Principles and parameters

Last updated

Principles and parameters is a framework within generative linguistics in which the syntax of a natural language is described in accordance with general principles (i.e. abstract rules or grammars) and specific parameters (i.e. markers, switches) that for particular languages are either turned on or off. For example, the position of heads in phrases is determined by a parameter. Whether a language is head-initial or head-final is regarded as a parameter which is either on or off for particular languages (i.e. English is head-initial, whereas Japanese is head-final). Principles and parameters was largely formulated by the linguists Noam Chomsky and Howard Lasnik. Many linguists have worked within this framework, and for a period of time it was considered the dominant form of mainstream generative linguistics. [1]

Contents

Principles and parameters as a grammar framework is also known as government and binding theory. That is, the two terms principles and parameters and government and binding refer to the same school in the generative tradition of phrase structure grammars (as opposed to dependency grammars). However, Chomsky considers the term[ clarification needed ] misleading. [2] [ further explanation needed ]

Framework

The central idea of principles and parameters is that a person's syntactic knowledge can be modelled with two formal mechanisms:

Within this framework, the goal of linguistics is to identify all of the principles and parameters that are universal to human language (called universal grammar). As such, any attempt to explain the syntax of a particular language using a principle or parameter is cross-examined with the evidence available in other languages. This leads to continual refinement of the theoretical machinery of generative linguistics in an attempt to account for as much syntactic variation in human language as possible.

Language acquisition

The Principles and Parameters approach is a postulated solution to Plato's Problem, as defined and stipulated by Chomsky. This program seeks to explain the apparent gap between linguistic knowledge and linguistic competency. [3] In particular, given finite and possibly incomplete input, how do children in different linguistic environments rapidly arrive at an accurate and complete grammar that seems to exhibit universal and non-obvious similarities? [4]

According to this framework, principles and parameters are part of a genetically innate universal grammar (UG) which all humans possess, barring any genetic disorders. As such, principles and parameters do not need to be learned by exposure to language. Rather, exposure to language merely triggers the parameters to adopt the correct setting. The problem is simplified considerably if children are innately equipped with mental apparatus that reduces and in a sense directs the search space amongst possible grammars. The P&P approach is an attempt to provide a precise and testable characterization of this innate endowment which consists of universal "Principles" and language-specific, binary "Parameters" that can be set in various ways. The interaction of the principles and the parameter settings produces all known languages while excluding non-natural languages.

Criticisms

Criticism of the P&P approach has come from a number of quarters, but with varying impact. These can be subdivided into three main groups.

Perhaps the most influential criticisms of P&P have been theory internal. As in any other developing field of enquiry, research published within the P&P paradigm often suggests reformulations and variations of the basic P&P premises. Notable debates emerged within P&P including (a) derivationalism vs representationalism (b) the locus of morphology (e.g. lexicalism vs derived morphology) and (c) the tension between a production model and a competence model amongst others. The development of head-driven phrase structure grammar (HPSG) and lexical functional grammar (LFG) reflect these debates: these are both strongly lexicalist and representational systems. Nevertheless, perhaps the most coherent and substantial critique of P&P is the Minimalist Program, Noam Chomsky's most recent proposal. [5] This program of research utilizes conceptions of economy to enhance the search for universal principles and parameters. Linguists in this program assume that humans use as economic a system as possible in their innate syntactic knowledge. The Minimalist Program takes issue with the large number of independent postulations in P&P and either (a) reduces them to more fundamental principles (e.g. Merge, Move, Agree), (b) derives them from 'reasonable' interface constraints on derivations (e.g. bottom-up Merge and requirement that no derivation be counter-cyclic derives Relativized Minimality effects) or (c) programmatically suggests that they be either derived from more basic principles or eliminated subject to future research (e.g. Binding Principles). Note that there is debate about whether the Minimalist Program is motivated by the empirical shortcomings of P&P [6] or whether it is motivated by ideological concerns with 'elegance' etc. [7] (see main article on the Minimalist Program).

