Semantics: materials for seminar classes.
2. What is the specificity of the language of empirical science?
3. On what basis does Morris believe that semiotics provides a basis for understanding the most important forms human activity and the connections of these forms with each other? Do you agree with him?
Roman Yakobson
Roman Jacobsen (1896-1982) - famous linguist, literary critic, semiotician. Okotil Lazarevsky Institute of Oriental Languages and Moscow University (1918). From 1921 he worked in Prague at the embassy of the RSFSR, but in the USSR
didn't return. Professor Harvard University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He was active in the Society for the Study poetic language(OPOYAZ) in Petrograd, on his initiative the Prague Linguistic Circle was created, and then the New York one. R. Jacobson belonged to the Russian formal school, who worked in line with structuralism, he has works written together with C. Lévi-Strauss. The work “In Search of the Essence of Language” is primarily a linguistic analysis of the structure and essence of language. In it, Jacobson conducts a polemic with F. Saussure, appealing to the works of C. Peirce, considered one of the founders of modern semiotics. The work is interesting in that its author addresses the problem of the relationship between sound and meaning, considering it in the context of secondary symbolic systems, in particular, poetic speech.
In search of the essence of language
"In human speech different sounds have different meanings." Hence Leonard Bloomfield in his famous book"Language" (1933) concludes that "to study this correspondence of certain sounds to certain meanings is to study language" 1 . A century earlier, Wilhelm von Humboldt had taught that “there is an obvious connection between sound and meaning, which, however, in rare cases amenable to an exact explanation, usually remains unclear." The problem of such correlation and connection has always been cardinal in the already middle-aged science of language. The extent to which this fact was nevertheless temporarily forgotten by linguists of the recent past is shown by the reaction to the interpretation of the sign, and in particular the linguistic sign, as the indissoluble unity of signifier and signified by Ferdinand de Saussure, this interpretation has been repeatedly praised for its amazing novelty, although the old concept, together with the terminology, was entirely transferred from the theory of the Stoics, which had existed for twenty centuries.In the teaching of the Stoics, the sign (semeton) was considered as the essence, formed by the relationship between the signifier (semainon) and the signified (semainomenon).
1 Bloomfield L.Yazyk.M, 1968. P. 42. (Approx. comp.)
was defined as “perceived” (aistheton), and the second as “understood” (noeton) or, more linguistically, “translated.” Moreover, the reference of the sign was clearly distinguished from the meaning by the term tynkhanon (grasped). The Stoic studies in the field of sign designation (semeiosis) were adopted and received further development in the writings of Augustine; in this case, Latinized terms were used, in particular signum (sign), which included both signans and signatum. By the way, this pair of correlative concepts and names was introduced by Saussure only in the middle of his course in general linguistics, perhaps not without the influence of “Noology” by X. Gompertz (1908). This doctrine runs like a red thread through medieval philosophy of language with its depth and diversity of approaches. The dual character and the resulting “double cognition” of any sign, in Ockham’s terminology, were deeply adopted by the scientific thought of the Middle Ages.
Test yourself!
1. What does the problem of correlation and connection between sound and meaning look like in the historical retrospective presented by R. Jacobson?
Perhaps the most inventive and versatile of American thinkers was Charles Sanders Peirce (1839-1914), so great that no university had a place for him. The first attempt to classify signs was made by Peirce in his insightful work "On a new list
categories,” which appeared in the “Proceedings of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences” (1867); forty years later, summing up “the study of the nature of signs to which he devoted his life,” Peirce noted: “As far as I know, I I am a pioneer, or, rather, even a guide in the matter of clarifying and discovering what I call semiotics, that is, in the doctrine of the essence and main types of sign designation; I believe that for a pioneer this field of activity is too vast, and the work is too great." Peirce was clearly aware of the inconsistency of general theoretical premises in the research of his contemporaries. The very name of his science of signs goes back to the ancient semeiotike; Peirce appreciated and widely used the experience of ancient and medieval logicians , "thinkers" upper class", severely condemning such a common "barbaric frenzy" before the "amazing insight of the scholastics." In 1903, he expressed the firm conviction that if earlier the "doctrine of signs" had not been consigned to oblivion and if it had been continued with all its strength mind and passion, then by the beginning of the twentieth
centuries, such vitally important special sciences, such as linguistics, would already be “certainly in a more developed state than that which they promise to achieve in the very best case scenario by the end of 1950."
