THE ORIGINS OF LANGUAGE
We simply do not know how language originated. We do not know that spoken language developed wellbefore written language. Yet we have no physical evidance relating to the speech of our ancestors and because of this absence of evidance speculations about the origins of human speech have been developed.
The Divine Source
The basic idea of the theory is that : “ If infants were allowed to grow up without hearing any language, then they would spontaneously begin using the original God-given language. “
The Natural Sound Source
“ Primitive words could have been imitations of the naturel sounds which early men & women heard around them “ Examples : cuckoo, splash, bang, boom. This view has been called “ bow-wow theory “ of language origin and these words echoing naturel sounds are called “ onomatopoeic words “
A similar suggestion : “ The original sounds of language came from naturel cries of emotion such as pain, anger & joy. Examples : Ouch! , Ah!, Hey!
Yo-heave-ho Theory
The sounds of a person involved in physical effort could be the source of our language, especially when that physical effort involved several people and had to be coordinated.
The importance of yo-heave-ho theory is that it places the development of human language in some SOCIAL CONTEXT.
The Oral-Gesture Source
The theory comes from the idea that there is a link between physical gesture & orally produced sounds. First of all a set of physical gestures was developed as a means of communication. Then a set of oral gestures specially involving the mouth developed in which the movements of the tongue, lips & so on where recognized according to patterns of movement similar to physical gestures.
Glossogenetics
The focus is on the biological basis of the formation. In the evolutionary development there are certain physical features, best thought of a partical adaptations that appear to be relevant for speech. By themselves, such features would not not lead to speech production, but they are good clues that a creature possessing such features probably has the capacity for speech.
Physiological Adaptations
Human teeth, lips, mouth, tongue, larynx, pharynx & brain have been created in such a way to coordinate in producing speech sounds. Their places, connections & coordinative functions make humankind different from all the living creatures.
Interactions & Transactions
There are two major functions of language:
• Interactional Function : It is related with how human use language to interact with each other socially or emotionally, how they Express therir feelings or their ideas.
• Transactional Function : It is related with how human use their linguistic ağabeylities to transfer knowledge from onegeneration to the next.
UNIT 2
THE DEVELOPMENT OF WRITING
Much of the evidance used in the reconstruction of ancient writing systems comes from inscriptions on stone or tablets found in the ruble of ruined cities.
Pictograms & Ideograms
A Picture representing a particular image in a consistent way it is called Picture-writing or Pictogram. There must be a link between the pictogram and its meaning. So, we can easily understand what isrefers to when we look at the pictogram.
More abstracts forms of pictograms are called Ideograms. The relationship between the entity & the symbol is not easily understood like pictograms.
• A shared property of both pictograms & ideograms is that they do not present words or sounds in a particular language.
Logograms
When symbols come to be used to represent words in a language they described as examples of word-writing or logograms.
Logographic writing was used by Sumerians & their particular inscriptions are called CUNEIFORM WRITING . Cuneiform means wedge-shaped and it was produced by pressing a wedge- shaped implement into soft clay tablets. When we consider the relationship between the written form & the object it represents, it is arbitrary.
We may accept the cuneiform inscriptions of Sumerians as ” the earliest known writing system “
Rebus Writing
The symbol for one entity is taken over as the symbol for the sound of the spoken word used to refer to that entity.
One symbol can be used in many different ways, with a range of meanings. This brings a sizeable reduction in the number of symbols needed in a writing system.
Syllabic Writing
When a writing system employs a set of symbols which represent the pronounciations of syllables it is described as syllabic writing.
There are no purely syllabic writing systems in use today, but modern Japanese can be written with a single symbols which represent spoken syllables & is consequently often described as having a syllabic writing or a syllabary.
Alphabetic Writing
An alphabet is essentially a set of written symbols which each represent a single type of sound.
Written English
• The spelling of written English took place in 15 th century, via printing, so Latin & French affected the written forms.
• Many of the early printers were Dutch, so they were not very successful in English pronounciation .
• Since the 15 th century spoken English has undergone a lot of changes.
UNIT 3
THE PROPERTIES OF LANGUAGE
Communicative vs. Informative
Communicative: To convey a message intentionally. e.g. All the things you say for communicating.
Informative: Unintentional messages.e.g. If you sneeze the person you are talking to can understand that you have a cold. / If you have a strange accent the person you are talking to can understand you are from some other part of the country.
Unique Properties of A Language
These features are uniquely a part of human language.
• Displacement: Talking about things that happened in the past, happens now or will happen in the future.
There is no displacement in animal communication.
Exception: Bee communication has displacement in an extremely limited form. A bee can show the others the source of the food.
• Arbitrariness: The word and object are not related to each other. e.g. dog. Cat
Exception: No arbitrary examples: Onomatopoeic sounds e.g. cuckoo, crash, squelch
Majority of animal signals have a clear connection with the conveyed message. Animal communication is non-arbitrary.
• Productivity: ( Creavity / open-endedness ) Language users create new words as they need them. It is an aspect of language which is linked to the fact that the potential number of utterances in any human language is infinite. Animal have fixed reference. Each signal refers to sth, but these signals can not be manipulated.
• Cultural Transmission: Language passes from one generation to another. In animals there is an instinctively produce process but human infants growing up in isolation produce no instinctive language. Cultural transmission is only crucial in the human acquisition process.
• Discreteness: Individual sounds can change the meaning. e.g. pack – back , bin – pin. This property is called discreteness.
• Duality: To use some sounds in different places. e.g. cat – act . Sounds are the same but the meanings are different.
There is no duality in animal communication.
Other Properties
a-) Vocal- auditory channel: Producing sounds by the vocal organs and perceiving them by ears.
b-) Reciprocity: Any speaker / reader can also be a listener / receiver.
c-) Specialization: Language is used linguistically.
d-) Non-directionality: Unseen but heard messages can be picked up by anyone.
e-) Rapid fade: Linguistic signals are produced & disappeared quickly.
THE PROPERTIES OF LANGUAGE
Communicative vs. Informative
Communicative: To convey a message intentionally. e.g. All the things you say for communicating.
Informative: Unintentional messages.e.g. If you sneeze the person you are talking to can understand that you have a cold. / If you have a strange accent the person you are talking to can understand you are from some other part of the country.
Unique Properties of A Language
These features are uniquely a part of human language.
• Displacement: Talking about things that happened in the past, happens now or will happen in the future.
There is no displacement in animal communication.
Exception: Bee communication has displacement in an extremely limited form. A bee can show the others the source of the food.
• Arbitrariness: The word and object are not related to each other. e.g. dog. Cat
Exception: No arbitrary examples: Onomatopoeic sounds e.g. cuckoo, crash, squelch
Majority of animal signals have a clear connection with the conveyed message. Animal communication is non-arbitrary.
• Productivity: ( Creavity / open-endedness ) Language users create new words as they need them. It is an aspect of language which is linked to the fact that the potential number of utterances in any human language is infinite. Animal have fixed reference. Each signal refers to sth, but these signals can not be manipulated.
• Cultural Transmission: Language passes from one generation to another. In animals there is an instinctively produce process but human infants growing up in isolation produce no instinctive language. Cultural transmission is only crucial in the human acquisition process.
• Discreteness: Individual sounds can change the meaning. e.g. pack – back , bin – pin. This property is called discreteness.
• Duality: To use some sounds in different places. e.g. cat – act . Sounds are the same but the meanings are different.
There is no duality in animal communication.
