Rita Miliūnaitė. „Dabartinės lietuvių kalbos vartosenos variantai“

RITA MILIŪNAITĖ VARIANTS OF CONTEMPORARY LITHUANIAN LANGUAGE USAGE Vilnius: Lietuvių kalbos institutas, 2009, 248 p. The book under review, Rita Miliūnaitė’s second monograph, is, one might say, a purposeful development of her first (The Principles of Standardization of Lithuanian Grammar, 2003). That earlier monograph already discusses the concept of a grammatical variant, the classification of such variants, distinguishes formal and functional variants, and describes their distributional relations and degrees of evaluation; there, too, variants are defined from the perspective of standard-language usage rather than the language system, that is, very broadly (see Miliūnaitė 2003: 38, note 17). Now this conception is consolidated in the term usage variants, encompassing all types of variants. In considering whether variants are a phenomenon of language or speech, the author finds acceptable the view that variation is encoded in the system and, when necessary, realized in the structure (following Aldonas Pupkis’s position); from this follows the conception of the phenomenon under study: “This view makes it possible to distinguish variation as a feature of language to some extent from a direct connection with the system and the norm, and to regard variants as concrete manifestations of that feature in usage.” (p. 124; emphasis added by the author). The subject of the study is highly relevant, since variants (especially those understood broadly) are abundant at all levels of living language, and new ones continually emerge. Schools need the findings and data of variant research; students must be introduced to the usage variants most characteristic of their environment and taught how to evaluate and choose among them: “A broader classification of variants is important not only for usage research but also for the methodology of teaching the standard language, since schools currently talk more about language errors than about how to evaluate the various manifestations of usage variation in general.” (p. 176). The nature and purpose of the research described in the monograph are quite precisely stated in the following claims: “In this study, variation is linked primarily to language norms and their functioning in usage—to changes in norms, fluctuations, and violations. It should be emphasized, however, that what is meant is not variation in language norms, but variation understood more broadly, encompassing both normative and non-normative vari- 348 KALBOS KULTŪRA | 83 ants that vary in usage” (pp. 119–120); “the exploratory study of usage and its variants that has been carried out provides a basis for compiling a register of variants from the data held in this card index” (p. 219). The card index mentioned in the last sentence is the Contemporary Usage Card Index, which the monograph’s author and her family have been compiling for several decades (more consistently since 1988), drawing on the written media, internet sources, and other spheres of public usage (pp. 92–113, 156). The book also draws on data from this card index. While noting that the functioning of variants in usage and their relations are not the direct subject of this monograph but, supposedly, of further research (pp. 160, 220), the author nevertheless already presents in this work the general functional features of variants that emerge in usage (she herself calls them hypothetical, p. 160), describes clusters of variants formed in usage (pp. 197–199), and once again foregrounds the problem of distributional relations among variants (pp. 199–201). The book consists of two parts: “Contemporary Usage and Its Phenomena” (pp. 15–113) and “Variants of Usage” (pp. 115–214). The first part (4 chapters) discusses the concept of usage, the features of contemporary Lithuanian language usage, the nature of research into usage phenomena, and their documentation; the second part (3 chapters) presents the conception of variation, discusses its manifestations, and surveys the relations among variants. All chapters conclude with summaries, and the monograph ends with concluding remarks. The book contains 17 figures (mostly diagrams) and 9 tables. They clearly show how the author seeks not only a consistent classification of language phenomena, but also clarity in scientific findings and generalizations. In considering various theoretical questions concerning variation, the author constantly has in view the register of contemporary Lithuanian language usage variants that she has compiled and is preparing for publication. The monograph can therefore rightly be regarded as a solid theoretical foundation for that register (the author herself says that theoretical questions of usage variation are considered essentially in the second part), while section 1.4 of the first part (“Documenting Usage Phenomena,” pp. 92–113) is an initial description of the register, a kind of introduction to the forthcoming work: here the index to the register is discussed and an excerpt from it is provided (pp. 108–109). The register is organized on the basis of variant forms and the structural features of variants (p. 177). How is the principal object of study in the work—usage variants?