Since the end of the last century, the need for such a scientific discipline has been ardently defended by Saussure. In turn, starting from the Greeks, he called it semiology and expected from this branch of knowledge that it would clarify the essence of signs and the laws governing them. He believed that linguistics should become part of this general science and that it would determine what properties distinguish language into a separate system from the totality of “semiological facts.” It would be interesting to find out whether there is any genetic connection between the work of both scientists in the field of comparative research of sign systems or whether it is just a coincidence.
Pearce's half-century of work to create general principles semiotics is of epochal importance, and if Peirce's works had not remained largely unpublished until the thirties, or if at least his published works had been known to linguists, they would undoubtedly have had an incomparable influence on the development of linguistic theory on a global scale.
Peirce also makes a sharp distinction between the "material qualities" - the signifier of any sign - and its "immediate interpretation", i.e. the signified. Signs (or, in Peirce's terminology, representamen (represent am in a)) exhibit three main types of sign designation, three different “representational properties”, which are based on different relationships between the signifier and the signified. This distinction allows Peirce to distinguish three main types of signs:
1) Action iconic sign based on the actual similarity of the signifier
And signified, for example, a drawing some animal and the animal itself; the former replaces the latter “simply because it resembles it.”
2) The action of the index is based on the actual, really existing contiguity of the signifier and the signified; “from the point of view of psychology, the effect of the index depends on the association by contiguity,” for example, smoke is an index of fire, and the knowledge confirmed by the proverb that “there is no smoke without fire” allows a person interpreting the appearance of smoke to draw a conclusion about the presence of fire, regardless to whether the fire was or was not lit intentionally to attract someone's attention; what Robinson Crusoe discovered was an index: his signifier was the print of a foot in the sand, and the signified established from it was the presence of a person on this island; according to Peirce, the index is acceleration
pulse as a possible symptom of fever, and in these cases its semiotics actually merges with the study of symptoms of diseases in medicine, which is called semiotics, semiology or symptomatology.
3) The action of a symbol is based mainly on the established by agreement, acquired contiguity of the signifier and the signified. The essence of this connection "is that it is a rule" and does not depend on the presence or absence of any similarity or physical contiguity. When interpreting
Culturology: Textbook. for students tech. universities / Coll. auto; Ed. N. G. Bagdasaryan. - 3rd
ed., rev. and additional - M.: Higher. school, 2001.-511 p.
of any given symbol, knowledge of this conventional rule is mandatory, and the sign receives a valid interpretation only because and simply because this rule is known. The word "symbol" was originally used in a similar sense by Saussure and his disciples, but he later objected to the use of this term because the traditional understanding of the latter assumes some natural connection between the signifier and the signified (for example, scales as a symbol of justice), and in the notes Saussure proposed the name seme for the conventional signs included in the conventional sign system, while Peirce used the term "seme" for a special, completely different purpose. It is enough to compare Peirce's use of the term "symbol" with the various meanings of the word symbolism to realize that there is a danger of annoying ambiguities here; but for lack of anything better we are forced to retain the term introduced by Peirce.
Test yourself!
1. What is the significance of C. Pierce's works?
2. How does Charles Pierce classify signs? Bring own examples iconic signs, conventional, indexical.
These semiotic considerations bring back to life a question that was discussed with insight in Plato's remarkable dialogue Cratylus: whether language assigns form to content "by nature" (physei), as the dialogue's protagonist asserts, or "by convention" (thesei) ), as stated in Hermogenes' counter-arguments. Socrates, who reconciles both sides, is inclined to agree in Plato's dialogue that representation through similarity prevails over the use of arbitrary signs, but, despite the attractive power of similarity, he feels obliged to recognize an additional factor - convention, custom, habit.
