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ON TEXTOLOGICAL RESEARCH: JUST A FEW REMARKS
Luciano Vitacolonna
University of Chieti (Italy)
 
 
In the last twenty years the research into text and discourse has greatly developed. One of the most important aspects of this progress lies in the shift from ‘text linguistics’ to ‘text theory’ (that is, to a text-theoretical framework), which means to get a semiotic viewpoint. More recently a new theoretical framework was born, the so called semiotic textology, that is the last version of J. S. Petöfi’s theory 1. All that has involved (a) deep changes at different levels in the study of communication and language; (b) a different structuring of traditional fields (for example the relationship between grammar and semantics, on the one hand, and semantics and pragmatics, on the other), (c) a more thorough analysis of eteromedial and multimedial texts, and (d) a new and a more close relation between interdisciplinary sciences and subjects (e.g. linguistics, logic, cognitive psychology, philosophy, and so on).
       However, I think that the most relevant and fruitful changes are the following:
 
       (a) the integration of the semantic and pragmatic components, which not only means to drop Chomsky’s opposition between syntax and semantics, but provides text theory with the only possibility to cross the linguistic borders as well;
 
       (b) the more and more frequent trend to substitute structuralism with proceduralism. Procedural analyses neither reject nor ignore the merits of both structuralist and generative-transformational theories: proceduralism is just a more powerful device to interpret texts and discourses.
      
       Notwithstanding all these theoretical and methodological achievements, the textological research has still a lot of work to do. Let’s try to shortly sketch its most urgent tasks:
 
       (1) The textological research should specify better and more clearly the relationships that occur, on the one hand, between semantics and pragmatics, and, on the other, between these two components and grammar/syntax. To put it another way: one should always take into account context, because texts are produced and interpreted always in a given context, that is, the production and the interpretation of texts are a semantic-pragmatic phenomenon. Therefore a new revision of illocutionary and perlocutionary acts is welcome, too.
 
       (2) If we want to get and/or set up non-ambiguous interpretations, a metalanguage or a canonical language 2 is requested. In the last years many scholars have criticized  the use of formalizations, and – to tell the truth – one has to admit that such formalizations prove boring and not very “readable”; yet science (and text research is a scientific enterprise) cannot do without this metalanguage.
 
       (3) If, till the seventies, preference was given to grammar and syntax, in the last twenty years greater attention has been paid to semantics (sense-semantics). Among the other things, that has involved:
            (a) a more exact specification of the relationships between ‘meaning’, ‘sense’, and ‘form’, as well as the specification of the way we construct the meaning(s) both in the production process and in the interpretative process, by taking into account the difference that always exists between the (physical) text as it is produced and the (physical) text as it is received/perceived/interpreted;
            (b) a re-formulation of the concept of ‘(linguistic) sign’: Saussure’s conception of the relationship ‘signifiant’–‘signifié’ is no longer enough, nor is Hjelmslev’s notion of ‘sign’ adequate any more. If we cannot reject the concept of ‘(linguistic) sign’, yet we have to re-structure it (see, e.g., Petöfi’s model of ‘sign’3) and to drop the idea of ‘sign’ as an abstract, fixed and isolated entity4: a ‘sign’ – or more precisely, a ‘sign complex’ – is always a dynamic relational object embedded in a context;
           (c) an integration of different kinds of logic (modal logic, model-theoretical logic, etc.);
           (d) the use of the concept of ‘possible world’;
           (e) the connection between the studies concerning brain processes and functioning and those concerning Artificial Intelligence;
            (f) a new way of analysing the problem of symbolic, metaphorical and figurative interpretation, as well as the connotation of both extension(s) and intension(s).
 
       (4) Till some years ago, textological research dealt only with short (fragments of) texts. Now its task is to (try to) analyse long texts and hypertexts. That means:
 
            (a) to work out a powerful and sophisticated strategy which can “simulate” the way our minds (brains) work in the interpretative process; with respect to this, the problem of (local and overall) re-interpretation (mainly the reinterpretation of oral texts) proves to be of primary importance; the question is: where/when/why does interpretation start and how does it proceed?;
            (b) to take into account the relation between ‘topic’ and ‘comment’ as devices for coherence;
            (c) to study Artificial Intelligence in depth, beyond any glorification;
            (d) to consider texts and hypertexts as dynamic objects which are multimedial, which (can) have a non-linear organization, and which are constructed (or construct themselves) during the interpretative process.
 
       (5) The textological research (semiotic textology) has to precisely specify the different text-types. Yet, since ‘typology’ is not an intrinsic property of texts, but a ‘function’ that is assigned to them, text-typology (or text-taxonomy) should be considered as a semantic-pragmatic matter. Among the various types of texts, literary texts deserve a special attention for many a reason: their “ontology”, their function(s), their teaching utilization, etc.
 
       (6) Thanks to the success of many new systems of computerized communication (Internet, e-mail, fax, unimedial hypertexts, multimedial hypertexts or hypermedia, virtual reality, and so on), the very concept of text could be, if not questioned or even rejected, at least changed so to become more flexible and more adequate to the new, more and more dynamical, communicative and interpretative situations.
 
       From what I have said, it follows that the most important and urgent task of textological research is to explain how the interpretative process works. Indeed, the very difference between human beings and animals is the following: the animals interpret, the human beings explain interpretation.
 
 
 
Notes
 
       1 On ‘semiotic textology’ see, e.g., Petöfi (1991, 1995a, 1995b, 1995c, 1996a, 1996c, 2000), Petöfi & Vitacolonna, eds (1996), Vitacolonna (1999), Borja Navarro Colorado & Blanco Fernández (2000).
       2 See, e.g., Petöfi (1977; 1982).
       3 See, e.g., Petöfi (1996b).
       4 However, Saussure (1965: 177) himself has to admit that “nous ne parlons pas par signes isolés, mais par groupes de signes, par masses organisées qui sont elles-mêmes des signes”.
 
 
 
 
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