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Article published In: Historiographia Linguistica
Vol. 20:2/3 (1993) ► pp.355–398

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A minimalist program for linguistics

The work of zellig harris on meaning and information

 | Bolt Beranek & Newman/University of Pennsylvania
Published online: 1 January 1993
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https://doi.org/10.1075/hl.20.2-3.06nev
Summary
Zellig S. Harris (1909–1992) is a familiar icon of American structuralism. According to received views of the history of linguistics in the 20th century, he is an exemplar of ‘taxonomic linguistics’ seeking practical discovery procedures whereby one could mechanically derive a grammar from distributional analysis of a corpus of utterances without reference to meaning, and a proponent of empiricist and behaviorist views that have been overthrown by the revolution of Generative linguistics. An examination of what he actually wrote, however, shows a lifelong concern with the analysis and representation of meaning. Harris’ approach to the evaluation of alternative tools of analysis, alternative grammars, and alternative theories of language arises from a crucial but little acknowledged dilemma of linguistics grounded in a fundamental property of language, namely, that it contains within itself virtually unrestricted metalinguistic capacities, upon which any description of language whatever either directly or indirectly depends.
Résumé
Zellig S. Harris (1909–1992) est un icône familier du structuralisme américain. En plus d’être l’auteur d’opinions empiristes et behavioristes qui ont été renversées par la révolution de la linguistique générative, Harris serait, selon les idées reçues sur l’histoire de la linguistique, un produit de la ‘linguistique taxonomique’, recherchant des procédures de découverte pratiques par lesquelles l’on peut dériver mécaniquement une grammaire à partir d’une analyse distributicnelle d’un corpus d’énoncés, sans référence au sens. Un examen attentif de ses écrits révèle, cependant, un véritable souci de l’analyse et de la représentation du sens, et cela sa vie durant. L’approche de Harris relative à l’évaluation d’outils alternatifs pour l’analyse, de grammaires alternatives et de théories du language alternatives est motivée par un dilemme linguistique crucial mais peu reconnu, encré dans une propriété fondamentale du language, à savoir que le language contient des capacités métalinguistiques quasi illimitées desquelles dépend, soit directement ou indirectement, toute description de celui-ci.
Zusammenfassung
Zellig S. Harris (1909–1992) ist ein geläufiges Bild des Amerikanischen Structuralism. Den üblichen Darstellungen in der Wissenschaftsgeschichte der Linguistik des 20. Jahrhunderts zufolge stellt er ein Muster der ‘taxonomischen Sprachwissenschaft’ dar, stets auf der Suche nach praktischen Entdeckungsprozeduren, durch die es möglich sein solle, auf mechanischem Wege eine Grammatik aufgrund einer distributionellen Analyse aus Korpus von Sprachäußerungen ohne Bezug auf die Bedeutung zu erstellen. Gleichzeitig gilt er als ein Vertreter von empiristischen und behavioristischen Ansichten, die durch durch die generative Revolution in der Linguistik über den Haufen geworfen worden seien. Dagegen ergibt eine sorgfältige Untersuchung dessen, was Harris tatsächlich schrieb, daß er ein lebenslanges Engagement für die Analyse und Darstellung der Bedeutung hatte. Harris’ Herangehen an die Bewertung alternativer Werkzeuge für die Analyse, alternative Grammatiken, und alternative Sprachtheorien nimmt seinen Ausgang im kruzialen, jedoch wenig erkannten Dilemma der Linguistik, die auf einer fundamentalen Eigenschaft der Sprache basiert, nämlich die, daß sie in sich unbeschränkte metalinguistische Möglichkeiten enthält, von der eine jede Sprachbeschreibung entweder direkt oder indirekt abhängt.
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Cited by (4)

Cited by four other publications

Nevin, Bruce
2020. Language and thought as control of perception. In The Interdisciplinary Handbook of Perceptual Control Theory, ► pp. 351 ff. DOI logo
Millaku, Shkelqim
2017. Kontributi i Zellig Sabbetai Harris ppr gjuhhsinn (The Contribution of Zellig Sabbetai Harris for Linguistics). SSRN Electronic Journal DOI logo
Graffi, Giorgio
1998. A survey of syntactic theories in the 20th century. Historiographia Linguistica 25:3 ► pp. 373 ff. DOI logo
Koerner, E.F. Konrad
1995. [no title] - Randy Allen Harris. The Linguistics Wars. New York: Oxford University Press. 1993. Pp. xii + 356. US$42.00 (hardcover).. Canadian Journal of Linguistics/Revue canadienne de linguistique 40:2 ► pp. 247 ff. DOI logo

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