Le nom propre en psychomécanique du langage

Abstract

Even though Gustave Guillaume never delved into an actual exploration of the proper noun (whose scope he did not strictly delineate either), one can distinguish two stages in its theory in psychomechanics. Early on, the proper noun is defined as a word without meaning, which denotes without connoting, hence the fact that its transition from tongue to discourse is cancelled, resulting in the absence of an article. At a later stage however, the proper noun is conceived as a noun with maximal comprehension, hence minimal extension, which provides a different explanation of the absence of determination in front of it. After Guillaume, a linguist such as Walter Hirtle sets within the framework of tongue and discourse the distinction made by others between proper noun (a phenomenon of tongue) and proper name (a phenomenon of discourse).

Keywords

• reference
• determination
• meaning
• proper noun
• psychomechanics