—understood? “The monograph adopts the broadest conception of variation, which makes it possible to view varying phenomena of usage objectively, without an evaluative stance, which is needed later, in normative work, once the relations among the variable phenomena in usage have been established.” (p. 217). Beg- R. MILIŪNAITĖ. Dabartinės lietuvių kalbos vartosenos variantai [Rec.] 349 To illustrate both the narrow and broad conceptions of variation, the example of derivational variants voveruška: voveraitė is especially compelling. Having shown how the evaluation of the hybrid voveruška changed across editions of the Dictionary of Contemporary Lithuanian (in the 1954 edition, voveruška was still considered a synonymous norm; in 1972 it was linked by a cross-reference to voveraitė; and from the 1993 edition onward, the hybrid was evaluated as inadmissible in the standard language and marked ntk.), the author says: “In public usage, voveraitė in this [mushroom] sense is now also clearly the exemplary norm. Thus, according to the narrow conception of a variant, voveruška and voveraitė were variants at the same time, but later their relationship as variants disappeared. According to the broad conception of a variant, voveruška and voveraitė are considered usage variants.” (p. 152). Many linguistic units with the same meaning, traditionally regarded as synonyms (lexical or grammatical), are included by the author among variants, for example: procentas and nuošimtis, the Versmė publishing house and the Versmė publishing house (p. 207; morphological variants, for instance, include competing singular and plural forms piešinio: piešinių [competition] (p. 172), while syntactic variants include the expressions the exploded bomb destroyed [the warehouse]: the bomb exploded and destroyed [the warehouse] (p. 173). Two types of variants are distinguished: formal and semantic (p. 214). Formal variants are cases in which the form of the same linguistic unit varies while its meaning remains unchanged; these variants may differ in functional (stylistic) features. This, one might say, is the narrow conception of linguistic variants, which has a certain tradition in our linguistics. Linguists who follow this usage of the term try to distinguish variants as clearly as possible from synonyms. Semantic variants are different linguistic units that systematically have the same meaning or function (e.g., absolute synonyms), or units of which one acquires in usage the meaning of the other alongside its own actual meaning. Variants of the second type considerably broaden the notion of variation. It is impossible not to note that the author also discusses lexical variants with similar meanings: “Lexical units—words or lexicalized, often fixed, word combinations—vary on the basis of the same or very similar meaning.” (p. 164), and summarizes her position as follows: “Variants in contemporary Lithuanian usage are linguistic phenomena that have the same or very similar meaning and recur regularly, and between which relations of variation—that is, the possibility of replacing one another—arise in usage.” (p. 177; emphasis by the author). The conception of variants she adopts allows the author to connect traditional language standardization work with a sociolinguistic approach to variable usage phenomena 350 KALBOS KULTŪRA | 83 (pp. 151–153, 215). The sociolinguistic nature of the research is substantiated in several places in the book. For example, it is noted that “in the standardization of the Lithuanian standard language, the evaluative aspect has so far lacked closer links with research into actual usage” (p. 217); the relationship between sociolinguistics, language planning, and language culture is also shown (pp. 121–122). The author’s search for and discovery of these connections is aided not only by her familiarity with contemporary sociolinguistic scholarship from other countries, but also by her in-depth study of the tradition of standardizing Lithuanian (the first monograph was devoted essentially to this subject) and her attention to both older and current works in Lithuanian linguistics. This is an especially valuable quality today, when more than a few younger-generation Lithuanian linguists (more often women linguists) are able to look at their native language only through foreign eyes. A noteworthy feature of the monograph is its effort to regularize the varying terminology of linguistics and, where necessary, to propose new terms. The terminology for functional styles is adjusted somewhat. The style known variously in Lithuanian linguistics as everyday colloquial, spoken-language style, simply colloquial or spoken, is termed everyday in the monograph (p. 42). It may be recalled that this was precisely the term Bronys Savukynas found more convenient than everyday colloquial (see Savukynas 1977: 19, n. 2). A term is proposed for describing members of a variant set: “All members of a variant set other than the principal one could be called corresponding variants”; the term secondary variants is unsuitable here, since it will be needed at a later