从现代语言学走向后现代语言学

From Modern Linguistics to Post-modern Linguistics

20世纪初由索绪尔所发起的语言研究的根本性变革,使现代语言学得以建立,但也人为地将语言学研究的视野局限在语言的所谓最中心部分,使其走上了一条十分狭窄的探索之路。自20世纪最后二三十年起,语言学经历了一系列重大变化,正在从现代语言学迈向可以称为"后现代语言学"的时代。观念的更新,视野的扩展,研究范式的更新和多样化,众多新学科及其分支的出现,使语言学研究显现出一个丰富多彩的全新格局,也因此拥有了更为广阔的发展天地,为我们获得对语言和人类生存状况新颖而又富有启示意义的洞见提供了机遇。充分认识和正确把握这样的发展趋势,对于从事语言研究及处于相关领域中的人们来说都十分重要。

The fundamental change of language research started by Saussure in the early twentieth century,which led to the establishment of modern linguistics,restricted the said research within the so-called central part of language,i.e.,language system,without taking into consideration anything that was conceived as external to language as an autonomous system.In terms of its clearly-defined theoretical structure and tasks,modern linguistics had once been an influential leading discipline in humanities and social sciences.It did achieve a great deal,but at the cost of isolating language from its environment and excluding the user of language and the context in which language is used from the scope of linguistic survey.Though this has long been criticized by scholars who prefer to see language in a more extended scope,it was generally ignored by mainstream linguists who dominated the linguistic circles.However,since the last few decades of the twentieth century,significant changes have taken place in linguistic studies.These changes have brought about a new era,the era of ″post-modern linguistics″,in which the theoretical foundations of modern linguistics are problematized and the way language is viewed and investigated is profoundly renovated.The era of ″post-modern linguistics″ seems to have at least the following characteristics that distinguish it from the era of ″modern linguistics″： 1.Linguistic study is no longer confined to the language system itself,for language is seen not as autonomous and isolated but as closely related to and inseparable from the broader context in which language serves social and cultural functions.Many issues that were treated by modern linguistics as marginal and external to linguistics proper are now being seriously addressed in the hope of better understanding the working of language not as it is idealized to be but as it actually is.2.The ″essentialist″ view of language and the ″objectivist″ paradigm for research have been abandoned.″Reductionism″ that prevailed in modern linguistics has been questioned and criticized.Much of what has often been taken for granted in previous linguistic studies now are being challenged and the concern with language and its use seems to be more local than universal.3.Linguistics is no longer ″pure″ but is becoming more and more inter-disciplinary or trans-disciplinary.Linguists,instead of emphasizing their disciplinary independence,now often join efforts with those of scholars of other academic backgrounds in the attempt to open up new areas and new ways for studying language and its use.The boundaries between disciplines that were once clearly drawn are now being blurred out.In a sense,the term ″linguistics″ should now be defined as a plural noun,suggesting that there are many different approaches to language,each legitimate in itself.4.As linguistic studies are becoming increasingly diversified,language and its use are studied in perspectives that may be very different from each other and each of them may provide some insight that is valuable in its own right.There is no one absolutely ″correct″ or ″scientific″ approach that can be universally applied.It is also more and more widely recognized that no research is conducted in a social or cultural vacuum,free of biases and value judgments.What characterize the era of ″post-modern linguistics″ clearly indicates an irreversible tendency of linguistics in the twenty-first century,which may bring about some breakthrough in language study in the foreseeable future.