Other Properties
a-) Vocal- auditory channel: Producing sounds by the vocal organs and perceiving them by ears.
b-) Reciprocity: Any speaker / reader can also be a listener / receiver.
c-) Specialization: Language is used linguistically.
d-) Non-directionality: Unseen but heard messages can be picked up by anyone.
e-) Rapid fade: Linguistic signals are produced & disappeared quickly.
UNIT 5
THE SOUNDS OF LANGUAGE
THE SOUNDS OF LANGUAGE
The sounds of spoken English don’t match up, a lot of time, with letters of English. The solution to describe the sounds of a language like English is to produce a seperate alphabet with symbols which represent sounds.
Such a set of symbols is called the “ PHONETIC ALPHABET “ .
Phonetics: The general study of the characteristics of speech sounds is called “ phonetics “ . We have got four areas of study with in phonetics.
a-) Articulatory Phonetics: The study of how speech sounds are made, or articulated.
b-) Acoustic Phonetics: It deals with the physical properties of speech as sound waves in the air.
c-) Auditory Phonetics: It deals with the reception, via the ear, of speech sounds.
d-) Forensic Phonetics: It deals with the identification of the speaker and the analysis of recorded utterances.
ARTICULATION
• Voiceless: The air is not dostructed at the glottis. So there sould be no vibration.
• Voiced: When the vocal cards are drawn together, the air from the lungs repeatedly pushes them apart as it passes through, creating a vibration effect.
Place of Articulation: It is the location, inside the month, at which the constriction takes place. We use the symbols of the phonetic alphabet to donate specific sounds.These symbols are enclosed within square brackets [ ] .
1- Bilabials: The sounds formed using both upper and lower lips.
2- Labiodentals: The sounds formed with the upper teeth & the lower lip.
3- Dentals: The sounds formed with the tongue tip behind the upper front teeth.
4- Alveolars: The sounds formed with the front part of the tongue on the alveolar ridge.
5- Alveo-palatals: The sounds produced with the tongue at the very front of the palate, near the alveolar ridge.
6- Velars: The sounds produced with the back of the tongue, against the velum.
7- Glottal: The sounds produced without the active use of the tongue & other parts of the mouth.
Manner of Articulation: How the sounds articulated.
1- Stops: The sounds produced by some form of complete “ stopping “ of the airstream and
then letting it go abruptly.
2-Fricatives:The sounds produced by almost blocking the airstream, and having the air push through the narrow opening. As the air pushed through, a type of friction is produced.
3- Affricates: The sounds produced by combining brief stopping of the airstream with an obstructured release which causes some friction.
4-Nasal: The sounds produced by lowering the velum and the airstream is allowed to flow out through the nose.
5- Approximants: Articulation of these sounds are strongly influenced by the following vowel sound.
a-) Glides: The sounds produced with the tongue moving to or from the position of a nearby vowel.
b-) Liquids: The sounds formed by letting the airstream flow around the sides of the tongue as it makes contact with the alveolar ridge.
6-Glottal stops: It occurs when the space between the vocal cords is closed completely, very briefly, and then realized.
7-Flap: The sounds produced by the tongue tip being thrown against the alveolar ridge for an instant.
Vowels: They are produced with a relatively free flow of air. They are all typically voiced. Front versus a back and a high versus a low area.
Dipthongs: Combined vowel sounds which contain two different sounds are called diaphanous. They begin with a vowel sound and with a glide.
UNIT 6
THE SOUND PATTERNS OF LANGUAGE
• Physically different individuals would inevitably have physically differnt vocal tracts, in terms of size & shape.
• Since every individuals has a physically different vocal tract, every individual will pronounce sounds differntly.
• Each individual will not pronunce the word “ me” in a physically identical manner on every occasion.
Phonology: The description of the systems and patterns of speech sounds in a language. It is concerned with the ways in which speech sounds form systems & patterns inhuman language Phonology permits a speaker.:
• To produce sounds that form meaningful utterances.
• To recognize a foreign accent.
• To make up new words.
• To form plurals or past tenses, etc.
Phonemes: Each meaning – distinguishing sound in a language is described as a “ phoneme “. It is the single sound type which came to be represented by a single symbol. Slash marksa re conventionally used to indicate a phoneme, /t/ .
• Phoneme functions contrastively. This contrastive property is the basic operational test for determining the phonemes which exist in a language. If we substitucle one sound for another in a word and there is a change of meaning, then two sounds represent different phonemes.
• Place of articulation, manner of articulation, voiced, voiceless are the distinguishing faetures of the sounds. If the feature is present, we mark it with a plus ( + ) sign: if it isn’t present, we use (- ) minus sign. /p/ – Voice, + Bilabial, + Stop )
Phones: They are different versions of a sound type. Phones are represented in square brackets.
Allophones: When we have a set of phones, all of which are versions of one phoneme, we refer to them as the allophone of that phoneme. e.g. Bean, bead.
Aspiration: When we are producing the same sound in different words, sometimes extra puff of air is produced for the same sound. This feature is just for stops ( b, p, t, d, k, g ) e.g. Pit, spit.
• Substituting allophones only result in a different pronounciation of the same word.
Minimal Pairs: When two words such as “ pat “ & “ bat “ are identical in form expect for a contrast in one phoneme, occuring in the same position, the two words are described as a minimal pair. e.g. Feat, fit, fat, fate
Phonotactics:There are definite patterns to the types of sound combinations permitted in a language. We can form nonsense words which are permissible forms with no meanings. They represent identical gaps in the vocabulary of English. E.g. “lig” or “vig” ( not English words but possible ).
But “sing” or “mig” are not obeying same constraints on the sequence. Such constraints are called the “ Phonotactics “ of a language.
Syllabus & Clusters: A syllable is composed one or more phonemes & it must contain a vowel sound. Every syllable has a nucleus, usually a vowel-liquid or nasal. The basic elements of the syllable are the onset ( one or more consonants ) and the rhyme. Plus any following consonants treated as the coda.
• The syllabus which hasn’t got a coda are known “ OPEN SYLLABUS “ , when a coda is present, they are called “ CLOSED SYLLABUS” .
Cup => closed syllable no => open syllable
• Both onset and coda can consist of more than one consonant known as a CONSONANT CLUSTER. /s/ + (/p/, /t/,/k/) + ( /r/, /l/, /w/ )
Co-articulation effects: Our talk is fast & spontaneous & it requires our articulators to move from one sound to the next without stopping. The process of making one sound almost at the same time as the next is called co-articulation. Articulation effects are called “ assimilation” & “ Ellision” .
• Assimilation:When two phonemes occur in sequence & some aspect of one phoneme is taken or copied by the other the process is known as “ assimilation “ .This process is occasioned by “ ease of articulation in everyday talk. For example, only vowel becomes nasal whenever it immediately procedes a nasal. E.g. can => I can go.
• Elision: Omission of a sound segment which would be present in the deliberate pronounciation of a word in isolation is technically described as “ elision “ . e.g. He must be. Aspects…
UNIT 7 : WORDS & WORD FORMATION PROCESSES
These word-formation processes are still being discusses among scalars. There is disagreement among them in this area, there do seem to be regular processes involved.
1- COINAGE: The least common processes of word-formation in English is “Coinage”. That is the invention of totally new terms and using it for any version of that product. Ex. Kleenex, Teflon, Xerox, nylon, aspirin, zipper…
2- BORROWING : That is taking over of words from other languages. Ex. Alcohol ( Arabic ) , Croissant ( French ) , Robot ( Czech ) , Bass ( Dutch ) , Piano ( Italian ) , Yogurt ( Turkish ) …
• A special type of borrowing is described as “ loan-translation “ or “ calque “ . In this process , there is a direct translation of the elements of a word into the borrowing language.