Among the scholars who followed in the footsteps of Plato's Hermogenes in their treatment of this issue, an important place belongs to the Yale linguist Dwight Whitney (1827-1894), who
put forward the thesis about language as a social institution. In Whitney's fundamental works dating back to the sixties and seventies of the 19th century, language was defined as a system of arbitrary and conventional signs (Plato's epitykhonta and synthemata). This teaching was borrowed and developed by F. de Saussure and was included in the posthumous edition of his “Course of General Linguistics” (1916), carried out by his students C. Bally and A. Sechet. The teacher proclaims: "On an essential point, it seems to us, the American linguist is right: language is an agreement; the nature of the sign about which the agreement is made remains indifferent." Arbitrariness is put forward by Saussure as the first of two basic principles that determine the nature of a linguistic sign: “The connection connecting the signifier with the signified is arbitrary” 1 . The commentary emphasizes that no one has refuted this principle, but "it is often easier to discover the truth than to assign it its due place."
Test yourself!
1. What is the essence of D. Whitney’s thesis about language as a social institution?
The formulated principle was dominant in the entire science of language (la langue in the Saussurean sense of the term, i.e., the language code); its consequences are incalculable. In agreement with Bally and Séchet, A. Meillet and J. Vandries also emphasized the "lack of connection between meaning and sound," and Bloomfield echoed the same principle: "Language forms are arbitrary."
It goes without saying that agreement with Saussure's dogma of the arbitrariness of the linguistic sign was far from unanimous. Thus, Otto Jespersen noted (1916) that the role of arbitrariness in language is too exaggerated and that neither Untny nor Saussure managed to solve the problem of the relationship between sound and meaning. The responses of J. Damourette, E. Pichon and D. L. Bolinger were entitled the same: “The sign is not arbitrary” (“Le signe n”est pas aibitraire”, “The sign is not arbitrary”). E. Benveniste in his very timely article
"The Nature of the Linguistic Sign" ("Nature de signe linguistique") revealed the decisive fact that only for an impartial and outside observer the connection
Culturology: Textbook. for students tech. universities / Coll. auto; Ed. N. G. Bagdasaryan. - 3rd
ed., rev. and additional - M.: Higher. school, 2001.-511 p.
between the signifier and the signified is pure chance, while for the carrier of this language this connection turns into a necessity2.
1 Saussure F. de. Works on linguistics. M., 1977. P. 100. (Approx. comp.)
2 See: Benveniste 3. General linguistics. M., 1974. Ch. VI.(Approx. comp.)
With his basic requirement of an internal linguistic analysis of any synchronic (ideosynchronic) system, Saussure clearly invalidates the reference to differences in sounds and meanings in time and space, which is an argument in favor of an arbitrary connection between both components of a linguistic sign. A Swiss peasant woman who spoke German, with her notorious question why her French-speaking fellow villagers call cheese fromage, - Kase ist doch viel naturlicheri “After all, Kase fits much better!”, revealed an attitude to the problem that is much more consistent with the point of view of Saussure than the statement that every word is an arbitrary sign, instead of which any other sign could be used for the same purpose. But does this natural necessity exist due to habit alone? Do linguistic signs - insofar as they are symbols - operate "only because of existing habit" connecting their signified with the signified?