Aside from this major move within the discipline, it seems that consensus has not been achieved over a list of universal parameters. [8] Certainly, there is no publicly available list of these parameters and textbooks tend to cite the same ones: the interrelated verb-movement parameters (V-v, V-T, T-C), noun-movement parameters (N-D), subject-related parameters (pro-drop and EPP) and headedness parameters. This is not to say that the theory has not been fruitful (e.g. Holmberg and Platzak’s comprehensive analysis of parametric variation in Scandinavian languages), or that the theory is not descriptively adequate, but rather that the accomplishments of this line of thinking have been less than anticipated in terms of explanatory adequacy. Particularly, a systematic, predictive system of parameters, their properties and interactions, along the lines of the periodic table in chemistry, has yet to be developed. Generally, theorists have moved to regarding parameters as varying feature specifications on lexical items within languages and derivations rather than parameters which are globally defined.

For example, while formal linguistics takes the sentence to be the canonical unit of analysis, conversation analysis (CA) takes the turn at talk as canonical. Speakers in conversation often do not use complete sentences or even complete words to converse. Rather, discourse is composed of sequences of turns which are composed of Turn construction unit (e.g. a word, phrase, clause, sentence). [9] In CA, the form and meaning of an utterance is a product of situated activity- which is to say meaning is highly contextual (within a social, interactive context) and contingent upon how participants respond to each other regardless of grammatical completeness of an utterance.

Similarly, other discourse and corpus linguistic analyses have found recursion and other forms of grammatical complexity to be rather rare in spoken discourse (especially in preliterate societies) but common in written discourse suggesting that much of grammatical complexity may in fact be a product of literacy training. [10] [11] [12] [13]

Other critics point out that there is little if anything that can unequivocally be called universal across the world's languages. [14] Discourse analyses have focused on the dynamic, dialogic, and social nature of language use in social situations. [15] [16] [17] [18] These critics argue that P&P and discourse analysis differ in the same way that chemistry and cookery differ: one is the study of fundamental interactions at a micro-scale in a deterministic model that attempts to be scientific in the broad sense, the other is a more macro-scale, non-deterministic, non-scientific model focussing on use of chemicals in everyday situations in the real world. What these critiques have in common is the claim that the analysis of I-language does not carry over to E-language. From a Chomskyan perspective, this is a truism because the two objects of study are fundamentally different.

There is a tendency for inter-paradigm critiques to focus on a number of assumptions that are commonly associated with P&P, but which actually are common to Chomskyan generative linguistics as a whole. These include innateness, modularity, the poverty of the stimulus, language universals, [19] binarity, etc. See for example, Connectionist, Functionalist and Cognitivist critiques. As another example, the linguist Larry Trask argues that the ergative case system of the Basque language is not a simple binary parameter, and that different languages can have different levels of ergativity. [20] Also, some have argued using evidence from historical linguistics that grammar is an emergent property of language use. [21] [22] [23] Language evolution theorist, Terrence Deacon notes that it is problematic to consider language structure as innate - that is, as having been subject to the forces of natural selection, because languages change much too quickly for natural selection to act upon them. There are many more critiques. There is debate about the validity of these arguments, but since these are not specific to P&P they will not be dealt with here.

Examples

Examples of theorized principles are:

Examples of theorized parameters are:

