grammar (n.)

A central term in LINGUISTICS, but one which covers a wide range of phenomena, being used both in mass noun and count noun senses (as ‘grammar in general’ and ‘a grammar in particular’). Several types of grammar can be distinguished.

A descriptive grammar is, in the first instance, a systematic DESCRIPTION of a LANGUAGE as found in a sample of speech or writing (e.g. in a CORPUS of material, or as elicited from NATIVE-SPEAKERS). Depending on one’s theoretical background, it may go beyond this and make statements about the language as a whole, and in so far as these statements are explicit and predictive of the speaker’s COMPETENCE the grammar can be said to be ‘descriptively adequate’ and GENERATIVE. In the older tradition, ‘descriptive’ is in contrast to the PRESCRIPTIVE or NORMATIVE approach of grammarians who attempted to establish RULES for the socially or STYLISTICALLY CORRECT use of language. Comprehensive descriptions of the SYNTAX and MORPHOLOGY of a language are known as reference grammars or grammatical handbooks (such as those produced in the twentieth century by the North European grammarians, e.g. the Dane, Otto Jespersen (1860–1943), and more recently by Randolph Quirk et al.

A theoretical grammar goes beyond the study of individual languages, using linguistic DATA as a means of developing theoretical insights into the nature of language as such, and into the categories and processes needed for successful linguistic analysis. Such insights include the distinction between ‘DEEP grammar’ and ‘SURFACE grammar’, the notion of ‘grammatical CATEGORIES’ and ‘grammatical MEANING’, and the study of ‘grammatical RELATIONS’ (the relationship between a verb and its dependents, such as ‘subject of’, ‘direct object of’). In so far as grammar concentrates on the study of linguistic FORMS (their STRUCTURE, DISTRIBUTION, etc.), it may be referred to as formal grammar (as opposed to ‘NOTIONAL grammar’); but formal grammar also refers to the use of the FORMALIZED techniques of logic and mathematics in the analysis of language.

Other general notions include the distinction between DIACHRONIC and SYNCHRONIC grammars, based on whether or not grammars introduce a historical dimension into their analysis. Comparative grammar, which compares the forms of languages (or states of a language), relies on a combination of theoretical and descriptive methods. A pedagogical or teaching grammar is a grammar designed specifically for the purposes of teaching or learning a (foreign) language, or for developing one’s awareness of the mother-tongue.

The phrase traditional grammar is an attempt to summarize the range of attitudes and methods found in the prelinguistic era of grammatical study. The term TRADITIONAL, accordingly, is found with reference to many periods, such as the Roman and Greek grammarians, Renaissance grammars, and (especially) the eighteenth- and nineteenth-century school grammars, in Europe and America. It is usually used with a critical (‘non-scientific’) implication, despite the fact that many antecedents of modern linguistics can be found in early grammars. Criticism is directed primarily at the PRESCRIPTIVE and PROSCRIPTIVE recommendations of authors, as opposed to the descriptive emphasis of linguistic studies.

In a restricted sense (the traditional sense in linguistics, and the usual popular interpretation of the term), grammar refers to a level of structural organization which can be studied independently of PHONOLOGY and SEMANTICS, and generally divided into the branches of SYNTAX and MORPHOLOGY. In this sense, grammar is the study of the way WORDS, and their component parts, combine to form SENTENCES. It is to be contrasted with a general conception of the subject, where grammar is seen as the entire system of structural relationships in a language, as in such titles as STRATIFICATIONAL grammar, SYSTEMIC grammar and (especially) GENERATIVE grammar. Here, ‘grammar’ subsumes phonology and semantics as well as syntax, traditionally regarded as separate linguistic LEVELS. ‘A grammar’, in this sense, is a device for generating a finite specification of the sentences of a language. In so far as a grammar defines the total set of RULES possessed by a speaker, it is a grammar of the speaker’s competence (competence grammar). In so far as a grammar is capable of accounting for only the sentences a speaker has actually used (as found in a sample of output, or CORPUS), it is a performance grammar. The study of PERFORMANCE grammars, in a PSYCHOLINGUISTIC context, goes beyond this, however, attempting to define the various psychological, neurological and physiological stages which enter into the production and perception of speech. Investigations which go beyond the study of an individual language, attempting to establish the defining (UNIVERSAL) characteristics of human language in general, have as their goal a universal grammar.

Students of grammar are grammarians, and they carry out a grammatical analysis (the term here having no implications of WELL-FORMEDNESS, as it has in the notion of GRAMMATICALITY). When it is necessary to differentiate entities in one’s analysis as belonging to a grammatical level of description as opposed to some other (e.g. semantic, phonological), the term ‘grammatical’ is often used attributively, as in ‘grammatical CATEGORY’ (e.g. GENDER, CASE, VOICE), ‘grammatical gender’ (as opposed to ‘natural gender’), ‘grammatical FORMATIVE/ITEM/UNIT’ (e.g. an INFLECTIONAL ending), ‘grammatical SUBJECT/OBJECT . . .’ (as opposed to ‘logical’ or ‘semantic’ subjects/objects . . . ), ‘grammatical word’ (as opposed to LEXICAL word). When a semantic contrast is expressed using grammatical forms, it is said to be grammaticalized (or grammaticized), a process often seen in HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS. An example of grammaticalization (grammaticization) is the use of the motion verb go, as in She is going to London, which has become a marker of TENSE in It’s going to rain.