f the three constituent parts of language is studied by a particular linguistic discipline. These disciplines, presenting a series of approaches to their particular objects of analysis, give the corresponding "descriptions" of language consisting in ordered expositions of the constituent parts in question. Thus, the phonological description of language is effected by the science of phonology; the lexical description of language is effected by the science of lexicology; the grammatical description of language is effected by the science of grammar. p align="justify"> Any linguistic description may have a practical or theoretical purpose. A practical description is aimed at providing the student with a manual of practical mastery of the corresponding part of language (within the limits determined by various factors of educational destination and scientific possibilities). Since the practice of lingual intercourse, however, can only be realised by employing language as a unity of all its constituent parts, practical linguistic manuals more often than not comprise the three types of description presented in a complex. As for theoretical linguistic descriptions, they pursue analytical aims and therefore present the studied parts of language in relative isolation, so as to gain insights into their inner structure and expose the intrinsic mechanisms of their functioning. Hence, the aim of theoretical grammar of a language is to present a theoretical description of its grammatical system, ie to scientifically analyse and define its grammatical categories and study the mechanisms of grammatical formation of utterances out of words in the process of speech making.
In earlier periods of the development of linguistic knowledge, grammatical scholars believed that the only purpose of grammar was to give strict rules of writing and speaking correctly. The rigid regulations for the correct ways of expression, for want of the profound understanding of the social nature of language, were often based on purely subjective and arbitrary judgements of individual grammar compilers. The result of this "prescriptive" approach was, that alongside of quite essential and useful information, non-existent "rules" were formulated that stood in sheer contradiction with the existing language usage, ie lingual reality. Traces of this arbitrary prescriptive approach to the grammatical teaching may easily be found even in to-date's school practice. p align="justify"> To refer to some of the numerous examples of this kind, let us consider the well-known rule of the English article stating that the noun which denotes an object "already known" by the listener should be used with the definite article. Observe, however, English sentences taken from me works of distinguished authors directly contradicting
"I've just read a book of yours about Spain and I wanted to ask you about it." - "It's not a very good book, I'm afraid" (S. Maugham). I feel a good deal of hesitation about telling you this story of my own. You see it is not a story like other stories I have been telling you: it is a true story (JK Jerome). p align="justify"> Or let us take the rule forbidding the use of the continuous tense-forms with the verb be as a link, as well as with verbs of perceptions. Here are examples to the contrary:
My holiday at Crome isn't being a disappointment (A. Huxley). For the first time, Bobby felt, he was really seeing the man (A. Christie). p align="justify"> The given examples of English articles and tenses, though not agreeing with the above "prescriptions", contain no grammar mistakes in them.
The said traditional view of the purpose of grammar has lately been re-stated by some modern trends in linguistics. In particular, scholars belonging to these trends pay much attention to artificially constructing and analysing incorrect utterances with the aim of a better formulation of the rules for "the construction of correct ones. But their examples and deductions, too, are often at variance with real facts of lingual usage. p align="justify"> Worthy of note are the following two artificial utterances suggested as far back as 1956:
Colourless green ideas sleep furiously. Furiously sleep ideas green colourless. p align="justify"> According to the idea of ​​their creator, the American scholar N. Chomsky, the first of the utterances, although nonsensical logically, was to be classed as grammatically correct, while the second one, consisting of the same words placed in the reverse order, had to be analysed as a disconnected, "ungrammatical" enumeration, a "non-sentence". Thus, the examples, by way of contrast, were intensely demonstrative (so believed the scholar) of the fact that grammar as a whole amounted to a set of non-semantic rules of sentence formation. p align="justify"> However, a co...
