CC BY
52
Вестник Челябинского государственного университета.
2019. № 6 (428). Филологические науки. Вып. 117. С. 228—238.
УДК 81'27:39 DOI 10.24411/1994-2796-2019-10631
ББК Ш100.621+Ш100.63
LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT: A PHILOSOPHICAL-LINGUISTIC APPROACH1
E. V. Shelestyuk, V. E. Budeiko
Chelyabinsk State University
The paper under study presents a concept relating to language development, linguistic-constructivist teleology and a notion of the comprehension of developed language, also with respect to the language of international communication. A philosophical, methodological and linguistic criticism of both the concept and the term "development" is displayed herein. With relation to language development, three aspects of language as a communicative system are considered from the point of view of L. V. Shcherba: a speech activity, a language system and a language material; three functions of a speech activity are analysed from the standpoint of V. V. Kolesov: communication, translation and transmutation. Some properties of developed language are selected and an issue of inconsistency in the application of a developed living language as a language of international communication is raised. Some characteristics of language evolution and involution are determined. An importance is specified of an activity-oriented approach and the purposefulness of language development as a subjective factor of the process under investigation. A negative impact of the restrictive, "subtractive" normalisation of language is denoted.
Keywords: development, language development, methodology, science, signs, derivation, derivatives, term, understanding.
Problem statement
1The concept of "language development" seems to be quite obvious at first glance, whereas it appears to be controversial under a closer scrutiny. In linguistics, it is common practice to speak about language evolution in the broadest sense, i.e. about qualitative changes in its system occurring as a result of intra-linguistic and extralinguistic processes, while language development can be predominantly referred to in terms of the development of speech abilities in ontogenesis and the social and cultural differentiation and complication of language, that is, in terms of the development of a speech activity. Yet, is the concept of development relevant in reference to language as a semiotic system? If development is understood as simple dynamics of changes, then one may state a fact of the development of any languages, even dominant languages that disappear or experience sub-
1Перевод статьи Шелестюк Е.В., Будейко В.Э. «Языковое развитие: философско-лингвистический подход», опубликованной в Вестнике Челябинского государственного университета. 2019. № 1 (423). Филологические науки. Вып. 115. С. 159—171.
The article was originally published in Russian as: Shelestyuk, E.V., Budeiko, V.E. Yazykovoye razviti-ye: filosofsko-lingvisticheskiy podkhod (Language development: philosophical and linguistic approach) // Vestnik Chelyabinskogo gosudarstvennogo universite-ta. Filologicheskiye nauki (Bulletin of Chelyabinsk State University. Philology). 2019. No. 1 (423). Pp. 159-171.
tractive influence. The study of language in dynamics has existed for a long time: comparative linguistics, lexicography based on historical principles, historical linguistics and glottogony are stages and directions of such an investigation.
If the term "language development" does not simply presuppose changing, but some improvement, progress, evolution, then we must inevitably evaluate these phenomena as opposed to concepts of deterioration, regression and involution. May one speak about the improvement and deterioration, evolution and involution, progress and regression of language? May one speak about the improvement of language as the pursuance of a certain goal, acme, pinnacle, to which language development is oriented?
Basically, we witness a spontaneous, purposeless language change, although most areas of human activity - economy, social development, even the spiritual sphere — are to some extent forced into various channels of changes. It turns out that complete control over such an important sphere of social and spiritual life of a person as language development is given to natural processes. Hence there originate uncontrolled borrowing, the modelling of a language after vocabulary and language samples of a dominant English-speaking culture, the foreignisation of a language system, the reduction of the replenishment of a native lexical stock predominantly to items of slang, jargon and substandard-vernacular vocabulary. High
style ceases to be developed creatively by means of native resources. Artistic and publicistic discourses cease to employ the original word-building means, figurative-idiomatic and syntactic potential of a native language. Are there any prerequisites for the purposeful cultivation, construction and improvement of a national language and, if so, what sort of principles should be those of linguistic-constructivist teleology?
