? On the other hand, although “Saussure’s goal was to establish the autonomy of linguistics, giving it a well-defined object and freeing it from reliance on other disciplines, with its coming of age linguistics is developing interactive links with other sciences. ? The central goal of describing the underlying system remains; this is the province of general, descriptive linguistics. But since Language has both individual and social aspects, it is naturally of interest to psychologists and sociologists among others” (Hartley, 1982: 16).
? It is not surprising therefore we have some branches of CROLINGUISTICS that show an interdisciplinary nature from the very names.
? Psycholinguistics investigates the interrelation of Language and mind, in processing and producing utterances and in Language acquisition for example.
There is the psycholinguistic study of grammar. The psycholinguistic constraints on the form of grammar are studied. It also studies language development in the child, such as the theories of language acquisition; biological foundations of language; and a big topic—relationship between language and cognition. (Slobin, 1979)
? Sociolinguistics is an umbrella term, which covers a variety of different interests in language and society, including the social functions of language and the social characteristics of its users. ? Sociolinguistics is the study of the characteristics of language
varieties, the characteristics of their functions, and the characteristics of their speakers as these three constantly interact and change within a speech community.
? Anthropologlcal Linguistics is interested in the history and structure of formerly unwritten languages/ the emergence of language and the divergence of languages over thousands of years ? Computational Linguistics is an interdisciplinary field, which centers on the use of computers to process or produce human language (also known as “natural language”, to distinguish it from computer languages). ? Applied Linguistics
? Findings in linguistic studies can often be applied to the solution of such applications as the recovery of speech ability. The study of such applications is generally known as “applied linguistics”. But in a narrow sense applied linguistics refers to the application of linguistic theories and principles to language teaching, esp. the teaching of foreign and second language.
Important distinctions in linguistics
Descriptive vs. prescriptive
They represent two different types of linguistic study. If a linguistic study aims to describe and analyze the language people actually use, it is said to be descriptive; if the linguistic study aims to lay down rules for “correct and standard” behavior in using language, i.
e. to tell people what they should say and what they should not say, it is said to be prescriptive. e.g.
Do/Don’t say X. People do/don’t say X. Commands / statements
How things ought to be/ how things are Modern linguistics is a descriptive science. Traditional grammar is prescriptive.
Synchronic vs. diachronic
The description of a language at some point of time in history is a synchronic study。
The description of language as it changes through time is a diachronic study.
A diachronic study is a historical study; it studies the historical development of language over a period of time.
Speech vs. writing
Speech and writing are the two major media of communication. Modern linguistics regards the spoken language as the natural or the primary medium of human language for some obvious reasons. 1. From the point of view of linguistic evolution, speech is prior to writing.
2. Then in everyday communication, speech plays a greater role than writing in terms of the amount of information conveyed. 3. Speech is always the way in which every native speaker acquires
his mother tongue, and writing is learned and taught later when he goes to school.
4. For modern linguistics, spoken language reveals more true features of human speech.
Langue & parole
The distinction was made by the Swiss linguist Saussure in the early 20th century.
Langue refers to the abstract linguistic system shared by all members of a speech community, and parole refers to the realization of language in actual use.
What linguists should do is to abstract langue from parole, i. e. to discover the regularities governing the actual use of language and make them the subjects of study of linguistics.
索绪尔（Ferdinand de Saussure, 1857--1913），瑞士语言学家。1857年出生于瑞士日内瓦。1875-1876年在日内瓦大学学习物理学和化学。1876年加入巴黎语言学会。1876-1878年转入莱比锡大学学习历史语言学，在那里结识了青年语法学派的重要人物布鲁格曼、奥斯脱霍夫等人，和他们共同从事印欧系语言的历史比较研究工作。1878年发表了他的成名作《论印欧系语言元音的原始系统》。1880年以论文《论梵语绝对属格的用法》获莱比锡大学最优生博士学位。1881-1891年他在法国巴黎高等研究学院任教，讲授历史比较语法，培养了众多的比较语言学专家。1891年回国担任日内瓦大学教授，讲授梵文和比较语法。
从1907年起，他曾三次讲授普通语言学，但没有写成讲义，1913年他因病去世后，他的学生巴利和薛施蔼根据同学们的笔记整理成《普通语言学教程》一书。这是一部具有划时代意义的著作，提出了全新的语言理论、原则和概念，为语言的研究和语言学的发展奠定了科学的基础。1916年在日内瓦出第一版，后来被翻译成多种语言，对语言学的发展产生了深远的影响，被人们称之为“现代语言学之父”。
Competence & performance
The distinction is discussed by the American linguist N. Chomsky in the late 1950?s.
Competence----the ideal user?s knowledge of the rules of his language.
Performance----the actual realization of this knowledge in linguistic communication.
诺姆·乔姆斯基 【Noam Avram Chomsky 1928.12.07】 美国语言学家、哲学家、政论家，出生于美国宾西法尼亚州的费城一个俄国移民家庭，有着犹太人血统。他创立了转换生成语法理论，这一理论不仅获得语言学界很高的评价，而且在心理学、哲学、逻辑学等方面引起人们普遍的重视。美国国家人文科学院、国家科学院院士，1984 年获美国心理学会颁发的杰出科学贡献奖。他的父亲是希伯来语言学者，所以他从小就受到了语言学的熏陶，特别是对犹太教传统有浓厚兴趣。1945 年进入宾夕法尼亚大学读语言学、数学和哲学,1947 年，在宾夕法尼亚大学语言学教授 Z.哈里斯【Zellin Harris】的影响下他开始研究