Филологические науки/9. Этно-, социо- и психолингвистика
Savitskaya I. P.
Kostanay State
University named after A.Baitursynov, Kazakhstan
The
notion of World Picture and its correlation with Cultural Peculiarities
In
last decade linguistics turns toward to language learning in close connection
with people. It has defined anthropological principle in linguistics when
language studying become studying of the speaking person. The anthropological
linguistics is understood, first of all, as research of the human factor in
language. In the attention centre it appears two circles of problems: 1) how
the person influences language; 2) how language influences the person, its
thinking, culture. [1]
Language has been studied for many years and from different
perspectives. Ancient Greek philosophers elaborated on its proper use and
purpose, modern scholars analyzed how it is produced and perceived. [3]
Language reflects
not only reality, but also interprets it, creating special reality where man
lives. A.M.Haidegger, an outstanding thinker of the last century named language
“The house of reality”. Language is
considered as a way by which we go through into nation’s mentality, into
outlook of ancient people to the World and their society. Echoes of past times
going through centuries are preserved in today’s proverbs, sayings,
phraseological units, metaphors, symbols of culture and etc. They are “mirrors
of the nation’s life”. [2] The meanings of phraseologies are closely connected with
the background knowledge of the speaker, with his life experience, with
historical-cultural traditions of his nation.
It’s
known that person becomes person only when he acquires language and culture of
his nation. All refinements of nation’s culture reflect in language, which is
specific and unique. Huge part of information about the World comes to person
through linguistic channel that’s why person lives rather in the world of
concepts, created by him for intellectual, spiritual and social needs.
Every
language creates the World in its own way also it has its way of
conceptualization. Thereby linguists decided that every language has unique
picture of the World and language speaker needs to arrange utterances in
equivalence with its picture. Here we can observe the specific perception of
the world fixed in language that represents itself what we call “language
intervening world”, “language model of the world», or at last “language world
picture”. According to wide usage we mostly choose the last term.
World
picture, which can be named knowledge about the world, lies on the basis of
individual and social consciousness. Language fulfils requirements of
informative process. [5] Conceptual pictures of the world at different people
can be various, for example at representatives of different epoch, different
social, age groups, different areas of scientific knowledge etc. People
speaking in different languages, can have under certain conditions close
conceptual pictures of the world, and the people speaking in one language, -
different. Hence, in a conceptual picture of the world co-operates universal,
national and personal.
According
to W. von Humboldt, each language reflects some definite worldview.
Consequently person’s attitude towards “objects” is completely defined by the
language.[4] Namely V. Malakhov comments the thesis in the following way: ‘Our
reasoning and superstitions are determined by the language we think at. That
means that, firstly, our thoughts – at pre-predication level – are defined by the
inner structures of the native language. Secondly, our reasoning – ‘the
experience of reasoning’ is determined by ‘the experience of the language’ – by
the history of the culture created in that language’. Similarly, according to
the so called Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, language and mode of thinking are closely
interconnected. [6]
Language
world picture doesn’t comparable with other special world pictures (chemical,
physical and ext.), it precedes them all and forms them, because person can
understand surrounded world and himself grace to language, which fixes social-
historical experience of common human beings and national.
Language
world picture forms the type of persons treat to the world (nature, animals, to
him as the element of the world). It sets the norms of people behavior in the
world and defines their relations to the world. Every natural language reflects
the defined way of perception and organization (conceptualization) of the
world. Expressed their senses take shape of some united system of visions, like
collective philosophy, which binds as obligatory to the whole bearers of the
language.
Usually
scientific and naïve pictures of the world are distinguished. The
scientific picture of the world, in its modern condition is an ideal which
constantly changes in process of change of a paradigm of knowledge and at
revision of views and theories. Naïve world picture is reflected in
language, which forms as an answer to practical needs of people, as necessary
cognate basis of his adaption to the world.
The
naive picture of the world of orderly consciousness, in which the subject way
of perception prevails, has interpreting character. Language, fixing collective
stereotypic and reference representations, objectify and also does interpreting
activity of human consciousness accessible to studying. [5]
One
of the most interesting concepts explaining communication of language and
culture belongs to W. Humboldt who considers, that national character of
culture finds reflection in language by means of special vision of the world.
Language and culture, being rather independent phenomena, are connected through
values of language signs which provide ontological unity of language and
culture. [4]
Bibliography
2. Апресян Ю.Д. Образ
человека по данным языка: попытка системного описания // Избранные труды. Т.II. Интегральное описание языка и системная лексикография.
М., 1995.
3. Верещагин Е.М.,
Костомаров В.Г. Язык и культура. М., 2005.
4. Гумбольдт В.
Избранные труды по языкознанию. М., 1984.
5. Постовалова В.И.
Картина мира в жизнедеятельности человека // Роль человеческого фактора в
языке. Язык и картина мира / Ответственный редактор Б.А. Серебренников. М.,
1998.
6. Сепир Э. Избранные
труды по языкознанию и культурологии. М., 2002.