Language - what it is and what is its role in the history of the people. Language and history The connection between language and history

Since the time when language was recognized as a historically changing phenomenon, its connection with the history of the people and the need to study it for the purposes of history and inextricably with it have been repeatedly emphasized. Already one of the very first founders of comparative historical linguistics, Rasmus Rask, wrote: “The religious beliefs, customs and traditions of peoples, their civil institutions in ancient times - everything that we know about them - at best can give us only a hint of family relationships and origins of these peoples. The appearance in which they first appear before us may serve to draw some conclusions about their previous state or about the ways in which they reached the present. But no means of knowing the origin of peoples and their family ties in hoary antiquity, when history leaves us, is as important as language” 1 . With even greater certainty, the historical aspect of language was emphasized by J. Grimm: “Of all human inventions,” he noted, “which people carefully guarded and traditionally passed on to each other, which they created in accordance with the nature inherent in them, language, as<201>is considered to be the greatest, noblest and most inalienable property. Having arisen directly from human thinking, adapting to it, keeping pace with it, language has become the common property and heritage of all people, without which they cannot do without, just as they cannot do without air, and to which they all have an equal right... » 2.

J. Grimm expressed his view on the close connection between language and history with utmost clarity: “Our language is also our history” 3 .

In its subsequent development, the science of language constantly turned to this essentially methodological position, but modified it in accordance with the general linguistic concepts of one direction or another. Thus, A. Schleicher put it in connection with his theory of two periods in the life of language (development and decay); neogrammarists brought the historical study of language to the fore, but, interpreting it as an individual psychological phenomenon, they tore it away from society. On the contrary, it was the social essence of language that was emphasized in every possible way by the sociological trend in linguistics. A representative of this direction, J. Vandries, wrote in this regard:

“A language does not exist outside of those who think and speak it. It is rooted in the depths of individual consciousness: from there it takes its power to be embodied in the sounds of human speech. But individual consciousness is only one of the elements of collective consciousness, which dictates its laws to the individual. The development of languages, therefore, is only one of the types of development of society” 4. From here a general conclusion is drawn about the methods of language learning: “Only by studying the social role of language can one get an idea of ​​what language is” 5 .

The theories of Academician Acad. N. Ya. Marr, who sought to establish direct<202>parallelism between the categories of language and forms of production, bases and superstructures 6.

Meanwhile, as E. Benveniste writes, “when they try to compare language and society systematically, an obvious discrepancy arises” 7 . “Therefore,” M. Cohen seems to pick up the thought of E. Benveniste, “it is correct to assert that as soon as they try to establish direct correspondences between linguistic and social structure, they come to negative conclusions” 8.

Soviet linguists also proceed from the position that the language and history of a people are closely related to each other.

In this respect, they continue the scientific tradition that was laid down with the awareness of language as a phenomenon changing over time and which has passed through all subsequent development of the science of language 9, enriched by an understanding of the social role of language. This latter demanded that the historical approach to the study of language cease to be limited by the linguistic framework itself and be put in connection with the history of society. In other words, we are now talking not just about the history of language, but about the history of language as a social phenomenon.

Thus, the position about the connection between language and society remains an unshakable basis for the scientific study of language. But this provision should not be interpreted too narrowly and one-sidedly. Firstly, language learning cannot be limited to only the historical aspect. Secondly, when studying the language and history of a people in close connection with each other, we must not forget about the specific patterns of development characteristic, on the one hand, of language,<203>and on the other hand, to the speaker of this language - the people. Thus, in linguistics, the problem of the connection between language and history should be considered from the point of view of how the structure of language reacts to the facts of general history (how these facts are refracted in the structure of language). And thirdly, the question of the connection between the history of a language and the history of a people cannot be limited to only one direction and trace only the influence of the history of society on the development of a language. There is no doubt that various types of contacts of languages ​​(which are determined by historical and territorial factors), processes and forms of crossing languages, the relationship between language and culture, the permeability of various spheres of languages, the relationship of language to the social structure of society, etc. are also directly related to this problem. d.

