Norse or Icelandic Language in 1814. His work demonstrated the
relation of Germanic to Latin, Greek and Slavic. Rask showed that in the
consonant sounds, words in the Germanic languages vary with a certain
regularity from their equivalents in the other Indo European languages e.g.
En: father, acre and Latin pater, ager.
What Rask observed, proved to be the basis of a fundamental law of
comparative linguistics,
later referred to as the Grimm’s Law enunciated in 1822 by Jacob Grimm.
Jacob Grimm pursued scholarly research on German language history
publishing the first edition of the book Deutsche Gramatik (German grammar)
in 1819. Apart from his research into linguistics, him and his brother Wilhelm
are famous for a series of fairy tales translated into Slovak as Rozprávky
bratov Grimovcov.

Another prominent comparative linguist is August Schleicher. From 1850 to

1857 Schleicher taught classical philology and comparative study of Greek
and Latin at the University of Prague. During this period, he turned to study of
Slavonic languages. He did research into Lithuanian which, in the same time,
was his first attempt to study Indo European Language directly from speech
rather than from texts. Following his previous work, he published his
masterpiece A Compendium of the Comparative Grammar of the Indo
European, Sanskrit, Greek and Latin Languages, in which he studied the
common characteristics of the languages and attempted to reconstruct the
Proto-Indo-European Parent language. Schleicher believed that language is an
organism exhibiting periods of development, maturity and decline. As such, it
could be studied by the methods of natural science. Developing the system of
language classification resembling a botanical taxonomy he traced groups of
related languages and arranged them into genealogical tree. His model came
to be known as the family-tree theory, and was a major development in the
history of Indo-European studies.

Lesson 2
The Functionalist and Structuralist Approach to
Language
In the late 1920 an attempt was made in Prague to utilize advantages of both
the genetic comparison and the analytic comparison of language. These
efforts gave rise to a new approach
referred to as functional and structural. The main representatives of the
newly born approach
were the Slavists N.S. Trubetzkoy, R. Jakobson and B. Havránek together with
the Anglicists
V. Mathesius, the founder of the approach and B. Trnka. Since the new
approach started in Prague, it was largely elaborated by Vachek. Thus the
following chapter relies quite heavily on
his work of A Linguistic characterology of Modern English.
The combination of the structural and the functional in the new approach had
its meaning. The above mentioned linguists, by declaring themselves as
structuralists moved away from the Neogrammarian atomism, by calling
themselves functionalists, they wanted to underline basically function of
language. The functional and structural approach partly relied on the
synchronic interests of the Humboltian traditions (see handout 1). That does
not mean that the Prague linguists were hostile to the diachronic study. On
the contrary, they were convinced that only the conception of diachronic
comparison of language can explain how languages change at all.

A related approach to the functional and structural approach presented in

Prague, was the one called generativist and transformationalist. This
approach was first introduced by Noam Chomsky, Professor at the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Mass.
As Chomsky presents, grammar is an ordered set of rules the application of
which we can generate, i.e. create all correct sentences of that language (and
only such sentences). He also
introduced the Theory of universal grammar proposing that humans
possess innate faculties
related to the acquisition of language. Universal grammar consists of a set of
atomic grammatical categories and relations that are the building blocks of
the particular grammars of all human languages, over which syntactic
structures and constraints on those structures are defined (Encyclopedia
Britannica).
Chomsky’s theory shares common features with Humboldt’s approach in that
it pushes forwards “Energeia” – the creative activity always present in
language. On the other hand, the objection that Vachek makes to the theory
of Chomsky’s is that Chomsky neglects the dynamic character of language
and its rich and delicate stratification (Vachek 1990).

