4. Code Model Linguistics: Patch or Abandon? 169
In considering the following discussion of “revolutionary” approaches within lin- guistics, it is important to keep in mind the context in which the term revolutionary is
employed. The question at hand is how the approaches are related to the code model of communication, which has been identified as playing a significant role in the disciplinary
matrix of the Saussurean paradigm. In that context, approaches which attempt to abandon a code model account of linguistics and develop an alternative can be defined as revo-
lutionary. This study will discuss three such approaches, the advocates of which call themselves emergent grammarians, and cognitivists, and integrationalists. Again, these
approaches are selected as convenient examples. This study does not intend to imply that these are the only revolutionary approaches being explored in contemporary linguistics.
In considering these three approaches, it is important to keep in mind the distinction between the terms revolutionary and revolution. It is not the intention of this study to
suggest that the theories and schools of thought reviewed in this section are evoking a revolution
in the discipline of linguistics. That they are the focus of attention for their subdisciplinary community is clear, but that does not mean that the discipline as a whole
will follow suit. Nor is it being suggested here that it necessarily should. The previous comments not withstanding, it should be noted that the way in which a
community responds to a developing theory may be a function of the moment at which a theory is introduced. If an alternative or revolutionary theory is introduced before the
community is ready, that is, before the community is generally aware of the anomalies being addressed, then the community will only consider those specific areas within the
new theory which clearly overlap with areas in well established theories. The community may ignore areas which do not overlap, perhaps even questioning the very relevance of
the areas which lie outside the established disciplinary focus. In this situation, a theory may “lie upon the shelf” unnoticed, only to be resurrected at a later date and hailed as
revolutionary. In some situations, the theory will be spurned until the community is provided or provides itself the instrumentation necessary to create data sufficient to
cause a disturbance in the established perspective.
As Hymes notes in developing the notion of cynosure, scientific revolution, if it is to occur, requires the focused attention of the community in question. Only history will tell
how the larger disciplinary community will respond to the revolutionary developments of the emergent grammar, cognitive, and integrational schools of linguistics. Hymes
1974a and Makkai
1993 have appropriately expressed concern over how some advocates of
new theories use Kuhn’s theory in marketing their own theoretical progeny as the “new paradigm.” This author shares that concern, but in contrast to Hymes and Makkai, this
study asserts that Kuhn’s theory can be a very useful tool in the study of the discipline of linguistics, and particularly in regard to how the discipline has supported a particular
constellation of commitments to metatheory and models.
4.4.2.1. Emergent grammarians
Emergent grammar is generally considered a functionalist approach. In contrast to the functional-typological approach authored by Givón, however, emergent grammar
170 4. Code Model Linguistics: Patch or Abandon?
theory, pioneered by Paul Hopper, does not seem to depend upon code model concepts. This does not mean that emergent grammarians have explicitly stated their rejection of
the code model account of linguistics. In fact, this author has not found such statements; nevertheless, that rejection seems apparent in the manner in which they diverge from
code model linguistics.
81
Since linguistic literature has only scarcely addressed the code model in an analytical manner, it would be impractical to use explicit rejection of the
model as a criterion for defining relationships to that model. Edmondson and Burquest
1998 introduce their own review of emergent grammar
with the following comments:
In 1985 Paul Hopper made a very unorthodox proposal about the origins and nature of grammar, by challenging the basic notion of generative transformational grammar that our
grammatical knowledge was a given in advance and that the acquisition process is merely well-known work-in-progress toward the necessary goal of a complete set of grammatical
rules see
Hopper 1988 .
Edmondson and Burquest 1998 :231
In the code model account of communication, it is assumed that the speaker and hearer must share a grammatical code in order for communication to proceed. By logical
extension, the code must be fixed, lest the speaker and hearer change their copy of the code and thereby render communication impossible. In order to assure this fixed status,
the grammatical code held by the speaker is clearly separated from the performance of that speaker. Similar conditions are of course established in Shannon’s information theo-
retic characterization of communication between electronic devices. More importantly for linguistics, these are conditions established in Saussure’s notion of langue, and in his
isolation of langue and parole see section
3.2.2.1 . While code model linguists rarely
refer to Saussure, they retain these conditions through dependence upon the code
81
It may be noted that Sandra Thompson, who has co-authored with Paul Hopper see Hopper and Thompson 1984
, 1985
on the topic of lexical categories, also co-authors a work on Rhetorical Structure Theory, which does explicitly reject at least certain aspects of the code model
Mann, Matthiessen, and Thompson 1992 :45. In particular, the
rejection concerns the idea that the string of speech codes information units. Rhetorical Structure Theory is an approach which employs rhetorical theory in assessing the structuring of discourse units. It is concerned with the
pairing of what may be called notional structure with surface structure at the discourse level—also see Mann and
Thompson 1988 ;
Longacre 1983 .
Analysts using emergent grammar do occasionally use the term “coding,” but they do not appear to be appealing to the broader notion of the code model. For example, see Traugott and Heine
1991 , where the term is used in the
following ways: “… but it is well known that languages prefer relatively heavy and explicit coding of objects in such
environments.” Lichtenberk 1991
:57 CODING =
CASE MARKING
“The factor of coding efficiency can be seen as blocking the use of … [particular forms].” Lichtenberk
1991 :57–58 CODING
EFFICIENCY =
FUNCTIONAL BIND
“These clauses differ from the other subordinate clauses in that they are not explicitly marked as adverbial, i.e. of coding condition, concession, temporal sequencing, or causation.”