Below, the problem of the connection between language and history will be considered in this broad sense - according to some of the most significant aspects. It seems most appropriate to start with different types of language contacts.

UDC 82.085

S.A. PROKHOTSKAYA

Volga Region Academy of Public Administration named after. P.A. Stolypina,

Saratov

RELATIONSHIP OF LANGUAGE AND CULTURE

The language of any people is its historical memory, embodied in words. It is in language and through language that such important features and traits as national psychology, the character of the people, the way of thinking, the original uniqueness of artistic creativity, moral state and spirituality are revealed. And therefore, the culture of language can and should be comprehended in its own ecological aspect - as part of a healthy surrounding “speech environment of existence.”

The language of any people is its historical memory expressed in words. It is in language and through language that we reveal such most important perculiarities and features as national psychology, people's character, the way he thinks, his specific ways of creative work, his moral and spiritual state. Subsequently the culture of language can and must be regarded in ecolioogical aspect as an integral part of “speech-environmental existence”.

The language of any people is its historical memory, embodied in words. Thousands of years of spiritual culture, the life of the Russian people are uniquely and uniquely reflected in the Russian language, in its oral and written forms, in monuments of various genres - from ancient Russian chronicles and epics to works of modern fiction. And, therefore, the culture of language, the culture of words appears as an inextricable link between many, many generations.

The native language is the soul of a nation, its primary and most obvious sign. In language and through language, such important features and traits as national psychology, the character of the people, the way of thinking, the original uniqueness of artistic creativity, moral state and spirituality are revealed.

Emphasizing the spirituality of the Russian language, K.D. Ushinsky wrote: “In their language, the people, over many millennia and in millions of individuals, have put together their thoughts and their feelings. The nature of the country and the history of the people, reflected in the human soul, were expressed in words. Man disappeared, but the word he created remained an immortal and inexhaustible treasury of the people's language... By inheriting the word from our ancestors, we inherit not only the means

convey our thoughts and feelings, but we inherit these very thoughts and these feelings.”

To know the expressive means of a language, to be able to use its stylistic and semantic riches in all their structural diversity - every native speaker should strive for this.

The protection and preservation of natural resources and the health of the people are now recognized as an important national matter. Monuments of material culture are protected and restored - part of the spiritual historical heritage. Our language needs the same careful approach. The Russian literary language must be protected from contamination with vulgarisms and jargon, from stylistic “lowering” and stylistic “averaging,” that is, leveling or clichedness. It must be protected from unnecessary foreign language borrowings, from various kinds of inaccuracies, and even more so from errors and irregularities, in a word, from everything that leads to its impoverishment, and, consequently, to the impoverishment or deadening of thought.

That is why the culture of language can and should be comprehended in its own ecological aspect - as part of a healthy surrounding “speech environment of existence”, freed from errors and inaccuracies, unwanted leveling and “dis-

tillation”, negatively affecting the life of the language, general spirituality and morality.

Speech culture in its traditional sense is the degree of proficiency in a literary language (its norms, stylistic, lexical and grammatical-semantic resources) for the purpose of most effective communication in various communication conditions. An ecological approach to issues of speech culture and verbal communication presupposes a responsible attitude towards national linguistic traditions, the cultivation of an effective love for the native language, and concern for its past, present and future. All this constitutes the essence of the ecological aspect of speech culture, if we understand it broadly and generally.

The subject of linguistic ecology is the culture of thinking and speech behavior, the education of linguistic taste, the protection and “improvement” of the literary language, the determination of ways and means of its enrichment and improvement, the aesthetics of speech. The linguistic-ecological approach presupposes a careful attitude towards the literary language both as a culture and as a tool of culture. L. Shcherba rightly compared a language whose stylistic structure has been destroyed with a completely out-of-tune musical instrument, “with the only difference being that the instrument can be tuned immediately, while the stylistic structure of the language is created over centuries.” But it’s worth thinking about the fact that every word that is lost, distorted or misunderstood by us is a world lost to us, a link in our culture.

