In "Prolegomena to any future metaphysics..." Kant outlines two ways of investigating categories. The first is focused on finding and systematizing actually existing in ordinary language, concepts (words), which are constantly encountered in any experimental knowledge.

The second consists in constructing, on the basis of previously developed rules, a complete speculative scheme of rational concepts, independent of either the historical conditions of a person's life or the content of the material being processed.

Kant himself chooses the second path, which ultimately leads to the cold heights of the Hegelian Absolute Spirit. But his main idea that the structures of being depend, even on universally universal, but still human definitions, turned out to be more fruitful precisely on the first path. This path led to the development of a linguistic interpretation of categories, which was stimulated by the research of Wilhelm Humboldt.

As already shown, the main function of categories is to introduce a certain order into some undivided or unorganized integrity. This order, one way or another, is expressed (or displayed) in the language.

The lexical composition of the language and the set of categories basically coincide, and any word, since it generalizes, acts as category for a certain set of things. Thanks to this coincidence, even a person who is completely unaware of the existence of theoretical schemes of categorical analysis or synthesis “sees” the world in a certain way ordered only because he uses his native language to describe it.

Language, just like categories, is not derived by each individual directly from his individual experience. Language has a pre-experimental (a priori) nature. Each individual person receives it as the legacy of a long line of past generations. But like any heritage, language, on the one hand, enriches, and on the other hand, binds a person before and independently of him by established norms and rules. Being, in relation to the knowable, subjective, the norms and rules of the language, in relation to the knower, are objective.

But if thinking can still be represented as absolutely pure (empty) thinking (Hegel and Husserl perfectly demonstrate this), then speech is unthinkable as absolutely “pure speech”, devoid of any definite content. Any conversation is a conversation about something. This "something" is the subject of speech, singled out and fixed in the word. Therefore, in words, as lexical units of language, both the primary division of being and the primary synthesis of sensory impressions are already taking place.

The history of the language does not have a clearly defined beginning. No matter how far back in time our research goes, wherever we find people, we find them already talking. But it is impossible that in the thinking of people who possess the word, those initial articulations of being and thought that already exist in language are completely absent. The notion of pure thinking, devoid of any content, working "on idle" is an abstraction that grows only on the soil of Cartesian cogito. Real thinking is never pure "thinking about nothing", it always has an intentional character, i.e. it is always directed at an object, there is always thinking about something definite.

At first glance, it seems that language, as a sign system, is completely neutral with respect to thought, which can be expressed in any arbitrarily chosen sign system: sound, graphic, color, etc. But in this case, it turns out that thought arises before language and only expressed in it. Thinking is clothed in sounding speech as a form (more precisely, as one of the possible forms) of an external expression of an already existing content of its own.

The actual relationship between thought and language is much more complex. This becomes noticeable when the question of their genesis is raised.

Phylogeny (historical development), as a rule, is reproduced in individual development - ontogenesis. As studies by J. Piaget have shown, the formation of categories in the mind of a child occurs after he has mastered the corresponding language structures. First, the child masters complex syntactic turns, such as "because", "where", "after", "despite", "if", etc., which serve to express causal, spatial, temporal, conditional - t .e. categorical relations.

Categories are not derived from subject experience, but are mastered along with the acquisition of the language and are fixed, first of all, in the skills of verbal communication. They are recognized much later than they begin to be used in language practices. Apparently, the order of the historical development of the categories was the same. First, unconscious unconscious use, and only then (much later) comprehension.

There is an organic connection of categories with certain types of very real practical questions, each of which can be formulated with the direct use of the corresponding category: Where? - In which space? When? - In which time? etc. But vice versa, each category can be expressed as a question. " What is this?" category entities; "Where when?" - categories space and time; "What?, How much?" - quality and quantity; "Why?" - category causes; "What for?" - goals.

We ask being about those aspects, properties and characteristics that constitute the sphere of our vital interests. In the linguistic interpretation of the category, there are lines along which the fragments and relations of interest to us are separated from the general mass and appear before us as objects of our close attention. Each category represents a certain perspective in which we see being from a special point of view, and all together they form a kind of functional unity, fixed in the language system. Everyone who speaks the language is involved in this system, but this does not at all mean intentionality and full awareness of its application. Man, as Sartre notes, "is not so much a speaking being as a spoken one," and the language knows the person, perhaps to a greater extent than the person knows the language.

The culture of each community, like its language, is different from the culture and language of any other community. This gives us every reason to assume that the dividing lines that language draws along the "body" of being can form worlds that have different configurations. This idea was first expressed in the well-known hypothesis of linguistic relativity, called, after its authors, the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis.

“We dissect nature,” Whorf says, “in the direction suggested by our native language. We single out certain categories and types in the world of phenomena not at all because they (these categories and types) are self-evident ... We dissect the world, organize it into concepts and distribute meanings in this way and not otherwise, mainly because we are parties to an agreement that prescribes such a systematization ... It is impossible to determine a phenomenon, thing, object, relationship, etc., based on nature; definition always implies an appeal to the categories of a particular language.

The essence of the hypothesis of linguistic relativity is that the organization of the world of our experience depends on the categorical structure of a particular language, so even the same event can look completely different, depending on the language means used. Indeed, a world in which "The rooster calls the hens with his crow" is different from a world in which "the crow of the rooster sets the hens in motion."

By accepting this hypothesis, we transfer the categories from the spheres of Aristotelian being, Kant's pure reason or the Hegelian Absolute idea into the sphere of human language and say goodbye to the hope that inspired these thinkers to discover (or create) an absolutely complete and complete system of categories that would be one and only "for all times and peoples." By placing the categories in the structures of language, we recognize that it is not being as such or consciousness in general that finds expression in them, but the concrete life world of a person belonging to a certain culture and historical epoch.

The idea of ​​the connection of categories with the immediate life world of a person is being developed in modern versions of phenomenological-existential philosophy. In the traditional sense, categories serve, first of all, to highlight and designate what is most important and significant for a person. But what seems important and significant from the point of view of the whole - a cultural community, for example - may be completely indifferent to a single, "this" person. For an individual, the most important thing may be what directly affects him, concerns precisely and only his individual being: his fears and hopes, aspirations and complexes, doubts and fears. Thus, in the context of philosophical research, completely non-traditional, so-called "existential categories" appear, such as, for example: "death", "fear", "abandonment", "care", etc.