stage in the study of variants, “to describe the unequal status of variants with respect to norms” (p. 198). The aim is to establish a consistent system of terms, especially for those used in our linguistics with similar meanings, often interchangeably. The section “Manifestations of Variation” discusses terms denoting related concepts (variants, doublets, synonyms, competitors, equivalents, and substitutes) and the different concepts they designate (pp. 140–196). Understandably, the concept of variants receives the most detailed treatment: its narrowest and broadest senses, the structural and functional features of variants, and their classification (pp. 140–177; see also pp. 201–211 on types of variation). The realization of a single invariant—the variant set and the relations among its variants—is called variation (p. 163, n. 98; 201). The author describes variability as “the most general property of linguistic phenomena whereby, in the same context, they regularly have identical or very similar meanings or perform identical or similar functions—and thus can replace one another.” (p. 192; emphasis by the author). R. MILIŪNAITĖ. Dabartinės lietuvių kalbos vartosenos variantai [Rec.] 351 Variants and synonyms are regarded as the most important manifestations of variability; different views on the relationship between these concepts are presented (p. 132). The principal feature of synonyms and broadly understood variants is the shared meaning of linguistic units with different forms of expression (p. 181). The author examines in depth the question of how synonyms and variants differ (pp. 180–188), draws certain conclusions, but, having stressed that this is a difficult issue to disentangle (p. 183), does not set herself the task of resolving it completely. One thing is clear: broadly understood usage variants include some of the linguistic phenomena that have generally been classified as synonymy up to now (p. 128); synonyms “are brought within the scope of variants essentially insofar as they relate to normativity” (p. 194). Nonstandard phenomena also belong among variants, but it would not be appropriate to regard the latter as systematic synonyms, since they are manifestations of a different system, not that of the standard language. Hence the observation: “Similar nonstandard phenomena [referring to the construction dėti ant keptuvės, used in the sense ‘put into the pan’] raise the question of whether they can be considered an object of research into syntactic synonymy.” (p. 185). The author believes that the term synonyms would be justified in this case, “[i]f we understand synonyms broadly—as a phenomenon of general usage (not merely standard usage)—then, in relation to the norms of the standard language, synonyms may stand in a relationship of norm and a motivated non-norm” (p. 193, n. 112). Of course, nonstandard linguistic means may be regarded as contextual or situational synonyms. The author seems to develop Aldonas Pupkis’s claim that “variation and synonymy are not strictly independent, entirely separate phenomena; in certain places they intersect and cross over, and in the development of language one may turn into the other” (p. 132), and says: “Over time, some variants acquire certain shades of meaning and additional features and cease to be competing variants, becoming instead synonymous means of expression” (p. 90). Regarding synonyms, one small point may be noted. In recalling that groups of synonyms in Lithuanian linguistics are usually called synonym rows or synonym strings, the monograph cites only Alvydas Umbrasas (2004) among linguists who use the latter term (p. 197). I know well that this term was proposed by Stasys Keinys, who prefers it to the expression synonym row (see also his article entitled synonym string; the reference to this article is given under the term synonym row in KTŽ 1990: 183). Competition between linguistic means was only briefly mentioned in the author’s first monograph (see Miliūnaitė 2003: 40; 57, n. 32; 167), but has now become one of the central concepts of variability (pp. 188–190); the discussion addresses competition between variants and its degrees (pp. 211–213). Lithuanian linguists use the terms con- 352 KALBOS KULTŪRA | 83 competition, competition is used mainly when discussing language change, cases in which one means of expression pushes another out of use, especially when nonstandard, uncodified variants are used instead of the variant recommended for the standard language. Thus, the perspective is clearly diachronic. Aleksas Girdenis once set out precisely this view: competition is a term “widely used in diachronic linguistics <...>. <...