Ex. Un gratteciel ( French ) – It is translated as a “ scrape-sky “ .
- It is normally referred to as a “ skyscraper “ .
3- COMPOUNDING : The joining of two seperate words to produce a single form is called “ Compounding “ . It is very common in German English, but less common in French, Spanish. Ex. Bookcase, fingerprint, sunburn, wallpaper…
4- BLENDING : Blending is typically accomplished by taking only the beginning of one word and joining it to the end of the other word.
Ex. Gasoline + Alcohol => Gasohol
Smoke + Fog => Smog
Binary + Digit => Bit
Brakfast + Lunch => Brunch
5- CLIPPING : When a word of more than one syllable is reduced to a shorter form, often in casual speech, is called clipping.
Ex. Goasoline => Gas
Advertisement => Ad
Situation comedy => Sitcom
Chemistary => Chem
Examination => Exam
Gymnastics => Gym
6- BACKFORMATION : A word of one type of ( usually a noun ) is reduced to form another word of a different type ( usually a verb ) .
Ex. Television => Televise
Donation => Donate
Option => Opt
• A longer word is reduced to a single syllable, then “ –y “ or “ -ie “ is added to the end. And this is known as “ HYPOCORISMS “ .
Ex. Moving pictures => Movie
Television => Telly
Australian => Aussie
7- CONVERSION : A change in the function of a word, as , for example, when a noun comes to be used as verb ( without any reduction ) , is generally known as Conversion. This process can also be called as “ category change “ and “ functional change “ .
Ex. Butter (n) => Have you buttered (v) the toast ?
Paper (n) => He is papering (v) the bedroom walls.
• Conversion can involve verbs becoming nouns.
Ex. Guess (v) => A guess
Spy (v) => A spy
Must (v) => A must
To print out (v) => A print out
To take over (v) => A take over
8- ACRONYMS : Acronyms are formed from the initial letters of a set of other words.
Ex. Compact Dick : CD , Personal Identification Number : PIN , Video Cassette Recorder : VCR , Automatic Teller Machine : ATM , Radio Detecting and Ranging ( RADAR ) …
9- DERIVATION : It is accomplished by means of a large number of small bits of English. These small bits are called “ affixes “ and this process is called “ Derivation “ .
Ex: –un / -less / -ish / mis- / pre- / – full / -ism / -ness …
Unhappy , boyish, misrepresent , joyful , careless, sadness, prejudge, terrorism …
• Prefixes & Suffixes : Some affixes have to be added to the beginning of a word. These are called PREFIXES. Some affixes have to be added to the end of the word. They are called SUFFIXES .
Ex. Mislead mis => prefix
Disrespectful dis => prefix ful => suffix
• Infixes : Infix is an affix which is incorporated inside another word. They are not normally to be found in English. Examples are from Kamhmu .
Ex. See => To Drill => Srnee => A drill
Toh => To Chisel => Trnoh => A chisel
Ex: ( English ) Absogoddamlutely! Hallebloadylujah !
UNIT 8 : MORPHOLOGY
Morphology is the study of forms. It has been used to describe that type of investigating which analyses all those basic elements which are used in a language. What we have been describing as elements in the form of a linguistic message are known as morphemes.
Morphemes : Morpheme is the minimal unit of meaning or grammatical function.
Ex. Tourists contains 3 morphemes. Tour + ist +s
Free Morphemes : They can stand by themselves as single words. Ex Tour, open , stay …
Bound Morphemes : They can not normally stand alone but they are typically attached to another form. Affixes are bound morphemes. Ex. re- , -ist , -ed , -s …
• When free morphemes are used with bound morphemes , the basic word – form involved is technically known as the ” stem ” .
Ex. un dress ed un=> Prefix ( bound ) , dress => stem ( free ) , ed=> suffix ( bound )
• Free morphemes fall into two categories :
1- Lexical Morphemes : The set of ordinary nouns adjectives and verbs which we think of the words which carry the content of messages we convey. They are called open class of words, since we can add new lexical morphemes to the language easily .
2- Functional Morphemes : This set consists largely off functional words in the language such as conjunctions, prepositions, articles and pronouns. They are called close class of words, since we almost never add new functional morphemes to the language.
Ex. and, but, on, near, above => functional morphemes
Sad, long, look => lexical morphemes
FREE MORPHEMES : LEXICAL MORPHEMES & FUNCTIONAL MORPHEMES !!!
• Bound Morphemes can also be divided into two types.
1- Derivational Morphemes : These are used to make new words in the language and are often used to make words of a different grammatical category from the stem .
Ex. good => adjective good + ness => noun
Care => noun care + less => adjective
2- Inflectional Morphemes : These are not used to produce new words in the English language, but rather to indicate aspects of the grammatical function of a word. Plural markers, possessive markers, tense markers, comparative & superlative markers are inflectional morphemes.
Ex. Tim’s two sisters : Tim’s ‘s => inflectional , sisters s => inflectional
Derivational Versus Inflectional
• An inflectional morpheme never changes the grammatical category of a word.
Ex. old => adj. , Older => adj.
• A derivational morpheme can change the grammatical category of a word.
Ex. teach => verb , teacher => noun
Some morphemes look the same but this does not mean that they do the same kind of word.
Ex. teacher => suffix + inflectional
Younger => suffix + derivational
Whenever there is a derivational suffix and inflectional suffix attached to the same word , they always appear in that order.
Ex. teach + er + s => stem + derivational + inflectional
Morphological Description
The girl’s wildness shocked the teachers.
The ( functional ) , girl ( lexical ) , ‘s ( inflectional ) , wild ( lexical ) , ness ( derivational ) , shock ( lexical ) , -ed ( inflectional ) , the ( functional ) , teach ( lexical ) , -er ( derivational ) –s ( inflectional ) .
* CATEGORIES OF MORPHEMES : FREE ( a- Lexical b- Functional ) & BOUND ( a- Derivational b- Inflectional )
Problems in Morphological Description
1- The inflectional morpheme –s is added to “ cat “ and we get the plural “ cats “ . What is the inflectional morpheme which makes sheep the plural of sheep ?
Ex. went past tense of go.
Legal => Is it he same morpheme as in “ international “ .
Solution : A full description of English morphology will have to take account of both historical influences and the effect of borrowed elements.
Ex. Law => borrowed into old English from old Norse
Legal => borrowed from the Latin form of “ legal is “ ( of the law )
Morphs & Allomorhs
Morphs : The actual forms used to realize morphemes.
Ex. cats => consists of two morphemes
An inflectional morpheme ( -s )
A lexical morpheme ( cat )
Allomorphs : The actual forms of the morphs which result from the single morpheme “ plural “ turn out to be different. They are all allomorphs of the one morpheme.
Ex. sheep ( s) => sheep ( p )
Sheep ( zero morpheme )
• zero morpheme is one allomorph of plural.
Reduplication : Repetition device as a means of inflectional marking.
Ex. Hocano language
Lo ( head ) => ululo ( heads )
Alan ( road ) => daldalan ( roads )
İag ( life ) => bibiag ( lives ) .
UNIT 9 : PHRASES & SENTENCES : GRAMMAR
[color=violet]Grammar : We need a way of describing the structure of phrases which will account for all of the grammatical sequences & rule out all the ungrammatical sequences providing such an account involves us in the study of grammar. The phrases & sentences can be described as ill-formed or well-formed.
