Arbitrariness and Complex Signs

Seminar paper from the year 2008 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Literature grade: 23 University of Leipzig (Institut für Anglistik) course: Motivation and Arbitrariness in the English Language language: English abstract: The following essay wants to draw attention to the relation between motivation and ar-bitrariness within complex linguistic signs. Modern linguistics tries to establish motivation within the language system and by this often seems to negotiate arbitrariness. Bolinger claimed in 1980: Arbitrary and conventional is a fitting description of distinctive sounds less so of words even less of sentences and beyond that scarcely fits at all (Fischer & Nänny 1999 p. xxi). Dirven and Verspoor proclaim that most of the complex forms of lan-guage...are...not arbitrary but transparent or motivated (Dirven & Verspoor p. 21).Motivation is used to construct convincing explanations for sometimes mystified phe-nomena in a language. Motivated by C.S. Peirce's sign system linguistic signs are recently moved from a box signed 'symbol' into a box signed 'icon'. Language by this is meant to be a more or less predictable act which is based on translucent regularities and ordering princi-ples. Structural similarities are the basis of motivation which examines and proclaims ordeing principles in all spheres of the language: phonology morphology lexicon and semantics Motivation even obstructs the syntax of a language.Three main ideas underlie the principle of motivation: (i) sequential ordering (ii) quan-tity and (iii) proximity. Simplified the ideas can be summarized as follows: (i) arrangement of linguistic elements according to temporal events like he opened the door and came in or veni vidi vici; (ii) the amount of meaning is reflected in the amount of linguistic form like I go - I went - I had gone or a car - a green car - a green convertible; (iii) conceptual distance is reflected in formal distance like I mad