Jazyková regulace jako věc dohody
Language regulation as a matter of agreement

Summary/Abstract: This article, a review of Václav Cvrček’s book on language regulation and the Concept of Minimal Intervention (2008), focuses on four main issues. (1) For the most part, Cvrček deals with linguists’ intervention into language. He pays little attention to the intervention of individuals in real interactions. (2) In Cvrček’s opinion, linguists should not present the public with prescriptive codifications, but rather, with descriptive ones. However, there is a more important difference between a reference book, which is presented and/or perceived as an instruction for language behavior, and a hypothetically exhaustive description of a language or its varieties which is neither presented nor perceived as instructive. (3) The authors find the definitions of the concepts of “real” and “declarative” attitudes very problematic. (4) Language norms are wrongly equated with the declarative attitudes of speakers towards their language. However, language norms can be neither inferred solely from usage nor reduced to usage. Rather, they consist of language users’ awareness of the language and its usage, or a set of features of regularly used linguistic means and their combinations. Finally, the authors suggest several specific points which Czech linguists should agree upon before implementing possible regulatory changes into practice.

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