Types of Grammar
1- Each adult speaker of a language clearly has some type of mental grammar. This grammar is subconscious & is not the result of any teaching.
2- This can not be considered as “ linguistic etiquette “ which is the identification of the proper or best structures to be used in a language.
3- This is the study and analysis of structures found in a language, usually with the aim of establishing a description of the grammar of English.
Parts of the speech : The terms for the parts of speech are nouns, adjectives, verbs, adverbs, prepositions, pronouns, and conjunctions.
Traditional Grammar . Since there were well-established grammatical descriptions of these older languages, it seemed appropriate to adopt the existing categories from these descriptions and apply them in the analysis of languages like English.
Traditional Categories : Agreement ( number, person ) , Tense ( Active Voice, Passive Voice ) , Gender ( Natural Gender, Grammatical Gender ) .
• Agreement on number : That’s whther noun is singular or plural.
• Agreement on Person : This covers the distinctions of persons ( He, she, it, we, you, they )
We => first person plural
She => third person singular
• Agreement on tense : For example , the verb ( likes ) is the present tense , which is distinguished from past tense ( liked ) .
• Agreement on Voice : for ex. “ The boy likes his dog. “ The sentence is in the Active Voice , with the boy doing the liking. An alternative is the Passive Voice, in which the liking is done to the boy , as in “ The boy is liked by his dog “ or just “ The boy is liked” .
• Agreement on Gender : This helps us to describe the agreement between “ boy “ and “ his “ . This relationship is described as Natural Gender mainly derived from a biological distinction between male & female . The other relationship is described as Grammatical Gender . Nouns are classified according to their gender class, typically articles and adjectives take different forms to agree with the gender of noun.
Ex. She Her => Natural Gender
Die Sone ( German ) ( Grammatical Gender )
The Prescriptive Approach
The view of grammar as a set of rules for the correct or proper use of a language may be characterized as the Prescriptive Approach. Grammarians set out rules fort he correct proper use of English.
Ex. Never begin a sentence with “ AND “.
You mustn’t split an infinitive. ( This rule can be broken it isn’t because of the English forms are bad, it is because of the breaking supposed rule of Latin Grammar.
The Descriptive Approach
Describing the regular structures of the language as it is used , not according to some viev of how it should be used is called the Descriptive Approach. Analysis collect samples of the language they are interested and they describe the structures of the language. We have got two different categories under this approach; Structural Analysis & Immediate Constituent Analysis.
1- Structural Analysis : Its main concern is to investigate distribution of forms in a language. The method employed involves the use of “ test-frames “ which can be sentences with empty slots in them.
Ex.The ___________ makes a lot of noice.
• “ Donkey, car, radio, etc… “ fit in the same test-frame and they are the examples of the same grammatical category “ noun “. But “ a dog, the car “ don’t fit the test-frame . They require different test-frames. They are the examples of the same grammatical category which is “ noun phrase “ .
2- Immediate Constituent Analysis : This approach is designed to show new small constituents ( components ) in sentences go together to form larger constituents. ( Analyzing the sentence by dividing it to different categories such as “ noun phrase “ , “ verb phrase “ , & “ prepositional phrase “ .
Ex. Her father brought a shotgun to the wedding.
Her father => noun phrase brought a shotgun => verb phrase to the wedding => prepositional phrase .
UNIT 10 : SYNTAX
If we concentrate on the structure & ordering of components within a sentence, we are studying what is technically known as the syntax of a language. Syntax means “ a setting out together “ or “ arrangement” .
Generative Grammar
If the sentences of a language can be seen as a comparable set, then there must be a set of explicit rules which yield those sentences. Such a set of explicit rules is a “ generative grammar “ .
Some properties of grammar :
1- The grammar will generate all the well-formed syntactic structures and fail to generate any ill-formed structures.
2- The grammar will have a finite number of rules, but will be capable of generating an infinite number of well-formed structures.
3- The rules of this grammar will need the property of recursion.
• Recursion : The capacity to be applied more than once in generating a structure.
4- This grammar also shows how some superficially distinct sentences are closely related & how some superficially similar sentences are in fact distinct.
Deep & Surface Structures
Charlie broke the window.
The window was broken by Charlie.
Their syntactic forms are different. One is an active sentence, the other is a passive one. So it can be said that they differ in “ surface structure “ , however, their deep strucures are identical. They carry the same meaning . The deep structure is an abstract level of structural organisation in which all the elements determining structural interpretation are represented.
Structural Ambiguity
Annie whecked a man with an umbrella.
This sentence is structurally ambigous since it has two underlying interpretations which would be represented differently in the deep structure.
Diffrent Approaches
There continue to be many different approaches among those who claim to analyze language in terms of generative grammar, and many more among those who are critical of the whole system.
Labelled Tree Diagram
It is a way of showing all the constituents in a hierarchical order. Refer to page 105.
Phrase Structure Rules
We can simply treat tree diagram as a static representation of the structure of the sentence at the bottom of the diagram. The alternative view is to treat the diagram as a dynamic format, in the sense that it represents a way of “ generating “ not only that sntence but a very large number of sentences with only a small number of rules. These are called “ phrase structure rules “ .
Back to Recursion
The phrase structure rules have no recursive elements. However, we have to be able to repeat some symbols on the right side of the arrow.
Mary helped George.
In the sentence above there are no recursive elements. But ;
Cathy thought Mary helped George or ,
John said Cathy thought Mary helped George .
Have recursive elements . In these sentences we need to add V & PN to our lexical rules.
Transformational Rules
a- George helped Mary yesterday.
b- Yesterday George helped Mary.
Phrase structure rules will generate all sentences with fixed word order to the constituents. So sentence “ a “ will be defined by phrase structure rules easily while sentence “ b “ will not. Here we have to transform some of the elements. Refer to page 108.
UNIT 11 : SEMANTICS
It is the study of the meaning of words, phrases and sentences. Linguistic semantics deals with the conventional meaning conveyed by the use of words and sentences of a language.
Conceptual Vs. Associative Meaning
Conceptual Meaning covers these basic, essential components of meaning which are conveyed by the literal use of a word. E.g needle : thin , sharp, steel, instrument.
Associative Meaning is the idea, connection what that specific word brings to you. E.g needle : painfuL
Semantic Features
e.g. The hamburger ate the man.
This sentence is syntactically perfect : S => NP + VP ( V + NP )
But the meaning is not acceptable. The verb and the subject do not relate each other.
We identify the meaning by analyzing some features . ( page 116 : table )
Semantic Roles
Agent, Theme, Instrument
Mary wrote the letter with my pen.
a- Agent : The entity that performs the action ( Mary ) .
b- Theme : The entity that is involved in or affected by the action ( the letter ) .
c- Instrument : The entity that is used by the agent to perform the action ( my pen ) .
Experiences , Location, Source, Goal
a- Experiences : When a noun phrase ( as the person ) performs an action including a feeling, a perception do not actually perform the action, it happen by itself and you feel it.
e.g Mary saw a mosquito on the wall. saw => experiences
Mary cooked the meal last night. cooked => agent
b- Location : The direction or the place of an entity.
e.g. Mary saw a mosquito on the wall. => on the wall
c- Source is where an entity moves from and Goal is where an entity moves to .
e.g Sally borrowed some Money from Tom bought a birthday present and gave it to Sam.