Finally, the word collocation "developed language", despite its seeming obviousness, has not been accepted as a terminological concept in the scientific community; there exists a concept of the development of individual subsystems of languages, for instance, they speak of languages with developed systems of vocalism/consonantism; morphology (suffixation, prefixation, agglutination, etc.); declination and conjugation. Less often - and mainly in relation to artificial languages - they speak about developed word-building, lexical and syntactic systems, while implying the number, diversity and productivity of vocabulary, word-formation means, syntactic structures. But is the sign "developed" relevant in relation to natural language?
This paper attempts at considering the problem of language development and finding certain answers to the posed questions.
Definition of the concept and notion of the term "development"
The term "development" as a loan translation originates either from the German word-form Entwicklung, f [21. P. 611] or from a loan translation of the French word développement, m, deployment, expansion [7. P. 278], as a word-form that is morphologically similar to a foreign word [18. P. 169]. Admitting two variants of a source of this loan translation, one may argue that the term entered by the agency of a Western European image and model into the Russian language at the end of the XVIII century. In the religious-ideological and mythological project "Enlightenment" of the XVII — XVIII centuries, it was imagined or even assumed that something (a thing, a phenomenon, a combination of forms) develops, unwinds from an initial protoform which in itself contains a certain scheme (a model, a form, an idea) of this oriented change for something better, more perfect. It was assumed that a scheme itself, a model was or might be laid either by God or by nature, or by chance, or by an internal regularity — this statement was based on faith initially inherent in actants of the mentioned project. We note here that the statement was problematic, i.e. doubtful, and has remained as such, to date.
Later on, E. G. Yudin defined the concept of "development" as "the irreversible, oriented and regular changing of material and ideal objects". According to E. G. Yudin, only the simultaneous presence of all the three properties distinguishes processes of development among other changes [32. P. 409]. On this basis, if changes return, these are, in fact, processes of the cyclic reproduction of a constant function of a system. If there is no regularity in changes, then these are obviously random processes, sometimes of a catastrophic kind (from the Greek word Kaxaoxpo^^ — "turn", "revolution"). In the absence of orientation, such changes cannot accumulate qualitatively and positively, and therefore a process of change is deprived of a single and internally interconnected line, a vector, an orientation, which is inherent to development. Thus, an idea of orientation is initially laid in the very notion of "development" originally laid, although up to the present time there is no unified reasonable proposition with respect to orientation, i.e. the teleology of language development, among linguists. In general, "an ability to develop is one of universal properties of matter and consciousness", as E. G. Yudin states [ibid].
A teleological uncertainty gives rise to a theoretical dispute regarding ways of language development and methods of its optimisation (for example, language planning) and regarding artificial intervention (language policy) in the historical process of language changes.
After 1991, when some opportunities for a methodological and philosophical criticism of dialectical and historical materialism opened up, certain interesting materials were discovered, revealing some weaknesses of the concept and the term "development" in relation to different scientific objects. We may see writers, economists, philologists, philosophers, theologians and representatives of art among critics. The number of critics is not decreasing, but growing.
While analysing the term "progress" and "development" V. V. Kozhinov wrote: "in the corresponding entry of Bolshaya Sovetskaya Entsiklopediya [the Great Soviet Encyclopedia] (vol. 21, published in 1975), it is at first stated that progress is "a transition from the lowest to the highest, from the less perfect to the more perfect" (p. 28), and then it is said that "the concept of progress does not apply to the universe as a whole, because there is no clearly defined orientation of development here " (p. 29). This is rather to be undersood in such a way that in the development of human society (in contrast to the universe as a whole) there reigns one quite "definite" orientation of development (towards perfection). But it is said in another
part of the entry that "in pre-socialist formations... some elements of the social whole systematically progress at the expense of others", that is, plainly speaking, something becomes better, something simultaneously deteriorates... And even "socialist society... does not abolish the inconsistency of development". These reservations in an official publication of the Soviet era negate, in essence, the idea of progress, since it turns out that acquisitions time lead at the same to losses. And the very fact of "the elimination" of the existence of humans from the existence of the universe as a whole is extremely doubtful, in which there is no progress (in the sense of "improvement") even from the point of view of progressists themselves; as a matter of fact, humans, in particular, not only represent a special — public, social — phenomenon, but also that of nature, an element of the universe in its whole... In short, one may reason about progress as the certain development, change and transformation of society. But an idea of progress as a kind of fundamental "improvement", "perfection", etc., is merely a myth of modern times — existent since the XVII — XVIII centuries (a valid reason for contemplation is given rise to by a fact that earlier an opposite myth dominated in the minds of people, according to which the "Golden age" was in the past...). A myth of the ever-increasing "improvement" of human society is obviously refuted by a simple comparison of specific and holistic embodiments of this society at different — separated by centuries and millennia — stages... who, in fact, would dare to claim that Plato and Phidias, Jesus Christ's apostles and Emperor Marcus Aurelius, Sergiy Radonezhsky and Andrey Rublev are less "perfect" than the most "accomplished" people of our time, who were preceded by such a long human "progress"?... Despite the fact that the myth of progress has been recently visibly discredited, it still continues to be a property of the majority (or, perhaps, even of the overwhelming majority) of "civilised" people. Indeed, as has been already mentioned, a faith in progress appeared to be a substitute for a faith in God, and humans cannot live without a faith at all. And a mass of humans is imbued with an entirely illusory belief that "by improving" the existing society they — or at least their children — will find true satisfaction and happiness" [12. P. 31-32] [italicised by the authors].
