A comparison between generative grammar and cognitive linguistics: from scientific reasoning styles to research strategies

• Grant number: 25/03587-0
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships abroad - Research Internship - Doctorate
• Start date: January 05, 2026
• End date: January 04, 2027
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - Philosophy - Epistemology
• Principal Investigator: Caetano Ernesto Plastino
• Grantee: Eliakim Ferreira Oliveira
• Supervisor: Jean-Michel Fortis
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (FFLCH). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil
• Institution abroad: Université Paris Cité, France
• Associated to the scholarship: 24/00609-0 - An investigation into the cognitive linguistics research program: from scientific reasoning styles to research strategies, BP.DR

Abstract

The development of my doctoral research (FAPESP 24/00609-0) during 2024 led me (mainly under the influence of the work of Jean-Michel Fortis) to examine the foundations of the metatheoretical conflict between generative grammar and cognitive linguistics. I realised that the theoretical gain that the concept of restriction and selection strategy can bring to the concept of scientific reasoning style (the objective set in my thesis project) can be better apprehended when we compare research programmes which, by hypothesis, are guided by the same style, while being guided by different strategies. From this point of view, particularly in the case of the conflict between generative grammar and cognitive linguistics, it becomes relevant to ask, from an epistemological point of view, whether the establishment of this conflict cannot be understood on the basis of different styles of reasoning and different strategies for restricting data and selecting hypotheses. Faced with this question, I support the hypothesis that generative grammar and cognitive linguistics are guided by the same style, namely the hypothetical modelling style, but that they differ in terms of the strategy that guides their research practice: while generative grammar is guided by a predominantly decontextualising strategy, cognitive linguistics is guided by a predominantly contextualising strategy. Indeed, if I manage to demonstrate this hypothesis during my research placement abroad (under the supervision of Jean-Michel Fortis), I will be able to highlight the transtheoretical nature of a style of scientific reasoning, while showing that the way in which rival theories achieve this same style can be better understood if we study the axiological complex that guides their forms of research, i.e. the strategies of restriction and selection that guide their approaches.