Tom => source Sam => goal
Lexical Relations
* Synonymy : 2 or more forms with very closely related meanings.
e.g broad – wide , hide – conceal
* Antonyms : 2 forms of with opposite meaning .
e.g quick – slow . big – small
- Gradable Antonyms : Antonyms that can be used in comparative constructions.
e.g bigger than – smaller than
the negative of one member of the pair does not necessarily imply the other
e. g. That dog is not old. ( It does not have tome an “ that dog is young “ ) .
- Non – Gradable Antonyms ( Complementary Pairs ) : Comparative constructions are not normally used, and the negative of one member does imply the other.
e.g. deader / more dead => not possible
e.g. that person is not dead : that person is alive.
Reversies
They do the opposite of the other action.
e.g. tie – untie , enter – exit
Hyponymy : when the meaning of one form is included in the meaning of another, the relationship is described as hyponymy.
e. g . rose – flower , carrot – vegetable
rose is a hyponymy of flower
carrot is a hyponymy of vegetable
Co – Hyponymy / Super ordinate
Animal ( super ordinate ) => horse / dog / bird
Horse, dog , bird => co- hyponymys of animal
Prototypes
A prototype is the best example of a category.
Homophony / Homonymy / Polysemy
Homophony : when two or more different written forms have the same pronounciation they are described as homophones.
e.g bear – bare , meet – meat
Homonymy : when one written and spoken called homonymy.
e.g bank ( bank – of a river ) , ( bank – financial institution )
Polysemy : when one form ( written & spoken ) has multiple meanings which are all related by extension .
e. g . head => top of your body / top of a glass of beer / top of a company
Metonymy : A type of relation between words based simply on a close connection in everyday experience.
e.g. bottle – coke ( a container – contents relation )
car – wheels ( a whole – part relation )
king – crown ( a representative – symbol relation )
Collocation : the words that naturally go together.
e. g. hammer – nail
table – chair
salt – pepper
They frequently occur together.
UNIT 12 : PRAGMATICS
The study of intended speaker meaning is called Pragmatics.
Invisible Meaning
Pragmatics is the study of invisible meaning or how we recognize what is meant even when it is not actually said. Speakers depend on a lot of shared assumptions and expectations. You use the meanings of the words, in combination, and the context in which they occur, and you try to arrive at what the writer of the sign intended his message to convey. E.g. Baby & Toddler sale – Not selling children but selling clothes for babies.
Context
We have got two kinds of contexts.
1- one kind is best described as linguistic context, also known as co-text. The co-text of a word is the set of other words used in the same phrase or sentence.
e.g. I get to the bank to cash a cheque.
Bank is homonym. By looking at other words in the sentence we know which type of bank is intended.
2- another type of context is described as pysical context . Our understanding of what we read and hear is tied to the physical context, particularly the time and place.
e.g. The word bank on the wall of a building in a city.
Dexis
There are some words in the language that can not be interpreted at all unless the physical context is known. These words are “ here, there, this, that, now, then, yesterday, come “ , pronouns, such as “ I , you, him, her, them “ .
e.g. You will have to bring that back tomorrow, because they are not here now. – this sentence is vague.
You, that, tomorrow, they, here , now => these expressions are called deictic.
Person deixis : expressions used to point to a person.
Place deixis : words used to point to a location.
Time deixis : expressions used to point to a time.
There is a distinction between what is marked as close to the speaker ( this, that, now ) . What is marked as distant ( that, there, then ).
Reference
Reference is an act by which a speaker uses language to enable a listener to identify something.
e.g. Can I look at your Chomsky ?
Chomsky refers to sth. The key process here is called inference. An inference ia any additionaal information used by the listener to connect what is said to what must be meant . The listener has to infer that the name of the writer of a book can be used to identify a book by that writer.
Anaphora
- Can I have your book ?
- Yeah, it is on the table.
The second underlined referring expression is an example of anaphora and the first mention is called antecedent. “ Book “ is antecedent, “ it “ is the anaphoric expression.
Presupposition
Speakers design their linguistic messages on the basis of assumptions about what their hearers already know. What a speaker assumes is true or known by the hearer can be described as presupposition.
e.g. Your brother is waiting for you. – There is a presupposition that you have a brother.
“ Constancy under negation “ test is applied for presupposition.
My car is wreck. / my car is not wreck. => “ I have a car “ remains true in both.
Speech Acts
The use of the term “ speech act “ covers actions such as requesting , commanding, questioning, informing. We use some linguistic forms with some functions.
When a speaker does not know sth and asks the hearer to provide the information, she typically produce a direct speech act.
e.g Can you ride a bike ?
Some questions are not about your ability to do sth.
You would not treat it as a question at all. Such an expression is described as an indirect speech act.
e.g. Can you pass the salt ?
Politeness
Politeness is showing awareness of another person’s face. Your face is your public self-image. Face – threatening act represents a threat to another person’s self image. Whenever you say sth that lessons the possible treat to another’s face . It is called a face – saving act.
You have both a negative and a positive face. Your negative face is the need to be independant and to have freedom from imposition. Your positive face is your need to be connected, to belong, to be a member of the group.
• Voiceless: The air is not dostructed at the glottis. So there sould be no vibration.
• Voiced: When the vocal cards are drawn together, the air from the lungs repeatedly pushes them apart as it passes through, creating a vibration effect.
Place of Articulation: It is the location, inside the month, at which the constriction takes place. We use the symbols of the phonetic alphabet to donate specific sounds.These symbols are enclosed within square brackets [ ] .
1- Bilabials: The sounds formed using both upper and lower lips.
2- Labiodentals: The sounds formed with the upper teeth & the lower lip.
3- Dentals: The sounds formed with the tongue tip behind the upper front teeth.
4- Alveolars: The sounds formed with the front part of the tongue on the alveolar ridge.
5- Alveo-palatals: The sounds produced with the tongue at the very front of the palate, near the alveolar ridge.
6- Velars: The sounds produced with the back of the tongue, against the velum.
7- Glottal: The sounds produced without the active use of the tongue & other parts of the mouth.
Manner of Articulation: How the sounds articulated.
1- Stops: The sounds produced by some form of complete “ stopping “ of the airstream and
then letting it go abruptly.
2-Fricatives:The sounds produced by almost blocking the airstream, and having the air push through the narrow opening. As the air pushed through, a type of friction is produced.
3- Affricates: The sounds produced by combining brief stopping of the airstream with an obstructured release which causes some friction.
4-Nasal: The sounds produced by lowering the velum and the airstream is allowed to flow out through the nose.
5- Approximants: Articulation of these sounds are strongly influenced by the following vowel sound.
a-) Glides: The sounds produced with the tongue moving to or from the position of a nearby vowel.
b-) Liquids: The sounds formed by letting the airstream flow around the sides of the tongue as it makes contact with the alveolar ridge.
6-Glottal stops: It occurs when the space between the vocal cords is closed completely, very briefly, and then realized.
7-Flap: The sounds produced by the tongue tip being thrown against the alveolar ridge for an instant.
Vowels: They are produced with a relatively free flow of air. They are all typically voiced. Front versus a back and a high versus a low area.
Dipthongs: Combined vowel sounds which contain two different sounds are called diaphanous. They begin with a vowel sound and with a glide.
UNIT 6
THE SOUND PATTERNS OF LANGUAGE
• Physically different individuals would inevitably have physically differnt vocal tracts, in terms of size & shape.
• Since every individuals has a physically different vocal tract, every individual will pronounce sounds differntly.
• Each individual will not pronunce the word “ me” in a physically identical manner on every occasion.
