LINGUISTICS: THE
SCIENTIFIC STUDY OF LANGUAGE:
by Abubakar Jimoh
Why do we
need to study linguistics, when there are languages being studied at various
level of educational attainment? There also misconception and conflict in
differentiating linguistics from language study.
It is
necessary to start by defining what linguistics is all about. Linguistic is the
scientific study of language whose goal is to describe and explain the
unconscious knowledge the speakers have of their language.
John Lyons
[1968] contends that by scientific study of language is meant its
investigations by means of controlled and empirical verifiable observations and
with reference to some general theory of language structure. It is a field that
deals with the scientific description and analysis of language.
Linguistics according to one of the
Nigeria’s applied linguists; Dr. A.A. Olaoye is the scientific study of
grammatical system of a language and their interrelationship with the rest of
human activities. Linguistics studies the form and their meaning in social
context of any language. The form in this sense indicates the grammatical
functions---- the syntax and the meaning---- the semantics.
To maintain the adequate and proper
description and analysis of language, linguists divided language into various
components. These include: Phonetics, the scientific study of speech sounds;
Phonology, the study of sounds with their meanings; Syntax, the study of
grammatical functions of language; Semantics, the study of meaning of
grammatical functions of a language according to its social context; and
Morphology which is the study of the internal structure of words.
Through these components of language the
linguists have been able to carry the scientific descriptions analyses of
language. For instance, with phonetics component, linguists design for many
languages of the world their orthographies both in consonants and vowels. These
can be seen in many of Nigeria languages like Hausa, Igbo, Yoruba language
orthographies etc. In designing orthography for a language, linguists
transcribe the vowels and represent them on a cardinal vowels chart. Cardinal
vowels chart as defined by a German phonetician, Daniel Jones is the set
reference chart used to describe the vowel sound of a language. With this the
linguists have been able to describe how the vowels sounds of a language are
being articulated. And consonants in the other hand on the consonants chart, is
designed by the International Phonetics Association [I.P.A]
Both the
cardinal vowels chart and the consonants chart have contributed enormously to
the second language learning and teaching by helping the second language
learning students to know those sounds contained in a language in order to
articulate them well. It also helps language teachers to solve teaching
problems that may be encountered by students in the formal walls. Its often
being argued by the language scholars that to get the best way of teaching
language, the teacher must firstly study critically the cardinal vowels and
consonants charts of the language spoken by the students and compare them to
those of the second language learning in the classroom. Through this the
teacher shall discover the similarities and the contrasts between the cardinal
vowels and the consonants charts which the students have of their language and
to those contained in the language learning. And also the teacher shall
discover new strategies and techniques to the best way the language students
can understand in the formal walls. And as it was contended by Lado [1957] “the
teacher who has made a comparison of foreign language with the native language
of the students will know better what the real problems are and can provide for
teaching them”. This is based on the assumption that a student who comes in
contact with a foreign language will find some features of it extremely
difficult. Phonetics has therefore made it quite easy for such a foreign
language to be leant by the student. It also contributes immensely in area of
speech rehabilitation by helping the speech pathologist to evaluate those
diseases said to affect human speech or linguistics behavior. Through it the
linguists have been able to bring together the area of divergence that arises
in speech production which varies from one language to the other. It is also the
channel through which difference sounds are brought together to form a
meaningful unit.
The phonological component of language is that
through which the linguists link with ordinary sounds.
With the syntactic component, the linguists
show the distinct between prescriptive and descriptive grammar which the former
in technical sense often referred to as tradition grammar and latter as
transformational generative grammar by Noam Chomsky [1975]. Through the syntax
the linguists draw for a language the basic regularities and adequate
systematic descriptions for a language in which they are concerned.
Using the
semantic component, the linguists derive the meaning of grammatical system of a
language according to the social context. Morphology is also that component
through which the linguists form new word for a language. They can do this
using many processes like clipping, coinage, borrowing, blending process etc.
Linguistics
also can be classified into two major branches according to language scholars.
These are: Theoretical linguistics which deals with the components of language
[i.e. phonetics, phonology, syntax, semantics and morphology]; Applied
linguistics which is the application of linguistics theories to evaluate the
language problems arisen from other professions like sociology and linguistics
called sociolinguistics, linguistics and psychology called psycholinguistics,
linguistics and ethnography called ethno-linguistics, linguistics
and geography called geolinguistics, linguistics and neurology
called neurolinguistics, linguistics and anthropology called anthropolinguistics,
linguistic and biology called biolinguistics, linguistics and
history called historicalinguistics, linguistics and philosophy
called philosophical linguistics, linguistics and computer called
computational linguistics, linguistics and statistics called statistical
linguistics.
Linguistics
is scientific study due to the fact that linguists conduct their scientific
investigation by means of controlled and empirically verifiable observations
and with reference to some general theory of language structure. John Lyons
[1968]. The scientific terms adopt by the linguists in conducting adequate
descriptions and analysis of a language includes: Observation; the linguists
observe the unconscious knowledge and other language facts the speakers have of
their language. They do this using direct observation. That is, the language
observation using the human natural speech organs like, tongue, lips [i.e.
upper and lower], pharynx, diaphragms, wind pipe, soft and hard palates,
uvular. And indirect observation using language machines like spectrograph and
others. Data collection; by this linguists are able to gather the necessary
facts on what has been previously observed. Hypothesis formulation; the linguists
draw the hypothesis on language using what is known of language to justify what
is unknown of a language. Experimentation; the linguists carry out an
experiment on the results of their findings. This is done so that the linguists
will arrive at proper and rational justified conclusion. This also said to be
done before communicating results of the language findings to the public.
Theory formation; linguists also form theories or laws on their
discoveries.
Therefore,
many students and even academicians find linguistics to be a much challenged
discipline because of its wide scope. Yes, it’s a much challenged discipline
and also it should be widely agreed that linguistics play a vital role in
language development for the fact that it has brought together the area s of
divergence in speech production that varies from one language to the other,
enhances language teaching and learning with the provision of adequate
descriptions and analysis of sounds, the grammatical structures and the
meanings in social context of a language. Linguistics also helps in orthography
design for a language, thereby bringing language to the world, in professional
broadcasting, in speech construction and rehabilitation by providing so called
the speech pathologists adequate supports in evaluating and describing those
diseases said to affect human speech. It also helps in machine language
constructions for human use especially with the use of computational
linguistics, and construction of generative grammar for a language. With
these roles it can be widely acceptable that study of linguistics has sustained
many languages from extinction.
Abubakar
Jimoh writes from:
Department
of linguistics,
University
of Abuja.
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