Ernst Pulgram

The nature and use of proto-languages

Abstract While it is true that languages related through (as one says) common descent are derived from a common ancestor language, this idiom, if unattested and available only in the form of a reconstructed proto-language, has only a limited degree of realism. The manner in which linguistic reconstruction proceeds, the lack of truly quantitative criteria in determining type and degree of linguistic relatedness, and the necessity to arrive at an entirely uniform linguistic construct are all apt to deliver a distorted or false view of the proto-language. Indeed its very existence may be questionable, especially if it cannot be supported by non-linguistic evidence; this applies in particular to intermediate reconstructed proto-languages like Proto-Italo-Keltic, Proto-West-Germanic, Proto-Ibero-Romanic, which are but way-stations on the road to the ultimate parent language. It is therefore suggested that all proto-languages be considered creations for the convenience of linguistic investigation and for the purpose of delving into an otherwise inaccessible linguistic past, but that no claim should be made for their being viewed and dealt with as real languages in any sense of the word, unless and until there accrues sufficient non-linguistic evidence for fixing them in time and place and for associating them with an anthropologically, archaeologically, or historically identifiable society. The reverse process, that is, the creation of a society to go with an unattested, reconstructed proto-language, is altogether improper.

The functions of past tenses: Greek, Latin, Italian, French

Abstract Latin grammarians describing their language (or laying down rules for the proper use of it) owe much to their Greek predecessors, notably Dionysius Thrax (c. 170-90 B.C.), whose rules they sought to replicate and whose terminology they translated. But since Latin is different in structure from Greek, and since in particular it does not have the same number of past tenses as Greek, the syntax of its tenses is not congruent with that of Greek either. And if the names of Greek tenses indicated in some measure, however awkwardly, their function, translation of these names into Latin could not but be misleading. Since also modern grammarians often base themselves on this Graeco-Roman grammatical tradition, the rules for the use of tenses and the names they devised in imitation of that tradition are less than satisfactory and at times confusing, whether they pertain to the temporal or the so-called aspectual function of the past tenses. It is argued that language in general, and tenses in particular, do not always or necessarily present faithfully the physical reality but rather re-present it, filtered, as it were, through the speaker. In this manner, the use of one or the other past tense evokes that perception of the action expressed by the verb which the speaker wants the hearer to receive. It follows that the same reality can be stated by, say, either the “imperfect” or the “past” (simple or compound) in Italian or French, depending on whether the speaker wishes to have the hearer contemplate what goes on as a picture (though movement may be involved), or whether he wants to report to the speaker the occurrence of an event, or of a series of events. In the first case, the verb answers the question — posed or implied — “What was the state? What were the circumstances?”; in the second, the question is “What happened? What happened next?”.

Homo loquens: An ethological view

Language, it is generally agreed, is the property of man alone on this earth. ‘Animal language’ is a metaphorical term at best, referring to nothing more elaborate than a set of vocal signals that some animals can produce so as to establish contact with their fellows. The range of these signals is niirrow, and their distinctiveness ,%ant. It is possible, indeed easy, to list exhaustively all the different utterances that even the most ‘arti.;ulate’ animal will ever produce in his life, and no member of the species will invent any new signals or utterances. But it is of course inconceivable to record or foretell the different utterances of one human in his lifetime, let alone Gose of the entire species. Animal signals serve to ammunce matters of simple, albeit often vital, import: the approach of an enemy, the staking out of a territorial claim (the singing of birds), the sole possession of food or of a mat{! henceforth imlcccscible to competitors, leadership over a group, and so forth.1) All such signals are of course species specific. They ue triggered by an attitude and a mood created by the animal’s present perceived surroundings. Animal language is made up, then, not of information symbols, but of mood signals.zj