Elbowing item

It was in the early 80s. I studied at the university then, and in the summer we went to a dialectological expedition to the Arkhangelsk region. And so we go from one village to another, it is several kilometers, around, how many eyes are enough, the Kargopol expanses. Suddenly towards us is a picturesque group with backpacks, well, obviously Muscovites. We, not to mention the thin word, and ask them: "Well, what's new in Moscow?" And they, too, are no extra words to us: "Yes, they cover Osil."

Osil is a separation of structural and applied linguistics (now theoretical and applied, otipol, that is) philological faculty of Moscow State University. And I remembered this story now, because Alexander Evgenievich Kibrik died, who stood at the origins of the department and headed it for the last two decades. Actually, I myself studied at the Russian department and the student was not a student. But I was lucky - just when I was a student, Alexander Evgenievich was suddenly offered to read a special course at my department. I remember what impression on my fragile mind made his reasoning that of the two possible solutions to the best scientists will consider one that is simpler and more beautiful, and this seems to us something of the granted one, but behind this is the idea that the world is arranged simply and beautifully.

I must say that Alexander Evgenievich was not only a wonderful scientist and amazing organizer of science - he was also an amazingly bright person. One of the brightest in our linguistics. Bright memory.

And I am moving to what, in fact, I was going to tell today. I note, however, that it would be interesting to discuss these matter with Alexander Evgenievich now.

So - what if the word is massively used in speech incorrectly? And is it not necessary to have a word wrong here Take the quotation marks? Here, let's say, almost everyone knows that the word shoulder There is an anatomical meaning (part of the hand from the place of its attachment to the elbow) - and domestic. When we talk about the dress With open We do not mean a sleeveless dress. And throw a coat on shoulders , referring to the shoulder In a medical sense, it would be difficult. Not to mention the fact to substitute shoulder . This is not a single case at all: many plots of this kind were collected by Boris Iomdin in the recent work “On the“ wrong ”use of terms: can the language be wrong?” For example, everyone is incorrectly called mimosa mimosa . U Bulgakov read: She carried V hands Disgusting , disturbing Yellow flowers . Crap their He knows how their The name is , but They The first Why - then Appear V Moscow . That's what we call mimosa and think that the master, like many men, does not understand the colors at all. However, a plant with yellow fluffy balls is not a mimosa at all, but a variety of acacia, but a real mimosa Balms - a completely different plant is not even yellow, but lilac. Biologists do not get tired of being indignant, but the mistake was fixed in the first half of the 19th century. For 50 years, how dictionaries recognize the new meaning of the word mimosa . Many people say to click on trigger , mistakenly calling the trigger trigger (in fact the trigger Submarine , and this is another detail of the weapon). Although what does "actually" mean? Isn't the tongue showed in us in the Uzus? Most non -recovers think that the litaurus are plates (in fact, the type of drum). What can I say, often known to us the meanings of words generally appeared as a result of an error. So, our word elephant probably arose as a result of borrowing a Turkic word, which means ... Leo. But even a biologist would not occur to the head of the people, saying that the word elephant It is used "wrong." Although when a word is used as a term, and-in a slightly different meaning-as a word of an everyday language, it is very difficult to explain to a specialist that this is not so wrong, but simply a different meaning. What a sin to hide when I hear something similar from my area, I also want to correct it. Here is the term impersonal offer In everyday life, they constantly use it wrong, say: - Me They asked ... - Who asked ? Not th the thief impersonal offers . I always want to say: this, they say, is not impersonal, but vaguely personal, and what only you were taught at school? ..

Actually, the pathos of the work of Boris Iomdin is lexicographic: he suggests that the common “incorrect” use of words should be fixed in explanatory dictionaries, as typical errors in stresses (with an occasion not to fix in orthoepic dictionaries rivers . or wrong .). Then “wrong.”, Perhaps it will have to be replaced with “everyday life.”, And then it may completely supplant the “correct” use in special dictionaries.

But here is another interesting.

Where, in fact, is the subject of our science? Language exists in the form of speech of specific people. And people, alas, often say all nonsense. Moreover, the development of technology puts us in such a situation that a number of examples can be found for any nonsense. And the further, the more examples can be found literally on everything. I once found that a huge number of people writes the circumstances of an indefinable strength - instead of irresistible strength . And where am I now with this knowledge?

Here, here, one indignant reader wrote to me about the note in which I talked about the words Bukashka And a goat and those naive biological ideas that are embodied in them: it is amazing that Some​​ Badly Educated underwear blurt out Something​​ Important V his own Book , a Then on basis just that​​ Someone​​ This blurted out , compiled Dictionary . NDAAA ... http://trv-science.ru/2012/10/09/zhidkonogaya-koozyavochka-bukashechka/ . Well, yes, the dictionaries are really compiled-on the basis of the fact that non-therapists just blink something if they bake it constantly.

Well, let's say, you can come up with some very complex statistics in order to outplay those use that you can probably neglect, although it will be difficult to agree here. Well, let's say, if we learn not just a language, but a more or less literary language, you can cut off completely illiterate use, far beyond the norm, and focus primarily on the speech of authoritative native speakers. You can arrange stylistic instruments everywhere (voluntarism, of course). But the matter is not only this.

In fact, language is not only the entire array of texts existing on it. This is also a set of models, structures, matrices, according to which new texts are generated, a set of various kinds of capabilities - grammatical, semantic and others. Here, say, people often confuse cases in spontaneous speech - sometimes they use one case instead of another by analogy with another word, sometimes they simply put a case ending under the influence of the context (the same nearby). Moreover, they are confused quite systematically. However, if a person himself notices what he said, he will correct, if he said that he said so, he will not believe, but to give a list of the record will be horrified. The matrix in his head is "correct." Of course, all kinds of reservations are also the facts of the existence of a language. But these are facts of some other level. So I say-we have some kind of elbowing object. Probably in the natural sciences is not so. Although in biology, perhaps partly it looks ...

Irina Levontina