La teoría crítica de la lingüística entre las ciencias de la cultura y las ciencias cognitivas, y las bases biológicas del lenguaje

Abstract

One basic task of the “Critical Theory of Linguistics” is to develop criteria of epistemological validity for creating and judging linguistic concepts. The German “critical philosophy” of Kant, Hegel and others furnish the main tools for the criticism of the recent expansion of the linguistic object towards modern “cultural sciences”, as well as of the reductionism governing current cognitive approaches. A brief summary of the most relevant results of contemporary neural sciences for linguistics follows, focusing mainly on the notions of emergent complexity, dynamics and individuality both at the anatomical level and at the shaping of connectivity. In an appendix a first critical approach to Steven Pinker’s cognitivistic theses is presented.

Keywords

• epistemological criticism on linguistic concepts, language and cultural sciences, reductionism in cognitive linguistics, neural base of language.