Routledge Dictionary of Language and Linguistics.pdf

Dictionary of language and linguistics 1016ReferenceVennemann, T. 1986. Rückumlaut. In D.Kastovsky et al. (eds), Linguistics across historical andgeographical boundaries. Berlin. 701–23.ruleBasic term in the natural sciences, social sciences, and humanities as well as in variouslinguistic schools used to describe, explain, or regulate behavior. Depending on thecontext, the term can be used to describe such varying concepts as norms, (universal)rules of conduct, formal procedures in calculus or natural laws. In the framework oflinguistics, the following interpretations can be established. (a) In school grammar. ruleshave the intention of being normative; actually, they are descriptions of regularities andexceptions based on selected examples whereby one is forced to call on readers andspeakers to use their intelligence and linguistic intuition to fill in holes left by thesometimes vague formulations. (b) In descriptive linguistics, rules are descriptions ofregularities that can be empirically observed; they do not have the same normative natureas rules in (a) above, but are still based on a static conception of rule. (c) In contrast tothe static understanding of rule outlined above, transformational grammar uses adynamic understanding of rule to describe linguistic competence. It refers to a productionprocess and is an explicit indication of formal operations that are carried out. Fortechnical details, phrase structure rules, recursive rule, transformation. (d) Basedon Wittgenstein’s understanding of meaning, a theoretical understanding of rule orientedaround language as act has developed in the framework of semantics and pragmaticssince the beginning of the 1970s, which sees language as rule-derived (social) behavior.See J.R. Searle’s distinction between constitutive and regulative rules.ReferencesChomsky, N. 1961. On the notion of ‘rule of grammar.’ In R.Jakobson (ed.), Structure of languageand its mathematical aspects. Providence, RI. 255–7.——1980. Rules and representations. New York.Gumb, R.D. 1972. Rule governed linguistic behavior. The Hague.Heringer, H.J. (ed.) 1974. Seminar: der Regelbegriff in der praktischen Semantik. Frankfurt.Wheatley, J. 1970. Language and rules. The Hague.