LanguageTheCorpusLinguisticsPerspective.pptVIP

LanguageThe Corpus Linguistics Perspective Wolfgang Teubert Department of English University of Birmingham teubertw@bham.ac.uk Language and its functions Language I: a mental faculty a device for storing memories a device for thinking Language II: a social device a social lubricant a device for conveying content Linguistic schools I Chomskyan and cognitive linguistics Language as an innate mental faculty Language as a universal faculty mentalese Language is a system Language: a limited mental lexicon and a limited set of rules lets us generate an unlimited number of sentences Language: Lists, laws and rules Preoccupation with rules Natural languages and the language faculty Introspective linguistics Linguistic schools II Corpus Linguistics: Language is a social phenomenon Language has to be observed no introspection Language is discourse There are many discourse communities We are keen on differences not on universals We investigate meaning We don’t believe in secret formulas – we rely on description Our corpus is always too small The role of language 60% gossip 10% rituals, incantations, spells, charms 10% singing 10% instructions 10% negotiating social interaction Gossip, rituals and singing I: grooming maintaining a social balance Gossip, rituals and singing II: maintaining a social balance today Language, content and discourse People acquire language only within a community People speak because they want to convey content A society works because content can be conveyed Content can be conveyed only in form of language Content does not exist independently of language Content can be preserved as language The discourse has a diachronic dimension All knowledge is contained in the discourse Four axioms of corpus linguistics Meaning is only in the discourse. The unit of meaning is the unit of meaning UoM : rarely words, often multi-word units or even larger chunks of text. Units of meaning are unambiguous. We know what units of meaning mean bec