Zhibek U. Kalimova

сandidate of Philology (PhD in Linguistics),

Shakarim State University of Semey, Kazakhstan.

Some problems of contrastive linguistics

In the 50 ^th and 60 ^th of the 19 ^th century in linguistics of different countries appeared a number of works dealing with the comparative study of language universals (matrials).

In 1816 German linguist F. Bopp (1791-1867) publishing his book "The system of conjugation in Sanskrit in comparison with Greek, Latin, Persian and Germanic languages" paved the way to the scientific comparative (contrastive) study in linguistics.

Comparing the verbal forms in the Greek, Latin, Germanic and Persian languages F. Bopp came to the conclusion that all these languages have a common system of grammatical forms.

Probably F. Bopp's point of view was the beginning of the comparative-historical linguistics.

In 1833-1849 F. Bopp published his main work "Comparative grammar of Sanskrit with Greek, Latin, Lithuanian, Gothic, Celtic and Germanic languages", where on the basis of grammatical material he proved that all these languages are kindred languages and called them as "Indo-European languages ". F. Bopp was the first to use the term "Indo-European languages".

Another German linguist J. Grimm (1785-1863) in his book "German grammar" gave detailed analysis of historical phonetics of Germanic languages, and made a number of investigations on modifications of consonants.

A well known German scientist V. Gumbold (1767-1835) founded the basis for general and theoretical linguistics. In 1820 at Berlin Academy V. Gumbold delivered a lecture on "Comparative study of languages in reference to different stages of their development". In his work V. Gumbold defined the main task of linguistic science i.e. the study of each language in its inner connection, in its relationship with other inner components, because the specific features of the whole may be characterized by their component parts. He came to the conclusion that "there is nothing single in the language, each separate element manifests itself as a part of the whole" (в языке нет ничего единичного, каждый отдельный его элемент проявляет себя как часть целого). V. Gumbold considers language as a system.

Comparisons of English and several languages were made in preparation for the English textbooks by some authors and various articles dealing with partial comparisons of languages appear in the journals Language learning as a contribution to foreign language learning research.

In English speaking countries, first of all, in the USA and Great Britain contrastive linguistics came into being in the 50^th of the 20^th century, when a wide program of systemic and structural, ethnolinguistic investigations were made. The foundation of contrastive linguistics were predicted by fundamental works of Ch. Fries, R. Lado, later by the works of such linguists as W.Ferguson, by the investigations on language contacts by N. Chomsky ("Transformation grammar") and Ch. Fillmore ( "Case Grammar") etc.

The fundamental assumption guiding the preparation of teaching materials at5 the English Language University of Michigan is given by Fries: “The most effective materials are those that are based upon a scientific descriptions of the language to be learned, carefully compared with e parallel description of the native language of the learner ” [ 1 ] .

The same assumption, that in the comparison between native and foreign language lies the key to ease the difficulty in foreign language learning, was applied to the preparation of language achievement tests by R. Lado [2].

A special role in the formation of contrastive linguistics in German speaking countries, according to V.G. Gak, played American contrastive linguistics, especially structural linguistic school and also an applied program in contrastive description of German and English languages. Ch. Bally founded the basis for contrastive study of French language, which was further developed in three directions: 1/ General description of the structure and means of expression of French in comparison with any kind of language; 2/ Contrastive study of special problems of the structures of the French language, e. g. parts of speech, system of tenses etc.; 3/ Characteristic description of the French language.

Contrastive study of French and Russian language takes its beginning with works of L.V.Scherba and was continued by M.NPeterson, K.A.Ganshina and others. An essential contribution to contrastive study of French and Russian languages was made by V.G.Gak. («Сопоставительная лексикология», «Сравнительная типология французского и русского языков», etc.). V.G. Gak emphasizes a special role of Prague linguistic school in the formation of contrastive linguistics. Prague linguists founded not only the conception of analytical comparison but also realized contrastive-analytical description of many languages and used it in teaching both native language and foreign languages.

The experience in contrastive study of Russian and Kazakh languages in the field of functional-semantic fields was made by Z.K. Akhmetzhanova ("Функционально-семантичекие поля русского и казахского языков" Алма -Ата, "Наука", 1989). The results of this work show that further investigations in the field of contrastive linguistics will be worth-while and actual in compiling functional grammar of Kazakh and Russian languages or other contrastive projects in this sphere.

Contrastive linguistics is a practice-oriented approach that seeks to describe the difference and similarities between two or more languages.

While traditional linguistic studies had developed comparative methods (comparative linguistics), chiefly to demonstrate kindred relations between cognate languages or to illustrate the historical developments of one or more languages, modern contrastive linguistics intends to show in what ways the two respective languages differ, in order to help in solution of practical problems. ( Sometimes the terms diachronic linguistics and synchronic linguistics are used to refer to these two perspectives).

The achievement of the tasks of contrastive linguistics is impossible without realizing the objects of investigation of cognitive linguistics, sociolinguistics, psycholinguistics and other linguistic sciences.