One of the most important features of Peirce's semiotic classification is the subtle recognition that the difference between the three main classes of signs is only a difference in relative hierarchy. The basis for the division of signs into iconic signs, indices and symbols is not the presence or absence of similarity or contiguity between the signifier and the signified, nor is it the exclusively factual or exclusively conditional, habitual nature of the connection between the two components, but only the predominance of one of these factors over the others . Thus, the scientist speaks of “iconic signs in which similarity is supported by conventional rules”; can you remember different rules constructing perspectives that the viewer needs to learn in order to perceive works of dissimilar movements in painting; in different pictorial codes, differences in the size of figures have different meanings; according to the tradition of some medieval schools paintings, the villains, unlike other characters, were consistently depicted in profile, and in ancient egyptian art they were depicted only from the frontal view. Peirce states that "it would be difficult, if not impossible, to give an example of an absolutely pure index, or an example of a sign absolutely devoid of the property of an index." A typical index such as a pointing finger conveys unequal meaning to different cultures; for example, among some South African tribes, when pointing a finger at an object, they curse it in this way. On the other hand, “a symbol always includes some kind of index,” and “without indexes it would be impossible to indicate what a person is talking about.”
Peirce's interest in the different levels of interaction of the three distinguished functions in all three types of signs and in particular close attention to the indexical and iconic components
linguistic signs are directly related to his thesis, which states that “the most perfect of signs” are those in which iconic, indexical and symbolic features are “mixed as much as possible in equal proportions.” On the contrary, Saussure's insistence on the conventionality of language is connected with his assertion that "entirely arbitrary signs are most suitable for ensuring an optimal semiotic process."
Indexical elements of language were discussed in our work "Shifters, Verbal Categories and the Russian Verb", 1957); let us now try to consider the iconic aspect of linguistic structure and answer Plato’s question: what kind of imitation (mimesis) is used by language to connect the signifier with the signified?
The sequence of verbs veni, vidi, vici tells us the order of Caesar's actions first and foremost because the sequence of composed past tense forms is used to reproduce the course of events. The temporal order of speech forms tends to mirror image order of narrated events in time or degree of importance. A sequence such as “The meeting was attended by the President and
Culturology: Textbook. for students tech. universities / Coll. auto; Ed. N. G. Bagdasaryan. - 3rd
ed., rev. and additional - M.: Higher. school, 2001.-511 p.
This publication contains the latest works of E. S. Kubryakova (1927-2011), an outstanding linguist, the creator of the onomasiological trend in Russian linguistics, the founder of the cognitive-discursive paradigm of linguistic research as one of the leading areas of cognitive science in our country, the author of innovative ideas and new approaches to describing linguistic phenomena.
The works presented to the reader were published in 2005-2011. in several issues of the collection “Cognitive Studies of Language”, published by the Institute of Linguistics of the Russian Academy of Sciences together with Tambov state university them. G. R. Derzhavin, as well as in the journal “Questions of Cognitive Linguistics” and in some other collections scientific works recent years.
The book represents a further development and clarification of those key concepts cognitive science and cognitive linguistics, which are contained in " Brief dictionary cognitive terms" (1996), published under the editorship of E. S. Kubryakova.
The articles are arranged in thematic order and provide insight into current state cognitive linguistics.
The publication is addressed to philologists, linguists, and anyone interested in current issues. modern science about language.
Main directions of conceptual analysis.
Publishing real materials Round table, we want to point them out distinctive features. By publishing them in the form in which they were presented at the Round Table meeting, which took place on November 3, 2006 at the Institute of Linguistics of the Russian Academy of Sciences and was organized by the Institute of Foreign Languages of the Russian Academy of Sciences, TSU named after G. R. Derzhavin, we want to emphasize that they are published independently of how we evaluate them. In other words, agreeing with the opinions expressed in them or strongly disagreeing with them, seeing in them the success or failure of argumentation in defense of a particular point of view, and even being aware of the authors’ ignorance of the sources necessary, it would seem, in this situation, we are completely We avoid evaluations of published works and in this sense we differ from those compilers of such collections (as well as journals), who reserve the right to 1) accept or not accept the relevant publication for publication; 2) “correct” certain shortcomings of published articles. Thus, our task is to present the materials of the Round Table to the readers without changes.
