透过语法化现象看语法机制的自主性

The Autonomy of Grammar Seen Through the Mist of Grammaticalization

语法化是语言演化中的实词虚化现象,认知语言学注重语法化与语法的关系,将语法化的起因扩大到句法和章法,以此佐证语言的体验观——语法化与人类的认知机制密不可分,通过语法化促成语法的研究可以进一步证明语言不是自主系统。旨在论证,语法化是后于语法的,语法化只表现为语言表征形式的改变,并不触及语言机制本身。表征形式的多样化并不否定本质的统一性,这有助于维护生成语言学的命题:语言是自足的,有其自身的运作规律。

Grammaticalization refers to the shift from lexical to grammatical categories. Cognitive linguistics, pinpointing the relationship between grammaticalization and grammar, has traced grammaticalization to the change of syntax and discourse, whereby to vindicate its experientialist view of language-grammaticalization is inseparable from human cognition, and the process from grammaticalization to grammar sheds light on the claim that language is not an autonomous system. This paper attempts to show that grammaticalization, posterior to grammar, is relevant only to the change of language representation, not involving the mechanism of language per se. The diversity of language representation does not undo the universality of essence, which helps to maintain the generativist view that language is autonomous, with principles and rules of its own.