V. V. Kozhinov writes, when summarising his research devoted to "progress and development" on the basis of a large historical and factual material, that the level of understanding and the depth of thoughts of "so-called progressivists" directly depends on that
of their spiritual maturity, not on that of the mind, but on that of spiritual wisdom that is inherent in an integral personality; in other words: the lower is one's spiritual maturity, the more fiercely, primitively and superficially "a progressist" thinks [ibid. P. 34].
A fragment of big fonetic changes occurred in the ancient Greek language of the beginning of our era represents a linguistic illustration of alterations in language at the expense of other resource-related changes when language evolution passes into involution. M. N. Slavyatinskaya writes about this fact: "In the system of vowelism, differences between vowels in quantity and shortness were gradually disappearing. In the II — III centuries AD, this led to a change of the type of accent — from musical accent to dynamic accent; a complex system of diphthongs began to simpify as early as in the V century BC, when the diphthong ou monophtongised; the convolution (involution) of the Greek vocalism resulted in a fact that the vowels i and n, and in some regions u as well, coincided in pronunciation - [i] (itacism, or iotacism). To the beginning of the first century BC jota completely disapperaed in diphthongs with the first long vowel" [23. P. 438]. This particular illustration can serve as an argument in favour of a proposition stating how one language stratum is evolved at the expense of another one.
Philosopher K. N. Leontyev (1831-1891) who studied the process of development on the basis of a vast historical material wrote the following while summarising his reasoning: "The idea of development, again, actually corresponds to a certain complex process in those real, exact sciences from which it was transferred to a historical area, and - let us remark here, which is in many cases entirely opposite to a process of propagation, outpouring - a process as it were hostile to this last-mentioned one" [Leontyev 2003: 74-75].
Here itself K. N. Leontyev gives a definition of development: this is "a gradual ascent from the simplest to the most complex [as we can see, this is one of the main features of language evolution, and the opposite leads to involution — V. Budeiko], gradual individualisation, isolation, on the one hand, from the surrounding world, and on the other, isolation from similar and cognate organisms, from all similar and cognate phenomena. A gradual move from colorless-ness, from simplicity to originality and complexity. The gradual complication of constituent elements, the increase of the wealth of the internal and at the same time the gradual strengthening of unity. So that the highest point of development not only in organic
bodies, but also generally in organic phenomena, is the highest degree of complexity united by such an internal despotic unity" [ibid: P. 75] [the emphasis in italics is made by the authors]. While analysing phenomena of organic, social, governmental and cultural life over the past 7000 years, K. N. Leontyev comes to the following scheme of development: a) a period of initial simplicity (ancient societies), b) a period of flourishing complexity (in the Middle Ages and up to the middle of the XIX century), c) a secondary blending simplification which foreshadows a problematic continuation of this process. K. N. Leontyev notes that the third (modern) period is characterised by a disorder of form (or forms of expression, blending), accompanied by a communion with the environment (i.e. eclecticism) where ""form is the despotism of an inner idea, despotism which prevents matter [a content, a content of tradition — V. Budeiko] from running away. When breaking bonds of this natural despotism, a phenomenon dies" [ibid: P. 82]. Let us remark here that the destruction of form in the twenty-first century becomes a token of the times.
