UNITYP further
Hansjakob Seiler
These concluding remarks are intended to review the most important terms and movements of UNITYP. They are intended to use stringent examples to clarify the existing connections and to create more clarity overall by removing some stumbling blocks.
In a second part, they are intended to show how some terms such as "dimension" and "concept" can be expanded and thus contribute to the further development of the large-scale project.
1. Fundamentals (to date and further):
We distinguish between three levels of organization:
1) The level of individual language facts
2) The level of General Comparative Grammar (see Lehmann, 1989: 133 ff.)
3) The conceptual level
1) The level of monolingual facts
Ad 1) Example of articles (generic vs. specific) in German: ein vs. der with corresponding context variants arranged as a field:
S1 The field der vs. ein
generic
specifically divisible (composite), introductory connecting, global
[Source: Seiler 2000: 153]
The mechanism of the article continuum can be seen particularly clearly at the level of individual languages.
S2 The continuum of articles in German
The lines connect topologically analogous points: generic in 1 and 1′, specific in 3 and 3′. 2 and 2′ are continuous transitions. N and N' are one and the same noun, split into an intensive and an extensive function (cf. 2 a man of action vs. 2′ the man of the day in S1). Topologically analogous points are defined by equidistance from a turning point ideally assumed in the middle in this schema. This property can be found in the schemas of the superordinate level. The continuum proves the coherence of one and the and the authorization of the address article.
2) The level of general comparative grammar
Ad 2) Example: The dimension of identification (ID)
S3 The ID dimension
[Source: Seiler 2000: 149]
Abbreviations:
CHARacterization, LOCalization, QUALification, © Wendepunkt.
LOCalization, QUANTification, DEIXis
Structure of the continuum
It is bidirectional; illustrated here by lines. The continuity can be read from the degree of morphological complexity. Parallels to the simple continuum S2: turning point, represented by individual nouns, especially personal names; techniques in equidistance to the turning point show identical features: QUAL shows gen and ZUGEH shows gen, cf. S2. DEIX shows article, i.e. the address of the continuum in S2. The "relationship" is as follows:
Continuum article def.-indef. → Article as an option of technique DEIX → Technique DEIX as an option of ID. Each option is a variant of ID.
As with the simple continuum, the inflection point © is also clearly recognizable with, among other things, the simple noun. What is missing in the illustration is the dynamic, here the reading from left to right (habitual) or vice versa. More on this in the next section.
The names of the curves are important in the diagram: pred/content and ind/reference. They correspond to the same designations in the simple continuum. Pred means that the content of the dimension is represented by predication, statement or description; Ind refers to the pointing, the reference to the content.
2. Typology of dimensions
A comparison of the dimensions found and described so far could bring the above-mentioned problems closer to a solution. The following dimensions have been dealt with in previous publications:
1) APPREHENSION - the linguistic coverage of the subject matter
(LUS 1, i, ii, iii)
2) NOMINATION - the naming of an object (LUS 8, 161)
3) IDENTIFICATION - the announcement of an object
(LUS 8.41-158; Bulletin de la Société de Linguistique de Paris, 105.7-33)
4) NUMERATION - the relation of counting objects
(François-Swiggers, Directory, No. 142)
5) POSSESSION - the relation of possession (LUS 2)
6) PARTIZIPATION - the relation of participation (LUS 6)
7) OPPOSITION - the relation of polarity (Studies in Communication Sciences 4:1 (2004) 183-200)
An overview of these dimensions can be found in Seiler, LUS 8.160-174. Their designation by abstract nouns containing an activity and a result is striking. All seven dimensions allow their content to be represented by curves that run parallel to each other, as in S3. These represent activities in each dimension: Predicativity (pred) (describe, content) vs. Indicativity (ind) (show, indicate).
They run from a maximum to a minimum of morphological effort.
The dimensions differ depending on whether the START is at the maximum of indicativity or at the maximum of predicativity. As with the simple continuum, the dimension includes the movement, here at the beginning vs. at the end of the run. Diagram S4 shows the ratios for the seven dimensions:
S4 Distribution of maxima and minima at the beginning vs. end of the dimension
The distribution is not random. It is noticeable that the first three dimensions - including ID - are preceded by predicativity, while the latter four are preceded by indicativity. The latter are characterized by a relational expression, usually a noun, which implies the indication, while what is expressed already anticipates the content. The items on the dimension following the START then primarily show the content and are predicative.
To explain what has just been said, here is the situation of the last four dimensions in detail:
The comparison of all seven dimensions shows us the two forces of indicativity vs. predicativity as they determine the content of a dimension in the manner of a field. They do this in a dynamic, characterized by the curves whose mirror-image progression captures all possible variants of the content represented by the dimension. There is no need for any further morphological labels for the content.
