American structuralism was a school of linguistic thought that emerged in the United States in the early 20th century. It was based on the idea that language could be analyzed and understood by examining its underlying structure, rather than focusing on its historical development or the intentions of individual speakers.
One of the key figures in the development of American structuralism was Leonard Bloomfield, a linguist and professor at the University of Chicago. Bloomfield argued that the only way to truly understand language was to study it objectively, as a system of sounds and structures that are independent of the context in which they are used. He argued that language should be studied in a scientific manner, using the methods of empirical observation and analysis.
Another important figure in the development of American structuralism was Edward Sapir, a linguist and anthropologist who worked at the University of Chicago and later at Yale University. Sapir argued that language was not just a system of sounds and structures, but also a cultural artifact that reflected the values and beliefs of the society in which it was used. He argued that language was an integral part of culture, and that the study of language could provide important insights into the way in which different societies functioned.
American structuralism had a significant impact on the field of linguistics, and it was influential in the development of other schools of thought, such as generative grammar and cognitive linguistics. It also had an impact on the study of other disciplines, such as anthropology and psychology, as it provided a framework for understanding how language shapes our thoughts and behaviors.
Overall, American structuralism was an important movement in the field of linguistics that helped to establish the study of language as a scientific discipline. Its focus on the underlying structure of language, rather than its historical development or the intentions of individual speakers, has had a lasting influence on the way in which we think about and study language.
American Structuralism: Features of American Structuralism
In Auroux, Sylvain ed. The premise is that all stories are founded on some form of structuralism, common to all kinds of writing. It would seem then that the content is not as important as the structure a piece of writing follows, in the structuralist's view. Bloomfield drew his inspiration from behavioral psychology, and considered that it was enough to describe the mechanism of language, to underscore its regularities. On Looking into Words and Beyond : Structures, Relations, Analyses.
What is American Structuralism?
Functionalism and Formalism in Linguistics, Vol. According to structuralism, the human mind perceives difference most readily in terms of opposites, which structuralists call binary oppositions: two ideas, directly opposed, each of which we understand by means of its opposition to the other. And we are able to perceive those components, as Saussure noted in terms of the structure of language, only because we perceive their difference from one another. In it Bloomfield explicitly adopted a behaviouristic approach to the study of language, eschewing in the name of scientific objectivity all reference to mental or conceptual categories. Yearbook 1992 of the Research Group for Linguistic Theory and Knowledge Representation of the University of Groningen, Groningen, pp. Another source states: Structuralists are not concerned with consumption of literature, about what happens when people actually read the works, about the role of literature in social relations. University of Chicago Press.
American structural linguistics
Chomsky's criticism did not address European structuralism. The structural approach in humanities follows from 19th century Saussure himself had actually used a modification of la langue is the Hjelmslev's elaboration of Saussure's structural explanation is that language arises from the structuring of content and expression. In his later Language, 1935 he adopted a strict and explicit behaviouristic stance. Western linguistics: An historical introduction. Edward Sapir, for example, focused his field work on the importance of linguistic intuition by native speakers and on the study of phonemes. History of Structuralism, Vol.
Structural linguistics
The Structure of Language: An Introduction to Grammatical Analysis. Translated by Rieux, Jacques; Rollin, Bernard E. Cambridge MA: MIT P. Structuralism, in this narrower sense of the term, is represented, with differences of emphasis or detail, in the major American textbooks published during the 1950s. I assume that your question refers to linguistics and anthropology, fields in which American contributions were particularly important. In Allan, Keith ed.
Structuralism (linguistics)
AMERICAN AND EUROPEAN STRUCTURALISM. Talking Minds: The Study of Language in Cognitive Science. In psychology Behaviorism 1920s-1950s rejected the focus on mental processes and stressed measurement based on objective behaviour. Regarding structuralism as it pertains to literary theory, structuralism connects literature to a wider "structure," which may be a particular Intertextual connects would be reflected, as Wikipedia cites, in New Testament references to the Old Testament in the Bible. Thus, when speaking a particular language, our attention is drawn to particular aspects of our experience, or more precisely, particular experiences are generated by that language.
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