As it seems to us, it follows from this figurative, metaphorical definition: a) the modern dominant methodology of philology is borrowed one, transferred from exact sciences, and the term and concept are taken from a methodological base of different intrisicality; b) development is not a linear process (its linearity is perhaps the most popular misconception) and continuous in its qualitative changes; c) actual development as applied to language needs some additional energy emanating from a human. We will discuss anthropological nature and anthropological motivation in improving a language activity in what follows.
With regard to the anthropological aspect in comparative linguistics, W. von Humboldt stated that laws of the development of language depend on those of the development of spirit [22. P. 159]. The concepts of "the spiritual" and "spirit" have a long history of substitutions in the XX century, but they have been deeply and conscientiously studied in our culture. The concept of "spirit/the spiritual" is defined as follows: spirit manifests itself in three forms: a) teophobia which is a reverential awe of God's greatness, inextricably linked with a belief in the truth of God's existence; b) conscience which shows a human what is righteous and what is wrong, what is pleasing to God and what is objectionable, what one should do and what should not and that one should think according to spiritual laws. Conscience not only points out, but also compels a human to fulfill the designated (the so-called transcendental experience), conscience awards one
with a consolation of soul and spirit for fulfillment, and punishes one with inner remorse, spiritual anxiety and a rebellion of soul and spirit for non-fulfillment, since conscience is an inner judge of man — a guardian of the law of spiritual life (it is known that our nation calls conscience "the voice of God" in man's soul); c) appetency for God, which is a search for God, a desire for a union with God, because human spirit cannot be satisfied with anything mortal and earthly, since every human yet wants something more; such a dissatisfaction proves that human spirit has a desire for the supreme, ideal, absolute [1]. As a rule, spiritual manifestations in man are also expressed in spiritual linguistic creativity: poetry, prose, vers libre. This spiritual linguistic creativity can be studied, it requires that a creative human should employ a rich, expressive, exact, logical, appropriate, correct language and it especially needs such. Since the spirit of a nation creates peculiar forms, the Russian nation created its own liturgical language during a millennium, grafting a branch of the old Bulgarian Church language onto the old Russian foundation — this resulted in the appearance of the Church Slavonic language of a Russian recension (a Russian version since 988 and until now), whereas a new church-religious style of the Russian literary language (XIX—XXI centuries) was formed in the modern strata of literary language [25. Pp. 612-616].
Objections can be obviated by an adequate approach to national peculiarities of the Russian language and of Russian linguistic consciousness. A. S. Khomyakov defined a difference between Western and Russian approaches to the problem of cognition in such a way: since the XI century West (Catholicism and Catholic scholasticism) perceived a solution of the cognition of truth in the activity of ratio, whereas the East (Eastern Orthodoxy and it patristics) in an integrity of cognising human spirit: "Rome broke off every contact between cognition and the inner perfection of spirit" [27. P. 55].
The same methodological and ontological divergence was pointed extensively out by I. V. Kireyevsky: "Striving for a truth of speculation, Eastern thinkers care, first of all, about the correctness of the internal state of thinking spirit; Western ones care more about the external connection of concepts. Eastern thinkers search for the inner integrity of the mind in order to achieve the fullness of truth: to attain that focus of mental powers, so to say, where all separate activities of spirit merge into one living and highest unity. Western ones, on the contrary, believe that the achievement of a full truth is possible for divided
forces of the mind as well, self-acting in their lonely isolation..." [15. P. 274]. Perhaps, that is why the Western methodology of a human's cognising a truth on the basis of chastity has left us only a scientific style and a concern about scientific ethics, i.e. a form not filled with a corresponding spiritual content.
The dominance of the Western paradigm in the cognition of the world, as we believe, has led to an internal division between humans and to future alternating permanent crises, including the expiration and extinction of languages. According to UNESCO, every year about 90 languages in the world become extinct.