3. Level 3: "Concepts"
The following initially seems to contradict what has just been explained. The names listed above under 2.2., built according to the same scheme, are the respective designations or addresses of the respective dimension, i.e. they necessarily belong to it. Under the collective name "concepts", this seemed to our earlier descriptions to be the direct starting point for the direct continuation in the dimensions of order. This view needs to be revised in the following points:
1) Concepts are not the starting point of the dimensions because they are at a different, higher level. It is the level of pragmatics or metalanguage (language about language). The terms mentioned belong precisely to this level, and as such they are necessary.
For the purpose of concretization, we return to a single dimension, IDENTIFICATION (ID). Schema S3 represents the complete content of the ID. The level of pragmatics or metalanguage allows the address of this content. It would also allow further definitions, e.g. "ID is an activity and at the same time a result", or "ID is when...". These are the results of a more philosophical approach. They reflect the dominant predicative techniques of CHAR and LOC in schema S3.
2) At the other end of schema S3 are the dominant indicative techniques: QUANT DEIX. The amount of morphology is low here: ein, der, er, ich etc. If, despite these economical means, the content of the ID is to be evoked, this must be done with extraordinary means, and these are those that are not provided for in the order dimension constitutive of ID. Just as philosophically tinged argumentation plays a role in the dominant predicative domain, we find expressions of a pragmatic nature in the dominant indicative domain, e.g. A: "Who was that?" B: "It was me", undoubtedly a context of ID.
A full understanding of this discourse requires certain additions: Who? sc. there may be several Bs; A is legitimized as asking about the identity of B/Bs; was sc. Something happened; reference to perpetrator; the sc. Something specific, perhaps undesirable; B knows what it is about; I sc. B identifies himself, but not completely: Who am I? Mere indication (indik); common auditory and visual presence of A and B necessary; war's sc. ich completes identification by predication (präd), which confirms the identity of war's and war das. [On this kind of analysis of meaning, compare C.J. Fillmore and D. Terence Langendoen (eds.) 1971].
4. Closing words
We have once again highlighted continuity as the leitmotif of UNITYP's research, in the form of the simple continuum at the level of linguistic utterance and at the level of General Comparative Grammar as a dimension.
A comparison of all previously researched and published dimensions showed us that they all share the two fundamental structural principles of indicativity and predicativity. This applies both to a single-language dimension such as ID and to dimensions in which phenomena from different languages provide the techniques, e.g. POSSESSION. We could therefore speak of universality in the area of approximately 7 dimensions - admittedly a tiny area compared to what could be found in the languages of the world.
We conclude - how could it be otherwise with UNITYP - with a series of questions:
What other dimensions can be found?
What would they look like?
What contribution could they make to the realization of true universality in language?
Literature
Fillmore, Charles J. & D. Terence Langendoen (eds.). 1971. Studies in Linguistic Semantics. New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston.
François, Jacques & Pierre Swiggers. 2008. Hansjakob Seiler. Notice Bio-Bibliographique. 2008. Leuven: Centre International de Dialectologie Générale.
Lehmann, Christian. 1989. Language Description in General Comparative Grammar. In Graustein Gottfried & Gerhard Leitner (eds.), Reference Grammar and Modern Linguistic Theory, 133–162. Tübingen: Max Niemeyer.
Seiler, Hansjakob. 1983. POSSESSION as an Operational Dimension of Language. Language Universals Series (LUS) 2.
Seiler, Hansjakob. 2000. Language Universals Research: A Synthesis. Language Universals Series (LUS) 8.
Seiler, Hansjakob. 2004. Polarität, Sprache und Kommunikation. Studies in Communication Sciences 4(1). 183–200.
Seiler, Hansjakob. 2010. Le continuum linguistique et la relation entre un invariant et ses variantes. Bulletin de la Société de Linguistique (BSL) de Paris CV: 7–33.
Seiler, Hansjakob (ed.). Language Universals Series. Vols. 1 (1i, 1ii, 1iii) (1981) – 8 (2000). Tübingen: Gunter Narr Verlag.
Seiler, Hansjakob & Waldfried Premper (eds.). 1991. PARTIZIPATION. Das sprachliche Erfassen von Sachverhalten. Language Universals Series (LUS) 6.
Seiler, Hansjakob (ed.). 2015. Das Konzept der Objektrelation und das Kontinuum ihrer Varianten: Ein muttersprachlicher Zugang. LINCOM Studies in Theoretical Linguistics 57. München: LINCOM Europa.
I would like to thank my friends Yoshiko Ono (Zurich), Christian Lehmann (Erfurt), Werner Drossard (Cologne) and Jürgen Broschart (GEO Hamburg) for their valuable suggestions for improvement. I alone am responsible for any unevenness.
Hj.S.