Genetti 1991 :173 CODING
CONDITION =
? “Presumably, considerations of relative coding density—i.e. functional load—also play a role in such
extension.” Givón 1991
:288 CODING DENSITY
= FUNCTIONAL
LOAD
4. Code Model Linguistics: Patch or Abandon? 171
model.
82
In emergent grammar theory, however, these conditions are not maintained. Grammar is described not as a prerequisite to communication, but as a byproduct of
communication. Edmondson and Burquest comment:
The most startling idea in Hopper 1988
is that, contra Chomsky, grammars may not be fixed in advance in a manner that allows knowledge of sentence structure to extend to discourses, nor
are these grammars complete, immutable, nor do they have sharp edges with black-white distinctions between grammatical and nongrammatical sentences. His position is that human
language grammars are only sets of incomplete partials. Edmondson and Burquest 1998
:233
Hopper writes:
… the name [emergent grammar stands] for a vaguely defined set of sedimented i.e., gram- maticalized recurrent partials whose status is constantly being renegotiated in speech and
which cannot be distinguished in principle from strategies for building discourses. Hopper
1988 :118
Edmondson and Burquest note several contrasts between formal and functional approaches, and between generative and emergent accounts in particular. Two key
distinctions are quoted here Edmondson and Burquest 1998
:231–232:
83
Formalists Functionalists
GRAMMAR Rule sets producing “platonic”
ideals that are immutable and given a priori as a result of
linguistics universals and shared language experience in
acquisition Rules are incomplete and partial, only
EMERGENT from discourse patterns by processes called GRAMMATICALI-
ZATION, tendencies that become conventionalized as morpho-syntax
TIME Grammars, at least in part, are
fixed in time as are ideal laws of nature
Grammars are emergent in time and are partly universally developmental in
tendency
As discussed in section 3.4
, it is an axiom of code model linguistics that “Languages i.e., codes are systematic, distinctive, and have an existence independent of any given
speaker or hearer.” This notion of language of course depends heavily upon Saussure’s notion of langue as being community property, and not accessible for change by any
individual. In contrast to this view, Hopper and Traugott write:
82
In regard to adoption of these conditions by generative grammarians, Givón writes: “Chomsky absorbed, without explicit discussion, Saussure’s and Bloomfield’s separation of synchronic from diachronic studies, as well as the
assumption that it was indeed possible—and somehow desirable—to formulate universals of language, whatever their nature, on a purely synchronic basis”
Givón 1984 :8.
83
Edmonson and Burquest 1998
:231–232 attribute this chart to Susan Herring. Unfortunately, they provide no citation or bibliographic entry for Herring’s work.
172 4. Code Model Linguistics: Patch or Abandon?
First, when we speak of change, what is thought to be changing? We speak loosely of “language change.” But this phrase is misleading. Language does not exist separate from its
speakers. It is not an organism with a life of its own: rather, each speaker of a language has to learn that language anew. Change is replacement
Hoenigswald 1966 , on the understanding
that “replacement” does not entail strict identity of an earlier function or category with a later one.
Hopper and Traugott 1993 :33
Saussure fixed his notion of langue via his notion of values. The values component held the relationships in equilibrium, so that the langue was resistant to change. Further-
more, since the langue was entirely a matter of form, with no links to any substance, there was no distinct point from which to “leverage” change.
Emergent grammar, in contrast, sees language as being grounded in discourse. Discourse, then, provides leverage for change. Furthermore, since individual speakers
and hearers will have had different experiences in discourse usage, grammatical usage is negotiated during each communicative experience. Hopper writes:
The notion of Emergent Grammar is meant to suggest that structure, or regularity, comes out of discourse and is shaped by discourse as much as it shapes discourse in an on-going
process. Grammar is hence not to be understood as a pre-requisite for discourse, a prior possession attributable in identical form to both speaker and hearer. Its forms are not fixed
templates, but are negotiable in face-to-face interaction in ways that reflect the individual speakers’ past experience of these forms, and their assessment of the present context,
including especially their interlocutors, whose experiences and assessments may be quite different. Moreover, the term Emergent Grammar points to a grammar which is not abstractly
formulated and abstractly represented, but always anchored in the specific concrete form of an utterance.
Hopper 1987 :142
Edmondson and Burquest explain:
Grammars are negotiated among interlocutors within discourse. Grammars cannot be con- structed from decontextualized sentences, but only from the function of language in larger and
informationally rich and real discourse. Grammars are dynamic and developmental, changing over time, and there is in principle no real difference between rules of discourse that have
emerged by grammaticalization and rules of sentences that once were rules of discourse. … The negotiated and informationally-based ad hoc rules of discourse can in time be projected
down to the sentence level.
Edmondson and Burquest 1998 :233–234
Hopper also comments upon the apparent misunderstanding some code model linguists have demonstrated in reviewing his approach.
Critics of “radical pragmatics”, and “functional grammar”, assume that they and those they oppose share a common view of language, that there is a pairing of autonomous i.e.,
decontextualized grammatical forms with “functions” whatever they might be in the abstract, and that the only point of disagreement is whether these forms might be eventually
derivable from “functions” or whether the forms must be described independently of “functions.”
Hopper 1987 :140
Although he does not identify it as such, Hopper has here commented on the relative incommensurability between the code model approaches and his own emergent grammar.
Code model linguists may not immediately recognize that emergent grammar does not share basic building blocks of the Saussurean paradigm.
4. Code Model Linguistics: Patch or Abandon? 173
4.4.2.2. Cognitivists