Phonology: The description of the systems and patterns of speech sounds in a language. It is concerned with the ways in which speech sounds form systems & patterns inhuman language Phonology permits a speaker.:
• To produce sounds that form meaningful utterances.
• To recognize a foreign accent.
• To make up new words.
• To form plurals or past tenses, etc.
Phonemes: Each meaning – distinguishing sound in a language is described as a “ phoneme “. It is the single sound type which came to be represented by a single symbol. Slash marksa re conventionally used to indicate a phoneme, /t/ .
• Phoneme functions contrastively. This contrastive property is the basic operational test for determining the phonemes which exist in a language. If we substitucle one sound for another in a word and there is a change of meaning, then two sounds represent different phonemes.
• Place of articulation, manner of articulation, voiced, voiceless are the distinguishing faetures of the sounds. If the feature is present, we mark it with a plus ( + ) sign: if it isn’t present, we use (- ) minus sign. /p/ – Voice, + Bilabial, + Stop )
Phones: They are different versions of a sound type. Phones are represented in square brackets.
Allophones: When we have a set of phones, all of which are versions of one phoneme, we refer to them as the allophone of that phoneme. e.g. Bean, bead.
Aspiration: When we are producing the same sound in different words, sometimes extra puff of air is produced for the same sound. This feature is just for stops ( b, p, t, d, k, g ) e.g. Pit, spit.
• Substituting allophones only result in a different pronounciation of the same word.
Minimal Pairs: When two words such as “ pat “ & “ bat “ are identical in form expect for a contrast in one phoneme, occuring in the same position, the two words are described as a minimal pair. e.g. Feat, fit, fat, fate
Phonotactics:There are definite patterns to the types of sound combinations permitted in a language. We can form nonsense words which are permissible forms with no meanings. They represent identical gaps in the vocabulary of English. E.g. “lig” or “vig” ( not English words but possible ).
But “sing” or “mig” are not obeying same constraints on the sequence. Such constraints are called the “ Phonotactics “ of a language.
Syllabus & Clusters: A syllable is composed one or more phonemes & it must contain a vowel sound. Every syllable has a nucleus, usually a vowel-liquid or nasal. The basic elements of the syllable are the onset ( one or more consonants ) and the rhyme. Plus any following consonants treated as the coda.
• The syllabus which hasn’t got a coda are known “ OPEN SYLLABUS “ , when a coda is present, they are called “ CLOSED SYLLABUS” .
Cup => closed syllable no => open syllable
• Both onset and coda can consist of more than one consonant known as a CONSONANT CLUSTER. /s/ + (/p/, /t/,/k/) + ( /r/, /l/, /w/ )
Co-articulation effects: Our talk is fast & spontaneous & it requires our articulators to move from one sound to the next without stopping. The process of making one sound almost at the same time as the next is called co-articulation. Articulation effects are called “ assimilation” & “ Ellision” .
• Assimilation:When two phonemes occur in sequence & some aspect of one phoneme is taken or copied by the other the process is known as “ assimilation “ .This process is occasioned by “ ease of articulation in everyday talk. For example, only vowel becomes nasal whenever it immediately procedes a nasal. E.g. can => I can go.
• Elision: Omission of a sound segment which would be present in the deliberate pronounciation of a word in isolation is technically described as “ elision “ . e.g. He must be. Aspects…
UNIT 7 : WORDS & WORD FORMATION PROCESSES
These word-formation processes are still being discusses among scalars. There is disagreement among them in this area, there do seem to be regular processes involved.
1- COINAGE: The least common processes of word-formation in English is “Coinage”. That is the invention of totally new terms and using it for any version of that product. Ex. Kleenex, Teflon, Xerox, nylon, aspirin, zipper…
2- BORROWING : That is taking over of words from other languages. Ex. Alcohol ( Arabic ) , Croissant ( French ) , Robot ( Czech ) , Bass ( Dutch ) , Piano ( Italian ) , Yogurt ( Turkish ) …
• A special type of borrowing is described as “ loan-translation “ or “ calque “ . In this process , there is a direct translation of the elements of a word into the borrowing language.
Ex. Un gratteciel ( French ) – It is translated as a “ scrape-sky “ .
- It is normally referred to as a “ skyscraper “ .
3- COMPOUNDING : The joining of two seperate words to produce a single form is called “ Compounding “ . It is very common in German English, but less common in French, Spanish. Ex. Bookcase, fingerprint, sunburn, wallpaper…
4- BLENDING : Blending is typically accomplished by taking only the beginning of one word and joining it to the end of the other word.
Ex. Gasoline + Alcohol => Gasohol
Smoke + Fog => Smog
Binary + Digit => Bit
Brakfast + Lunch => Brunch
5- CLIPPING : When a word of more than one syllable is reduced to a shorter form, often in casual speech, is called clipping.
Ex. Goasoline => Gas
Advertisement => Ad
Situation comedy => Sitcom
Chemistary => Chem
Examination => Exam
Gymnastics => Gym
6- BACKFORMATION : A word of one type of ( usually a noun ) is reduced to form another word of a different type ( usually a verb ) .
Ex. Television => Televise
Donation => Donate
Option => Opt
• A longer word is reduced to a single syllable, then “ –y “ or “ -ie “ is added to the end. And this is known as “ HYPOCORISMS “ .
Ex. Moving pictures => Movie
Television => Telly
Australian => Aussie
7- CONVERSION : A change in the function of a word, as , for example, when a noun comes to be used as verb ( without any reduction ) , is generally known as Conversion. This process can also be called as “ category change “ and “ functional change “ .
Ex. Butter (n) => Have you buttered (v) the toast ?
Paper (n) => He is papering (v) the bedroom walls.
• Conversion can involve verbs becoming nouns.
Ex. Guess (v) => A guess
Spy (v) => A spy
Must (v) => A must
To print out (v) => A print out
To take over (v) => A take over
8- ACRONYMS : Acronyms are formed from the initial letters of a set of other words.
Ex. Compact Dick : CD , Personal Identification Number : PIN , Video Cassette Recorder : VCR , Automatic Teller Machine : ATM , Radio Detecting and Ranging ( RADAR ) …
9- DERIVATION : It is accomplished by means of a large number of small bits of English. These small bits are called “ affixes “ and this process is called “ Derivation “ .
Ex: –un / -less / -ish / mis- / pre- / – full / -ism / -ness …
Unhappy , boyish, misrepresent , joyful , careless, sadness, prejudge, terrorism …
• Prefixes & Suffixes : Some affixes have to be added to the beginning of a word. These are called PREFIXES. Some affixes have to be added to the end of the word. They are called SUFFIXES .
Ex. Mislead mis => prefix
Disrespectful dis => prefix ful => suffix
• Infixes : Infix is an affix which is incorporated inside another word. They are not normally to be found in English. Examples are from Kamhmu .
Ex. See => To Drill => Srnee => A drill
Toh => To Chisel => Trnoh => A chisel
Ex: ( English ) Absogoddamlutely! Hallebloadylujah !
UNIT 8 : MORPHOLOGY
Morphology is the study of forms. It has been used to describe that type of investigating which analyses all those basic elements which are used in a language. What we have been describing as elements in the form of a linguistic message are known as morphemes.
Morphemes : Morpheme is the minimal unit of meaning or grammatical function.
Ex. Tourists contains 3 morphemes. Tour + ist +s
Free Morphemes : They can stand by themselves as single words. Ex Tour, open , stay …
Bound Morphemes : They can not normally stand alone but they are typically attached to another form. Affixes are bound morphemes. Ex. re- , -ist , -ed , -s …
• When free morphemes are used with bound morphemes , the basic word – form involved is technically known as the ” stem ” .
