The Integralism of Eugenio Coseriu’s Linguistics

Abstract

This study pleads for the use of the term “integral linguistics” for the theory of language created and developed by the Romanian linguist Eugenio Coseriu starting with the middle of the twentieth century. The term was proposed by Coseriu himself only in 1981, when he contributed in the second edition of the National Congress of Linguistics in San Juan with a presentation named “Fundamentas y tareas de la lingüistica integral (Basis and tasks of integral linguistics)”. The term was not so much used in the world of linguistics, except for some of Eugenio Coseriu’s disciples, who clearly understood the amplitude of his vision on language (like Johannes Kabatek in Germany or Mircea Borcilă and all his followers in the linguistic school from Cluj-Napoca, Romania). The rationale for promoting the name of “integral linguistics” for the theory created by Eugenio Coseriu is based on some arguments listed and detailed in this study: integral linguistics has a unitary object, the language as a cultural object, studied from all relevant perspectives; it is based on a solid and well integrated philosophy of language (with ideas from Aristotle, Humboldt and Hegel and many other philosophers fundamenting Coseriu’s vision on language); it includes most relevant ideas from linguists who preceded Coseriu’s theory, in a constant integrative effort; it relates to other theories of language, clarifying its position in connection with different lines of study opened especially in the second half of the twentieth century; it proposes extremely valuable instruments and concepts adequate for the study of language and it offers the perspective of continuation and development of the study of language.