Theory-Orientation Versus Data-Orientation: A recurrent theme in linguistics

R. H. Robins
University of London

Two contrasting attitudes towards the scientific study of language have been apparent from the earliest period of linguistic studies in Europe. The forms that the contrast has taken have varied from one era to another. In Greece the debate was between the claims of grammar to be a science (téchnè) and the opinion that its was no more than practical knowledge (empeiría). In the Middle Ages the scholastic speculative grammarians maintained that their theory of grammar embodied a superior level of adequacy over against the mere accurate record of observed fact provided by Priscian and the didactic grammarians. A similar opposition was seen in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries between rationalist linguists, with their emphasis on linguistic universals and on the importance of ‘general grammar’, and the empiricists, who paid most attention to the individual differences of each language, to be accurately observed and independently classified. These continuing attitudes are still a matter of controversy today, and each has an essential place in the progress of linguistic science.

Quick links
Full-text access is restricted to subscribers. Log in to obtain additional credentials. For subscription information see Subscription & Price. Direct PDF access to this article can be purchased through our e-platform.

References

Aristotle
[384–322 B.C.] Analytica priora et posteriora [Prior analytics; Posterior analytics]. Ed. by W[illiam] D[avid] Ross, with introd. and appendices by L. Minio-Paluello. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press 1968 [Cited as An.Pri. and An.Post., respectively.]Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
[384–322 B.C.] Ethica Nichomachea [Nichomachean ethics]. Ed. by Ingram Bywater. Oxford: Clarendon Press 1894 [Cited zsEth.Nic]Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
[384–322 B.C.] Metaphysica [Metaphysics]. Ed. by W. D. Ross. Oxford: Clarendon Press 1924 (Repr. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press 1966.) [Cited as Metaph.]Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Arnauld, A.
see Lancelot, N.
Bach, Emmom
1964 Introduction to Transformational Grammars. New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bach, Emmom, and Robert T. Harms
(eds.) 1968 Universals in Linguistic Theory. Ibid.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Beauzée, Nicolas
1767 Grammaire générale; ou. Exposition raisonnée des éléments nécessaires pour servir de fondement à l’étude de toutes les langues. 2 vols. Paris: J. Barbou. (Repr. of 1819-ed., with an introd. by Barrie E. Bart-lett, Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt: Frommann-Holzboog 1973.)Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bekker, Immanuel
(ed.) 1816 Anecdota Graeca, Vol II. Berlin: G. Reimer. (Repr. Graz: Akad. Druck- u. Verlagsanstalt 1965.)Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bloomfield, Leonard
1933 Language. New York: H. Holt.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bumann, Waltraud
1965 Die Sprachtheorie Heymann Steinthals. Meisenheim: A. Hain.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Chomsky, Noam
1961 “On the Notion ‘Rule of Grammar’ ”. Structure of Language and Its Mathematical Aspects ed. by Roman Jakobson, 6–24. Providence, R.I. (Repr. in The Structure of Language ed. by Jerry A. Fodor and Jerold J. Katz, 119–36. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall 1964.) Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
1965 Aspects of the Theory of Syntax. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
1966 Cartesian Linguistics: A chapter in the history of rationalist thought. New York: Harper & Row.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cordemoy, Géraud
1668 A Philosophical Discourse concerning Speech; conformable to the Cartesian principles. London: J. Martin. (Repr., together with Cordemoy’s Discourse Written to a Learned Frier (1670), with an introd. by Barbara Ross. Delmar, N.Y.: Scholars’ Facsimiles & Reprints 1972.)Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Diogenes -Laertius
[c.200–250 A.D.] [Lives and opinions of eminent philosophers]. Ed. by Robert D. Hicks. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Dionysius Thrax
[fl.100 B.C.] Cited from Bekker 1816 (Also in Grammatici graeci ed. by Gustav Uhlig, vol. I. Leipzig: Teubner 1883.)Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Fillmore, Charles J.
1968 “The Case for Case”. Bach & Harms 1968.1–88.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Firth, John Rupert
1946 “The English School of Phonetics”. TPhS 1947.92–132.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Gill, Alexander
1903 [1621] Logonomia Anglica. Ed. by Otto L[uitpold] Jiriczek. Strassburg: K. J. Trübner. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Halliday, M[ichael] A. K.
1961 “Categories of the Theory of Grammar”. Word 17.241–92. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Hjelmslev, Louis
1928 Principes de grammaire générale. Copenhagen: A. F. Høst&Søn. (2nd. ed. 1968.)Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Hockett, Charles F.
1965 “Sound Change”. Lg 41.185–204.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Hume, Alexander
1865 [c.1617] Of the Orthographie and Congruitie of the Britan Tongue: A treates noe shorter then necessaire, for the schooles. Ed. by Henry Benjamin] Wheatley. London: Trübner & Co.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
[
Lancelot, Claude, and Antoine Arnauld] 1846 [1660] Grammaire générale et raisonnée [de Port Royal]; contenant les fondemens de l’art de parler, expliqués dune manière claire et naturelle. Les raisons de ce qui est commun à toutes les langues et des principales différences qui s’y recontrent; et plusieurs remarques nouvelles sur la langue françoise. Ed. by Alexandre Bailly. Paris: Hachette. (Repr. Geneva: Slatkine 1968.)Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Leitzmann, Albert
(ed.) 1908 Briefwechsel zwischen Wilhelm von Humboldt und August Wilhelm Schlegel. Introduction by Berthold Delbrück. Halle/S.: M. Niemeyer.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Ruscelli, Giroiano
1581 Commentarii delia lingua italiana. Ed. posthumously by Vincenzo Ruscelli. Venice: D. Zenaro.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Sahlin, Gunver
1928 César Chesneau du Marsais et son rôle dans l’évolution de la grammaire générale. Paris: Presses Univ. de France.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Thurot, Charles
1868 Extraits de divers manuscrits latins pour servir à l’histoire des doctrines grammaticales au moyen âge. ïmpr. Impériale. (Repr. Frankfurt/M.: Minerva 1964.)Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Trager, George L.
1948 Review of Lingua, vol.I (1948) UAL 14.207–08.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Wallerand, G.
(ed.) 1913 Les OEuvres de Siger de Courtrai: Etude critique et textes inédits. Louvain: Acad, de Louvain.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Wallis, John
1765 [1653] Grammatica linguae Anglicanae: Cui praefigitur, De loquela: sive sonorum formation, tractatus grammatico-physicus. 6th ed. London: W. Bowyer. (Repr. Menston: Scolar Press 1969.)Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
William of Conches
. Cited from Thurot 1868.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Zvegincev, V[ladimir] A[andreevič]
1972 “Bor’ba meždu empirizmom i racio-nalismom v sovremennoj amerikanskoj lingvistike [The struggle between empiricism and rationalism in modern American linguistics]”. Voprosy Filosolii 26:1.137–46. (E. transl, in General Systems 17.189–97 [1972].)Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
 
Mobile Menu Logo with link to supplementary files background Layer 1 prag Twitter_Logo_Blue