Pointing out to laws of language development, B. A. Serebrennikov denoted that development is characterised "primarily by the growth of language vocabulary and by an increase of the number of meanings of words... Words become able to convey the most subtle meanings" [22. P. 160]. Based on works of our domestic lexicographers, we observe an evident involutional decline of many indicators in the vocabulary of the Russian language beginning in the XVIII century, including the lexical potential which is capable to convey subtle values of a spiritual state of man.
Revealing the essence of the conscious orientation of human life, biologist and physiologist A. A. Ukhtomsky who studied the conscious life activity of humans and animals, derived a desire for absolute truth and goodness as a common dominant of the Russian nation [26]. I. A. Ilyin (1883— 1954) noted spirituality as a dominant of the Russian nation [10. P. 8]. Metropolitan Ioann (Snychev) also wrote about the main common property of Russian man as the principality of holiness, a search for the absolute good [11]. Hence it follows that the culture of goodness and truth had somehow to be reflected in the vocabulary of the Russian language. And so it was. Dictionaries of the XI — XVII centuries reflect this spiritual trend: we find more than 200 derivatives with the roots -dobr- [good, kind-hearted] andprav-/ pravd- [right, true/truth], without considering words with prefixes, in texts of this time. A different picture is presented by dictionaries of the XX century, which reveal indices 3 to 4 times inferior as compared to previous ones. In this way, an obvious drop is noted in the Russian nation's culture of goodness and truth. An increase of the number of special, technical and scientific terms in Russian dictionaries expresses a general trend acting opposite to the spiritual aspiration of man, i.e. a tendency towards life improvement, secularisedness, utilitarianism and pragmatism.
A vector of development (linguistic teleology) depends on a high goal, a target associated with spiritual objects, whereas a practical activity can do with a low style, with simple forms of expression, considerably formally and superficially connected with man's essence and depth of understanding, soul and spirit. An increase of vocabulary at a pragmatic level is temporary; due to the augmentation of technological progress, a lexical system generates an abundance of special tools in business, scientific, technological and technical style (according to B. N. Golovin's hypothesis). Such vocabulary becomes obsolete relatively quickly, because it rests on a change of technical objects and technologies; vocabulary units associated with these objects periodically turn into histori-cisms. We observe a diferent picture at the high level of styles of bookish and spiritual nature, where vocabulary holds on for centuries, giving rise to new derivatives and meanings. Thus, a goal and trend of language development directly depend on what purpose a nation serves: either truth or utility. Hence, it is possible to orient oneself regarding terms, namely what development it is necessary to speak about: spiritual language development or a utilitarian trend of its changes. It will not be difficult to determine a quality of vocabulary and a nature of its innovations and borrowings.
Verbal communication and language development
Based on L. V. Shcherba's understanding of language theory, verbal communication consists of three components: a speech activity, a language system and a language material [31]. Despite the special importance of speech, which consists in its daily, vital use, despite the observability of a speech activity and discourses defined by it, speech itself and a speech activity are based on the state of a language system and language material, on their flexibility, wealth and development, which enable one to perform the basic functions of language: communicative, cognitive, nominative and cumulative. In a linguistic system, a big role is played by a volume and diversity of language means: vocabulary which indicates the size and complexity of a thesaurus, a system of notions and concepts of a particular linguistic culture; idiomatics; productive word-formation means; syntactical structures that permit one to express pragmatically and semantically rich thoughts, no matter how logically complex they might be. In a language material, a volume, a stylistic and genre diversity of an accumulated corpus of expressions in a particular language,
an abundance of paremic, aphoristic, precedent statements and precedent texts which have meanings fixed in the linguistic consciousness of a particular nation are important. Thus, the development of a language system and the wealth of a language material provide the combinatorial flexibility, presentive-logical precision and pragmatic success of speech. A language system and a language material constitute a stable materialised substrate for the functioning of speech and for a speech activity, they represent a language in a constant, fixed aspect, whereas a speech activity is language in a mobile, modificatory form.