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ Newmeyer, F.J. (2004). Against a parameter-setting approach to language variation. Linguistic Variation Yearbook 4:181-234.
  2. ↑ Chomsky, Noam (2014). The minimalist program (20th anniversary ed.). Cambridge, Massachusetts. p. 26. ISBN   978-0-262-32728-2. OCLC   899496765.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  3. ↑ David Adger. (2003) Core Syntax. Oxford University Press. p.11.
  4. ↑ ibid., p.16
  5. ↑ Chomsky, Noam. (1995). The Minimalist Program. MIT Press, Cambridge MA
  6. ↑ Holmberg, Anders (2000). Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 18: 837–842
  7. ↑ Lappin, Shalom. Levine, Robert. Johnson, David. (2000). Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 18: 665–671.
  8. ↑ Haspelmath, Martin. (2008). Parametric versus functional explanations of syntactic universals. Pp75--107 in The limits of syntactic variation. Biberauer, Theresa (Ed.) John Benjamins, Amsterdam.
  9. ↑ Sacks, H., E. Schegloff, G. Jefferson (1974). "A Simplest Systematics for the Organization of Turn-taking for Conversation." Language 50(4): 696-735.
  10. ↑ Chafe, W. L. (1985). Linguistic differences produced by differences between speaking and writing. Literacy, language, and learning: The nature and consequences of reading and writing. D. R. Olson, N. Torrence and A. Hildyard. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press
  11. ↑ Croft, W. (2000). Explaining Language Change. New York, Longman.
  12. ↑ Kalmar, I. (1985). Are There Really No Primitive Languages? Literacy, Language, and Learning. D. R. Olson, N. Torrence and A. Hildyard, Cambridge U Press.
  13. ↑ Thompson, S. A. and P. J. Hopper (2001). Transitivity, Clause Structure, and Argument Structure: Evidence from Conversation. Frequency and the Emergence of Linguistics Structure. J. L. Bybee and P. J. Hopper. Amsterdam, Benjamins.
  14. ↑ Tomasello, M. (2004). "What kind of evidence could refute the UG hypothesis? Commentary on Wunderlich." Studies in Language 28(3)
  15. ↑ Goodwin, C. (1979). The Interactive Construction of a Sentence in Natural Conversation. Everyday Language:Studies in Ethnomethodology. G. Psathas. New York, Irvington Publishers: 97-121
  16. ↑ Goodwin, C. (2003b). The Semiotic Body in its Environment. Discourses of the Body. J. Coupland and R. Gwyn. Oxford, Oxford University Press
  17. ↑ Heritage, J. (1987). Ethnomethodology. Social Theory Today. A. Giddens and J. Turner. Cambridge, Polity Press.
  18. ↑ Duranti, A., Ed. (2001). Linguistic Anthropology: A Reader, Blackwell Publishing.
  19. ↑ Evans, N and Levinson, Stephen. (2009). "The Myth of language universals: language diversity and its importance for cognitive science. Behavioral and Brain Sciences. 32. pp429--492.
  20. ↑ Larry Trask reviews The Atoms of Language: The Mind's Hidden Rules of Grammar by Mark C. Baker
  21. ↑ Hopper, P. (1987). "Emergent Grammar." Berkeley Linguistics Society 13: 139-57.
  22. ↑ Hopper, P. and E. Traugott (2003). Grammaticalization, Cambridge U Press.
  23. ↑ Heine, B. and T. Kuteva (2007). The Genesis of Grammar: A Reconstruction, Oxford U Press.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Syntax</span> System responsible for combining morphemes into complex structures

In linguistics, syntax is the study of how words and morphemes combine to form larger units such as phrases and sentences. Central concerns of syntax include word order, grammatical relations, hierarchical sentence structure (constituency), agreement, the nature of crosslinguistic variation, and the relationship between form and meaning (semantics). There are numerous approaches to syntax that differ in their central assumptions and goals.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Universal grammar</span> Theory of the biological component of the language faculty

Universal grammar (UG), in modern linguistics, is the theory of the innate biological component of the language faculty, usually credited to Noam Chomsky. The basic postulate of UG is that there are innate constraints on what the grammar of a possible human language could be. When linguistic stimuli are received in the course of language acquisition, children then adopt specific syntactic rules that conform to UG. The advocates of this theory emphasize and partially rely on the poverty of the stimulus (POS) argument and the existence of some universal properties of natural human languages. However, the latter has not been firmly established, as some linguists have argued languages are so diverse that such universality is rare, and the theory of universal grammar remains controversial among linguists.

In linguistics, transformational grammar (TG) or transformational-generative grammar (TGG) is part of the theory of generative grammar, especially of natural languages. It considers grammar to be a system of rules that generate exactly those combinations of words that form grammatical sentences in a given language and involves the use of defined operations to produce new sentences from existing ones.

