从世界语言看汉语到从汉语看世界语言——中国语言研究的传承与创新

Chinese Linguistics:From Chinese language per se to world languages through a Chinese perspective

中国语言研究的传统侧重于汉语本身和与中国文化的关系,研究者善于从汉语传统看汉语,研究汉语主要是出于实用的目的。自《马氏文通》以来的100多年里,国内的语言研究通过借鉴西方语言研究的理论和方法取得了巨大的进步。越来越多的中国学者努力从世界语言看汉语,但多数中国学者还不善于从汉语看世界语言,从普通语言学或哲学层面通过汉语看语言、看世界更是无从谈起。又因为中国的人文社会科学研究缺乏引领性的学科,语言研究无法实现研究范式的突破。因此,中国语言学家要对世界语言学有更大贡献,需要有哲学的眼光,跨学科的视野和研究方法,在继承中国语言学研究优秀传统的基础上,努力通过对汉语个性的探究,发现人类语言和语言使用方面更多、更重要的特点,为构建普遍的语言或人类社会发展理论作出应有的贡献。

Chinese linguistics used to focus on relations between the Chinese language and its culture.Researchers excelled in looking at Chinese from its linguistic and cultural traditions.In the past 100 years or so since Ma Jianzhong's Grammar of Ancient Chinese,Chinese linguistics has made tremendous progress by borrowing from Western linguistic theories.More and more researchers are trying to find the unique features of Chinese by comparing Chinese with other languages.But few are trying to contribute to our knowledge about human languages in general based on the characteristics of the Chinese language.Chinese linguistics face many challenges in initiating research paradigm shifts or innovations,especially when there is little to borrow from other related disciplines in China.In order to contribute our fair share to general linguistics and human understanding in general,Chinese linguists need to look at languages from a more philosophical standpoint of view and aim at paradigm shifts with insights gained from the unique history and characteristics of the Chinese language and writing system and its rich cultural heritages,cross-disciplinary approaches and by utilizing modern hi-tech and research lab facilities.