CONTENT
Preface.
At the origins of cognitive science.
About the installations of cognitive science and current problems cognitive linguistics.
On the place of cognitive linguistics among other sciences
cognitive cycle and its role in the study of processes of categorization and conceptualization of the world.
Main directions of conceptual analysis.
About the cognitive processes occurring
during the description of the language.
In search of the essence of language.
On the relationship between language and reality and the connection between this
problems with the interpretation of the concept of knowledge.
On the problem of mental representations.
About the term “discourse” and the structure of knowledge behind it.
Linguistic and cultural status of drama (new in the study
language of plays).
In the genesis of language, or Reflections on abstract names.
Towards a definition of the concept of image.
On the question of the nature of explanations in linguistics.,
Reviewed by: D. Lee, Cognitive Linguistics. An Introduction. N. Y:
Oxford Univ. Press, 2002. - 223 p.
First publications of articles.
Free download e-book in a convenient format, watch and read:
Download the book In Search of the Essence of Language: Cognitive Research., Kubryakova E. S., 2012 - fileskachat.com, fast and free download.
IN SEARCH OF THE ESSENCE OF LANGUAGE
R. Jacobson
One of the most important features of Peirce's semiotic classification is the subtle recognition that the difference between the three main classes of signs is only a difference in relative hierarchy. The basis for the division of signs into iconic signs, indices and symbols is not the presence or absence of similarity or contiguity between the signifier and the signified, nor is it the exclusively factual or exclusively conditional, habitual nature of the connection between the two components, but only the predominance of one of these factors over the others. Thus, the scientist speaks of “iconic signs in which similarity is supported by conventional rules”; one can recall the different rules for constructing perspective that the viewer needs to learn in order to perceive works of dissimilar movements in painting; in different pictorial codes, differences in the size of figures have different meanings; in accordance with the tradition of some medieval schools of painting, villains, unlike other characters, were consistently depicted in profile, while in ancient Egyptian art they were depicted only from the front. Peirce states that "it would be difficult, if not impossible, to give an example of an absolutely pure index, or an example of a sign absolutely devoid of the property of an index." A typical index such as the pointing finger conveys different meanings in different cultures; for example, among some South African tribes, pointing a finger at an object curses it in this way. On the other hand, “a symbol always includes some kind of index,” and “without indexes it would be impossible to indicate what a person is talking about.”
Peirce's interest in the different levels of interaction of the three distinguished functions in all three types of signs, and in particular his close attention to the indexical and iconic components of linguistic signs, is directly related to his thesis that “the most perfect of signs” are those in which iconic, indexical and symbolic attributes are “mixed as much as possible in equal proportions.” On the contrary, Saussure's insistence on the conventionality of language is connected with his assertion that "entirely arbitrary signs are most suitable for ensuring an optimal semiotic process."
Indexical elements of language were discussed in our work “Shifters, Verbal Categories and the Russian Verb”, 1957; Let us now try to consider the iconic aspect of linguistic structure and answer Plato’s question: what kind of imitation (mimesis) is used by language to connect the signifier with the signified?
Verb Sequence veni , vidi , vici tells us the order of Caesar's actions primarily and mainly because the sequence of composed past tense forms is used to reproduce the course of events. The temporal order of speech forms tends to mirror the order of narrated events in time or degree of importance. A sequence such as “The meeting was attended by the President and Secretary of State", is much more common than the reverse, because the first position in a pair of siblings reflects a higher official position.