> Usually, some linguistic phenomena compete for a while. For example, there was a construction with the dative and a participle, dativus absolutus, and later it gave way to a converb construction. This is competition understood diachronically”; phenomena of competition perceived synchronically, it is said, “could be described by stylistic opposition. I imagine cases such as: The people came, singing and The people sang their way through” (quoted from the transcript of Aleksas Girdenis’s speech at the meeting of the habilitation committee at Vilnius University on February 8, 1996). Rita Miliūnaitė is less categorical; she believes that the same terms for competition can denote somewhat different concepts in language culture and stylistics: “in stylistics, competition is shifted from the relations between linguistic phenomena that develop in usage over a longer period to competition between means of expression at the moment of choosing among them” (p. 189); “unlike in stylistics, variants are considered competitors not at the moment when they are chosen for use, but when, in usage and within a defined context, they are regularly used interchangeably, regardless of their relation to codification” (p. 190). Here it is worth briefly recalling the concept of competition in Czech linguistics, drawing on more recent publications, since Lithuanian stylistics adopted this concept from it. Czech linguists, too, take a twofold view of competition: either as a process in which one or several means of expression are displaced by a synonymous means, or as preference for one means of expression over synonymous ones. Thus, competition is understood as a dynamic phenomenon that can be studied either as change or in terms of its consequences and manifestation “in a synchronic cross-section of language.” Accordingly, competition between linguistic means is distinguished from parallelism (paralelnost). Linguists who adopt this view do not speak of competition when they mean obvious co-occurrences of doublet forms (paralely) that express a particular meaning or perform a particular function. In recent years, Czech linguistics has most often ceased to distinguish between competition and parallelism; competition is defined as the use of different means to express the same content, as a possibility from the perspective of the system—that is, as a set of linguistic means made available by the language system for a communicative act or for different types of communication (see Martincová 1997: 161; Jelínek 2002: 223). R. MILIŪNAITĖ. Dabartinės lietuvių kalbos vartosenos variantai [Rec.] 353 In developing the idea of competition between means of expression, it would also be worth considering the working group of terms derived from the verb to compete. The terms competitors, competing (variants), competition, and perhaps competitive (expression) have become established and uncontroversial. However, in the table “Characteristics of Variants” (p. 161), we find the adjective competitive and the noun competitiveness. So perhaps competitiveness? Or competitional and competitionality? Since the term competition is a metaphor adopted from economics or other social sciences, all terms in this group that emerge in linguistics could draw on the codification established in those disciplines1. The relationship between variants and other manifestations of variation is summarized as follows: “Synonyms reveal a greater range of possibilities for using variants; doublets indicate that variation is redundant and perhaps ought to be eliminated; competitors show how variants become established in usage in relation to one another.” (p. 193). Throughout the monograph, in many places, the author distinguishes and foregrounds the stylistic level of variation research. One characteristic of usage, viewed in terms of the mode of language use, is described with reference to so-called styles of use: on this basis, informal (unofficial) and official usage are distinguished (pp. 34–47). “Perhaps the most important criterion is formality–informality. Along this axis, contemporary Lithuanian usage has attained a certain balance: under this criterion, the means of linguistic expression are becoming increasingly differentiated in both written and spoken form”; “the once fairly reliable criteria of written–spoken language and public–private use are no longer suitable”; “the purpose of use and the addressee are increasingly coming to determine the use of the standard language” (pp. 216–217); “informal usage is developing as a separate language style” (p. 47). The motivated study of norm violations is assigned to stylistics (p. 196). For example, in the context presented on pp. 194–195, the expression “the compound to wash the highway <...> violates language norms” (p. 195), but this metaphor seems stylistically motivated (cf. Long-day rains set in, drenching and sweeping through Vilnius all week]. Balt. LKŽ X 583). (On the stylistic level of language, see also pp. 50, 90, 112, 173, note 105, and 195.) In places, the author revises her earlier positions and formulations. For instance, she says that “because of its heterogeneity, journalistic style should be divided into at least two parts—informative and expressive. Language Advice so 1 Pavyzdžiui, Rūtos Vainienės Ekonomikos terminų žodyne (Vilnius: Tyto alba, 2005) yra konkurencija, konkurencingumas ir konkurencinis pranašumas (p. 139–140). Žodyne skaitome padėkė neįvardytiems kalbininkams, bet jame, deja, nėra įrašo apie aprobaciją Valstybinėje lietuvių kalbos komisijoje, tad nieko negalima pasakyti apie žodyne pateikiamų terminų kodifikacijos lygį. 354 KALBOS KULTŪRA | 83 this was not done quite accurately: only its expressive part was called journalistic style, and it was separated from the informative part” (p. 41, n. 22; the monograph’s author is the editor and one of the authors of several Language Advice booklets). While essentially agreeing with this refinement, I must nevertheless say that no error was made in separating informative style from journalistic style; a different approach to dividing styles was simply adopted. For example, in the English stylistic tradition, newspaper (i.e. informative) style is distinguished from journalistic style (see Galperin 1971: 306–318; the author of the subsection “Newspaper Style” is V. L. Nayer (Nayer)), whereas in Russian stylistics newspaper style is understood as the core of journalistic style, and even a double name is used: newspaper-journalistic (газетно-публицистический) style (see Стилистика 2007: 116). Long influenced by Russian stylistics, and having newspapers and journalism similar in terms of style and genre, we divided styles in the same way; over several decades, a tradition thus developed in Lithuanian linguistics of classifying styles and their varieties (substyles, genres) in the same way as Russian linguistics. Until the restoration of independence, this linguostylistic approach clearly corresponded to the stylistic reality of the language. It may be that it is still too early to adopt the tenets of English or some other Western stylistic tradition. A more decisive change to the established classification of styles would be possible only after a thorough stylistic study of contemporary usage (and thus the collection of reliable data) and a clear formulation of the criteria for dividing styles. A few words on distinguishing units of language (the system) from units of speech (utterance). In the works of our linguists, the same names for units are understood in different ways. The author is consistent in this respect, but it would help the reader to understand why this particular approach was chosen. Citing Jonas Palionis’s Fundamentals of Linguistics (1985), the text states that “phonemes and morphemes are units of language, whereas words, phrases, and sentences are units of speech” (pp. 153–154). In the works of other authors, however, we find a somewhat different interpretation of the term sentence. For example, The Dictionary of Linguistic Terms gives a somewhat transitional description: “A sentence is a specific kind of linguistic unit that is the principal means of expressing thought, and therefore it itself belongs to speech (utterance). <...> However, the types of syntactic structure of sentences belong to a more abstract level—that of language.” (KTŽ 1990: 175). Vitas Labutis (1994: 57) has described this relationship somewhat differently (and, it seems to me, most accurately): “The actual fact of communication is an individual sentence in a text, closely connected with its context and the situation in which it is used. The term ‘utterance’ or ‘phrase’ is currently applied to such a sentence in a text. <...> The most important thing, R. MILIŪNAITĖ. Dabartinės lietuvių kalbos vartosenos variantai [Rec.] 355 that we distinguish between an utterance as a unit of communication and a sentence as a unit of the language system.” (Emphasis added throughout the quotation.) Here, one linguist, and there, another, publicly expresses a view of the current state of the Lithuanian language and of the place occupied by its various varieties, showing that views on the standard language and language change are not merely different but even diametrically opposed. It depends on what role is assigned to the native language. We hear voices claiming that all varieties of language (including slang?) are equal, that Lithuanian changes naturally because the most important thing is to meet the needs of communication, and that some loss of expressiveness and increased bookishness (on the one hand), and colloquialization (on the other), are normal. Rita Miliūnaitė sees the situation of our language differently; she does not think that everything will work itself out, and opposes attempts to adopt egalitarianism—the view that all language varieties and modes are equal (p. 131). She argues that the development of the standard language has lost its evenness, the domains in which it is used are shrinking, non-codified means of expression are proliferating, and written language has lost “the status of a homogeneous and well-organized linguistic formation” (p. 83). She concludes: “Thus, it is already clear that the intensification of peripheral phenomena, together with the direct penetration of foreign elements (at various levels of language) into usage, is dissolving the distinctiveness of the Lithuanian language” (p. 85). A measured opinion is expressed about imitators of political correctness in Lithuania: there is no need to adopt fashions imposed by other languages regarding the use or prohibition of certain words; we should instead heed the traditions of using those words in our own language and its system of meanings. This is not only the opinion of a linguist with a wealth of valuable experience as a researcher of contemporary language, but also the