The Programme of Linguistic Characterology

First, it needs to be noted that the term of “characterology” was made up by

Wilem Mathesius and is not used in any other context apart from its reference
to the field of linguistics. A great part of the programme can be observed in
the below diagram.
Formerly, linguistic analysis was carried out from the point of view of reader
(hearer) – linguists analysed written text, old and new, with the aim to
establish the meaning of such utterances. More recently, however, linguists
have begun to approach the problem of language from the speaker’s
(writer’s) perspective stating that there are certain communicative needs
and the speaker / writer is faced with the task of finding the linguistic means
to express them.
In other words, while previously linguists were interested in the process of
decoding, the more
recent approach is concerned with the process of encoding. As for the type
of text, the older
research was primarily concerned with written texts whereas the latter put
emphasis on spoken
utterances. And all efforts were directed towards penetration through written
text, to the phonic
structure behind them. The latest approach though, is a complementary one
as it has been found
out that written language has its own, specific function, different from that of
spoken language.
Spoken utterances react to extralinguistic reality in a quick and immediate
manner while written
utterances cater for such reactions as are preservable and easily surveyable.

The process of encoding is accompanied by two major questions:

1. What elements are selected in the encoding process from the
extralinguistic reality.
2. How the elements selected are brought into mutual relationship in actual
utterances.

These two questions postulate the two major directions of linguistic

characterology:

functional onomatology and functional syntax. Functional onomatology

is concerned with
the activity of naming the selected elements of the extra-linguistic reality and
functional syntax is concerned with organizing such elements into larger
wholes, sentences and utterances (Vachek). In other words, Functional syntax
is, in Mathesius’ view (1929b), mainly concerned with the sentence- forming
act and "concentrates its attention mainly on the investigation of predicate
forms in any language", on the description of its "sentence patterns"
(Mathesius 1936b-c) as they are defined by the linguistic meaning of a langue
(Nekula 1994).

On a contrastive basis, we ascertain the characteristic differences existing

between languages:
e.g. in functional onomatology, different classification of actions by tenses, in
functional syntax, the differences in rules governing word order. Functional
onomatology thus covers most problems of lexicology and, in part, some
essential problems of morphology. Functional syntax covers the same ground
as syntax in the narrower sense of the term.

A few words about the founder

Mathesius established English Studies in Czech university education. He
became a professor in 1912. The academic surroundings gave rise to a new
linguistic circle called the Prague Linguistic Circle in 1926. In 1936, Mathesius
became editor-inchief of the periodical called Slovo a slovesnost. Even though
Mathesius wrote his dissertation on a literary topic, later he was more
associated with linguistics, particularly the confrontation of Czech and English.
Working with English as a background, Mathesius worked out and described
for Czech what he called
the “functional sentence perspective” (aktuálne členenie vety). (Nekula
1994).

Functional Sentence Perspective

Word order and its communicative function was largely analysed by the
Prague linguistic
circle. This was done mainly within the framework of Functional sentence
perspective. FSP is
a fundamental principle identifying word order in the languages with flexible
word order (e.g.
Slovak language). FSP demonstrates the communicative intention of the
speaker. FSP, first
introduced by Mathesius viewed the sentence from two basic perspectives:

1. Something that one is talking about, from which the speaker proceeds
(basis / theme).
2. What one says about it (the nucleus / rheme)

Since it is often difficult to draw a neat line between theme and rheme,
transition is sometimes
added, and three elements are distinguished as in the following example:

Mr. Brown / has turned out / an excellent teacher.

Theme transition rheme

The unmarked sequence of these elements is Th + Rh (Objective order), the

reverse sequence
Rh + Th is called Subjective order which is usually carries an emotional
colouring.
The dichotomy of theme and rheme was further developed by Firbas who
introduced the theory
of communicative dynamism which he defines as the extent to which the
sentence elements
contribute to the development of the communication. Following his theory of
communicative
dynamism, Firbas defines FSP as the distribution of various degrees of
communicative
dynamism over the elements of the sentence. As Firbas puts it, there is a
basic distribution of
communicative dynamism which consists of theme-transition-rheme
sequence. FSP for Firbas
is the outcome of an interplay of (1) the basic distribution of communicative
dynamism and (2)
the context and the semantic structure of the sentence. (Gutknecht 1977).
Firbas then suggests
the so-called three level approach to syntax – the semantic level, the
grammatical level and the
level of contextual organisation. If a sentence is uttered, it is always uttered
within a context
thus the contextual realisation of sentences constitutes the last of the three
levels.

