Author:
Csaba Pléh Department of Cognitive Science, Central European University, Budapest, Hungary

Search for other papers by Csaba Pléh in
Current site
Google Scholar
PubMed
Close
https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9041-9902
Restricted access

Abstract

The paper analyzes some early theoretical works on psychology of language presented in the works of the trend setting historical linguist Zoltán Gombocz (1887–1935), Antal Klemm (1883–1963) a master of historical syntax, and Gyula Lux (1884–1957) a successful language education expert.

All three were representatives of classical mentalistic linguistics, and interpreted language as relevant for psychology, even if they emphasized change instead of structure. The paper presents the specific ideas of Klemm regarding the historical articulation of sentence structure along psychological and logical lines. Both Gombocz and Lux follow Wundt that we must draw evidence from gestural language for the origin of spoken language. Gombocz and Klemm deal with the possible mechanisms of word class formation. Klemm's reconstruction of word classes takes communication as a starting point. Initial communication is about an object given as a non-linguistic stimulus: [this thing] apple. The (psychological) subject is given, only the predicate is pronounced. This would be followed by combining two nominal words in a predicative way: wood-fire. Then the property words would appear, and finally the combination of object and property (apple-red).

  • Bickerton, D. (1981). Roots of language. Karoma Publishers, New York.

  • Bickerton, D. (1984). The language bioprogram hypothesis. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 7: 173221.

  • Blumenthal, A. (1970). Psychology and language: a historical introduction to psycholinguistics. Wiley, New York.

  • Chomsky, N. (1968). Language and mind, Harcourt. Third edition 2006. Cambrige University Press, New York.

  • Givón, T. (2009). The genesis of syntactic complexity: Diachrony, ontogeny, neuro-cognition, evolution. John Benjamins, Amsterdam.

  • Goldin-Meadow, S. (2003). The resilience of language: what gesture creation in deaf children can tell us about how all children learn language. Psychology Press, New York.

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation
  • Gombocz, Z. (1903). Nyelvtörténet és lélektan Wundt néplélektanának ismertetése. ‘History of Language and psychology. Introduction to Wundt’s ethnopsychology’. Athenaeum, Budapest.

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation
  • Gombocz, Z. (1906). Paul és Wundt a nyelv eredetéről. ‘Paul and Wundt on the origin of language’. Nyelvtudomány, 1: 316320.

  • Gombocz, Z. (1912). Die bulgarisch-türkischen Lehnwörter in der ungarischen Sprache. Mémoires de la Société Finno-Ougrienne XXX, XVIII + 252.

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation
  • Gombocz, Z. (1997). Jelentéstan és nyelvtörténet. ‘Semantics and languge history’. Akadémiai, Budapest.

  • Gombocz, Z. and Meyer, E. (1909). Zur Phonetik der ungarische Sprache. Belings, Uppsala.

  • Haeckel, E. (1866). Generelle Morphologie der Organismen. ‘General morphology of organisms’. Georg Reimer, Berlin.

  • Hewes, G.W. (1973). Primate communication and the gestural origin of language. Current Anthropology, 14(1–2): 512.

  • Husserl, E. (1900). Logische Untersuchungen. ‘Logical investigations’. Fischer, Halle.

  • Jeannerod, M. and Jacob, P. (2005). Visual cognition: a new look at the two-visual systems model. Neuropsychologia, 43: 301312.

  • Kicsi, S. (2006). Gombocz Zoltán 1877–1935. Életrajz és pályakép. ‘Zoltán Gombocz. 1877–1935. Biography and intellectual path’. ELTE Eötvös Kiadó, Budapest.

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation
  • Klemm, A. (1925). Zur Geschichte der sog. Tempora in den finnisch-ugrischen Sprachen. Finnisch-Ugrische Forschungen, 17: 5564.

  • Klemm, A. (1928). A mondattan elmélete. ‘The theory of syntaxʼ. MTA, Budapest, (Academic inaugural delivered in 1927).