Summing up our analysis, we can say the following. Regardless of the context of their interpretation, philosophical categories represent extremely broad generic definitions of being. As extremely general genera, they themselves do not have a higher genus standing above them and, therefore, cannot be defined, like concepts, by referring to a higher genus, with an indication of specific difference. They are determined not through higher genera, but by establishing relationships with other categories. The concepts that are included in the semantic field of each category are subordinate to it and express one or another of its aspects, shades and specific forms of manifestation. The relationship between categories and concepts can be illustrated as follows.

Any concept has a specific subject area or volume, which includes a set of subjects covered by this concept. So, for example, the scope of the concept "table" is the set of all possible tables, and the concept of "house" is the set of all possible houses. It is clear that, since we mean not only actually existing, but also all possible tables or houses, the scope of each of these concepts is an infinite set, so we cannot say which of these concepts has a larger volume and which one has a smaller one. However, there are concepts, the relations between which are such that they make it possible to unambiguously determine which of the two compared infinities is greater. So, for example, an infinite number of birches is clearly less than an infinite number of trees, and an infinity of trees is less than an infinity of plants. We get a hierarchical series of concepts, in which each subsequent one includes the previous one as its component part: birch - tree - plant - living nature - nature - being. The concept completes this series, which exhausts the possibility of further expansion of the scope. This is the philosophical category, which acts as the broadest possible generalization, the absolute limit of further expansion of the subject area.

The concepts of the lower levels of generality outline the boundaries of the subject areas of specific sciences, and act as categories of a particular science, since they perform (within the limits of the area limited by them) the same role of limiting generalizations. For example, if the subject of philosophy is being, then nature is the subject of natural science in general, Live nature- the subject of biology, plant- Botany, and probably some kind of science is being studied at the Forestry Academy, the subject of which is only trees.

So, we found out that the role of philosophical and scientific categories in cognition is extremely important. However, there is no single universal system of categories. At different stages of historical development, different types of categories or, what is the same, different principles of structuring being and thinking become dominant in practical and spiritual activity. In general, each categorical conceptual system can be likened to a net that we throw into the ocean of being, in the hope of catching the Golden Fish of Absolute Knowledge. But each time this network brings to the surface only what the interwoven cells capture by us.

Category (in linguistics) Category in linguistics, linguistic meanings that are correlated and interconnected on the basis of a common samantic attribute and representing a closed system of subdivisions of this attribute. For example, K. of a person in Russian (combining 3 meanings based on the feature - participation in a speech act), K. of the genus Rus. adjectives, lexical K. color terms. K. differ in the nature of their semantics (denotative, semantic-syntactic, etc.), in the degree of their obligatory nature in a given language (grammatical, non-grammatical), and in the methods of expression (morphological, lexical, syntactic). Semantically close suffixes may be obligatory in some languages ​​and optional in others. So, K. of locative relations with nouns is realized in the Lak language in K. in a series of local cases (katluin - "to the house", katluinmai - "towards the house", katluykh - "from above the house past" and before.), and in Russian language, the corresponding meanings are expressed by separate lexical units. Grammatical (mandatory) quotations form rigid hierarchical systems in the language. For example, in the Hungarian language, the noun expresses K. the number of possessiveness, the person and number of the owner, the relative, the number of the relative, the case. B. Yu. Gorodetsky.

Great Soviet Encyclopedia. - M.: Soviet Encyclopedia. 1969-1978 .

See what "Category (in linguistics)" is in other dictionaries:

I Category 1) groups, rank, degree. 2) see Categories, Category in linguistics. II Category in linguistics, linguistic meanings that are correlated and interconnected on the basis of a common samantic feature and representing ... ...

In Wikipedia, categories are used to systematize articles, grouping them according to the most important features. For more on how this works, see Wikipedia:Category. For a guide to categories, see Wikipedia:Categorization. For an overview of existing ... ... Wikipedia

Number in linguistics, a grammatical category denoting in a sentence the number of participants in an action (subjects and objects) using morphological means. The main opposition in the category of Ch. is uniqueness ‒ ... ... Great Soviet Encyclopedia

Modality in linguistics, a conceptual category that expresses the attitude of the speaker to the content of the statement, the target setting of speech, the relationship of the content of the statement to reality. M. can have the meaning of statements, orders, wishes, ... ... Great Soviet Encyclopedia

Models in linguistics are used in structural linguistics when describing a language and its individual aspects (phonological, grammatical, lexical and other systems) to clarify linguistic concepts and relationships between them, which helps to identify ... Great Soviet Encyclopedia

Functional semantic-stylistic category, FSSK- - a kind of text categories (see), reflecting the functionally stylistic differentiation of speech (typology of texts). FSSK is a system of multi-level linguistic means (including textual ones), united functionally, semantically and stylistically ... ... Stylistic encyclopedic dictionary of the Russian language

Number (in grammar) is a grammatical category that expresses a quantitative characteristic of an object. The division into singular and plural is perhaps a relic of that distant era when counting was rarely used in practice, and ... ... Wikipedia

Linguistics- (linguistics, linguistics) the science of natural human language in general and of all languages ​​of the world as its individual representatives. The place of linguistics among other sciences. Linguistics and social sciences. Because language is the most important...

concept- The concept 1) a thought reflecting in a generalized form the objects and phenomena of reality by fixing their properties and relationships; the latter (properties and relations) appear in the concept as general and specific features correlated with classes ... ... Linguistic Encyclopedic Dictionary

