Document Type : Original Research Article
Authors
1
Department of Social Sciences-Sociology, SR.C., Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran
2
Department of linguistics, Isf.C., Islamic Azad University, Isfahan, Iran.
3
Assistant Professor, Department of Arabic Language and Literature, Shahid Chamran University of Ahvaz, Ahvaz, Iran
10.22034/icwj.2026.603923.1103
Abstract
This study presents a rigorous sociological reconstruction of the problem of the historicization of language within Mohammed Abed al-Jabri’s Critique of Arab Reason project, examining its structural articulation with the phenomenon of historical-social asynchrony. Situated epistemologically within critical constructivism and employing a qualitative, historical-conceptual, and interpretive-critical approach, the research investigates the dialectic between the institutional stabilization of linguistic norms and the rapid transformation of modern social experience. Utilizing a reconstructive logic of inference, the core analytical corpus comprises al-Jabri’s foundational texts—Takwīn al-ʿAql al-ʿArabī, Bunyat al-ʿAql al-ʿArabī, and al-Turāth wa-al-Ḥadātha—systematically synthesized with contemporary scholarship in the sociology of language, language ideology, enregisterment, and historical institutionalism. The findings demonstrate that the historicization of language cannot be reduced to structural stasis or an inherent inability of the linguistic system to adapt; rather, it is a socio-institutional process wherein the "Age of Compilation" established a durable regime of referential authority through codification, education, and intergenerational transmission. Within this cognitive architecture, language functions as a crucial conceptual mediator in organizing meaning rather than an independent causal agent. Consequently, the encounter between institutionalized linguistic norms and emergent modern realities does not inevitably yield normative collapse or obsolescence. Instead, it generates a multi-path dynamic encompassing continuity, negotiation, modification, functional coexistence, or structural reconfiguration.To conceptualize this temporal and structural gap with heightened precision, the study introduces the theoretical construct of "historical-social asynchrony of language". This construct transcends the traditional dichotomies of the fuṣḥā/colloquial binary or linguistic rigidity, offering a sophisticated analytical lens for exploring how historical regimes of normative legitimacy interact with contemporary experiential transformations.
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