{"id":1148,"date":"2010-12-14T10:00:49","date_gmt":"2010-12-14T08:00:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/elanguage.net\/blogs\/booknotices\/?p=1148"},"modified":"2010-09-24T10:03:48","modified_gmt":"2010-09-24T08:03:48","slug":"language-and-meaning","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/journals.linguisticsociety.org\/booknotices\/?p=1148","title":{"rendered":"Language and meaning"},"content":{"rendered":"
Language and meaning:<\/strong> The structural creation of reality. By Christopher Beedham<\/strong>. (Studies in functional and structural linguistics 55.) Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 2005. Pp. xiv, 225. ISBN 9789027215697<\/a>. $49.95.<\/div>\n

Reviewed by Jamin R. Pelkey<\/strong><\/a>, Canada Institute of Linguistics<\/em><\/p>\n

Christopher Beedham would like to see a broad reappraisal of Saussurean Structuralism. In Ch. 1, \u2018Saussurean structuralism\u2019 (3\u201317), B reviews the tenets and implications of Saussure\u2019s approach to language and insists that linguistics must proceed from form (language) to meaning (reality) since the first creates the second.<\/p>\n

In Ch. 2, \u2018Aspect\u2019 (19\u201331), he examines crosslinguistic verbal aspect as an indicator that linguistic categories should be understood and studied formally rather than semantically, by using grammaticality judgments in syntactic frames. He draws attention to formal contrasts between aspect systems in Russian, German, and English to illustrate some ways in which each is a unique structure.<\/p>\n

B then explores English, Russian, and German passive constructions from a structuralist perspective in Ch. 3, \u2018The passive\u2019 (33\u201360), arguing that instead of being derived from underlying transitive actives, the passive results from sentences in which telic verbs are reinterpreted as \u2018action + state\u2019 (i.e. be<\/em> + V-ed<\/em>). Thus, under B\u2019s formal, structural analysis, the passive is not a voice phenomenon but an aspectual phenomenon. In B\u2019s view this reinforces the idea that a correct interpretation of syntax-dependent form (i.e. linguistic categories) is what enables the semantic intuitions of speaker and grammarian alike. This reanalysis was motivated by unexplained lexical exceptions.<\/p>\n

In Ch. 4, \u2018Generative grammar\u2019 (61\u2013105), B divides linguistics into two camps, descriptivist and generative, and identifies himself with the former. He argues that the generative tradition is guilty of \u2018constructing assumptions in a notation and claiming that they are explanations\u2019 (99\u2013100), the nature of the passive construction being essential among these assumptions. He examines several branches of generative grammar, identifies Steven Pinker as a descriptivist and concludes that descriptive linguistics (in the Saussurean style) should be reinstated.<\/p>\n

In Ch. 5, \u2018Tense and irregular verbs\u2019 (107\u201333), B presents evidence from English, German, and Russian to argue against the notion that the old \u2018tense\u2019 labels\u2014\u2018present\u2019, \u2018past\u2019, and \u2018future\u2019\u2014describe time-based phenomena in a straightforward manner and thus should not be approached as such.<\/p>\n

In Ch. 6, \u2018Text grammar: Parole<\/em> versus Langue<\/em>\u2019 (135\u201352), B equates \u2018text grammar\u2019 with Saussure\u2019s parole<\/em> and \u2018sentence-grammar\u2019 with langue<\/em>. Whether or not this was Saussure\u2019s intention, B argues that linguists should study both types of grammar in a dialectical relationship. He further argues, in the best interests of science, that sentences must be abstracted from specific texts in order to discover important generalizations.<\/p>\n

In Ch. 7, \u2018The method of lexical exceptions\u2019 (153\u201364), B asserts that exceptions to grammatical rules signify that grammarians have not yet properly identified the rules. In other words, a structural grammar should be watertight. He furthers his application of Hegelian dialectic to grammatical analysis by proposing a method based on the search for lexical exceptions as a preferred way of defining structural rules.<\/p>\n

The argument of the book might be summed up in the two following quotes: \u2018The meanings we perceive are determined by the forms through which we see them\u2019 (93), and \u2018the linguist who starts with meaning is doomed to be trapped in the analysis which produced that meaning\u2019 (156). We might only wish to ask, paradoxically, whether or not the \u2018meaning\u2019 of these claims is itself determined by its \u2018form\u2019.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Language and meaning: The structural creation of reality. By Christopher Beedham. (Studies in functional and structural linguistics 55.) Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 2005. Pp. xiv, 225. ISBN 9789027215697. $49.95. Reviewed by Jamin R. Pelkey, Canada Institute of Linguistics Christopher Beedham would like to see a broad reappraisal of Saussurean Structuralism. In Ch. 1, \u2018Saussurean structuralism\u2019 (3\u201317), […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.linguisticsociety.org\/booknotices\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1148"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.linguisticsociety.org\/booknotices\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.linguisticsociety.org\/booknotices\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.linguisticsociety.org\/booknotices\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.linguisticsociety.org\/booknotices\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1148"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/journals.linguisticsociety.org\/booknotices\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1148\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1194,"href":"https:\/\/journals.linguisticsociety.org\/booknotices\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1148\/revisions\/1194"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.linguisticsociety.org\/booknotices\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1148"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.linguisticsociety.org\/booknotices\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1148"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.linguisticsociety.org\/booknotices\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1148"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}