Introduction
The question of the mental basis of language structures and their speech realizations is considered in the modern linguistic paradigm as one of the most important. In this regard, research within the framework of the relatively recently declared itself conceptual linguistics - a field of linguistics focused on the analysis of the genesis, development and functioning of language structures in terms of their conditionality by a mental substrate, the most important component of which are discrete elements of consciousness - concepts (concepts), which are capable of being grouped into complex structures called conceptual categories. The latter have already been the subject of quite numerous studies, but have not received any uniform interpretation. The purpose of this article is to give an overview of the history of the issue of conceptual categories and propose a possible taxonomy of their essential characteristics and functions.
1. Information from the history of the issue
For the first time the term “conceptual categories” was introduced into scientific use by O. Jespersen in his classic work “Philosophy of Grammar”, which was published in 1924. O. Jespersen admits that “along with syntactic categories, or besides them, or behind these categories , depending on the structure of each language, in the form in which it exists, there are still extralinguistic categories that do not depend on the more or less accidental facts of existing languages. These categories are universal in that they apply to all languages, although they are rarely expressed in those languages ​​in a clear and unambiguous way. (…) For lack of a better term, I will call these categories conceptual categories.” Without excluding the traditional approach to the study of languages ​​- from form to content (semasiological approach), O. Jespersen, like his contemporary F. Bruno, considers it important to study the language from the inside, from the inside, going from content to form, thus laying , fundamentals of onomasiology.
It is with this approach that the essential role that conceptual categories play in the success of linguistic research becomes obvious, and the question arises of determining their ontology and functions.
The term “conceptual categories”, as noted above, belongs to O. Jespersen; it would, however, be erroneous to assume that the theory of conceptual categories as the mental substratum of language began to develop only with the works of this researcher. It should be recognized that even before O. Jespersen, in the linguistic literature, assumptions were made about the existence of a certain mental entity that precedes linguistic (especially grammatical) constructions and underlies them.
There is reason to believe that W. von Humboldt was the first to substantiate the existence of a “universal component” of a language (or, rather, languages) from the proper linguistic positions in connection with his typological studies and the creation of a morphological classification of languages. S. D. Katsnelson sums up Humboldt's statements on this topic found in various works as follows: “Universal categories are mostly mental forms of logical origin. They form a system that is the general basis of the language, but is not directly included in the structure of the language. At the same time, they cannot be called properly logical, since, being turned towards grammar, they reveal specific features. One might say that they constitute the domain of "logical grammar," which is essentially neither logic nor grammar; it is an ideal system that does not coincide with the categories of individual languages. In each individual language, the categories of ideal logic are transformed into specific grammatical categories. Although Humboldt's "universal categories" are not quite Jespersen's "conceptual categories" (which is quite natural: Humboldt is mostly a typologist, and Jespersen is a grammarian), nevertheless, the coincidence of the essential characteristics of both is striking.
Some time passes, and G. Paul in his work “Principles of the History of Language”, published in 1880, dwells in sufficient detail on such categories, calling them “psychological categories” in accordance with the traditions of his time and in the spirit of the neo-grammatical teaching. G. Paul believes that any grammatical category arises on the basis of psychological ones, and the first is nothing more than an external expression of the second. As soon as the effectiveness of the psychological category begins to be revealed in linguistic means, this category becomes grammatical. Note that this provision obviously echoes Humboldt's idea of ​​"transforming" the universal categories he considers into specific grammatical categories. According to Paul, with the creation of the grammatical category, the effectiveness of the psychological category is not destroyed. The psychological category is independent of language (cf. O. Jespersen's statement quoted above about the extralinguistic nature of conceptual categories and that they do not depend on more or less random facts of existing languages.); existing before the emergence of the grammatical category, it continues to function after its occurrence, due to which the harmony that originally existed between both categories can be broken over time. The grammatical category, according to Paul, being associated with a stable tradition, is to a certain extent a “frozen” form of the psychological category. The latter always remains something free, alive, taking on a different shape depending on individual perception. In addition, a change in meaning very often contributes to the fact that the grammatical category does not remain an adequate psychological category. Paul believes that if a tendency to equalization subsequently appears, then a shift in the grammatical category occurs, in which peculiar relationships may arise that do not fit into the categories that existed before. Further, the author makes an important methodological conclusion regarding the linguistic value of the analysis of the processes of interaction between “psychological” and grammatical categories: “Consideration of these processes, which we can trace in some detail, at the same time gives us the opportunity to judge the initial emergence of grammatical categories that are inaccessible to our observation.”
At about the same time as O. Jespersen, the French linguist G. Guillaume developed the theory of the conceptual basis of the language. Not received enough attention and deserved appreciation during the life of the author, now G. Guillaume's theory is the object of close study and analysis. Considering the issues of the language analysis method, the essence of the linguistic sign, the genesis of the word and its systemic nature, and others, G. Guillaume constantly refers to the conceptual factor, strives to study the mental and linguistic in their close relationship. Before the publication in 1992 of G. Guillaume's book “Principles of Theoretical Linguistics”, his concept was known to the Russian-speaking reader primarily thanks to the works of E.A. And although these authors differ in the interpretation of some provisions of Guillaume's linguistics, both scholars note the most important place in it of the conceptual component.
At present, there is every reason to believe that G. Guillaume managed to create his own linguistic school, called “vector linguistics”, or “psychosystematics”. On its principles, descriptions of individual subsystems of the English language (for example, the name and article, as well as the verb) have already been created. Among the students and followers of G. Guillaume are R.-L. Wagner. P.Imbs, R.Lafont, B.Potier, J.Stefanini, J.Moynier, M.Mollo, J.Maillard and others. Giving an assessment to their linguistic works, L.M.Skrelina considers close attention to to specific linguistic facts, which comes from G. Guillaume, and the desire to consider them “from the inside”, from the side of the signified, starting from conceptual categories when explaining the functioning of elements in speech.
Following O. Jespersen, II Meshchaninov raises the question of the nature of conceptual categories. The first work of the scientist, which marked the beginning of his development of the theory of conceptual categories, was published in 1945. It was followed by a number of other works devoted to this problem. The impetus for these studies was the insufficient elaboration of the question of the relationship between language and thinking, especially the fact that “the establishment of a common point of view on the relationship between language and thinking was largely hampered by blind and categorical borrowing from textbooks of logic and psychology, which boils down to attempts to interpret linguistic facts. from the point of view of the provisions developed in them. The facts of language were illuminated from the outside, instead of receiving their explanation within themselves. In addition, the typological studies conducted by I.I. Meshchaninov led the scientist to the idea that the differences between languages ​​are not absolute, but relative in nature and relate mainly to the form of content explication, while such concepts as objectivity and action, subject, predicate , an object, an attribute with their modal nuances, as well as relationships between words in a sentence, are common to all languages. The identification of this universal mental substratum became a problematic in the works of I.I. Meshchaninov, connected with the analysis of conceptual categories.
Among other most famous domestic researchers who contributed to the development of the topic of the mental foundations of the language, one should mention S.D. Katsnelson. S. D. Katsnelson develops this topic in relation to three main areas of linguistic research: general grammar and theory of parts of speech; the problem of generating an utterance and speech-thinking processes; typological comparison of languages. Let's consider all three of these areas in more detail.