In addition to L. V. Shcherba's theoretical provisions, some profound remarks about the development of language were made by V. V. Kolesov [13]. The researcher identified three areas (aspects, constituents) of a speech activity, the successful functioning of which testifies to the development of language:
A) communication, intercourse performed by means of language signs is carried out between now-living generations of humans and takes place in the sphere of the present; it is the embodied consciousness of functionally and mutually equal participants of intercourse;
B) the translation, transference and translation of knowledge from seniors to juniors through training; this is a transition from the past to the present, where a teacher appears to be the main participant in the unequal process;
C) transmutation, changing and exchange with the emergence of new knowledge in the creative work of cognition which tends from the present to the future, where an innovator scientist (a philologist, a poet, a writer, poeta doctus) is the main person of this language activity.
Understanding which is certainly based on respect and love (let us note here: on spiritual-moral categories) is a necessary condition ensuring the successful development of the three aspects of speech and language activity. A vector synthesising knowledge, consciousness and cognition moves from the past to the present and from the present to the future. "A disruption of graduality in the organisation of the semantic structure of language invites disaster: a possible violation of tradition, a fall of the semantic energy of words and a destruction of a complex system of styles [please see the above-stated proposition of K. N. Leontyev regarding the modern destruction of form — V. E. Budeiko]. The dialectics of the development of semantic structures is determined by the mutual relation of all the three spheres of a speech activity. A preference for information and communi-
cation spheres in the prejudice of other ones leads to the destruction of tradition and stops the development of new knowledge" [13. Pp.10-11]. In other words, the violation of these general terms and conditions brings about the involution of language.
A concept of a developed language includes certain features, among which the following ones may be considered, in our opinion, as important: 1) a large amount of vocabulary that reflects a multitude of notions and of concepts, designated by this vocabulary; 2) a wide usability, a broad contextual and stylistic acceptability of diverse vocabulary, including archaisms and lexical innovations; 3) simple and easy word formation and, at the same time, conceptually and connotatively various morphological means; an ease, productivity, logicality of word-formation methods using a minimum number of exceptions and limitations; 4) a rich and diverse syntax: a variety of complex sentences, syntactic expressions, conjunctions, which express various nuances of logical relations between objects, as well as modality; 5) simple inflection: a limited number of inflectional morphemes; the simplicity, consistency and uniformity of declension and conjugation systems and grammatical paradigms of variable parts of speech with a minimum number of exceptions and limitations; the simplicity, consistency and uniformity of the expression of grammatical categories; 6) a small number of incomplete paradigms and "deficient" parts of speech; 7) broad polysemy, semantic processes and changes in the semantic structure of words on a transparent, logical basis.
Thus, the richness and diversity of lexical, word-formation and syntactical systems may testify to language evolution, whereas the complexity of an inflectional system, the violation of the logic of a language and an abundance of exceptions to the rules may lead to language involution.
Despite the positive connotation of the notion "developed language" and according to theorists of an artificial international auxiliary language, an excessive manifestation of the above features impedes the application of a developed national language as that of international communication. Language complexity is inapplicable to an international auxiliary language — ideally this language should be as simple as possible. Complicating factors of languages are as follows: 1) the diversity of elements; so, if there are eight consonants in some language, and 60 in another one, then the first language is simpler than the second one due to its system of consonants; 2) non-reciprocal correspondence between form and meaning at the level of a grammar of a language: if one and the same
form is implemented in ten different ways in some language, then it is more difficult to do if this form is realised in one way. Say, the plural number of the absolute majority of nouns in English is formed regularly with the help of the same ending -5, while in Russian and German — in many ways, cf. Baum — Bäume (a tree — trees), Vater — Väter (a father - fathers), Ziegel — Ziegel (a brick — bricks), Rand — Ränder (an edge — edges) in German; derevo -derevya (tree — trees), otets - otsy (a father - fathers), kirpich - kirpichi (a brick — bricks), krai - kraya (an edge — edges) in Russian; 3) non-reciprocal correspondence between form and meaning at the level of a phrase (a text), agreement; thus, the plural number in English is expressed once at the end of a noun, and in the Russian language — at the termination of both an adjective and a noun [20].