position of a native-language user who accepts responsibility and cares about the language’s fate, present, and future. Reading Rita Miliūnaitė’s new monograph, one cannot help noticing certain distinctive, or simply pleasing, aspects of scholarly writing etiquette. For example, we are accustomed to finding an author’s acknowledgments to reviewers, editors, publishers, and others at the end of a book’s preface, whereas here Acknowledgments form a separate part of the book (as we sometimes see in the scholarly works of Western authors). We have no single convention for referring in the text to an author whom we mention, quote, or otherwise rely on when we do not settle for the usual source citation (the abbreviation surname, year, page in parentheses): either we write only the initial of the given name alongside the surname, or, when mentioning the author for the first time, we give the full name and thereafter use only the surname, as is customary in everyday speech when referring to a third person who is not present—a neighbor, a colleague, even some eminent person. Mo- 356 KALBOS KULTŪRA | 83 In the monograph, without concern for repetition, the author mentioned in the text is identified each time, consistently throughout the book, by both given name and surname. One might say that this is a more elevated, formal, and respectful style. No author quoted is criticized, disparaged, or mocked when the monograph’s author reasonably takes a different view. For example, publications on Lithuanian-language teaching sometimes make the baseless suggestion that language expressed through sounds or writing should be called spoken or written language, respectively, even though we have a fairly strong tradition of using the terms oral language and written language in this context. The monograph’s author adheres to the latter terms, but does not disparage the authors of those rather odd suggestions; she merely notes that the terms are also interpreted differently and quotes that different opinion (p. 34, n. 11). Her assessment of views she disagrees with or doubts is nicely nuanced through litotes: “to transfer this feature [referring to codified standard-language norms] to general usage and seek language errors in dialects or sociolects is a s o m e w h a t m i s g u i d e d n o t i o n” (p. 23); “to speak of general usage as the basis for language standardization s e e m s e x c e s s i v e l y b o l d” (p. 21; emphasis added in the quotation). Readers of the review may feel that the work under review is quoted a great deal. Indeed. The monograph’s key claims, definitions, and summaries, which seemed necessary to discuss in the review, are formulated by the author so precisely and clearly that I feared I would violate scholarly accuracy by paraphrasing rather than quoting them verbatim. The book is written in an exemplary scholarly, matter-of-fact style. On the other hand, as already noted, the author is not merely an objective, detached researcher of linguistic phenomena; she is keenly aware that she is studying her native language, and so alongside the matter-of-fact discussion, a more impassioned voice also emerges, with more vivid turns of phrase and more expressive periods. I would therefore like to end the review with one more quotation from Rita Miliūnaitė’s monograph—from observations that lead to an imperative for linguists: “It is all very well for sociolinguists around the world to study all sorts of minute linguistic variations in the most exotic peripheral domains of usage <...>, once the methodology has been refined, experience acquired, a body of research accumulated, and a statistical context for comparing language usage across different languages established. For now, we cannot afford the luxury of squandering our efforts on trivial, unhelpful matters, even if they may seem attractive at first glance; sociolinguistic research should not be an end in itself, pursued solely for the interest of the research. The current state of the Lithuanian language urges us to concentrate on vital language changes so that we can not only understand what is happening in usage, but also apply research findings to language planning” (p. 138). R. MILIŪNAITĖ. Dabartinės lietuvių kalbos vartosenos variantai [Rec.] 357 LITERATŪRA Galperin I. R. 1971: Stylistics, Moscow: Higher School Publishing House. Jelínek M. 2002: Konkurence výrazová. – Encyklopedický slovník češtiny, Praha: Nakladatelství Lidové noviny, 223–225. KTŽ 1990: K. Gaivenis, S. Keinys. Kalbotyros terminų žodynas, Kaunas: Šviesa. Labutis V. 1994: Lietuvių kalbos sintaksė. I dalis, Vilnius: Vilniaus universiteto leidykla. Martincová O. 1997: Na okraj konkurence slovotvorných prostředků. – Slovo a slovesnost 58 (3), 161–164. Miliūnaitė R. 2003: Lietuvių kalbos gramatikos norminimo pagrindai, Vilnius: Lietuvių kalbos instituto leidykla. Savukynas B. 1977: Leidinio paskirtis ir kalba. – Žmonės ir kalba, Vilnius: Mokslas, 15–22. Стилистика 2007: Стилистика и литературное редактирование. Под ред. В. И. Максимова. 3-е изд., Москва: Гардарики. KAZIMIERAS ŽUPERKA Šiaulių universitetas P. Višinskio g. 38, LT-76352 Šiauliai [email protected] 358 KALBOS KULTŪRA | 83