Speaking against the formal understanding of parts of speech, based on the allocation of formal features and specific categories from words, which are formed on the basis of inflectional morphology, S.D. Katsnelson, following L.V. The category considers the meaning of the word. The taxonomy of the elements of the language, therefore, is carried out by him on an onomasiological basis - from meaning to form (compare the above points of view on this issue by O. Jespersen and F. Bruno). According to S. D. Katsnelson, “in the very meanings of words, regardless of whether they are inflectional or according to the norms of a different morphology, there are some strong points that allow us to talk about nouns, adjectives, etc.”. Conceptual and semantic categories serve as such “strongholds”.
In the theory of speech generation, S.D. Katsnelson adheres to the understanding of the process of speech generation that is typical for representatives of generative semantics, in which the initial structure of the generative process and one of the basic concepts of the whole concept is a proposition. The latter is understood as a kind of mental content expressing a certain “state of affairs”, an event, a state as a relationship between logically equal objects. As part of the proposition, the members-bearers of the relation and the relational predicate linking them are distinguished. Moreover, each of the members of the proposition in itself is neither a subject nor a direct object, but as part of the sentences that have arisen on the basis of the proposition, it can appear in any of these syntactic functions. “The proposition contains an element of imagery and in this respect reflects reality more directly than a sentence. Like a picture, it depicts a holistic episode, without prescribing the direction and order of consideration of individual details. Propositions, acting as operational schemes at the initial stage of the speech-generating process, although they are focused on a certain semantic content, but by themselves, without filling the “places” they open with certain meanings, they are not meaningful enough to serve as the basis for their further transformation into sentences. These structures need special units to complete propositional functions. Concepts are such units. As can be seen from these arguments of the scientist, not only the existence of a certain mental substrate, which has a non-linguistic character and serves as the basis of the speech-generating process, is allowed, but also its heterogeneity, complex structuredness is noted.
As for typological research, according to S.D. Katsnelson, the involvement of the content side in the orbit of these studies is necessary due to at least the fact that in the field of content, languages ​​also show features of both similarities and differences. Emphasizing the fundamental possibility of the transition from the semantic system of one language to the semantic system of another language, the scientist focuses on the universal, universal human thought processes that underlie speech-creative activity. On the other hand, “the transition from the logical-semantic system to the idio-semantic system of a given language does not present significant difficulties, since, remaining within the same language, we always know when the configuration of conceptual components forms a value fixed by the norm and when more than one corresponds to it, but multiple values. When we encounter a new language for us, these boundaries disappear due to a different distribution of conceptual components between meanings compared to the one with which we have become accustomed. It is the conceptual components of meanings that are the sine qua non condition for their typological (interlingual) congruence.”
It is possible to sum up S. D. Katsnelson's views on the significance of the mental pre-linguistic substrate as follows: “Thinking categories form the basis of the grammatical structure, since they help to comprehend sensory data and transform them into propositions.”
Research in line with this issue was further developed in the works of A.V. Bondarko in connection with the development by this author of the category of the functional-semantic field, as well as his analysis of the functional-semantic, semantic/structural categories. Of particular note is the article by A.V. Bondarko “Conceptual categories and linguistic semantic functions in grammar”, which is specially devoted to the consideration of the relationship between these entities and the analysis of the linguistic semantic interpretation of conceptual categories. The article also considers the question of the universality of conceptual categories. In general, it should be emphasized that A.V. Bondarko, repeatedly noting the close connection of his theoretical research with the views of O. Jespersen and I.I. Meshchaninov, at the same time expresses his own, somewhat different attitude to the problem under consideration. Relying on the theory of conceptual categories, A.V. Bondarko at the same time somewhat departs from it. The direction chosen by him is determined by the desire to consistently interpret the categories under consideration as linguistic categories that have linguistic content and linguistic expression. This is also related to the rejection of the term “conceptual category” by the scientist, since, as he believes, this term gives reason to think that logical concepts are meant, and not categories of language.
A significant contribution to the study of the conceptual sphere of thinking in its relation to language was made by the American linguist W. L. Chafe. In his most famous work, The Meaning and Structure of Language, he considers meaning from the point of view of the conceptual (ideational) theory of language. This theory states that ideas or concepts are real entities in the minds of people and that they are denoted by sounds through language so that they can be transferred from the mind of one individual to the mind of another. WL Chafe believes that the conceptual structure and the surface structure are different things: and if the surface structure is represented by the material means of language and given to us in sensory perception, then the concepts are deep inside the human nervous system. According to W. L. Chafe, we cannot make conceptual spectrograms, x-rays, or tape recordings in order to examine them slowly and carefully. Among other processes, W.L. Chaif ​​in his book considers the process of communication from the point of view of the use by communicants of the conceptual apparatus that they have, analyzes the problem of combining an increasing inventory of concepts with a strictly limited set of linguistic symbols, writes about the non-linear nature of concepts. He characterizes the mechanism of communication as the excitation and activation by the speaking means of the language of conceptual entities in the mind of the listener. At the same time, W. L. Chafe is fully aware of the complexity of the study of the conceptual sphere: “To say that concepts exist does not mean that we are able to single them out in the blink of an eye in our minds or that we have satisfactory ways of representing them. and review."
Having briefly described the most basic research in the field of conceptual categories in the historical aspect, let us proceed to the presentation of the actual theoretical aspects of this problem.
2. Functions of conceptual categories
As soon as one has to admit the presence of conceptual categories in human consciousness, then the problem of their ontological status, the definition of that sphere, that “floor” of consciousness where they are rooted, as well as their relationship to the phenomena of reality and categories of logic and language, arises in full growth.
On this occasion, researchers express different points of view, often not devoid of some duality, and sometimes internal inconsistency. So, O. Jespersen, establishing the extralinguistic nature of conceptual categories, insists in the further presentation that it is always necessary to remember that they must have a linguistic meaning. O. Jespersen believes that we want to understand linguistic (linguistic) phenomena, and therefore it would be wrong to get down to business without taking into account the existence of language in general, classifying objects and concepts without regard to their linguistic expression.
Reflecting on the status of conceptual categories, I.I. Meshchaninov strongly points out the need to distinguish them from the categories of logic and psychology and characterizes them as follows: “We have to trace in the language itself, in its lexical groupings and correspondences, in morphology and syntax, the expression of those concepts, which are created by the norms of consciousness and form sustained schemes in the language. These concepts, expressed in the language itself, although in the non-grammatical form of the grammatical concept, remain within the limits of the linguistic material. Therefore, they do not come out of the total number of language categories. At the same time, expressing in the language the norms of the acting consciousness, these concepts reflect the general categories of thinking in its real manifestation, in this case in the language. However, in one of his subsequent works, I.I. Meshchaninov, contradicting his previous views, interprets conceptual categories as a kind of logical-grammatical categories.
To a large extent, the point of view of S.D. Katsnelson, according to which concepts and meaningful grammatical functions, due to their direct or indirect conditionality to extralinguistic reality and due to the variety of ways of their expression in the language, within certain limits they are independent of the language. Since, however, the mode of expression is not “neutral” in relation to the content, the study of linguistic content is impossible without taking into account the conditions for its distribution among the forms of the language.
