Nikitin O.V. Linguistic Paradigms of the 21st Century: Dialogues with Academician V.M. Alpatov

DOI: https://doi.org/10.15688/jvolsu2.2025.5.9

Oleg V. Nikitin

Doctor of Sciences (Philology), Professor, Department of the Russian Language, Petrozavodsk State University, Petrozavodsk, Russia

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https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2815-6691

Abstract. The article analyzes the state of linguistics at the turn of the 20th – 21st centuries in scientific dialogues with academician V.M. Alpatov and shows the prospects for its development in the 21st century in connection with accounts of the new methodology and the search for breakthrough directions. It points to the crisis phenomena in modern science and the lack of generally recognized markers of linguistic prognostics. The causes of coups and cultural breakthroughs in linguistics are identified and explained. External factors are noted to influence profoundly the state and vectors of research into the language, as well as the shift of the centers of linguistics, which leads to a change in scientific paradigms. An assessment is given to the most promising ideas and discoveries of the past periods in the development of linguistics related to the names of F. de Saussure, L. Bloomfield, I.A. Baudouin de Courtenay, N. Chomsky, and others. It is assumed that linguistics develops according to the principle of interacting "black boxes." It points out the leading role of authorities in science and the Kazan, Moscow, St. Petersburg, Prague, American, Geneva schools they have created for shaping linguistic policy on a global scale. The author emphasizes the connection of linguistics with applied sciences and the role of mathematical knowledge in the transformation of views and approaches to language studies. The innovative ideas and methods of Russian linguists V.I. Abaev, V.Vs. Ivanov, E. Kibrik, Yu.S. Stepanov etc. are commented on. The dialogues view the problems of the 21st cent. linguistics terra incognita. The opinion on the variability of the terminological apparatus of linguistics and the role of tradition in shaping the image of modern humanities is substantiated. V.M. Alpatov's observations about the linguistic expansion and the struggle between two approaches to language study are given: the rigorous one is modelled after natural sciences, and the interdisciplinary one. They indicate the search for new directions in sciences of the 21st century. The conclusion informs about the opportunities for linguistics to overcome the crisis and evolve in the future.

Key words: theory of linguistics, linguistic prognostics, crisis of linguistics, evolution of linguistics, personality of a linguist, V.M. Alpatov.

Citation. Nikitin O.V. Linguistic Paradigms of the 21st Century: Dialogues with Academician V.M. Alpatov. Vestnik Volgogradskogo gosudarstvennogo universiteta. Seriya 2. Yazykoznanie [Science Journal of Volgograd State University. Linguistics], 2025, vol. 24, no. 5, pp. 114-137. (in Russian). DOI: https://doi.org/10.15688/ jvolsu2.2025.5.9

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