西方“语言学”名义考论

A Study on the Term and Meaning of Western Linguistics

西方"语言学"的概念在不同时期名称不同且含义有别。本文通过文献梳理认为,公元前4世纪古希腊的philologia指爱好文献语言知识的语言学;公元前2世纪古希腊的grámmatik是讲究读写技艺训练的语言学。1777年新造的Linguistik用于异邦语言资料的编目,后定义为研究世界语言的学科。19世纪初,语言关系研究被称为vergleichende Sprachlehre(比较语言学)、vergleichende Grammatik(比较语法)和vergleichende Sprachenkunde(比较语文学),凸显的是方法论。19世纪初出现的另一名称Sprachwissenschaft(语言科学),其使用者的取向有生物学、历史学、心理学和社会学等。本文认为,学科名称术语的出现时间、含义及演变,不仅与学术史研究相关,而且反映了对该学科认识的发展变化。

The concept of"linguistics"in Western countries has different terminologies and meanings at different stages.By a critical literature review,this paper holds the idea that the term of philologia in the 4th century BC of ancient Greek means the linguistics focusing on literature and language knowledge,and the term of grámmatik in the 2nd century BC of ancient Greek means the linguistics focusing on literacy training.The newly-born German term of Linguistik was used for the cataloging of foreign languages,which was defined later as a subject studying world language.In the early 19th century,languages kinship study was called vergleichende Sprachlehre、vergleichende Grammatik or vergleichende Sprachenkunde,all of which emphasized methodology.The terminology of Sprachwissenschaft appeared at the beginning of the 19th century,which oriented biology,history,psychology and sociology.This paper views that the creating time,meaning and evolution of a terminology are not only related to its subject’s academic history study,but also are a reflection of the development of understanding its subject.