Interesting in terms of analyzing the problem under consideration is the concept of A.V. Bondarko, who considers it necessary to distinguish between conceptual (logical, mental) categories and bilateral linguistic unities such as the functional-semantic fields he establishes. These fields include semantic elements in the interpretation of this particular language and specific elements of the expression plan also of this particular language. This implies the interpretation of these fields as unities located on the surface level, which, however, does not mean that the connection with the deep level is excluded. The author sees such a connection in the fact that the semantic functions, the carriers of which are the elements of this field, are a “surface” realization of a certain “deep” invariant conceptual category or a complex of such categories. So, it can be assumed that the actual conceptual categories, which have a universal character, belong to the deep level, while the concrete-linguistic semantic interpretation of a given conceptual category, the organization of linguistic means that serve to express a given meaning, the distribution of semantic load between morphological, syntactic, lexical and word-formation means - all this refers to the surface level.
A.V. Bondarko proposes the idea of ​​highlighting several levels of the contensive side of the language. Semantics, according to his point of view, exists both at the deep and at the surface level. Deep semantics is characterized by him as having no concrete language organization and interpretation and not assigned to certain language means. Surface semantics, based on deep semantics, refers already to a given, specific language. Deep conceptual invariants here appear in variants, the general configuration of which and many details are characteristic of this particular language. Thus, conceptual categories play a functionally active role both in relation to deep semantics, where they are realized in variants of generally significant ones that do not have specific language specifics, and in relation to surface semantics, where they are realized in such variants that constitute a specific feature of this particular language or group of languages, as distinct from other languages.
In one of his subsequent works, A.V. Bondarko comes to the idea of ​​the need to distinguish between conceptual categories. He distinguishes two types: fundamental conceptual categories, which are obligatory and universal, and non-fundamental categories - optional and non-universal. Such a division of semantic and conceptual categories testifies to a subtle analysis of the object of study and to the scientist's awareness of the complexity and versatility of systemic relations between entities that are not given to a person in direct sensory perception. Unfortunately, we have to state that the reverse side of such a classification is its some cumbersomeness, not always a clear enough identification of the relationship between the proposed levels, sometimes the lack of a clear delimitation of one level from another. Not quite clear, for example, is the difference between non-fundamental conceptual categories and categories of surface semantics. Apparently, realizing this, A.V. Bondarko writes that, perhaps, non-functional conceptual categories should be called not conceptual categories, but in some other way.
So, what is the place of conceptual categories in the structure of human consciousness and what are their functions? I.I. Meshchaninov’s position on this issue seems to be quite correct: “They serve as the connecting element that ultimately connects the linguistic material with the general structure of human thinking, and therefore with the categories of logic and psychology.” There are several very important ideas in this judgment. Firstly, it is shown that conceptual categories are, as it were, bidirectional: on one side they are turned to universal logical and psychological categories and laws and through them are connected with objective reality; on the other hand, they are turned to the linguistic material and find their expression in the facts of the language (cf. the property of “two-facedness” of conceptual categories noted by A.I. Varshavskaya). Secondly, the conceptual categories, located between the logical-psychological and linguistic ones, are not in the proper sense either one or the other; they have their own, relatively independent status. Thirdly, in the above statement by I.I. Meshchaninov, the idea of ​​the “multi-story” nature of human consciousness is unequivocally expressed, where each “floor” is directly connected with the neighboring ones, relatively independent of them due to the presence of specific functions, and together with all forms a single building of the human mentality .
O. Jespersen was also right, delimiting the conceptual and linguistic spheres and thus establishing the non-identity of conceptual and linguistic categories: “More than once we will have to state that grammatical categories are at best symptoms, or shadows cast by conceptual categories; sometimes the “concept” behind a grammatical phenomenon turns out to be as elusive as the Kantian thing-in-itself.”
Thus, conceptual categories are mental categories relevant to the language, oriented, on the one hand, to the logical-psychological categories, and on the other, to the semantic categories of the language. Representing the result of human experience mediated by the universal laws of thought, they, in turn, are the basis of the semantic structures of the language, a necessary prerequisite for the functioning of the language system as a whole. The following two remarks should be made here.
First. Saying that the conceptual categories in the genetic plan, as it were, “anticipate” the linguistic categories, precede them, it is necessary to take into account the fact of the heterogeneity of conceptual categories. So, if the conceptual category of quantitativeity is formed in consciousness and then takes shape in the language as a result of reflecting the quantitative parameters of objects of reality, then such conceptual categories as modality - and in particular its axiological type, “come” not from reality, but from a person, are determined the activity of human consciousness, its ability to a very complex and non-unidirectional interaction with the external environment. N.A. Kobrina distinguishes the following three types of conceptual categories. The first type is those that represent a reflection of reality in the form of forms and objects of thought (that is, they coincide with concepts in philosophy). These are certain semantic entities that are reflected in semantics, either in lexical groupings of words, or in part-speech classes, depending on the level of consideration, or rather, understanding of the object. For such conceptual categories, the boundaries between their semantics and conceptual meaning are practically blurred. In linguistics, this blurring is manifested in the fact that in semantic syntax, conceptual concepts are often called semantic roles (actants). Another type of conceptual categories - parameters, attributes, characteristics - such as type, tense, voice, mood, gender, number, case. For these conceptual categories, there is most often no unambiguous correlation with form. The third type is relative, or operational, conceptual categories, that is, those that underlie concept organization schemes. The most characteristic feature of a relative conceptual category is a grid of concepts reflecting the correlation of such referents as an action or event with the objects of thought involved in them. Such a relation is a figurative reflection of the real situation, and it turns into a proposition after a relational predicate is chosen at the semantic level and all “places” of the relational scheme are filled.
Second. The thesis that conceptual categories are a necessary prerequisite for the adequate functioning of the entire language system needs clarification. Language, as is known, has a level and aspect organization, and each level and aspect relates to the conceptual sphere in different ways. If the number and nomenclature of units of the phonetic level are determined by the physiological capabilities of the articulation apparatus and, in general, do not correlate with the units of the conceptual sphere, then the units of the lexical system of the language regularly correlate with the fund of concepts. The grammatical system most obviously “reacts” to the conceptual sphere because of its proximity to the general laws of the organization of thinking.
There are reflections between the extralinguistic reality and the logical-psychological level - the external world acts through the human receptors on his brain, resulting in the emergence of ideal correlates of the phenomena of reality. In general, the relationship between extra-linguistic reality and the logical-psychological sphere is isomorphic (we are distracted from particular cases of distortion of the perception of reality, the causes of which vary from the specific nature of the reflected object to the individual pathology of the consciousness of the reflecting subject).
The conceptual sphere organizes the phenomena of the logical-psychological level. The classifying activity of the human mind discretizes, structures and groups these phenomena on the basis of their most general and most relevant features for a person. The conceptual sphere is the sphere of conceptual analogues of entities of the logical-psychological level. The relations between these levels are thus characterized as relations of systematization, and they are characterized by homomorphism.
The essence of the next stage (the transition from concepts to the sphere of language) is the formalization of conceptual categories, giving them a linguistic meaning, their “linguistics”. There is a transition from universal phenomena to idioethnic phenomena, therefore, these interlevel relations are allomorphic. It should be noted that at this stage, the structure of the system of conceptual categories also arises, their various types are revealed.
The last step is the connection of semantics with the surface structure. Since this is a connection between the two sides of a linguistic sign, its consideration is a separate linguistic problem and is beyond the scope of this work. We will confine ourselves to stating the existence of different points of view on it (cf. the idea of ​​F. de Saussure about the unambiguous correspondence between the signifier and the signified and the theory of S. O. Kartsevsky about the asymmetric dualism of the linguistic sign).