Unfortunately, we are unlearning the beauty of the word, just as we are weaning ourselves from the beauty and arrangement of our home, from the beauty of a melodious Russian melody, a traditional ritual... And is it really so bad to become a conscious guardian of our native language, its beauty and imagery on the path of this “unlearning” ? Of course not. We have been scattering our native stones for a very long time, not caring about the future. The time has come to collect them. The ecology of language and, more broadly, the ecology of culture is becoming one of the most pressing problems of our time, which

where the greening of science, human behavior and thinking itself are an important sign of the times.

The history of the term (and concept) ecology dates back to the 60s of the 19th century. As is known, the term ecology, or otology (from the Greek oikos “dwelling”, “habitat” and logos “study”) was proposed in 1866 by the famous German naturalist Ernst Haeckel (1834-1919). He was one of the greatest biologists of the 19th century, a reformer of science, and a supporter of the evolutionary teachings of Charles Darwin. He wrote the fundamental “General Morphology of the Organism” and many other works. He was one of the first to propose a “family tree” of the entire animal world and formulated the famous biogenetic law, according to which ontogeny (individual development of an individual) is, as it were, a brief repetition of phylogeny (the most important stages of the evolution of the entire group to which this individual belongs).

Nowadays, an ecology of culture or, more broadly, a spiritual ecology is being actively formed. It is associated with the preservation (or revival) of accumulated values, as well as with the rational regulation of technical progress, which should not negatively affect people. “Preserving the cultural environment is a task no less significant than preserving the surrounding nature. If nature is necessary for a person for his biological life, then the cultural environment is just as necessary for his spiritual, moral life, for his “spiritual settledness,” for his attachment to his native places, for his moral self-discipline...”

The historian-archaeologist V.L. Yanin revealed the content of the concept “ecology of culture” very figuratively and accurately. According to him, if you uproot a tree, you can grow a new one in its place; but if we destroy cultural monuments, erase historical toponymic names from the geographical map, then we destroy the genetic code of our historical memory. Such losses break the connection between times and generations and ultimately lead to

morality. In addition, if architectural monuments can be restored (although this will be a “remake”, in the terminology of restorers), then burnt manuscripts and lost books are irreplaceable.

Speech culture is included in the ecology of culture as an important component. In fact, if culture is the totality of the achievements of society in the field of science, education, art, and so on, then these achievements are consolidated, as a rule (although not exclusively), in language and in words. The connection of general culture with such a form of language as its literary processed “cultural” variety (literary language), enshrined in writing and in oral examples, is absolutely undeniable. Having emerged at a certain historical stage and in certain cultural and historical conditions, the literary language itself serves as evidence and an indicator of the level of spiritual development of the people in a given period of time.

It must be said that the modern era brings a lot of new things into the Russian literary language of our days, especially in such areas as vocabulary and phraseology, word combinations, their stylistic coloring, and the like.

Among the factors and conditions for the development of the modern Russian language (internal and external), in our opinion, three can be particularly highlighted. The effects on the everyday “speech environment” of each of them are unequal and ambiguous at the same time.

Firstly, this is the universality of the literary language, which led and is leading to the constant updating of literary norms, to their liberation from outdated elements and features that contradict the spirit of popular speech, the trends of general linguistic development - towards democratization.

Secondly, this is a wide and active introduction of the modern educated reader to the work of such writers as

B. Nabokov, B. Zaitsev, I. Shmelev, M. Aldanov, acquaintance with the works of N. Berdyaev,

S. Bulgakov, P. Struve, P. Sorokin, V. Rozanov, G. Fedotov, E. Trubetskoy, P. Florensky, D. Andreev and many others. All

this, of course, influences the modern literary language, raising its authority, cultivating the linguistic taste of speakers and writers.

Finally, this is the flowering of all genres of modern journalism, the development of media that directly reflect the breath of time, active processes occurring both in society and in language. Here it is necessary to say about the development of various types and genres of oral public speech, seeking support for themselves in the traditions of national Russian eloquence, in examples of oratory skills of the past and present.

