7.3 Pratibhā and the Concept of Transformations in Modern Linguistics

[Full title: 7. The Concept of Pratibhā and its Implications, (2): Pratibhā and the Sentence Sphoṭa]

Recent researches in the field of syntax and semantics heve presented various theories regarding the analysis of sentence. The psycholinguistic approaches of transformational linguistics^[1] revolutionanised the scientific study of of sentence and its meaning. The two major prosoects of thansformational grammar are 'linguistic competency' and 'generative grammar'. These two conceppts are developed by the later cognitive linguists such as Noam Chomsy^[2], Ronald Langacker^[3] etc. In contrast with the structuralists, transformational linguists believe that the proper object of linguistic study is the knowledge that the native speaker possesses, which enables them to produce and understand various sentences. This knowledge is termed as 'competence'. According to Chomsky, this is innate and he called it as 'innate linguistic knowledge' or 'innate language competency'. The concept of generative grammar tries to define rules that can generate the infinite number of grammatical sentence possible in a language. This method of grammar uses the concept of 'transformations' which helps people to produce new sentences from the existing ones. To explain this concept, Chomsky sets forth the idea that each sentence in a language has two levels of representation; a deep structure and a surface structure. The deep structure reresents the core semantic relations of a sentence and is mapped on to the surface structure via transformations. Thus deep structures can be perceived as a universal grammar underlying the language act and corresponding to the linguistic competence.

On a shrewd analysis of the concept of Pratibhā, conceived by Bhartṛhari, it can be stated that Pratibhā is the prototype of 'transformations'. In a conversation, the listener first grasps the speech in terms of words, one after the other. This manifests the internal sphoṭa (buddhisthaśabda), which is the auditory impression of the uttered speech. At this level it resembles the concept of 'deep structure' presented by the transformationalists. Sudden after the manifestation of the internal sphoṭa, Pratibhā, the intuitive instinct transforms it into the meaning. Similar process is adopted by the cognitive linguists, when they explain that the deep structure is mapped on to the surface structure via transformations.

It has been a topic of debate among the scholars of linguistics as well as psychology that how a child acquire its first language. Some of them accept the role of instinct as not so useful in the child's language acquisition, while some others hold the view that child's language is a product of instinct (Gayatri Rath, 2000, p.151-152). Chomsky answers this vexed problem by his notions of generative grammar and innate linguistic knowledge. In his cognitive theory, Chomsky suggests that, language acquisition is based on various rules and regulations. A child, who comes in contact with various language features, makes his own rules though unconsciously. Earlier it was believed that the children grasp their preliminary words from either the parents or the other elders.

But recent linguistic trends do not accept that parents 'teach' children their first language. The reason is no parent has the necessary explicit knowledge to do so, and children anyway acquire the knowledge of their first language long before they are in a position to understand the relevant instructions of their parents (Neil Smith, 2004, p.116). In his theory of 'cognitive capability', Chomsky argues that people possess a kind of language faculty which is a part of human natural biological qualities. This idea is known as 'Innate language faculty', which has a basic grammar system which is termed as 'Universal Grammar' (Jyothirmayi Pāṇini C, 2009, p.283). This innate linguistic knowledge enables a child to acquire the notion of structure, which helps the child to learn any language.

Bhartṛhari, also holds similar view with Chomsky and he emphasises on the role of intuition in child's language acquisition. He opines that it is śabdabhāvanā that enables a new born baby to make the first movements of vocal organs. Stimulated by this śabdabhāvanā, air coming out of baby's mouth is able to strike at certain points of articulation and produce sounds.

The Vṛtti again mentions that there is no other reasons than Pratibhā to make these movements

ādyaḥ karaṇavinyāsaḥ prāṇasyordhnaṃ samīraṇam
sthānānāmabhighātaśca na vinā śabdabhāvanām.
  —(Vākyapadīya, 1.122)

This theory of word impregnatedness of Bhartṛhari akin to the innate language competency of the transformationalists. Even though Chomsky's concepts of language are different from that of Bhartṛhari, there are resemblences between Pratibhā and Chomsky's 'Innate Language Faculty'. Both are innate and instinctive in nature and explain the process through which children gain the knowledge of language.

In Indian scenario, Mīmāṃsakas and Naiyāyikas also present a similar concept in the child's language acquisition, with slight changes. They also state that children first understand the sentence as a whole and later, by the process of inclusion and exclusion (āvāpa and udvāpa), they come to know about the individual meanings of the words. Later they are able to understand and produce new sentences.

The process is elaborated in Nyāyasiddhāntamuktāvalī as:-

evam vyavahārādapi yathā prayojakavṛddhena ghaṭamānayetyuktaṃ tacchrutvā prayojyavṛddhena ghaṭa ānītastadavadhārya pārśvastho bālo ghaṭānayanarūpakāryaṃ ghaṭamānayeti śabdaprayojyamitya vadhārayati. tataśca ghaṭaṃ naya gāṃ badhānetyādivākyād āvāpodvāpābhyaṃ ghaṭādipadānāṃ kāryānvitaghaṭādau śaktiṃ gṛhṇāti.——prathamataḥ kāryānvitaghaṭādau śaktyavadhāraṇe' pi lāghavena paścāttasya parityāgaucityāt.
  —(1988, p.561-563)

The sum total of this discussion is that Bhartṛhari was the first to introduce the instinctive innate knowledge of a person called Pratibhā into the realm of linguistics. This innate capacity enables a person to understand and produce various sentences and is manifested by the indivisible-sentencesphoṭa. The concept of transformations introduced by the modern cognitive linguists akin to Bhartṛhari's Pratibhā in several aspects.

Footnotes and references:

[1]:

The linguist's approach towards the analysis of a sentence is mainly of four types:

Traditional, Comparative and Historical, Structural and Descriptive and Transformational. The traditional grammarians break up the word order to analyse the relationship between the words such as nouns and adjectives. On the other side, linguists like Otto Jespersen tried to analyse language in a historical and comparative methodology. They hold that language undergoes constant change and thus the prototypes can be traced through the historical and comparative analysis. As scholars focused more on language and less on history, they introduced a new methodology in analysing language. These scholars approach language in two ways; Synchronic and Diachronic, which focus on the structural analysis of language. This methodology has been devloped by a group of linguists called structuralists. The goals, methods and assumptions of transformational grammarians are unique and different from those of descriptive lingistics. In contrast with the structuralists, they consider grammar to be a system of rules that generate exactly those combinations of words which form grammatical sentences in a given language. They developed the concept of 'transformations' which helps the user to produce new sentences from the existing ones.

[2]:

1957. Syntactic Structures.

[3]:

1987. Foundations of Cognitive Grammar.