General revaluation of the aim and tasks of linguistics, the change of fundamental notions about language etc. are also reflected in contrastive linguistics, which includes into its object of investigation communicative pragmatic, social-functional, ethnocultural and other similarities and differences in studied languages.

The object of contrastive linguistics may be any phenomena of contrasted languages; the fact makes it possible to widen the sphere of investigation of contrasted languages.

There are numerous cases in linguistics based on the comparison of two languages: the English language is compared with German, Russian, French, Finnish, Greek, Norwegian, Polish; German language is compared with English, French, Japanese, Norwegian, Russian; Russian language with English, French, Polish, Czech, Finnish and etc.

Sociolinguistics also studies the peculiarities of functioning of languages, especially, interlingual connections which are determined by the volume and nature of social functions characteristic of this and that language.

A close contact with contrastive linguistics have such sociolinguistic problems as social and functional sublanguages and languages, socio-linguistic aspects of bilinguism, and, at last, problems connected with the study of language situations, language politics and language formation.

Contrastive linguistics is also connected with psycholinguistics. Psycholinguistics studies processes of education, perception, formation and interaction of speech. Psycholinguistics is interested, first of all, in the speaker, that's why in psycholinguistic investigations an important role plays the decision of the problems as mastering the native and second language, the peculiarities of speech production in the native and second language, the role of the first language and second languages etc. which are very important and necessary for contrastive linguistics.

Contrastive linguistics has a close connection with cognitive linguistics. In cognitive linguistics language is studied as an integral and inseparable part of human mind, universal knowledge as a structure standing on one level with perception, understanding and thought etc. At present a lot of sciences are under influence of the ideas of cognitive linguistics and they try to use its most essential results. C.L. also constantly uses the results of scientific interests of cognatology.

Cognitive linguistics as organizing principles of speech activity is explained by the orientation of the general knowledge as basis for mutual understanding and in formation of principles of language teaching in connection with contrastive linguistics.

Contrastive linguistics, since its inception by Robert Lado in the 1950^th, has often been linked to aspects of applied linguistics, e.g., to avoid interference errors in foreign language learning and to assist interlingual transfer in the process of translating texts from one language into another [2].

Contrastive description can be made at every level of linguistic structure: speech sounds (phonology), written symbols (graphology), word-formation(morphology), word meaning (lexicology), collocation (phraseology), sentence structure (syntax) and complete discourse (textology).

Contrastive linguistic studies can be also applied to the differential description of one or more varieties within a language, such as styles, dialects or terminologies of technical genres.

The appearance of this branch of linguistics is predicted by the necessity of the comparative study of the English and other native languages because any national language has its own definite grammatical structure in reference to the English language.

The specific features, e.g., of grammatical structure of the native language may have a reflection in studying foreign languages, that have quite different grammatical structures. As the native language is considered to be the basis of thinking process of the learners, any notion, first of all, is represented in the form of grammatical structure of a certain native language. Let’s take some examples to illustrate grammatical structures of different national languages. E.g. I bought a book in the bookshop. – Я купил книгу в магазине (in Russian) – Мен дүкеннен кітап сатып алдым (in Kazakh)). According to the grammatical structures of the English and Russian languages the word combinations bought in the shop and купил в магазине require the question where (где?) whereas in Kazakh the combination дүкеннен кітап сатып алдым requires the question қайдан? (откуда)? And the word магазин in Russian is used in the prepositional (в магазине) and the word дүкеннен takes the original case (шығыс септігі) (from where?), hence, the Kazakh- learners in translating the sentence – Мен дүкеннен кітап сатып алдым into Russian may exactly say “Я купил книгу из магазина” or “Я из магазина книгу купил”.

One more example, in Russian: два стола, три стола, четыре стола (the numerals два, три, четыре require the possessive case, in English two tables, three tables, four tables, in Kazakh the numerals екі, үш, төрт are combined with the noun in the common case екі стол, үш стол, төрт стол as in the English language. That’s why in learning foreign languages a special care should be given to specific features of this or that native language and it is necessary to teach them by contrasting grammatical categories of contrasted language.

List of literature

1. Charles G. Fries, Teaching and Learning English as a Foreign Language, University of Michigan, 1980.

2. Robert Lado, Linguistics across cultures: Applied linguistics for language teachers. University of Michigan Press, 1957.

3. Ахметжанова З.К. Функционально-семантические поля русского и казахского языков, Алма -Ата, "Наука" , 1989.

4. Гак В. Г. О контрастивной лингвистике // Вып. XXV. Контрастивная лингвистика / Сост.: В. П. Нерознак, В. Г. Гак.  М.: Прогресс, 1989, 438 с. 

5. Лингвистический энциклопедический словарь.  /Под ред. В. Н. Ярцевой. — М.: Советская энциклопедия, 1990.

6. Контрастивная лингвистика / Сост.: В. П. Нерознак, В. Г. Гак.  М.: Прогресс, 1989, 430 с.

7. Ярцева В. Н. Контрастивная грамматика, М: Наука, 1981, 112 с.