In modern literary language, there is an intensive convergence of traditional book-written and oral means with everyday spoken elements, urban vernacular, social and professional dialects. However, a certain emancipation of literary norms should not lead to their weakening or stylistic decline. As a normal and inevitable process, such emancipation creates conditions for the richness and diversity of all means of expression and, consequently, for the improvement of speech culture. At the same time, we are well aware that modern oral and written speech is stylistically declining and coarsening. The language of fiction tends toward impersonality and standardization (including the standards of the latest modernism and underground). The language of science suffers from unnecessary complexity and an abundance of not always justified foreign language borrowings in the field of terminology. Journalism sometimes suffers from verbosity, vagueness and lack of expression. The public’s legitimate concern is caused by the argotic elements pouring into our press, which are monotonously used to “revive” texts. For example: to download rights, in law (often in the headlines of articles), to hang noodles on one’s ears, to fool one’s brains, for free, to hang out and much more. Such deliberate coarsening of speech, of course, has no direct relation to the normal processes of democratization

literary language and is, rather, a reflection and indicator of an insufficiently high level of speech and general culture of speakers and writers, and a lack of linguistic taste.

The state of the modern literary language worries writers, journalists, scientists, wide circles of educated people, everyone who cares about the fate of the Russian

speeches, who are seriously concerned about the state of its culture.

LITERATURE

1. Culture of Russian speech / Ed. L.K. Graudina and E.N. Shiryaev. M., 1998.

2. Oganesyan S.S. Culture of speech communication // Russian language at school. 1998. No. 5.

3. Skvortsov L.I. Language, communication and culture // Russian language at school. 2000. No. 1.

Language is not only a system of signs, but also a historically established form of culture of a people. Natural language arises as a result of centuries-old efforts of people belonging to the same national community to make their speech generally understandable within the national community. The Russian language has evolved over many centuries. His vocabulary and grammatical structure were not formed immediately. The dictionary gradually included new lexical units, the appearance of which was dictated by the new needs of social development. The grammatical system gradually adapted to a more accurate and subtle transmission of thought following the development of national social and scientific thinking. Thus, the needs of cultural development became the engine of language development, and the language reflected and preserved the history of the cultural life of the nation, including those stages that are already a thing of the past.

Thanks to this, language is for the people a unique means of preserving national identity, the largest historical and cultural value.

As W. Humboldt wrote, “language, no matter what form it takes, is always the spiritual embodiment of the individual life of a nation” and, moreover, “language is the breath, the very soul of a nation.” Thus, speech culture is an important part of the national culture as a whole.

Conclusion

In the modern era, which requires receiving and processing a large amount of information, prompt action, and quick decision-making, a specialist requires oral and written communication skills to be successful in his professional activities.

Famous Russian scientist D.S. Likhachev wrote: “Language is not only the best indicator of culture, but also a person’s educator. A clear expression of one’s thoughts, rich language, and precise selection of words in speech shapes a person’s thinking and his professional skills in all areas of human activity... If a person can accurately name the mistake he made in his work, then he has identified its essence.”

The Russian language is the language of the Russian nation. A nation (Latin tribe, people) is a historically established community of people that takes shape in the process of forming the commonality of their territory, economic ties, literary language, cultural characteristics and character.

National language is a socio-historical category that denotes a language that is a means of communication of a nation and appears in two forms: oral and written (Linguistics. Big Encyclopedic Dictionary. M., 1998).

The national Russian language is heterogeneous in its composition, since it is used by people of different social status, level of culture, age and occupation.

Each era is judged based on its inherent categories and concepts, since each era is unique, irreversible in time and characterized by circumstances unique to it, expressed in historical terms.

In different periods of historical development, society took different forms, the degree of its maturity and internal structure changed, i.e. economic, social class, political structure. The formation of society, the centuries-old achievements of its material and spiritual culture, the education and development of nations are reflected in language. Language and history are inextricably linked. The path traveled by a people in its development becomes the property of subsequent generations thanks to language.

