Ethnolinguistic Notes
New Series, Number 5
INTELLECTUALIZED LANGUAGE
George W. Grace
University of Hawaii
October 15, 1978
“Studies of the matter are nonexistent, but one could argue as an initial hypothesis that the modern intellectual world and the modern state of consciousness could never have come into being without Learned Latin or something like it.” Walter J. Ong (1977: 36).
“I propose that Chomsky’s theory is not a theory of language generally but a theory of a particular specialized form of language assumed by Luther, exploited by the British essayists, and formalized by the logical positivists. It is a model for the structure of autonomous written prose, for what I have called text.” David R. Olson (1977: 272).
“By the intellectualization of the standard language, which we could also call its rationalization, we understand its adaptation to the goal of making possible precise and rigorous, if necessary abstract, statements, capable of expressing the continuity and complexity of thought, that is, to reinforce the intellectual side of speech. This intellectualization culminates in scientific (theoretical) speech, determined by the attempt to be as precise in expression as possible, to make statements which reflect the rigor of objective (scientific) thinking in which terms approximate concepts and the sentences approximate logical judgements.” Bohuslav Havránek ([1932J 1964:6).
“With the problem of modernization, we are confronted, in particular, with new emerging nations as they attempt to adjust the concepts, ideas and ways of thinking of their culture to the concepts, ideas and ways of thinking of the modern world through the coining of new words or terms. Since the difference between the culture of the modern world and the cultures of the traditional societies lies in the dominating position of science, technology and economics in the former, it is clear that the bulk of the newly coined words in the national languages of the young nations of Asia and Africa are related to these subjects. ....
“It goes without saying, that this change of concepts and values orientation, manifesting itself in the acceptance of new ideas and sometimes even in a new worldview, is not only limited to the coining of new words, but is also extended to the more or less conscious change of the morphology and even of the phonemic system of the language.” S. Takdir Alisjahbana (1965: 520).
It is my purpose in this Note to propose that intellectualized varieties of language such as are described by Olson, Havránek, and Alisjahbana do exist and are an important aspect of the modern linguistic scene. I propose further that such varieties are necessary for full participation in the modern world. It may be, as Ong suggested that in the original case the availability of a language distinct from that learned in infancy, one whose predominant form was written (“chirographically controlled" and “chirographically distanced"), was an indispensable condition. However, subsequently, any people which aspires to participate in the modern world must acquire such an intellectualized variety--often simply creating it within the mother tongue. I would suggest further that this intellectualization process occurred for English in the 16th and 17th centuries, that it consisted in large measure (how large I do not know) of reproducing within English the content form of Learned Latin, and that the process was virtually complete by the beginning of the 18th century (cf. Jones 1953). I imagine further that it occurred at roughly the same time and in the same way in other Western European languages, but later in Eastern Europe. I believe it is probably the central issue in the impressive interest in language “planning” in the underdeveloped world. I wish I could say how much individuality is left a language after modernization (intellectualization) and how far it has moved toward being just another lexification of Learned Latin. There is, I would maintain, cause for more concern than has so far been made manifest.
I suggest further that since intellectualized varieties of languages tend consistently to be highly valued, if a language has such a variety at all, it will be that variety which is reflected in any linguistic description made for the language. Furthermore, I suggest that in the case of languages which have not been sufficiently exposed to modernizing influences to develop such varieties, bearers of modern culture (including linguists) will tend to perceive in them a more intellectualized character than they possess in actuality.
Finally, I suggest that intellectualized language is closely associated with and adapted to a particular culture, which we may call "modern civilization”. This culture can be said to have originated in Western Europe (above all, England) in the 17th century. [It may be drawing to a close in the late 20th century, which promises to be a period of re-opening and re-examining basic questions which have passed for being solved since the 17th and 18th centuries]. A key aspect of modern civilization is its characteristic epistemology based on “modern science" which arose in conjunction with it. A major role in this epistemology is assigned to the language in which the order of reality is to be represented.
As is pointed out by Murray Cohen (1977: xxiii), "For everyone concerned with language in the middle of the seventeenth century, it seemed possible to organize, recover, or invent a language that represented the order of things in the world." This quest has persisted up to the present in the development of symbolic logic, the Unified Science movement, and in analytical philosophy, generally. However, the point of the present Note is that its effects have been more far-reaching.
REFERENCES
Alisjahbana, S. Takdir. 1965. New national languages: A problem modern linguistics has failed to solve. Lingua 15: 515-30. (Back up)
Cohen, Murray. 1977. Sensible words: Linguistic practice in England, 1640-1785. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins. (Back up)
Havránek, Bohuslav. [1932] 1964. The functional differentiation of the standard language, in Paul Garvin (editor and translator), A Prague School reader on esthetics, literary structure, and style. Washington: Georgetown University Press, pp. 3-16. (Back up)
Jones, Richard Foster. 1953. The triumph of the English language: survey of opinions concerning the vernacular from the introduction of printing to the Restoration. Stanford: Stanford U. Press. (Back up)
Olson, David R. 1977. From utterance to text: The bias of language in speech and writing. Harvard Educational Review 47: 257-81. (Back up)
Ong, Walter J., S.J. 1977. Interfaces of the word: Studies in the evolution of consciousness and culture: Ithaca: Cornell U. Press. (Back up)
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