Usage-based models of language: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 12:40, 30 July 2022

Revision as of 13:49, 8 February 2023

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{{Linguistics}}

The '''Usage-based linguistics''' is a [[linguistics]] approach within a broader [[Functional linguistics|functional]]/[[Cognitive linguistics|cognitive]] framework, that emerged since the late 1980s, and that assumes a profound relation between linguistic structure and usage.<ref name="Mengden2014">{{Cite book |doi = 10.1075/sfsl.69.01men|chapter = Introduction. The role of change in usage-based conceptions of language|title = Usage-Based Approaches to Language Change|series = Studies in Functional and Structural Linguistics|year = 2014|last1 = von Mengden|first1 = Ferdinand|last2 = Coussé|first2 = Evie|volume = 69|pages = 1–20|isbn = 978-90-272-1579-6}}</ref> It challenges the dominant focus, in 20th century linguistics (and in particular con [[Formal linguistics|formalism]]-[[generativism]]), on considering language as an isolated system removed from its use in human interaction and human cognition.<ref name="Mengden2014"/> Rather, usage-based models posit that linguistic information is expressed via context-sensitive mental processing and mental representations, which have the cognitive ability to succinctly account for the complexity of actual language use at all levels ([[phonetics]] and [[phonology]], morphology and [[syntax]], [[pragmatics]] and [[semantics]]). Broadly speaking, a usage-based model of language accounts for [[language acquisition]] and processing, synchronic and diachronic patterns, and both low-level and high-level structure in language, by looking at actual language use.

The term ''usage-based'' was coined by [[Ronald Langacker]] in 1987.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Serafima Gettys, Patricia Bayona, Rocío Rodríguez|title=From a Usage-Based Model to Usage-Based Instruction: Testing the theory|url=http://ijehd.cgrd.org/images/vol4no2/6.pdf|journal=International Journal of Education and Human Developments|volume=4|pages=50}}</ref> Usage-based models of language have become a significant new trend in linguistics since the early 2000s.<ref name="Mengden2014" /> Influential proponents of usage-based linguistics include [[Michael Tomasello]], [[Joan Bybee]] and [[Morten H. Christiansen|Morten Christiansen]].

Together with related approaches, such as [[construction grammar]], [[emergent grammar]], and language as a [[complex adaptive system]], usage-based linguistics belongs to the wider framework of [[evolutionary linguistics]]. It studies the lifespan of linguistic units (e.g. words, suffixes), arguing that they can survive language change through frequent usage or by participating in usage-based generalizations if their syntactic, semantic or pragmatic features overlap with other similar constructions.<ref name="Christiansen&Chater_2008">{{cite journal | last1=Christiansen | first1=Morten H. | last2=Chater | first2=Nick | date=2008 | title=Language as shaped by the brain | journal=Behavioral and Brain Sciences | volume= | issue=31 | pages=489–558 | doi=10.1017/S0140525X08004998 | url=https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/168484/1/download10.pdf | access-date=2020-12-22 }}</ref> There is disagreement as to whether the approach is different from [[memetics]] or essentially the same.<ref name="Blackmore_2008">{{cite journal | last=Blackmore | first=Susan | date=2008 | title=Memes shape brains shape memes | journal=Behavioral and Brain Sciences | volume= | issue=31 | pages=513 | doi=10.1017/S0140525X08005037 | url=https://www.academia.edu/3444108/Memes_shape_brains_shape_memes | access-date=2020-12-22 }}</ref>

== Disciplinary roots ==

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'''Langacker’s Cognitive Grammar'''

The term ‘usage-based’ was coined by [[Ronald Langacker]] in 1987, while doing research on [[Cognitive Grammar]]. Langacker identified commonly recurring linguistic patterns (patterns such as those associated with Wh- fronting, subject-verb agreement, the use of present participles, etc.) and represented these supposed rule-governed behaviours on a hierarchical structure. The Cognitive Grammar model represented grammar, semantics and lexicon as associated processes that were laid on a continuum, which provided a theoretical framework that was significant in studying the usage-based conception of language.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Murkherjee |first1=J.|chapter=Corpus Data in a Usage-Based Cognitive Grammar |editor1=K. Aijmer |editor2=B. Altenberg |title=Advances in Corpus Linguistics: Papers from the 23rd International Conference on English Language Research on Computerized Corpora (ICAME 23) Göteborg 22-26 May 2002 |series=Language and Computers: Studies in Practical Linguistics |volume=49 |pages=85–100 |___location=Amsterdam |publisher=Rodopi|date=2004}}</ref> Consequently, a usage-based model accounts for these rule-governed language behaviours by providing a representational scheme that is entirely instance-based, and able to recognize and uniquely represent each familiar pattern, which occurs with varying strengths at different instances. His usage-based model draws on the cognitive psychology of schemata,<ref>{{cite book|last1=Schank |first1=R.C.|last2= Abelson |first2=R.P.|title=Scripts, plans, goals, and understanding: an inquiry into human knowledge structures|___location=Hillsdale, NJ |publisher=Erlbaum|date=1977}}</ref> which are flexible hierarchical structures that are able to accommodate the complexity of mental stimuli. Similarly, as humans perceive linguistic abstractions as multilayered, ranging from patterns that occur across whole utterances to those that occur in phonetic material, the usage-based model acknowledges the differing levels of granularity in speakers’ knowledge of their language. Langacker’sLangacker's work emphasizes that both abstract structure and instance-based detail are contained in language, differing in granularity but not in basic principles.

'''Bybee’sBybee's Dynamic Usage-based framework'''

[[Joan Bybee|Bybee]]’s work<ref>{{cite book|last1=Bybee |first1=J. L.|title=Morphology: A study of the relation between meaning and form|___location=Amsterdam |publisher=John Benjamins|date=1985}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Bybee |first=J. L.|title=Phonology and language use |___location=Cambridge, UK |publisher=Cambridge University Press|date=2001}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Bybee |first=J. L.|title=Frequency of use and the organization of language |___location=New York |publisher=Oxford University Press|date=2006}}</ref><ref name=":0">{{cite book|last1=Bybee |first1=J. L.|last2= Perkins |first2= R.D.|last3= Pagliuca |first3=W.|title=The evolution of grammar: tense, aspect, and modality in the languages of the world|___location=Chicago |publisher=University of Chicago Press|date=1994}}</ref> greatly inspired the creation of usage-based models of language. Bybee’s model makes predictions about and explains synchronic, diachronic and typological patterns within languages, such as which variants will occur in which contexts, what forms they will take, and about their diachronic consequences. Using the linguistic phenomenon of splits (when a word starts to show subtle polysemy, and morphological possibilities for the originally single form ensue), Bybee proves that even irreducibly irregular word-forms are seen to be non-arbitrary when the context it occurs in is taken into consideration in the very representation of morphology. Simultaneously, she shows that even seemingly regular allomorphy is context-sensitive. Splits also aligns with the idea that linguistic forms cannot be studied as isolated entities, but rather in relation to the strength of their attachment to other entities.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Luce |first=P.A.|last2=Pisoni |first2=D.B|last3=Goldinger |first3=S.D.|chapter=Similarity neighborhoods of spoken words |editor=G. T. M. Altmann |title=Cognitive Models of Speech Processing: Psycholinguistic and Computational Perspectives |pages=122–147 |___location=Cambridge, MA |publisher=MIT Press|date=1990}}</ref>