Performing the function of a source and custodian of information, language is simultaneously a way of expressing accumulated knowledge and the basis for the formation of new knowledge. A specific language as a “carrier of information” acts as an instrument of social heredity, thanks to which a person can turn to the knowledge and experience of previous generations, and then, by performing a thought experiment, gain new knowledge (Weizsacker C.Fr.von. 1959.S.49) . It is thanks to language that the information picture of the world radically changes for the better. By maintaining an active attitude towards past experience, something that contributes to the further development of society is preserved and created.

However, everything that was not recorded in writing “remains soundless and dumb,” passing without history (G.V. Hegel, 1993, p. 479). The history of mankind became possible only thanks to language.

Fundamentally significant is the fact that “in the process of transmitting information, three levels are distinguished - syntactic, semantic and pragmatic, determined by the internal structure of the transmitted signs, as well as their content and value” (Reiman N., 1968, S/87).

The peculiarity of English law is the continuity and continuity of its development. Due to the uniqueness of the English legal system, the difference between its legal theory and history is almost invisible. So the analysis of law among the British is always more like a study of its history. “No modern work on English law,” notes Professor Raoul van Coneghem, “can be fully understood unless it contains sufficiently extensive excursions into history... The law of England, much more than any other legal system based on codification, is a product its historical development, since any codification is always an ax blow to the continuous connection of times” (Caenegem R.C. van Op.cit. p. 16).

It is quite natural to study the specific patterns of the emergence, development and functioning of the state and law as unified and integral systems. The relationship is manifested in the fact that: a) the state and law arise simultaneously due to the same reasons; b) in the process of their historical development, the type of state and the type of law coincide, corresponding to a certain socio-economic formation. Their transition from one type to another occurs simultaneously and for the same reasons; c) the state and law are organically connected and closely interact in the process of their functioning; practically they cannot exist separately (M.I. Baitin, 2000, p. 18).

Legal terminology is one of the most interesting objects of research. In the system of its terms, we can observe the life of any state, the spectrum of values ​​of a particular human society at a given stage of development. Consequently, the process of forming a legal terminology system is closely connected with historical events and the views of human society. Research into functioning and formation

This category of terminological vocabulary is of interest to researchers also because, having developed as a terminological system, it chooses the commonly used language as the source of verbal expression, and draws its conceptual apparatus from the norms of customary law.

Many language processes cannot be regulated; they operate according to their own laws, although attempts at such regulation have been made repeatedly (G.V. Lashkova, 2000, p. 97).

Knowledge of a specific era, the culture of a particular state is of great importance for the study of legal terminology. The term is subject to the laws operating in the language, that is, under certain conditions it must reflect the history of the era in which it operates.

The history of England is naturally complemented by the history of the English language. In turn, the history of the English language is based on the history of England.

The English language is known from written monuments dating back to the 7th century AD. The history of the language is divided into three main periods: 1)

The Old English period (before the end of the 11th century) is distinguished by the fact that laws are represented only by local customs. 2)

The Middle English period (XIV - XVII centuries) is characterized by the flourishing of common law. 3)

in the modern period (from the 18th century to the present), common law is faced with an unprecedented development of legislation, and therefore is forced to adapt to a society where the role of public administration is constantly increasing (S.P. Khizhnyak, 1986; Rene David, 1999; A.K. Romanov, 2000).

This periodization takes into account socio-economic and historical changes in society, which predetermined the change in the composition of English legal terminology

Hello dear readers of the site! Have you ever thought about what speech is and the words that we pronounce? Let's talk in more detail in this article about the role of language, its functions, types and characteristics.

Language is a tool with which people can communicate, express their feelings and thoughts. Also, the dialect of each nation preserves a whole history, traditions and culture.

The role of language in the history of the people

The history of the people and dialect have a close connection with each other. Experts have noticed that people's speech changes over time, which means that the dialect constantly has a different speech form. This factor pushed him to study more in order to better master the history of peoples and the whole world.