In linguistics, X-bar theory is a model of phrase-structure grammar and a theory of syntactic category formation that was first proposed by Noam Chomsky in 1970 reformulating the ideas of Zellig Harris (1951), and further developed by Ray Jackendoff, along the lines of the theory of generative grammar put forth in the 1950s by Chomsky. It attempts to capture the structure of phrasal categories with a single uniform structure called the X-bar schema, basing itself on the assumption that any phrase in natural language is an XP that is headed by a given syntactic category X. It played a significant role in resolving issues that phrase structure rules had, representative of which is the proliferation of grammatical rules, which is against the thesis of generative grammar.

Deep structure and surface structure are concepts used in linguistics, specifically in the study of syntax in the Chomskyan tradition of transformational generative grammar.

Government and binding is a theory of syntax and a phrase structure grammar in the tradition of transformational grammar developed principally by Noam Chomsky in the 1980s. This theory is a radical revision of his earlier theories and was later revised in The Minimalist Program (1995) and several subsequent papers, the latest being Three Factors in Language Design (2005). Although there is a large literature on government and binding theory which is not written by Chomsky, Chomsky's papers have been foundational in setting the research agenda.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Generative grammar</span> Theory in linguistics

Generative grammar, or generativism, is a linguistic theory that regards linguistics as the study of a hypothesised innate grammatical structure. It is a biological or biologistic modification of earlier structuralist theories of linguistics, deriving from logical syntax and glossematics. Generative grammar considers grammar as a system of rules that generates exactly those combinations of words that form grammatical sentences in a given language. It is a system of explicit rules that may apply repeatedly to generate an indefinite number of sentences which can be as long as one wants them to be. The difference from structural and functional models is that the object is base-generated within the verb phrase in generative grammar. This purportedly cognitive structure is thought of as being a part of a universal grammar, a syntactic structure which is caused by a genetic mutation in humans.

In linguistics, the minimalist program is a major line of inquiry that has been developing inside generative grammar since the early 1990s, starting with a 1993 paper by Noam Chomsky.

In generative grammar, non-configurational languages are languages characterized by a flat phrase structure, which allows syntactically discontinuous expressions, and a relatively free word order.

In linguistics, linguistic competence is the system of unconscious knowledge that one knows when they know a language. It is distinguished from linguistic performance, which includes all other factors that allow one to use one's language in practice.

Poverty of the stimulus (POS) is the controversial argument from linguistics that children are not exposed to rich enough data within their linguistic environments to acquire every feature of their language. This is considered evidence contrary to the empiricist idea that language is learned solely through experience. The claim is that the sentences children hear while learning a language do not contain the information needed to develop a thorough understanding of the grammar of the language.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Biolinguistics</span> Study of the biology and evolution of language

Biolinguistics can be defined as the study of biology and the evolution of language. It is highly interdisciplinary as it is related to various fields such as biology, linguistics, psychology, anthropology, mathematics, and neurolinguistics to explain the formation of language. It is important as it seeks to yield a framework by which we can understand the fundamentals of the faculty of language. This field was first introduced by Massimo Piattelli-Palmarini, professor of Linguistics and Cognitive Science at the University of Arizona. It was first introduced in 1971, at an international meeting at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Biolinguistics, also called the biolinguistic enterprise or the biolinguistic approach, is believed to have its origins in Noam Chomsky's and Eric Lenneberg's work on language acquisition that began in the 1950s as a reaction to the then-dominant behaviorist paradigm. Fundamentally, biolinguistics challenges the view of human language acquisition as a behavior based on stimulus-response interactions and associations. Chomsky and Lenneberg militated against it by arguing for the innate knowledge of language. Chomsky in 1960s proposed the Language Acquisition Device (LAD) as a hypothetical tool for language acquisition that only humans are born with. Similarly, Lenneberg (1967) formulated the Critical Period Hypothesis, the main idea of which being that language acquisition is biologically constrained. These works were regarded as pioneers in the shaping of biolinguistic thought, in what was the beginning of a change in paradigm in the study of language.

