Cognitive Dynamics in Linguistic Interactions

Alexander Kravchenko

Μαρ 2012 · Cambridge Scholars Publishing

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In the era of globalization, issues of international and intercultural communication in different professional areas become even more acute. There is a growing demand to increase the efficiency of higher learning educational programs, called upon to enhance second or foreign language communicative competence of would-be specialists. Yet the existing methods of teaching a foreign or second language are far from being satisfactory in terms of expected efficiency. This is symptomatic of a general methodological problem: we lack holistic understanding of how natural language shapes the cognitive domain of human interactions.

Orthodox linguistic science is based on a premise that language is a tool for expressing and conveying thought, thus making communication between humans possible. This dualistic assumption ignores the fact that just as there may be no language without interacting human subjects, there may be no human thought (or, largely, humanness) to speak of without languaging as species-specific behavior, because ‘we as humans happen in language’ (Maturana). The study of language, therefore, must focus on the dynamics of linguistic interactions, and dialogue should be pursued between applied linguists and theoreticians about the conceptual-theoretic foundations of linguistic education. This volume is just such an attempt.

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Alexander Kravchenko is a Professor in Linguistics and Chair of the Department of Foreign Languages, Baikal National University of Economics and Law, Russia. His research interests lie in the area of theoretical and applied cognitive linguistics, the biology of language and cognition, and (bio)semiotics. He has authored several books and over a hundred articles published in Russian and in English, including Biology of Cognition and Linguistic Analysis (Peter Lang, 2008). As a member of the Distributed Language Group, he is looking for ways to transform modern linguistic orthodoxy into a realistic language science.