De Mauro e Chomsky: convergenze parallele sul «mistero» del linguaggio

Tullio De Mauro’s conception of language and of linguistics has been deeply scrutinised after his passing away, including works that have directly or indirectly compared his theory with that of the eminent American linguist Noam Chomsky. The Italian master frequently compares the notions of the Saussurean theoretical linguistics which inspired his thinking with those progressively emerging in the generativist school from the 1950s, highlighting affinities as well as theoretical and epistemological inconsistencies. From the same meta-theoretical horizon aimed at revealing the “mystery” of language, the two scholars land at delimiting two distinct “object” for linguistics: the headlight of De Mauro’s research is meaning, while meaning is precisely the point at which Chomsky is forced to stop, entangled in a theory of competence (today I-Language) too unyielding to ponder the variety and variability of the linguistic use, i.e. the living langue, which De Mauro places not (only) in the brain, but in the life and the hands of real speakers.