Formalism and Functionalism

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"The terms 'Formalism' and 'Functionalism,' although generally accepted as designations of two different approaches within linguistics, are not entirely adequate, since they embody two different kinds of opposition.

"The first opposition concerns the basic view of language adopted by linguistic theories, where, roughly speaking, one either views grammar as an autonomous structural system or views grammar primarily as an instrument of social interaction. Theories taking these two views of grammar may be called 'autonomous' and 'functional,' respectively.

"The second opposition is of a quite different nature. Some linguistic theories have the explicit aim of constructing a formal representational system, whereas other approaches do not

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Edwin Castel

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Allied at one point to the Russian Futurists and opposed to sociological criticism, the Formalists placed an “emphasis on the medium” by analyzing the way in which literature, especially poetry, was able to alter artistically or “make strange” common language so that the everyday world could be “defamliarized.”