Linguistic theory must be sufficiently rich and comprehensive to be able to account for the structure of the most complex or elaborate manifestation of language. In consequence any structurally less complex verbal behaviour is typically explained as a use of some ‘reduced’ or ‘simplified’ code or register. Many languages, if not all, are said to possess such reduced registers and it is said to be part of a native speaker's competence to be able to use such ‘reduced registers’ where appropriate. It is part of his total communicative competence to know when it is appropriate to use such registers. These reduced or simplified registers are associated with more or less well defined situations of language use or types of discourse. Telegraphese is obviously restricted by the medium of transmission as well as the restricted range of communicative functions it is used for, e.g. orders, reports and announcements of plans. Technical description in botanical and ornithological reference books have a purely referential function, while the so-called language of instructions has clearly restricted rhetorical functions.

The notion of simplification has been a familiar one in language teaching for a long time. It underlies not only the production of “simplified readers” but also the whole process of syllabus design. Essentially, it is the pedagogic analogue of the linguist's idealization of data, from which it ultimately derives: the teacher simplifies by selecting and ordering the linguistic phenomena he is to deal with so as to ease the task of learning, and the linguist idealizes by selecting and ordering the linguistic phenomena he is to deal with to ease the task of analysis. In both cases the purpose of the operation is essentially a methodological one. And in both cases there is a danger that something crucial may be left out of account for the sake of methodological convenience. In this paper I want to suggest that something crucial IS generally left out of account and that the notion of simplification can be given a more general, and significant, definition. In the first part of the paper I shall try to work my way towards this definition and in the second part I shall cry to draw out a number of implications for language teaching pedagogy that seem to arise from it.

In their search for more solid theoretical underpinnings applied linguists are turning increasingly toward the burgeoning field of pidgin and Creole linguistics (Schumann 1975). This attraction stems from recent changes in orientation in these two domains of linguistics that have led to a shared interest in the psychological processes underlying language acquisition. Abandoning their primary concern for the nature of the input data provided to the second language learner, applied linguistics are paying more attention to the nature of the psychological structures and processes that determine what type of data the learner will “take in” and that guide him in the transformation of the intake into his version of the target language. The focus on the learner's language processing mechanisms is evidenced by the favor enjoyed currently by the branch of applied linguistics labelled -- quite inappropriately -- error analysis. At the same time, creolists are looking at pidgin and creole languages from a different standpoint. They are less concerned with the problems that these languages pose to genetic classifications of languages or with the historical filiation among extant pidgins and Creoles. They believe that because of the very fact that these languages, particularly pidgins, assume limited communicative functions in speech communities they are more likely to provide insights on the nature of language acquisition and on the relationships between linguistic structure and the communicative setting.

The growing interest in error analysis shows a concern with errors as evidence of learner language systems. A study of errors becomes a means of revealing what the learner has yet to know. However, the analyst takes a lenient view of errors as such. What has to be remedied is the system, not the symptoms. Nevertheless, the errors produced may be more or less serious. As the analysis will normally reveal a host of deficiencies in the learner system, it may be difficult to know where to start and what to emphasize in applying the results. This is where error evaluation fits in, i.e. the study of error gravity (see Fig. 1.).

If one would ask me as a regular, though not systematic reader in applied linguistics to mention a major theoretical issue in this field of study, I would choose for the controversy about “behavioristic” audiolingual learning versus “mentalistic” cognitive code learning. This dichotomy is apparent in many theoretical papers, and starting point of various research programs.

C'est un truisme que de dire que la grammaire descriptive traditionelle repose sur des notions vagues et floues. L'absence de concepts dignes de ce nom fait que ce type de grammaire (le plus répandu encore aujourd'hui hélas!) ne peut décrire que ce que l'on voit -- à savoir l'énoncé linéaire de surface (c'est ce que Chomsky appelle “le niveau observationnel”). C'est ainsi par exemple que le sujet grammatical d'un énoncé, à cause de la place privilégiée qu'il occupe dans la chaîne linéaire, se voit attribuer implicitement ou explicitement, le rôle de locomotive de la phrase (“c'est le sujet qui fait l'action”). Mais le sujet grammatical n'est pas seul à ne pas avoir de statut précis dans la grammaire scolaire. Si on regarde du côté du verbe, on constate que ce dernier reçoit des labels tels que “dynamique” ou “statique” selon qu'il exprime “une action” ou “un état.” Il est permis de se demander ce que des labels de ce genr- peuvent bien apporter à la compréhension des phénomènes GRAMMATICAUX étant donné qu'ils renvoient purement et simplement à l'extralinguistique! Toujours en relation avec le verbe, la grammaire scolaire de l'anglais parle “D'ACTION EN COURS” lorsqu'on se trouve en présence de la forme dite “progressive” (BE + ING). Implicitement une action en cours renvoie à un acteur, à un agent responsable: nous retrouvons ici la “locomotive de la phrase” et la croyance naïve, toujours implicite, que la grammaire d'une langue colle à la réalité extralinguistique, qu'elle en est le calque fidèle et qu'en conséquence le seul problème pour une grammaire est d'établir ce type de correspondance biunivoque entre discours et réalité, entre les mots et les choses. On retrouve le slogan “c'est le sujet qui fait l'action” jusque dans la façon dont sont traités et définis les verbes dits “défectifs,” à propos desquels on dira qu'ils ne prennent pas d's a la troisième personne du singulier -- ce qui trahit une conception linéaire de l'énoncé -- et aussi, ajoutons-le, un manque total d'ouverture sur le problème de la structuration des énoncés.

English Reference Grammar for Polish Students or shortly Polish English Grammar (PEG) is a pedagogical contrastive grammar. It is written on contrastive principles and is based on the results of investigations conducted by a team of Polish linguists within the Polish-English Contrastive Project, sponsored by Center for Applied Linguistics at Arlington, Virginia and the Polish Ministry of Science, Technology and Higher Education. The Project is managed by Professor Jacek Fisiak, Director of the Institute of English Studies at Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznan. Two volumes of the studies have already been published and two more are in preparation. (Fisiak 1973, 1974). The studies are conducted in the theoretical framework of generative transformational grammar, covering the most recent developments of the theory, without priority given to any specific version of the theory. Case grammar, generative semantics, extended standard theory, natural phonology, natural generative grammar and even language-in-the-context versions are all considered in the studies. Being basically theoretically oriented, the Project is not directly applicable in pedagogical practice, although a considerable amount of work is also being done along the didactic lines.

In this essay, the methodological point of departure is the assumption that the Saussurian inherited distinction between diachronic and synchronic levels of description is fictitious and arbitrary and will therefore have to be abandoned in its stringent interpretation (see Baumgärtner's convincing display of arguments (Baumgärtner 1969) and, in the same vein, Kanngießer 1972). Not only, it will be argued, is this meanwhile classical dichotomy unnecessary, and does it fail to account for similarities between semantic change and certain types of human reasoning, but it leads into blind alleys when one attempts to systematize various linguistic phenomena. The integration of catachresis, metaphor, and other figurative usage of lexical items into a theory of grammar are cases in point (Abraham 1975).

Pour toute une tradition linguistique, la linéarité est considérée comme une des propriétés fondamentales du langage. “Tout le mécanisme de la langue en dépend” affirmait Saussure. La constitution de classes paradigmatiques, l'analyse distributionnelle supposent que les unités se suivent ou se remplacent mais ne sauraient être présentes simultanément en un même point de la chaîne.