Further Reading:
Luelsdorff, P.: The Prague School of Structural and Functional Linguistics, John
Benjamins
Publishing Company, Amsterdam / Philadelphia 1994
Nekula, M.: Vilém Mathesius, published in . Verschueren, J.-O. Östman, J.
Blommaert & Ch.
Bulcaen (eds.): Handbook of Pragmatics. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John
Benjamins
Publishing Company, 1999, 1–14.
Gutknecht, Ch.: Grundbegriffe und Hauptstromungen der Linguistik, Hoffmann
und Campe
Verlag, Hamburg 1977, ISBN: 3-455-09214-4
Vachek, J.: A Linguistic Characterology of Modern English, SPN Praha 1990,
ISBN: 80-218-
0110-0

An important role in comparative philology and the development of the

languages of the Indo-European language family was played by
Neogrammarian school (Junggrammatiker). Their hypothesis stated that
sound laws have no exceptions. Their principle was very controversial
because there seemed to be several irregularities in language change not
accounted for by the sound laws, such as Grimm’s law, that had been
discovered by that time. (encyclopedia Britannica). Any explanation of forms
can only be done in terms of regular sound-laws. The thesis of the
unexceptional character of the sound-laws was programmatically declared.
(Vachek 1990). The neogrammarian theory was summarized by Hermann
Paul in his book Prinzipien der Sprachgeschichte (Principles of the History of
Language). In this book Paul formulated the well-known neogrammarian
maxim that a truly scientific grammar of language can only be based on
historical research. The results of the neogrammarian research were codified
in their five-volume compendium whose English translation was published
under the title Elements of the Comparative Grammar of the Indo-Gemanic
languages.

All linguists mentioned earlier had something in common – they attempted to

establish the connections between the current and the ancestor languages
and restore the common source language, so-called the Proto Language
(Proto-Indo-European). Thus the names like Proto-Indo-European, Proto-
Germanic share the prefix “proto” meaning “first, original or from which other
similar things develop” Also, all the linguists mentioned earlier explored
genetically related languages. The type of their exploration may well be
traced in the word “genetic” as such… genetic may refer to the word “genus”
(pl. genera) used in biology for the usual major subdivision of a family or sub-
family in the classification of organisms.

As for the methodology of linguistic research, the question may arise whether
the research into
the genetic comparison of languages is synchronic or diachronic. Language
system at any stage of its existence needs to be studied as synchronic. On the
other hand, the comparative method, i.e. the one used in historical diachronic
linguistics (mentioned in the earlier paragraphs), languages are studied from
the diachronic perspective.

2. Analytic Comparison of Languages

Besides the genetic comparison of languages, there was another current

using a different method. Mathesius calls it a method of analytic comparison
because it analyzes languages – whether genetically related or not – by a
detailed comparison of their elements and features.
Whereas the genetic comparison of languages is primarily the concern of
diachronic study of
language, the analytic comparison is purely synchronic as the main focus is
put on searching
for differences among language at a particular time, regardless their ancestor
language or their
historical developments.
The main representative of the analytic comparison of languages is William
Von Humoldt. He studied a number of languages of various genetic origins
and tried to find the typical features which differentiate them from one
another. The method used by Humboldt was exclusively synchronic, non-
historical.
To Humboldt we owe the three well-known language types:
isolating, agglutinating and inflecting.
Humboldt placed himself into opposition to the genetically comparative
approach. Humboldt’s theory was that language is not an “ergon” a
completed piece of work, but an energeia – creative activity. As a result, he
emphasized concrete acts of speech rather than the system of language
(Vachek 1990). One of the drawbacks of his theory was his effort to explain
the specific character of a given language from the specificity of the national
character of the people speaking that language. National character, however,
is a very vague concept and if it is used as an explanatory principle, one
unknown is substituted by another unknown.