Learning outcomes: The course aims at acquainting students with the interpretation of ideas adopting a historical perspective, which is framed by the examination and understanding of fundamental tools in different schools of linguistic theory.
General Competences:
- Working in an interdisciplinary environment
- Working independently
- Teamwork
- Production of free, creative, and inductive thinking
The linguistic apparatus does not only reflect the passing of historical time but is also instrumental in forming the terms of perception of changing realities. The goal of this series of lectures is twofold. First, they provide an overview of linguistic theories, from antiquity to the present day, which aim at deciphering linguistic data as a tool and index of the trajectories of human conscience. Second, they provide an in-depth investigation of the content of turning points in our conceptual universe, which have solidified in contrasting pairs such as law/nature, interest/law, part/whole, etc., under specific historical circumstances.
Thematic units
PART Α (C. Canakis)
A.1 Introduction: From the “correctness/truth of names” to early contemporary linguistic thought
A.2 Saussure’s structuralism
A.3 From structuralism to Chomsky’s generative transformational grammar
A4. Linguistic relativity and the “Sapir-Whorf hypothesis”
A.5 Cognitive linguistics: Language as a categorizing device
A.6 From mainstream theoretical linguistics to sociolinguistics
PART Β (V. Anastasiadis)
Β.1 Introduction to the history of concepts, method and working hypotheses
Β.2 Ideas, concepts, and reality
Β.3 Ideas, concepts, and the birth of history
Β.4 the emergence of contrasting pairs: nature and law in the ancient Greek paradigm
Β.5 Sophistry and relativity
Suggested bibliography:
PART A
- Πλάτων. Κρατύλος: Ή περί ορθότητας ονομάτων, μτφ. Φιλολογική Ομάδα Κάκτου, ( Αθήνα: Χατζόπουλος, 1994).
- De Saussure, Ferdinand. Course in General Linguistics (New York: Philosophical Library, 1959).
- Lyons, John. 1995. Εισαγωγή στη γλωσσολογία. Αθήνα: Πατάκης.
- Φρόμκιν, Β., Ρ. Ρόντμαν, & Ν. Χάιμς. 2008. Εισαγωγή στη μελέτη της γλώσσας. Μτφρ. Έ. Βάζου, Γ. Ξυδόπουλος, Φ. Παπαδοπούλου, Α. Τσαγγαλίδης. Επιμ. Γ. Ξυδόπουλος. Αθήνα: Πατάκης.
- Chomsky, Noam. Syntactic Structures (Berlin-New York: Mouton de Gruyter, 2002).
- Lakoff, George. Women, Fire and Dangerous Things: What Categories Reveal about the Mind (Chicago:University of Chicago Press,1987).
PART B
- Guthrie, William. Οι σοφιστές, μτφρ. Δ. Τσεκουράκης (Αθήνα: MIET, 1991).
- Koselleck, Reinhart. Kρίση, μτφ. Α. Αζελής (Αθήνα: Επέκεινα, 2017).
- Koselleck, Reinhart. «Ιntroduction and Prefaces to the Geschichtliche Grundbegriffe», μτφρ. M. Richter. Contributions to the History of Concepts 6 (2011) 1-37.
- Koselleck, Reinhart. Τhe Practice of Conceptual History (Stanford: Stanford UP, 2002).
- Brunner, Otto, Werner Conze και Reinhart Koselleck (επιμ.): Geschichtliche Grundbegriffe. Historisches Lexikon zur politisch-sozialen Sprache in Deutschland. 8 τ. (Στουτγάρδη: Klett-Cotta,1972-1997).
Related academic journals:
PART A
Language
Cognitive Linguistics
Language in Society
PART B
Antike und Abendland
Contributions to the History of Concepts
Journal of the History of Idea