Thus, a complex lexical system, grammar and phonetics complicate communication and do not enable a language to perform its main — communicative — function optimally and effectively. This function which is central to a language of international communication involves the simplification and economy of language resources. Thus, the number of words in a language should not be excessively big, their study should not take too much time and one needs a thesaurus necessary and sufficient for effective communication; the study of rare vocabulary characterised by the preferential usage of words due to valency-based, stylistic, contextual and connotative restrictions should be not be compulsory. An abundance of inflectional morphemes, complex systems of declination and conjugation, multiple exceptions to the rules, the so-called "incomplete" paradigms and "deficient" parts of speech, which inhibit a language from performing its communicative function, are not desirable. At the same time, too extensive polysemy and homonymy, which cause ambiguities, including homonymous inflective means, are inconvenient. Also uncomfortable are the absence or minimum of inflection and inflection means which excessively increase the role of word order in the sentence and that of peculiarities of pronouncing words (for instance, different types of tonic stress) and other additional factors.
Referring to English as an example, I. Garshin notes that it is a developed language with a syntax logical and simple for the formulation of thought and a flexible word-formation system that enables speakers to create words for any new notions "on-the-fly"— both scientific-technical terms and appellations for cultural phenomena, implying subtleties expressing emotional attitude to them. And, what is
very important, English words are short. However, at the same time, English becomes excessively bulky while its vocabulary enriches uncontrollably. In addition, the English language is not suitable for the role of an international language as its pronunciation is weakly associated with the writing of words and its phonetics is rather complex, making the "English" speech of nations with significantly different articulation habits incomprehensible. Thus, the English language should be recognised as one of the most developed languages in the world, but its shortcomings seem to be too significant to recognise its status as a world language, and there is a need for an artificial "universal planned language" [8].
According to interlinguists, in principle, any national language is poorly suited for a role of an international language: a) because this gives an unwarranted advantage to representatives of some nations to the detriment of others (language chauvinism); b) because there is no agreement and there will not be any in choosing such a language; c) because the study of another national language to a high productive level is an uphill task involving the diversion of resources (time, mental effort, memory) from other disciplines, in many cases it is not crowned with a significant success at that.
Preliminary conclusions and recommendations
As above, we touched upon a fundamental complex of constituents of development in general and language development in particular. Based on the above-stated provisions, a purpose of language, a vector of its development (linguistic teleology) are associated with its ontology, ultimately - with the spiritual meaning, the essence, soul and spirit of a nation.
The development of progress generates an abundance of linguistic means in business, scientific, technological and technical styles. But the development of language is far from being limited to this, because the vocabulary connected with these objects turns periodically into historicisms. We observe different things at the high level of styles of bookish and spiritual nature, where vocabulary is preserved for centuries, giving rise to new derivatives and meanings. In our view, a positive vector of language development from a tradition to an innovation is primarily determined by this anagogic vocabulary and corresponding notions.
What are the criteria of the positive language development? We may speak about evolution and progress in the development of language, if the following provisions are observed:
1) the principle of the synergy and orderly interaction of a language system with the external environment and components within the system with optimal emergence; a synergetic language system is stable and favourable for communication, for the translation and transmutation of knowledge in accordance with the ontology of a particular linguistic culture, with a linguistic and cultural tradition;
2) the improvement of a national language's performance of all basic language functions (communicative, cognitive-nominative, expressive, cumulative, translational, transmutative);
3) the constant enrichment of vocabulary based on the indigenous word-formation material, rather than on borrowings from a lingua franca; the development of indigenous (native) word-formation means; an ease of the creation and assimilation of neologisms from a national morphemic material, the loan-translation of foreign neologisms; the preservation of important old words and concepts, especially anagogical, abstract, culture-forming and culture-differentiating ones;
4) the development of syntax, the enrichment of conjunctions system and syntactic-rhetorical constructions for the purpose of facilitating expression of different logical relations and pragmatic background assumptions;
5) the implementation of the principle of wide usability, which implies a broad collocability - contextual, grammatical and stylistic acceptability of literary units of native vocabulary, including obsolescent words and lexical innovations;
6) the improvement of communicative speech characteristics at a high level of speech manifestations: correctness, accuracy, consistency, purity, beauty, expressiveness, richness and diversity, relevance; the quality of generated texts should be analysed according to these parameters.