Merge is one of the basic operations in the Minimalist Program, a leading approach to generative syntax, when two syntactic objects are combined to form a new syntactic unit. Merge also has the property of recursion in that it may be applied to its own output: the objects combined by Merge are either lexical items or sets that were themselves formed by Merge. This recursive property of Merge has been claimed to be a fundamental characteristic that distinguishes language from other cognitive faculties. As Noam Chomsky (1999) puts it, Merge is "an indispensable operation of a recursive system ... which takes two syntactic objects A and B and forms the new object G={A,B}" (p. 2).

<i>Aspects of the Theory of Syntax</i>

Aspects of the Theory of Syntax is a book on linguistics written by American linguist Noam Chomsky, first published in 1965. In Aspects, Chomsky presented a deeper, more extensive reformulation of transformational generative grammar (TGG), a new kind of syntactic theory that he had introduced in the 1950s with the publication of his first book, Syntactic Structures. Aspects is widely considered to be the foundational document and a proper book-length articulation of Chomskyan theoretical framework of linguistics. It presented Chomsky's epistemological assumptions with a view to establishing linguistic theory-making as a formal discipline comparable to physical sciences, i.e. a domain of inquiry well-defined in its nature and scope. From a philosophical perspective, it directed mainstream linguistic research away from behaviorism, constructivism, empiricism and structuralism and towards mentalism, nativism, rationalism and generativism, respectively, taking as its main object of study the abstract, inner workings of the human mind related to language acquisition and production.

<i>Lectures on Government and Binding</i>

Lectures on Government and Binding: The Pisa Lectures (LGB) is a book by the linguist Noam Chomsky, published in 1981. It is based on the lectures Chomsky gave at the GLOW conference and workshop held at the Scuola Normale Superiore in Pisa, Italy in 1979. In this book, Chomsky presented his government and binding theory of syntax. It had great influence on the syntactic research in early 1980s, especially among the linguists working within the transformational grammar framework.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Formalism (linguistics)</span> Concept in linguistics

In linguistics, the term formalism is used in a variety of meanings which relate to formal linguistics in different ways. In common usage, it is merely synonymous with a grammatical model or a syntactic model: a method for analyzing sentence structures. Such formalisms include different methodologies of generative grammar which are especially designed to produce grammatically correct strings of words; or the likes of Functional Discourse Grammar which builds on predicate logic.

In linguistics, transformational syntax is a derivational approach to syntax that developed from the extended standard theory of generative grammar originally proposed by Noam Chomsky in his books Syntactic Structures and Aspects of the Theory of Syntax. It emerged from a need to improve on approaches to grammar in structural linguistics.

In formal syntax, a node is a point in a tree diagram or syntactic tree that can be assigned a syntactic category label.

<i>Chomskys Universal Grammar: An Introduction</i> Book by Vivian Cook and Martin Newson

Chomsky's Universal Grammar: An Introduction is a linguistics book about the concept of universal grammar as proposed by Noam Chomsky. First published in 1988, its third edition was authored by Vivian Cook and Martin Newson and released in 2007.

The basis of Chomsky's linguistic theory lies in biolinguistics, the linguistic school that holds that the principles underpinning the structure of language are biologically preset in the human mind and hence genetically inherited. He argues that all humans share the same underlying linguistic structure, irrespective of sociocultural differences. In adopting this position Chomsky rejects the radical behaviorist psychology of B. F. Skinner, who viewed speech, thought, and all behavior as a completely learned product of the interactions between organisms and their environments. Accordingly, Chomsky argues that language is a unique evolutionary development of the human species and distinguished from modes of communication used by any other animal species. Chomsky's nativist, internalist view of language is consistent with the philosophical school of "rationalism" and contrasts with the anti-nativist, externalist view of language consistent with the philosophical school of "empiricism", which contends that all knowledge, including language, comes from external stimuli.

References

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.