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from Part IIIB - 1960–2000: Formalism, Cognitivism, Language Use and Function, Interdisciplinarity
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 20 July 2023
This chapter discusses the rise of Noam Chomsky’s formal, syntax centered, transformational grammar (T) and then ‘generative grammar’ (GG), chronicling its start in Syntactic Structures (1957), influenced by Zellig Harris, the Prague school, mathematics, set theory, Carnap and Goodman. In Aspects of the Theory of Syntax (1965, the ‘Standard Theory’), Chomsky defined competence (vs. performance), the creativity and infinitude of language, grammar as a theory of a language, sentence meaning (the Katz-Postal hypothesis), deep vs. surface structure, the formal ‘simplicity’ of the grammar, and Universal Grammar (UG).
After 1965, alternative models, such as Generative Semantics and later Case Grammar arose, as well as Construction Grammar and Cognitive Linguistics, while Chomsky developed Extended Standard Theory (EST), leading to Government-Binding (GB), Principles-and-Parameters (P&P), modularity, and in the 1990s the Minimalist Program (MP), with ‘minimalist’ syntax but ‘maximal’ UG.
Alternative approaches were varied, including Relational Grammar (RG), and also ‘superlexicalism,' with narrowly conceived T’s, constraint-based architecture, model-theoretic semantics, e.g., CF-PSG (Context-free Phrase Structure Grammar), Head-Driven PSG, and LFG (Lexical Functional Grammar), with no Ts -- and many others.
While few followed the MP in 2000 and after, Chomsky’s influence was incontestable worldwide, especially for those who take a formal approach to grammar.
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