Conclusion

It is unlikely that modern science sets itself tasks more global and complex than the study of the laws and properties of human consciousness. Linguistics also makes a significant contribution to the analysis of the properties of this unique object. And looking at language otherwise than as “the materialization of human consciousness” inevitably entails increased attention to the conceptual foundations of linguistic constructions. The description of conceptual categories, therefore, not only helps to adequately understand and interpret the facts of the language, but also helps
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In the article we will consider the main linguistic categories, give examples. You will learn that in linguistics there are various associations according to which one or another unit can be classified.

What is a category

The very concept of "category" was first developed by Aristotle. In particular, he identified 10 categories. Let us list them: undergoing, action, state, position, time, place, relation, quality, quantity, essence. In many ways, their selection influenced the subsequent inventory of various predicates, predicates, sentence members and parts of speech.

Conceptual category

Before considering linguistic categories and the problems of linguistic categorization, it is necessary to clarify this term as well. It is usually understood as a certain closed system of meanings of a semantic universal attribute or a specific meaning of this attribute, regardless of the method of expression ("explicit" or "hidden") and the degree of their grammaticalization in a given language. For example, we can talk about the presence of the following conceptual categories: alienability / inalienability, activity / inactivity, reasons, places, goals, etc. In linguistics, there are lexico-semantic linguistic categories. By them are meant classes such as the names of states, professions, living beings, etc. If a categorizing seme receives a derivational formal expression, linguistic categories are called derivational. Examples are as follows: diminutive names (pancake-chik, smoke-ok, house-ik), names of the figure (beg-un, cart-chik, teacher).

Linguistic categories in the broad and narrow sense

Language categories are associations that can be considered both in a broad and narrow sense. In the first case, these are any groups of elements that are distinguished on the basis of a common property. In a narrow sense, language categories are certain parameters (features) that underlie the division of homogeneous units into a certain number of non-overlapping classes. Their members are characterized by some value of this or that sign. Examples: the category of aspect, case, animation/inanimateness, deafness/voicedness, etc. However, this term often denotes one of the values ​​of this parameter (attribute). Examples: category of inanimate, accusative case, state, deafness, perfect aspect.

Types of categories according to various criteria

Depending on the nature of the corresponding attribute and the set allocated according to it, as well as on its relation to partition classes, different types of categories can be distinguished. A set may include phonemes that are homogeneous units. In this case, various phonological linguistic categories are distinguished. This is, for example, a distinction in deafness / sonority. Another example is the category of stop consonants. According to the differential phonetic feature, a classification is made in this case.

A set divisible into categories may include two-sided units. Usually they are sentences, phrases and words. In this case, word-building, lexico-semantic, syntactic, grammatical and other categories are distinguished. Classification is carried out according to a certain semantic or syntactic feature. It can be both proper syntactic, semantic, and general categorical (this word is often understood as "referring to parts of speech").

Classifying and modifying features

There are other signs as well. In relation to partition classes, they are divided into classifying (selective, integral) and modifying (flexion, differential). An attribute for some object is modifying when it corresponds to an element of some other partition class, which differs from it only in the value of this attribute. This correspondence is called opposition. If this is not observed, the sign is classifying for the corresponding element. In what case, then, can we speak of varieties of some more general unit that changes according to a given attribute? Let's answer this question too. When the elements differ from each other only by the values ​​of one or another modifying attribute. As for the classifier, its value is constant, fixed for a given unit.