Correspondence in order between signifier and signified finds its place among the “principal possible kinds of signification” outlined by Peirce. Peirce identifies two distinct subclasses of iconic signs: images and diagrams. In images, the signifier represents “ simple qualities"of the signified, while with diagrams the similarity between the signifier and the signified "concerns only the relations of their parts." Peirce defines a diagram as “a representament which is par excellence the iconic sign of a relation, which convention helps it to become.” An example of such an “iconic sign reflecting the relationship between the parts of the signified” can be rectangles different sizes, which express a quantitative comparison of steel production in different countries. The relationships in the signifier correspond to the relationships in the signified. In typical diagrams such as statistical curves, the signifier represents a pictorial analogy with the signified as regards the relationship of their parts. If in a chronological chart relative population growth is indicated dotted line, and mortality is continuous, then these are, in Peirce’s terms, “symbolic characteristics.” Diagram theory occupies an important place in Peirce's semiotic studies; he gives due credit to the considerable merits of diagrams arising from the fact that they are “truly tonic signs, naturally analogous to the object signified.” Consideration of various sets of diagrams leads Peirce to the statement that “every algebraic equation is an iconic sign, since it represents by means of algebraic signs (which are not themselves iconic) the ratios of the corresponding quantities.” Any algebraic formula turns out to be an iconic sign due to the rules of commutation, association and distribution of symbols. Thus, “algebra is just one kind of diagram,” and “language is just one kind of algebra.” Peirce clearly understood that, for example, “the arrangement of words in a sentence must serve as an iconic sign in order for the sentence to be understood.”
Discussing grammatical universals and near-universals discovered by J.X. Greenberg, I noted that the order of significant elements, due to its clearly iconic character, reveals a particularly clearly expressed tendency towards universality (see my report in the collection “Universal of Language”, edited by J. H. Greenberg, 1963). That is why in conditional sentences In all languages, the order in which the condition precedes the consequent is normal, primary, neutral, unmarked. If in almost all languages, again according to Greenberg's data, in a declarative sentence with a nominal subject and object, the first, as a rule, precedes the second, then this grammatical process clearly reflects the hierarchy of grammatical concepts. The subject of the action designated by the predicate is perceived, in the terms of Edward Sapir, as the “starting point”, “the producer of the action”, as opposed to the “final point”, the “object of the action”. The subject, the only independent member of the sentence, emphasizes what is being said. Whatever the true rank of the actor, he is necessarily promoted to the hero of the message as soon as he takes on the role of the subject. The subordinate obeys the principal – ‘The subordinate obeys the principal’. Contrary to the table of ranks, attention first of all focuses on the subordinate as a doer, and then moves on to the object - to the main one, who is obeyed. If, however, the predicate expresses a “passive” action instead of an “active” action, then the role of the subject is assigned to the object of the active sentence: The principal is obeyed by the subordinate.
The hierarchy under consideration is emphasized by the impossibility of omitting the subject when the object is optional: The subordinate obeys, the principal is obeyed. As has become clear after centuries of grammatical and logical studies, predication is so fundamentally different from all other semantic acts that persistent attempts to argue for the equation of subject and predicate must be categorically rejected.
The study of diagrams has found its further development in modern graph theory. A linguist reading an excellent book by F. Harari, R.3. Norman and D. Cartwright's Structural Models (1965), which provides a detailed description of various directed graphs, is struck by the suspicious analogy between graphs and grammatical models. The isomorphic structure of the signifier and the signified reveals in both areas similar means that facilitate the precise transposition of grammatical and especially syntactic structures into graphs. In the structure of graphs, there is a close analogy to such properties of language as the connection of linguistic objects with each other, as well as with the initial boundary of the chain, immediate proximity and connection at a distance, centrality and peripherality, symmetric and asymmetric relationships, ellipsis of individual components. A literal translation of an entire syntactic system into the language of graphs will make it possible to separate the diagrammatic, iconic forms of relations from the strictly conventional, symbolic features of this system.
Not only the connection of words into syntactic groups, but also the connection of morphemes into words has a pronounced diagrammatic character. In both syntax and morphology, any relation of parts and whole is consistent with Peirce's definition of diagrams and their iconic nature. The significant semantic contrast between roots as lexical morphemes and affixes as grammatical morphemes finds its graphic expression in their different positions within a word: affixes, especially inflectional suffixes, in those languages where they exist, usually differ from other morphemes in their limited and selective use of phonemes and their combinations. Thus, the only consonants used in productive inflectional suffixes are in English, is a dental continuous and occlusive, and their combination is st. Of the 24 stop phonemes of the Russian consonantal system, only four phonemes, clearly opposed to each other, appear in inflectional suffixes.