Ex. un dress ed un=> Prefix ( bound ) , dress => stem ( free ) , ed=> suffix ( bound )
• Free morphemes fall into two categories :
1- Lexical Morphemes : The set of ordinary nouns adjectives and verbs which we think of the words which carry the content of messages we convey. They are called open class of words, since we can add new lexical morphemes to the language easily .
2- Functional Morphemes : This set consists largely off functional words in the language such as conjunctions, prepositions, articles and pronouns. They are called close class of words, since we almost never add new functional morphemes to the language.
Ex. and, but, on, near, above => functional morphemes
Sad, long, look => lexical morphemes
FREE MORPHEMES : LEXICAL MORPHEMES & FUNCTIONAL MORPHEMES !!!
• Bound Morphemes can also be divided into two types.
1- Derivational Morphemes : These are used to make new words in the language and are often used to make words of a different grammatical category from the stem .
Ex. good => adjective good + ness => noun
Care => noun care + less => adjective
2- Inflectional Morphemes : These are not used to produce new words in the English language, but rather to indicate aspects of the grammatical function of a word. Plural markers, possessive markers, tense markers, comparative & superlative markers are inflectional morphemes.
Ex. Tim’s two sisters : Tim’s ‘s => inflectional , sisters s => inflectional
Derivational Versus Inflectional
• An inflectional morpheme never changes the grammatical category of a word.
Ex. old => adj. , Older => adj.
• A derivational morpheme can change the grammatical category of a word.
Ex. teach => verb , teacher => noun
Some morphemes look the same but this does not mean that they do the same kind of word.
Ex. teacher => suffix + inflectional
Younger => suffix + derivational
Whenever there is a derivational suffix and inflectional suffix attached to the same word , they always appear in that order.
Ex. teach + er + s => stem + derivational + inflectional
Morphological Description
The girl’s wildness shocked the teachers.
The ( functional ) , girl ( lexical ) , ‘s ( inflectional ) , wild ( lexical ) , ness ( derivational ) , shock ( lexical ) , -ed ( inflectional ) , the ( functional ) , teach ( lexical ) , -er ( derivational ) –s ( inflectional ) .
* CATEGORIES OF MORPHEMES : FREE ( a- Lexical b- Functional ) & BOUND ( a- Derivational b- Inflectional )
Problems in Morphological Description
1- The inflectional morpheme –s is added to “ cat “ and we get the plural “ cats “ . What is the inflectional morpheme which makes sheep the plural of sheep ?
Ex. went past tense of go.
Legal => Is it he same morpheme as in “ international “ .
Solution : A full description of English morphology will have to take account of both historical influences and the effect of borrowed elements.
Ex. Law => borrowed into old English from old Norse
Legal => borrowed from the Latin form of “ legal is “ ( of the law )
Morphs & Allomorhs
Morphs : The actual forms used to realize morphemes.
Ex. cats => consists of two morphemes
An inflectional morpheme ( -s )
A lexical morpheme ( cat )
Allomorphs : The actual forms of the morphs which result from the single morpheme “ plural “ turn out to be different. They are all allomorphs of the one morpheme.
Ex. sheep ( s) => sheep ( p )
Sheep ( zero morpheme )
• zero morpheme is one allomorph of plural.
Reduplication : Repetition device as a means of inflectional marking.
Ex. Hocano language
Lo ( head ) => ululo ( heads )
Alan ( road ) => daldalan ( roads )
İag ( life ) => bibiag ( lives ) .
UNIT 9 : PHRASES & SENTENCES : GRAMMAR
[color=violet]Grammar : We need a way of describing the structure of phrases which will account for all of the grammatical sequences & rule out all the ungrammatical sequences providing such an account involves us in the study of grammar. The phrases & sentences can be described as ill-formed or well-formed.
Types of Grammar
1- Each adult speaker of a language clearly has some type of mental grammar. This grammar is subconscious & is not the result of any teaching.
2- This can not be considered as “ linguistic etiquette “ which is the identification of the proper or best structures to be used in a language.
3- This is the study and analysis of structures found in a language, usually with the aim of establishing a description of the grammar of English.
Parts of the speech : The terms for the parts of speech are nouns, adjectives, verbs, adverbs, prepositions, pronouns, and conjunctions.
Traditional Grammar . Since there were well-established grammatical descriptions of these older languages, it seemed appropriate to adopt the existing categories from these descriptions and apply them in the analysis of languages like English.
Traditional Categories : Agreement ( number, person ) , Tense ( Active Voice, Passive Voice ) , Gender ( Natural Gender, Grammatical Gender ) .
• Agreement on number : That’s whther noun is singular or plural.
• Agreement on Person : This covers the distinctions of persons ( He, she, it, we, you, they )
We => first person plural
She => third person singular
• Agreement on tense : For example , the verb ( likes ) is the present tense , which is distinguished from past tense ( liked ) .
• Agreement on Voice : for ex. “ The boy likes his dog. “ The sentence is in the Active Voice , with the boy doing the liking. An alternative is the Passive Voice, in which the liking is done to the boy , as in “ The boy is liked by his dog “ or just “ The boy is liked” .
• Agreement on Gender : This helps us to describe the agreement between “ boy “ and “ his “ . This relationship is described as Natural Gender mainly derived from a biological distinction between male & female . The other relationship is described as Grammatical Gender . Nouns are classified according to their gender class, typically articles and adjectives take different forms to agree with the gender of noun.
Ex. She Her => Natural Gender
Die Sone ( German ) ( Grammatical Gender )
The Prescriptive Approach
The view of grammar as a set of rules for the correct or proper use of a language may be characterized as the Prescriptive Approach. Grammarians set out rules fort he correct proper use of English.
Ex. Never begin a sentence with “ AND “.
You mustn’t split an infinitive. ( This rule can be broken it isn’t because of the English forms are bad, it is because of the breaking supposed rule of Latin Grammar.
The Descriptive Approach
Describing the regular structures of the language as it is used , not according to some viev of how it should be used is called the Descriptive Approach. Analysis collect samples of the language they are interested and they describe the structures of the language. We have got two different categories under this approach; Structural Analysis & Immediate Constituent Analysis.
1- Structural Analysis : Its main concern is to investigate distribution of forms in a language. The method employed involves the use of “ test-frames “ which can be sentences with empty slots in them.
Ex.The ___________ makes a lot of noice.
• “ Donkey, car, radio, etc… “ fit in the same test-frame and they are the examples of the same grammatical category “ noun “. But “ a dog, the car “ don’t fit the test-frame . They require different test-frames. They are the examples of the same grammatical category which is “ noun phrase “ .
2- Immediate Constituent Analysis : This approach is designed to show new small constituents ( components ) in sentences go together to form larger constituents. ( Analyzing the sentence by dividing it to different categories such as “ noun phrase “ , “ verb phrase “ , & “ prepositional phrase “ .
Ex. Her father brought a shotgun to the wedding.
Her father => noun phrase brought a shotgun => verb phrase to the wedding => prepositional phrase .
UNIT 10 : SYNTAX
If we concentrate on the structure & ordering of components within a sentence, we are studying what is technically known as the syntax of a language. Syntax means “ a setting out together “ or “ arrangement” .
Generative Grammar
If the sentences of a language can be seen as a comparable set, then there must be a set of explicit rules which yield those sentences. Such a set of explicit rules is a “ generative grammar “ .
