'Unlimited use of limited means': linguistic creativity of human beings

The claim that 'language makes infinite use of finite means' has been stated repeatedly over the last forty years by linguists seeking to find the origin of linguistic creativity. N. Chomsky, the founder of generative grammar, provided the impetus for this line of research in Cartesian Linguistics, published in 1966, where he quoted Wilhelm von Humboldt's now-famous sentence. The paper aims at integrating the restricted concept of creativity as made familiar in generative linguistics with a theory of creativity in the realm of lexical reference. It discusses examples of linguistic creativity with regard to syntax, morphology and semantics. Finally, the paper deals with the creative processes active in language acquisition, which now and then lead to errors through over-generalisation.