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Lecture 13 Descriptivism and Prescriptivism

Descriptivism and prescriptivism are contrasting approaches in linguistics. Descriptivism seeks to describe language as it is used, focusing on patterns and natural variation, while prescriptivism seeks to prescribe rules for how language should be used according to authorities. Noam Chomsky is a seminal linguist who challenged behaviorist approaches through his theory of generative grammar and the Chomsky hierarchy, and is one of the most influential scholars of the 20th century. Henry Watson Fowler was an influential English lexicographer and commentator known for his works on English usage and his contributions to the Concise Oxford Dictionary.

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113 views

Lecture 13 Descriptivism and Prescriptivism

Descriptivism and prescriptivism are contrasting approaches in linguistics. Descriptivism seeks to describe language as it is used, focusing on patterns and natural variation, while prescriptivism seeks to prescribe rules for how language should be used according to authorities. Noam Chomsky is a seminal linguist who challenged behaviorist approaches through his theory of generative grammar and the Chomsky hierarchy, and is one of the most influential scholars of the 20th century. Henry Watson Fowler was an influential English lexicographer and commentator known for his works on English usage and his contributions to the Concise Oxford Dictionary.

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PrinceMino
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© © All Rights Reserved
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Lecture 13

Descriptivism and prescriptivism


Taken from The Oxford Companion… 1996:262–263;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Descriptive_linguistics;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_prescription;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noam_Chomsky;
and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Watson_Fowler

Descriptivism and prescriptivism are contrasting terms in linguistics.

Descriptivism

Bloomfield

Prescriptivism

A descriptive grammar

A prescriptive grammar: prescriptions vs proscriptions  It is I.  It´s me.


He behaved like he was in charge.  He behaved as if he were in charge.

Chomsky is credited with the creation of


the theory of generative grammar,
considered to be one of the most
significant contributions to the field of
linguistics made in the 20th century. He
also helped spark the cognitive revolution
in psychology through his review of B. F.
Skinner's Verbal Behavior, in which he
challenged the behaviorist approach to the
study of behavior and language dominant
in the 1950s. His naturalistic approach to
the study of language has affected the
philosophy of language and mind. He is
also credited with the establishment of the
Chomsky hierarchy, a classification of
formal languages in terms of their
generative power.
Avram Noam Chomsky (1928)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noam_Choms According to the Arts and Humanities
ky Citation Index in 1992, Chomsky was cited
as a source more often than any other
is an American linguist, philosopher, living scholar during the 1980–1992 time
political activist, author, and lecturer. He is period, and was the eighth-most cited
an Institute Professor and professor scholar in any time period.[2][3][4]
emeritus of linguistics at the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology.

1
Beginning with his critique of the Vietnam Chomskyan linguistics challenges
War in the 1960s, Chomsky has become structural linguistics and introduces
more widely known—especially transformational grammar. This theory
internationally—for his media criticism takes utterances (sequences of words) to
and politics. He is generally considered to have a syntax which can be characterized
be a key intellectual figure within the left by a formal grammar; in particular, a
wing of United States politics. Chomsky is context-free grammar extended with
widely known for his political activism, transformational rules.
and for his criticism of the foreign policy
of the United States and other
governments.

Authorities
Henry Fowler´s English Usage

Duden grammar  German

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Watson_Fowler

Henry Watson Fowler (1858 –1933) was an English schoolmaster, lexicographer and
commentator on the usage of English. He is notable for both Fowler's Modern English Usage
and his work on the Concise Oxford Dictionary.

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