A Study On Iconicity Of Linguistic Signs From The Perspective Of Adaptation Theory

The debate between arbitrariness and iconicity of language began two thousandyears ago, and from the ancient Greek era, the study on “arbitrariness” and “motivation”has been one of the important topics discussed by philosophers and linguists. Thedifference between the two can also be regarded as the argument between “nominalism”and “realism”. The school of nominalism, represented by Aristotle, believes that there areno necessary links between the language form and the object which the language formrepresents, that is to say, naming things is an arbitrary behavior; the school of realism,represented by Plato, proposes that there are intrinsic links between the two, that is,naming things must follow certain rules. With one aspect waning the other waxing, thedispute between “nominalism” and “realism” continues, and the debate betweenarbitrariness and iconicity never stopped.In the beginning of the20th century, Saussure proposed the principle of arbitrarinessof linguistic signs, which dominated the linguistics in the20th century. But with thedevelopment of functional linguistics and cognitive linguistics, the principle ofarbitrariness has been faced a great challenge. Peirce (1940), semiotics founder, firstproposed the term of iconicity used to refer to a natural relationship between thesymbolic signifier and signified. In1965, Jacobson, for the first time, made substantivechallenge on the concept of arbitrariness of language; he believes that iconicity isprevalent in language. Haiman published two books in1980s, in which he systematicallyanalyzed and researched the iconicity existing in syntax of the language, which brings thestudy of language signs into a new era. After that, more comprehensive researches oniconicity, from multiple angles and dimensions, continue to emerge, involving voice,vocabulary, syntax, discourse, synchronic and diachronic, literary and non-literary etc..The object and scope of the study on iconicity are progressively established, whichbecomes a new research paradigm.In China, there are three main perspectives on iconicity and arbitrariness oflinguistic signs: first, the view of arbitrary domination (王,2001;马,2002); second, theview of motivation domination (陆,郭,2005); third, dialectic view of iconicity (许,1988;沈,1993). Wang Yin proposed that there are both links and differences betweeniconicity and arbitrariness of language symbols, and both of them oppose to each other and complement each other; language is between these two extremes (王,2002).Studies, from pragmatic perspective, on iconicity of language signs are among themost important subjects in cognitive linguistics and pragmatics. At present, the domesticstudies on iconicity of language signs, from the perspective of pragmatics, mainly focuseon the following two aspects: first, the comparison between principles of iconicity(quantity iconicity, iconicity of order, iconicity of markedness) and pragmatic principlesproposed by linguists (deixis, principles of cooperation, politeness, etc.); second,pragmatic analysis used to the study on iconicity (王,2003); Hou Guojin proposed a“pragmatic iconicity hypothesis”(侯,2007), in which the research of iconicity has beenexpanded into the scope of pragmatics.In Understanding Pragmatics, Verschueren systematically expounded pragmaticAdaptation Theory that pragmatics is a functional overview about the language andpragmatics has been understood and interpreted from a new perspective. The study on theapplication of Adaptation Theory is mainly focused on the research of translationpractices from the perspective of Adaptation Theory. There are few discussions,domestically, within the theoretical framework of Adaptation Theory, about languageiconicity. This paper will combine Adaptation Theory and iconicity to explore the iconicaspects of language symbols from the perspective of Adaptation Theory.This thesis, theoretically, based on existing studies at home and abroad, explores theiconic aspects of language symbols from the perspective of Adaptation Theory, and bymeans of systemic dialectics, it can be concluded that: arbitrariness is the basic propertyof language sings, and iconicity is a further development of understanding the nature oflanguage, meanwhile, the language signs used to fulfill the communicative purposepossess motivation namely iconicity.Three parts are included in this thesis, namely, an introduction, a main body and aconclusion.The main contents are as follows:In the first part, the introduction section, it provides a brief statement of thesignificance of the research, innovation and the basic composition of this paper. Thesecond part is the main body that consists of four chapters:The first chapter introduces the basic problems of iconicity of language signs and discusses arbitrariness and motivation, and it reviews the previous studies on iconicity oflanguage sings made by scholars at home and abroad, putting forward its own idea,namely: arbitrariness is the basic property of language signs, and iconicity is a furtherdevelopment of understanding the nature of language, meanwhile, the language signsused to fulfill the communicative purpose possess motivation i.e. iconicity. Based onsystem dialectics, it discusses the relation between iconicity and arbitrariness of languagesigns.The second chapter describes pragmatic Adaptation Theory proposed byVerschueren, including the Adaption Theory as a perspective on language, key notions ofthe Theory of Adaptation and four angles of investigation.The third and fourth chapters are the focuses of this paper, exploring the iconicaspects of language symbols from the perspective of Adaptation Theory. The four anglesof investigation of Adaptation Theory will be combined with iconicity issues to discussiconicity from contextual factors (social context and linguistic context), from thestructure of the object (pronunciation, vocabulary and syntax and other aspects of starting)from the dynamic process of language and from the salience of the process of AdaptationTheory. By studying salience, it analyzes the relationship between iconicity and psychicalprocess, setting up “Subconscious Pragmatic Model” which is one of the innovationpoints of this thesis.The fourth chapter is about the application of iconicity research from the perspectiveof Adaptation Theory, discussing the research on iconicity used in language teaching aswell as Adaptation Theory and iconicity applied to the theory and practice of translation.In the concluding section of this paper, it briefly summarizes the characteristics ofthe study, the problems that have not been able to be solved and issues that need to befurther explored.