Modifying and classifying categories

In a number of cases, for most elements of the set, the attribute is modifying. Then the category as a whole is also called modifying. For example, these are inflectional (inflectional) categories. These include the case and number of the noun, case, number, gender of the adjective, mood, tense, person, number of the gender of the verb. If for a sufficient number of elements the categorical attribute is classifying, then the category as a whole will be the same. For example, these are lexico-semantic categories. Examples: animacy, gender and parts of speech of a noun, transitivity/intransitivity, nominal classes of a verb, etc.

"Rules" and "Exceptions"

Which type a particular category should be assigned to depends on what the classification was originally, as well as on what is the "rule" for this or that class, and what can be called the "exception". For example, we can assume that in Russian for some classes of the form it is inflectional (modifying), and for its other classes it is word-forming (classifying). Or you can make one of these decisions for a whole class of verbal lexemes. Note that all of them are presented in Russian.

Offer categories

Studying the paradigmatic relations existing in syntax, many researchers use the concepts of "communicative-grammatical categories" or "categories of a sentence". They mean the semantic differential features of certain sentences (syntactic modality, affirmation/negation, goal-setting of the statement). Less often, we can talk about individual values ​​of these features (for example, the category of negation). A number of researchers, in particular, N. Yu. Shvedova, offers a different concept. They talk about phrase-changing categories. There are other concepts as well.

Grammar categories

Grammatical linguistic categories and their types are among the most studied and most important. Their characteristic features are the modifying type of the attribute taken as the basis, its involvement in syntax, the presence of a regular way in which it is expressed, as well as the “mandatory” choice for (word) forms belonging to a given set, one of its meanings. Grammatical categories are closed systems of meanings that exclude each other. They define a division into non-intersecting classes of a vast set of word forms. For example, such grammatical meanings as plural or singular form in their totality the category of number.

Text concept

Before considering the linguistic categories of the text, let's define the key concept. The text is an object of multidimensional study in linguistics, however, in the specialized literature, this concept is still interpreted differently. There is also no generally accepted definition. Therefore, consider the one that is the most common.

The text in general terms is characterized as a product of the specific activity of people (verbal-thinking). The latter can arise both in the process of indirect and direct communication, and in the process of human cognition of the surrounding reality.

Text as a linguistic category

Its units form components (structural elements), being expanded into a separate sentence or their groups. A sentence (texteme, phrase, statement) is the main element of the text. It is recognized and perceived as related to other sentences. That is, it is a component of the text, part of the whole. The sentence is its smallest communicative unit.

SSC (SFE)

At the same time, proposals are sometimes combined into groups, which have received different names from different researchers. V. A. Bukhbinder, for example, calls them phrasal ensembles and phrasal units. N. S. Pospelov, A. P. Peshkovsky, S. G. Ilyenko, L. M. Loseva consider them complex syntactic integers (CTS). (SFU) call them T. M. Nikolaeva, O. I. Moskalskaya, I. R. Galperin. To designate a group of sentences related in meaning, SFU and STS are most often used. These are very complex structural units, which consist of at least two independent sentences that have semantic integrity in the context of coherent speech, and also act as part of a complete communication.

Free and strong offers

Note that in the structure of the text, not all sentences are combined into groups. Free ones are also distinguished, which are not included in them, but are connected by semantic relations with a particular group. They contain comments, author's digressions. Such proposals act as a link between the SCS, are the means by which a new micro-theme is designated.

Some researchers, in addition, highlight strong sentences in the text. They can be understood without knowing the content of others. Such proposals are not included in the SSC.

Communication blocks and larger associations

What other language categories of the text can be distinguished? Groups of sentences are combined into blocks of even larger parts. They are called in various studies either fragments or predicative-relative complexes. Another common name is communication blocks.

Associations are even larger. They are associated with the following segments of the text: chapter, part, paragraph, paragraph.

So, sentences and their groups are the main communicative elements of the text. All the rest perform, as a rule, a text-forming function. They are usually means of interfacial communication. Let's define this concept.

Interfacial communication

It is a connection between STS, sentences, chapters, paragraphs and other parts of the text, which organizes its structural and semantic unity. At the same time, the semantic connection between individual sentences is provided with the help of lexical and grammatical means. It is most often a parallel or chain connection. The latter is implemented by repeating a member of the previous sentence in one form or another, deploying in the subsequent part of its structure. Proposals with parallel communication are not linked, but compared. In this construction, it allows for opposition or comparison, depending on the corresponding lexical content.

Means of implementing various types of communication

With the help of language tools, each of them is implemented. For example, particles, conjunctions, introductory words, etc. are used to connect parts of the text. parallel communication, for its implementation, parallelism is appropriate in the construction of sentences. It is expressed in the use of verbs that have a common tense plan, anaphoric elements, the same word order, etc.

Linguistic categories of creolized texts

They are characterized by the same categories as the so-called classical verbal homogeneous texts. It is necessary to clarify the concept of "creolization". This is a combination of various means of sign systems in a complex that meets the condition of texturality. Figurative components refer to the means by which the creolization of verbal texts is carried out. They have a significant impact on their interpretation and on all technical aspects related to the design of the text that affect their meaning. The following stand out among them: background, color and font of the text, means of punctuation, spelling, word formation, graphic design (in a column, in the form of a figure), printed (ideograms, pictograms), etc.

The text is thus a definite structure where parts and individual sentences are interconnected. Linguistic and logical categories is a topic that can be covered for a very long time. We tried to highlight the most important, what every philologist needs to know.

A generally accepted definition of the text still does not exist, and answering this question, different authors point to different aspects of this phenomenon: D.N. Likhachev - to the existence of its creator, who implements a certain idea in the text; OL Kamenskaya - on the fundamental role of the text as a means of verbal communication; A. A. Leontiev - on the functional completeness of this speech work. Some scientists recognize the text only in written speech, others find it possible that oral texts exist, but only in monologue speech. Some recognize the existence of a text in dialogic speech, understanding it as the realization of any speech plan, which may be just a desire to communicate. Thus, according to M. Bakhtin, “a text as a semiotic complex refers to utterances and has the same features as a utterance. It is this point of view of the scientist that is accepted in linguistics and psycholinguistics, and the text is considered as thematically coherent, semantically unified and holistic in terms of intent speech work. [Bakhtin M.M. 1996, p. 310]

I. R. Galperin argues that “A text is a work of a speech-creative process that has completeness, a work objectified in the form of a written document, consisting of a name (title) and a number of special units (superphrasal units), united by different types of lexical, grammatical, logical, stylistic connection, having a certain purposefulness and pragmatic attitude. "[Galperin, I.R. 1981]

Thus, I. R. Galperin understands the text not as oral speech fixed on paper, always spontaneous, unorganized, inconsistent, but as a special kind of speech creation, which has its own parameters that differ from those of oral speech.