  • Klemm, A. (1942). Magyar történeti mondattan.ʻHungarian historical syntax’. MTA, Budapest.

  • Klemm, A. (1948). Nyelvészet, logika, pszichológia. ‘Linguistics, logic, psychology’. Magyar Nyelv, 44(2): 118127.

  • Lamendella, J.T. (1976). Relations between the ontogeny and phylogeny of language: a neorecapitulationist view. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 280: 396412.

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation
  • Lengyel, Z. (1976). Magyar gyermeknyelvi kutatások a XIX. században. ‘19th century Hungarian child language research’. Magyar Nyelv, 72: 8190.

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation
  • Lux, G. (1927). A nyelv. ‘Language’. Atheneum, Budapest.

  • Lux, J. (1961). Wörterbuch der Mundart von Dobschau (Zips). Elwert, Marburg.

  • MacWhinney, B. (1976). Hungarian research on the acquisition of morphology and syntax. Journal of Child Language, 3: 397410.

  • Nelson, K. (1974). Concept, word, and sentence: interrelations in acquisition and development. Psychological Review, 81(4): 267285, https://doi.org/10.1037/h0036592.

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation
  • Nerlich, B., Clarke, D.D, and Sokal, M.M (1998). The linguistic repudiation of Wundt. History of Psychology, 1: 179204.

  • Slobin, D. (2004). From ontogenesis to phylogenesis: what can child language tell us about language evolution? In: Langer, J., Parker, S.T., and Milbrath, C. (Eds.), Biology and knowledge revisited: from neurogenesis to psychogenesis. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Mahwah, NJ, pp. 255285.

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation
  • Stern, C. and Stern, W. (1907). Die Kindersprache. Barth, Leipzig.

  • Collapse
  • Expand

Senior editors

Editor-in-Chief: Andrea Seidler

Editorial Board

  • Bíró, Annamária
  • Khavanova, Olga
  • de Montety, Henri
  • Áron Orbán

Nemzetközi Magyarságtudományi Társaság
Address: H-1097 Budapest, Tóth Kálmán u. 4. B.8.41.
Tel.: (36 1) 321 44 07, (36 1) 224 6700/4556
Web: http://hungarologia.net/

Scopus

ERIH PLUS

2024  
Scopus  
CiteScore  
CiteScore rank  
SNIP  
Scimago  
SJR index 0.1
SJR Q rank Q4

2023  
Scopus  
CiteScore 0.1
CiteScore rank Q4 (General Arts and Humanities)
SNIP 0.03
Scimago  
SJR index 0.101
SJR Q rank Q4

Hungarian Studies
Publication Model Hybrid
Submission Fee none
Article Processing Charge 900 EUR/article
Printed Color Illustrations 40 EUR (or 10 000 HUF) + VAT / piece
Regional discounts on country of the funding agency World Bank Lower-middle-income economies: 50%
World Bank Low-income economies: 100%
Further Discounts Editorial Board / Advisory Board members: 50%
Corresponding authors, affiliated to an EISZ member institution subscribing to the journal package of Akadémiai Kiadó: 100%
Subscription fee 2025 Online subsscription: 426 EUR / 468 USD
Print + online subscription: 474 EUR / 522 USD
Subscription Information Online subscribers are entitled access to all back issues published by Akadémiai Kiadó for each title for the duration of the subscription, as well as Online First content for the subscribed content.
Purchase per Title Individual articles are sold on the displayed price.

Hungarian Studies
Language English
French
German
Size B5
Year of
Foundation
1985
Volumes
per Year
1
Issues
per Year
2
Founder Nemzetközi Magyarságtudományi Társaság -- International Association for Hungarian Studies
Founder's
Address
H-1097 Budapest, Tóth Kálmán u. 4. B.8.41.
Publisher Akadémiai Kiadó
Publisher's
Address
H-1117 Budapest, Hungary 1516 Budapest, PO Box 245.
Responsible
Publisher
Chief Executive Officer, Akadémiai Kiadó
ISSN 0236-6568 (Print)
ISSN 1588-2772 (Online)