Jūlijs Kārkliņš – nozīmīga personība latviešu valodniecībā
Jūlijs Kārkliņš – important personality in Latvian linguistics

Summary/Abstract: The article deals with the personality of Jūlijs Kārkliņš and analyses his point of view regarding the concept of syntax. The personal characteristics of Kārkliņš are considered from two viewpoints, firstly, as a university lecturer on syntax at the University of Latvia (until 1982), and, secondly, as a colleague. Kārkliņš is characterized as a capable and hardworking person and researcher, a representative of modern linguistics (in comparison to comparative-historical philology and traditional grammar). Kārkliņš’s view on syntax is logical and systemic, it integrates linguistic theory with a language material. Kārkliņš was the first in Latvia to use structural and statistical methods in syntactic studies. This led him to reconsider the main problems of syntax, for example, a precise formulation of the object of syntactical studies, defining the aspects of research and structuring syntax as a subsystem of language. The syntactic subsystem is structured in the level of words, simple sentences, compound and complex sentences and text. These were new ideas at the time of Kārkliņš. All of them are reviewed in this article. At the end of the article, Kārkliņš is characterised as a demanding and precise university lecturer who was democratic and humane, and had a great sense of humour.

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