The appearance of the term "Category of text" is due to the desire of modern linguistics and stylistics to identify the structure of the text, which cannot be done relying only on elementary units of analysis - words and speech techniques. Each text category embodies a separate semantic line of the text, expressed by a group of linguistic means, organized in a special way into a relative intra-text integrity. Text categories (meaningful, structural, structural, functional, communicative), being essentially different, do not add up to each other, but are superimposed on each other, giving rise to a kind of single formation, qualitatively different from the sum of its components. Coherence and integrity as text properties can be considered autonomously only for the convenience of analysis, somewhat abstractly, since both of these qualities exist in unity within the framework of a real text and presuppose each other: a single content, the meaning of the text is expressed precisely by linguistic means (explicitly or implicitly).

The basis of the universal categories of the text is integrity (plan of content) and coherence (plan of expression), which enter into relations of complementarity, diarchy with each other.

The largest researcher of the linguistic organization of the text, I. R. Galperin, argued that “one cannot speak about any object of study, in this case about the text, without naming its categories” [Galperin, 1981, p. 4].

According to the classification of I.R. Galperin, the text has such categories as:

1. Integrity (or wholeness) of the text

2. Connectivity

3. Completeness

4. Absolute anthropocentricity

5. Sociological

6. Dialogical

7. Deployment and sequence (illogic)

8. Static and dynamic

10. Aesthetic text

11. Imagery

12. Interpretability

In terms of the topic under consideration, the most important category to consider is dialogue.

The dialogic nature of a literary text as a side of a literary work is studied in a series of monographic works by M.M. Bakhtin. And it is connected, in his opinion, with another quality of a literary text - with the infinity, openness, multi-layeredness of its content, which does not allow an unambiguous interpretation of the text, as a result of which highly artistic literary works do not lose their relevance for many decades and centuries. In addition, the dialogical nature of the text, according to M.M. Bakhtin, is also manifested in the fact that any text is a response to other texts, since any understanding of a text is its correlation with other texts.

As you know, M.M. Bakhtin distinguished linguistics as the science of language and metalinguistics as the science of dialogical speech. In this regard, he noted that “linguistics studies “language” itself with its specific logic in its generality, as a factor that makes dialogic communication possible, while linguistics consistently abstracts itself from dialogical relations” [Bakhtin, 1979: p.212]. This statement of Bakhtin should be perceived, first of all, as an extended interpretation of the traditional term "dialogue", in connection with which it is quite reasonable to attribute to Bakhtin a new broad understanding of dialogue, which has the fundamental properties of universality [Zotov, 2000: p.56]. The basis of this understanding is the recognition of the fact that a statement, if considered not in isolation, but in relation to other statements, turns out to be an extremely complex phenomenon. “Each individual utterance is a link in the chain of verbal communication, on the one hand, absorbing the previous links of this chain, and on the other, being a reaction to them. At the same time, the utterance is connected not only with the previous, but also with the subsequent links of verbal communication. As for the second case, the connection of statements is manifested here in the fact that any statement is built taking into account possible responses” [Bakhtin, 1979: p. 248]. On the basis of this proposition, Bakhtin argues that dialogical relations of this kind cannot be reduced to either purely logical or purely linguistic ones, they presuppose language, but they do not exist in the system of language [Ibid: p. 296].

MM. Bakhtin noted that the specificity of dialogical relations in their extended interpretation needs a special philological study, since dialogical relations are a phenomenon much more capacious than the relations between the replicas of a compositionally expressed dialogue [Bakhtin, 1979: 296]. At the same time, one cannot but admit that traditional dialogue and dialogue in the Bakhtinian understanding have the same basis and represent a certain type of speech activity, a description of the nature of which can be taken as the basis for further linguistic research, ultimately oriented towards the typology of dialogue. One of the latest developments undertaken in line with Bakhtin's dialogue formulates the problem in the form of a theory of dialogue and introduces a special term "dialogistics", thus giving even more weight and significance to the ideas of dialogic communication. Its authors trace the origins of this problem in the works of Bakhtin's older contemporaries, such as, for example, A.A. Meie, M.M. Prishvin, A.A. Ukhtomsky, some of whom used their own terminology, in fact, identifying dialogue with conversation.

As is known, based on the ideas of M.M. Bakhtin in modern linguistics, a direction arose, defined as intertextuality and aimed at identifying relationships between statements within the boundaries of a certain macrotext, understood in this case as a text space not limited by any spatio-temporal framework. Such an interaction of statements, following Bakhtin, is usually called dialogic [Zotov Yu.P., 2000: 5].

The essence of the dialogical interaction of utterances within the boundaries of literary communication can be considered from various points of view, and first of all from the point of view of the purpose of a particular utterance to one or another specific or non-specific person. The "predestination" of the text to a specific addressee, which the author has in mind when writing a literary work, seems to be the very factor that ultimately determines the laws of text construction. The way the author imagines the future recipient turns out to be the decisive moment in the end, setting a peculiar tone for the entire text structure. Despite the importance of this textual element, as such, it has not yet been singled out and has not been traced in various parts of the macrotext, which in this particular study means the English-language poetic text of certain chronological periods in its entirety of existing works without a special emphasis on idiolect features. . Meanwhile, it is already a priori quite obvious that individual genre text samples, such as epitaphs, dedications, or, for example, poems for children, have such a high degree of textual purpose (or even addressing) that it completely determines the laws of their construction. [Solovyeva E.A. 2006, p.17]

Thus, the problem of text dialogics (or in the newest formulation, dialogistics), as far as the scope of research within the competence of text linguistics, is to consider special dialogic relations that determine the position of the author in text construction and depend on the purpose of the literary text he creates to that or to another addressee. Of no small importance is the establishment of the nature of such dialogic relations within the boundaries of a single macrotext, which is recognized as an indispensable condition for its genre and style originality.