Morphology is rich in examples of signs in which the equivalence of the relationship between signifiers and signifieds is manifested. Thus, in Indo-European languages, positive, comparative and superlative adjectives show a gradual increase in phonemes, for example: high – higher – highest , altas – altior– In this way, signifiers reflect the gradation of signifieds according to the degree of quality.
There are languages in which the plural forms are distinguished from the singular forms by an additional morpheme, while, according to Greenberg, there is no language in which this relationship is reversed. A signifier of a plural form tends to reflect the meaning of quantitative superiority by lengthening that form. Wed. personal forms of the verb in the singular and corresponding forms in the plural with longer endings in French: 1 l. je finalis – nous finissons, 2 l. tu finalis – vous finissez, 3 l. il final – ils finissent, or in Polish language: 1. znam – znamy , 2. znasz – know , 3. zna– In the declension of Russian nouns, the real endings of the same case are plural longer than in the only one. Tracing the various Slavic languages historical processes who constantly created this relationship, it can be seen that these and many similar data of linguistic observations are at odds with Saussure's assertion that "there is nothing in the sound structure of the signifier that bears any resemblance to the significance or meaning of the sign."
Saussure himself weakened his “fundamental principle of arbitrariness” by distinguishing between “radically” and “relatively” arbitrary elements of language. To the second of these categories he included those signs that on the syntagmatic axis can be decomposed into components identified on the paradigmatic axis. However, even such, from Saussure’s point of view, “completely unmotivated” forms, such as the French. berger‘shepherd’ (from lat. berbicarius), may be amenable to similar analysis, since -er is associated with other cases of use of this doer suffix and occupies the same place in other words of the same paradigmatic class, for example, vacher‘shepherd’, etc. Moreover, when finding a connection between the signifier and the signified, it is necessary to take into account not only cases of complete identity of form, but also cases when different affixes have some common grammatical function and one constant phonological feature. Thus, the Polish instrumental case in different endings for different genders, numbers and parts of speech consistently retains the sign of nasality either in the last consonant or in the vowel. In Russian, the morpheme [m] (represented by two phonological variants - palatalized and non-palatalized) occurs in the endings of peripheral cases (agency, dative and prepositional) and never occurs in the endings of cases of other classes. Consequently, individual phonemes or distinctive features within morphemes can serve as independent indicators of certain grammatical categories. Saussure's remark on the "role of relative motivation" applies to the use of such units smaller than the morpheme: "Consciousness succeeds in introducing the principle of order and regularity into certain parts of the corpus of signs."
Saussure identified two trends in language - the tendency to use lexical means, i.e. unmotivated signs, and a tendency to use a grammatical tool, or rules of construction. Sanskrit turns out, from his point of view, to be an example of an ultragrammatical, maximally motivated system, while in French, in comparison with Latin, Saussure reveals that “absolute arbitrariness, which, in essence, is the true condition of the linguistic sign.” It should be noted that Saussure's classification is based only on morphological criteria, while syntax remains virtually aside. This oversimplified two-pole scheme is greatly improved by Peirce, Sapir, and Whorf by thinking about broader syntactic problems. In particular, Benjamin Whorf, who emphasized the “algebraic nature of language,” was able to extract from individual sentences “models of sentence structure” and argued that “in language, the object of structural modeling always predominates and exercises control over the lexical or naming aspect.” Thus, syntactic diagrams in the system of language as a sign system are no less important than the dictionary.
Jacobson, R.O. In search of the essence of language /
R.O. Jacobson // Semiotics. – M.: Raduga, 1983. – P. 102–117.