It is the duty of every nation to protect its native language. If you don’t preserve it, you can lose history, because ignorance of your dialect is the spiritual poverty of people and the decline of culture. The last factor influences thinking, on which the fate of the entire country depends.

Philosophers like G.A. Brutyan, E.S. Markaryan, S.A. Atanovsky, E.I. Kukushkin, were the first to study the relationship between history, culture and dialect. They noticed that when national traditions or beliefs change, the style of speaking changes. The Prague School also tried to answer the question of the influence of speech, whose experts confirmed previous hypotheses.

Language is the consciousness of a person, without which he simply has no place to exist. Many works of scientists confirm the fact that countries speaking the same dialect have similarities in character, cultural education, literacy, traditions and beliefs.

No nation would know its history and origins without the ability to speak. People wrote chronicles, told stories and legends from generation to generation, and this is how information about the ancient world came to us.

Studies and analyzes have not been interrupted to this day. It is considered an open question that attracts writers, scientists, philosophers and politicians. It shapes humanity and the relationships between peoples.

Scientists confirm that language does not stand along with other sciences (geography, mathematics, biology, etc.), it goes forward and leads the sciences behind itself, shaping them. It turns out that it is speaking that generates intelligence and creativity. All the discoveries that people made were described and studied through speaking.

No one knows exactly how speech abilities appeared, but it is clear that everything depended on the picture that people saw around them.

If these were peoples under enslavement, then their speech was not distinguished by melody and softness. And vice versa, good-natured people spoke in a friendly and affectionate dialect. The speech of one people therefore changed its forms, as people experienced different periods: war, illness, peacetime, time of discovery, and so on.

Functions of language, its types and characteristics

Speech is an immaterial thing; we can only hear a combination of consonants and vowels.

Today we can distinguish four speech functions:

1. Communication (communication). This is the main function without which the language would not exist at all. When interacting, people need to express their opinion, agreement, or vice versa, convey important information, etc. Speaking helps to find that unity with the help of which communication is established.
2. Function of knowledge of the world , consolidation of received information (cognitive). This aspect especially influences history; before people did not write it down, they passed it on through their mouths, telling children about how to live, hunt, what to eat, and so on.
3. Storage function (accumulative). The aspect is responsible for the preservation and accumulation of knowledge. There is a relationship between speaking and the nervous system, which is involved in the transmission of received information.
4. Expression of feelings (emotive). In this case, speech interacts with intonation and emotions.

The type of dialect may depend on a person’s position in society, or perhaps on the literacy of the population.

In the first case, the language has the following types:

• State;
• Official;
• Regional;

In the second case:

• Native;
• Everyday;
• Colloquial:
• Worker;
• Foreign.

If we talk about the signs of language, then they include:

1. Historically emerged communication tool;
2. An indicator of the state of the people;
3. Every person needs it;
4. Stability, normativity;
5. Not associated with individualism;
6. Refers to any state.

What languages ​​are spoken all over the world - TOP 5 popular

Specialists number more than 7 thousand different speaking. Some of them are unknown to anyone except small tribes. Others are at the peak of popularity.

1) Chinese. It is spoken by approximately 1.3 billion people, not all of whom are citizens of the People's Republic of China. This language is the official language of the UN.

2) English language. In total, it is spoken in 106 countries (600 million people), which is quite a lot. 6 countries, including Great Britain, recognized it as official. But every nation still has a native dialect. This way their history is preserved.

Be sure to read why I started from scratch and what lessons I use for this.

3) Hindi. 4 countries use this dialect (490 million people). Experts predict that Hindi may take first place in the list of popular dialects. But when this will be is currently unknown.

4) Spanish. The official language of the UN is spoken by 427 million people in 31 countries. It appeared at the time when the great geographical discoveries began, the Middle Ages.

5) Arabic language. It is also officially registered with the UN. The total number of speakers of this language is 267 million in 58 countries. Fame came because of the Muslim religion and the Koran.

Language is like a carrier of the mentality of a certain people. This topic is not entirely simple, but every person should delve into and appreciate the history of the country, culture and their dialect.