Routledge Dictionary of Language and Linguistics
Neogrammarians (also Junggrammatiker, Leipzig School)
A group of linguists in Leipzig in the 1870s whose positivistic view of language was aimed against the metaphysical and biological views of the previous epoch. Leading representative of this approach included K.Brugmann, H. Osthoff, B.Delbrück, E.Sievers, K.Verner, A. Leskien, H.Paul, O.Behaghel. The name, used derogatorily by the older generation, stems from F.Zarncke and is first attested in Osthoff and Brugmann (1878). The beginning of the Neogrammarian school is considered to be the publication dates of K.Verner’s 1877 explanation of apparent exceptions to Grimm’s Law, A.Leskien’s 1876 investigations of declension, in which the postulate of the inviolability of sound laws is formulated, and above all H. Paul’s Prinzipien der Sprachgeschichte (‘Principles of the history of language’), published in 1880.
The works of the Neogrammarians, inasmuch as they pertain to general linguistics, can be characterized by the following aspects. (a) The object of linguistic investigation is not the language system, but rather the language as it is localized in the individual, and therefore is directly observable (
idiolect). This is seen as a psychological as well as a physical activity. (b) Autonomy of the sound level: according to the postulate of observability of the material (instead of abstractions), the sound level is seen as the most important level of description, and absolute autonomy of the sound level from syntax and semantics is assumed. (c) Historicism: the chief goal of linguistic investigation is the description of the historical change of a language. This almost exclusive interest in the diachronic development of language ( synchrony vs diachrony) is documented in the large number of comparative historical compendia (cf. Leskien, Osthoff and Brugmann, and others), which excel in their wealth of facts as well as in the exactness of their methods of reconstruction. (d) Inviolability of sound laws: this much-debated postulate, patterned after the natural sciences, is not based on empirical findings, but rather is an a priori assumption, made to ensure the uniformity of the investigatory methods of linguistics and the natural sciences. (e) Analogy: wherever the premise of the inviolability of sound laws fails, analogy is applied as an explanation, i.e. exceptions are understood to be a (regular) adaptation to a related form.
Despite their strong repercussions, the methods and goals of the Neogrammarian view of language have been criticized from various quarters and with various emphases. Such criticism has been aimed especially at the following: reduction of the object of investigation to the idiolect; restriction to the description ‘of surface phenomena (sound level); overvaluation of historical languages and neglect of contemporary ones; description of individual processes instead of systemic connections.
References
Jankowsky, K.R. 1972. The Neogrammarians: a reevaluation of their place in the development of linguistic science. The Hague.
——1990. The neogrammarian hypothesis. In E.C.
Polomé (ed.), Research guide on language change. Berlin. 223–39.
Leskien, A. 1876. Die Deklination im SlavischLitauischen und Germanischen. Leipzig.
Osthoff, H. and K.Brugmann. 1878. Morphologische Untersuchungen auf dem Gebiet der indogermanischen Sprachen, part 1. Leipzig.
Paul, H. 1880. Prinzipien der Sprachgeschichte. Tübingen. (9th edn 1975.)
Steinthal, H. 1890–1. Geschichte der Sprachwissenschaft bei den Griechen und Römern mit besonderer Rücksicht auf die Logik, 2 vols. Berlin. (Repr. Hildesheim, 1961.)
Vennemann, T. and T.H.Wilbur (eds) 1972. Schuchardt, the Neogrammarians, and the transformational theory of phonological change. Frankfurt.
Verner, K. 1877. Eine Ausnahme der ersten Lautverschiebung. ZVS 23. 97–130.
Wilbur, T.H. (ed.) 1977. The Lautgesetz-controversy: a documentation. Amsterdam and Philadelphia, PA.
linguistics, sound law
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