The notion of involution, again, i.e. the regression of language, probably, implies such a state of language, when:
1) it loses synergy, harmony and breaks up into heterogeneous components and functions not bound up by means of a common function (goal); it stops producing new knowledge in the tideway of a tradition;
2) it does not sufficiently and effectively perform its functions and loses its ability to induce thinking to produce new meanings in the native linguistic-conceptual sphere, to nominate, communicate, accumulate and develop native cultural concepts and constants;
3) it "shrinks" and convolutes "high" discourses held on an indigenous language material, it loses its native vocabulary and concepts-meanings together
with the latter, it loses the productivity of indigenous word-formation morphemes;
4) it shows impoverishment (poverty) of syntax, logical means of connectivity and syntactic-rhetorical constructions;
5) it limits the applicability of literary vocabulary; it imposes many formal, contextual and stylistic restrictions; it contributes to the emergence of grammatically "deficient" words and to a loss of valuable appellations (including spiritual concepts) from its native vocabulary;
6) it does not contribute to the improvement of communicative properties of speech at a high level of speech manifestation, while readily creating and circulating native vocabulary items and speech specimens of low registers.
Apart from the above-discussed objective laws of language development, the subjective purposeful-ness and an activity-based approach to the language on the part of speakers who use it are also important. We postulate the following regularity: it is the language in which resources are invested that develops, and it develops inasmuch as they are invested in it. That is to say, if effort is made and study-time spent on learning a language; if the writing of textbooks in it is financially encouraged; if a trend is created of and finance given to writing artistic and journalistic works in this language; if business-official and scientific texts in it are encouraged; if its literary heritage is studied; and if dictionaries and corpora in it are created, etc., then this language develops. It increases with respect to discourses, expands with respect to the number of lexical units and expressions and deepens with respect to its semantic-notional capacity. A language material in it is enriched, as well as its system, the latter enabling one to easily articulate a variety of meanings in speech. If no resources are invested in a language, it is, on the contrary, curtailed and reduced to ordinary forms of oral communication.
Let us emphasize here that the purpose of investing in a language should, in our view, be exactly its enrichment, rather than its "subtractive" normalization. The writing of literature in a language, the elaboration of word-formative means, word creation in accordance with traditions on the indigenous language material, etc. — all this should have minimal restrictions in the process of the normalisation of a language. The restrictive "subtractive" normalization, aimed at excluding vocabulary units, which do not conform to various tight standards from dictionaries and at limiting the circulation of particular
expressions through refusal to register them in a dictionary, does not contribute to language development. In Russia, unfortunately, this trend has dominated for decades, that is why academic dictionaries of the Russian language contain fewer units of language than there are in reality. That is, a language material is not processed efficiently enough, and valuable units of speech experience are thoughtlessly sifted out from the language system. There is a lot of evidence for this, let us refer here at least to a fact of a much larger volume of lexical units in translation resources as compared to conventional dictionaries, to which users can independently add adequate translation equivalents, for example, in the Multitran.ru website.
A failure to include in dictionaries anagogic vocabulary of abstract nature on the basis of its supposed "pastness", as well as occasional, although successful, products of word creation negatively affects language development. A negative effect of restrictive normalisation also consists in that it does not expand word-formative and syntactical capabilities of a lan-
guage; no instances of word usage, which "breaks" inflexible lexico-grammatical paradigms of the so-called deficient verbs, nouns and adjectives are recorded in dictionaries and reference books. Consequently, the absence of specimens of word usage can lead to significant restrictions, as some language units are only capable to be used in certain limited forms and contexts. Unfortunately, there are many more words with incomplete paradigms, deficient forms and of limited usage in the Russian language than in the flexible and diverse English language.
If we prefer to invest resources in a foreign language — more precisely, in the so-called "global" English language, then we contribute, in the same way as other countries of the world do, to its enrichment, to the "bulking" of discourses using it, as well as to its entrenchment in various spheres of social interaction, previously served by national languages. But if we act against the imposed linguistic tide and start to invest in the development of national languages, then, accordingly, their language material, language system and speech (discourses) will get enriched.
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Information about the authors:
Elena Shelestyuk is PhD (Philology), Professor of the Theoretical and Appled Linguistics Department of Chelyabinsk State University, shelestiuk@yandex.ru
Valery Budeiko is PhD (Philology), Associate Professor of the Theoretical and Applied Linguistics Department of Chelyabinsk State University, boudeyko@yandex.ru
