Abstract
In the 1920s and 1930s, some of the most talented linguists of the Soviet Union, among whom one can highlight N.F. Jakovlev and E.D. Polivanov, were involved in the process of “language building”. Their role in the success of this process is examined from the point of view of the phonological theory that they developed for creating scripts for the numerous peoples of the Soviet Union, Turkic and Caucasian above all. Jakovlev’s phonology, that Polivanov termed “social phonology”, was very different from the one that N. Trubetskoj proposed some 10 years later. We will try to explain their ambitious script projects, which remain difficult to understand from the point of view of the modern phonology.
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Notes
On the use of the term ‘language building’ in relation to the USSR, see Fierman, 1991, pp. 1–11.
We can say that here Jakovlev develops Ščerba’s thesis about the distinctive or the meaning-differentiating function of phonemes (smyslorazličitel’naja funkcija).
Note Jakovlev’s use of the terminology of the Leningrad School here.
For more details concerning the reception of Saussure’s ideas in the USSR, see Chudakova and Toddes, (1982).
Troubeztkoj reviewed them the Bulletin de la Société de Linguistique de Paris (Meillet, 1929; Troubeztkoj, 1925), where he noted the importance of Jakovlev’s researches on Northeast Caucasian languages several times (Troubeztkoj, 1925, p. 286; Troubetskoi, 1937 (2000), pp. 52, 144, 173, 257, 295; Dumézil 1934, p. 32).
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Simonato, E. ‘Social phonology’ in the USSR in the 1920s. Stud East Eur Thought 60, 339–347 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11212-008-9065-8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11212-008-9065-8