Some properties of grammar :
1- The grammar will generate all the well-formed syntactic structures and fail to generate any ill-formed structures.
2- The grammar will have a finite number of rules, but will be capable of generating an infinite number of well-formed structures.
3- The rules of this grammar will need the property of recursion.
• Recursion : The capacity to be applied more than once in generating a structure.
4- This grammar also shows how some superficially distinct sentences are closely related & how some superficially similar sentences are in fact distinct.
Deep & Surface Structures
Charlie broke the window.
The window was broken by Charlie.
Their syntactic forms are different. One is an active sentence, the other is a passive one. So it can be said that they differ in “ surface structure “ , however, their deep strucures are identical. They carry the same meaning . The deep structure is an abstract level of structural organisation in which all the elements determining structural interpretation are represented.
Structural Ambiguity
Annie whecked a man with an umbrella.
This sentence is structurally ambigous since it has two underlying interpretations which would be represented differently in the deep structure.
Diffrent Approaches
There continue to be many different approaches among those who claim to analyze language in terms of generative grammar, and many more among those who are critical of the whole system.
Labelled Tree Diagram
It is a way of showing all the constituents in a hierarchical order. Refer to page 105.
Phrase Structure Rules
We can simply treat tree diagram as a static representation of the structure of the sentence at the bottom of the diagram. The alternative view is to treat the diagram as a dynamic format, in the sense that it represents a way of “ generating “ not only that sntence but a very large number of sentences with only a small number of rules. These are called “ phrase structure rules “ .
Back to Recursion
The phrase structure rules have no recursive elements. However, we have to be able to repeat some symbols on the right side of the arrow.
Mary helped George.
In the sentence above there are no recursive elements. But ;
Cathy thought Mary helped George or ,
John said Cathy thought Mary helped George .
Have recursive elements . In these sentences we need to add V & PN to our lexical rules.
Transformational Rules
a- George helped Mary yesterday.
b- Yesterday George helped Mary.
Phrase structure rules will generate all sentences with fixed word order to the constituents. So sentence “ a “ will be defined by phrase structure rules easily while sentence “ b “ will not. Here we have to transform some of the elements. Refer to page 108.
UNIT 11 : SEMANTICS
It is the study of the meaning of words, phrases and sentences. Linguistic semantics deals with the conventional meaning conveyed by the use of words and sentences of a language.
Conceptual Vs. Associative Meaning
Conceptual Meaning covers these basic, essential components of meaning which are conveyed by the literal use of a word. E.g needle : thin , sharp, steel, instrument.
Associative Meaning is the idea, connection what that specific word brings to you. E.g needle : painfuL
Semantic Features
e.g. The hamburger ate the man.
This sentence is syntactically perfect : S => NP + VP ( V + NP )
But the meaning is not acceptable. The verb and the subject do not relate each other.
We identify the meaning by analyzing some features . ( page 116 : table )
Semantic Roles
Agent, Theme, Instrument
Mary wrote the letter with my pen.
a- Agent : The entity that performs the action ( Mary ) .
b- Theme : The entity that is involved in or affected by the action ( the letter ) .
c- Instrument : The entity that is used by the agent to perform the action ( my pen ) .
Experiences , Location, Source, Goal
a- Experiences : When a noun phrase ( as the person ) performs an action including a feeling, a perception do not actually perform the action, it happen by itself and you feel it.
e.g Mary saw a mosquito on the wall. saw => experiences
Mary cooked the meal last night. cooked => agent
b- Location : The direction or the place of an entity.
e.g. Mary saw a mosquito on the wall. => on the wall
c- Source is where an entity moves from and Goal is where an entity moves to .
e.g Sally borrowed some Money from Tom bought a birthday present and gave it to Sam.
Tom => source Sam => goal
Lexical Relations
* Synonymy : 2 or more forms with very closely related meanings.
e.g broad – wide , hide – conceal
* Antonyms : 2 forms of with opposite meaning .
e.g quick – slow . big – small
- Gradable Antonyms : Antonyms that can be used in comparative constructions.
e.g bigger than – smaller than
the negative of one member of the pair does not necessarily imply the other
e. g. That dog is not old. ( It does not have tome an “ that dog is young “ ) .
- Non – Gradable Antonyms ( Complementary Pairs ) : Comparative constructions are not normally used, and the negative of one member does imply the other.
e.g. deader / more dead => not possible
e.g. that person is not dead : that person is alive.
Reversies
They do the opposite of the other action.
e.g. tie – untie , enter – exit
Hyponymy : when the meaning of one form is included in the meaning of another, the relationship is described as hyponymy.
e. g . rose – flower , carrot – vegetable
rose is a hyponymy of flower
carrot is a hyponymy of vegetable
Co – Hyponymy / Super ordinate
Animal ( super ordinate ) => horse / dog / bird
Horse, dog , bird => co- hyponymys of animal
Prototypes
A prototype is the best example of a category.
Homophony / Homonymy / Polysemy
Homophony : when two or more different written forms have the same pronounciation they are described as homophones.
e.g bear – bare , meet – meat
Homonymy : when one written and spoken called homonymy.
e.g bank ( bank – of a river ) , ( bank – financial institution )
Polysemy : when one form ( written & spoken ) has multiple meanings which are all related by extension .
e. g . head => top of your body / top of a glass of beer / top of a company
Metonymy : A type of relation between words based simply on a close connection in everyday experience.
e.g. bottle – coke ( a container – contents relation )
car – wheels ( a whole – part relation )
king – crown ( a representative – symbol relation )
Collocation : the words that naturally go together.
e. g. hammer – nail
table – chair
salt – pepper
They frequently occur together.
UNIT 12 : PRAGMATICS
The study of intended speaker meaning is called Pragmatics.
Invisible Meaning
Pragmatics is the study of invisible meaning or how we recognize what is meant even when it is not actually said. Speakers depend on a lot of shared assumptions and expectations. You use the meanings of the words, in combination, and the context in which they occur, and you try to arrive at what the writer of the sign intended his message to convey. E.g. Baby & Toddler sale – Not selling children but selling clothes for babies.
Context
We have got two kinds of contexts.
1- one kind is best described as linguistic context, also known as co-text. The co-text of a word is the set of other words used in the same phrase or sentence.
e.g. I get to the bank to cash a cheque.
Bank is homonym. By looking at other words in the sentence we know which type of bank is intended.
2- another type of context is described as pysical context . Our understanding of what we read and hear is tied to the physical context, particularly the time and place.
e.g. The word bank on the wall of a building in a city.
Dexis
There are some words in the language that can not be interpreted at all unless the physical context is known. These words are “ here, there, this, that, now, then, yesterday, come “ , pronouns, such as “ I , you, him, her, them “ .
e.g. You will have to bring that back tomorrow, because they are not here now. – this sentence is vague.
You, that, tomorrow, they, here , now => these expressions are called deictic.
Person deixis : expressions used to point to a person.
Place deixis : words used to point to a location.
Time deixis : expressions used to point to a time.
There is a distinction between what is marked as close to the speaker ( this, that, now ) . What is marked as distant ( that, there, then ).
Reference
Reference is an act by which a speaker uses language to enable a listener to identify something.
e.g. Can I look at your Chomsky ?
Chomsky refers to sth. The key process here is called inference. An inference ia any additionaal information used by the listener to connect what is said to what must be meant . The listener has to infer that the name of the writer of a book can be used to identify a book by that writer.
Anaphora
- Can I have your book ?
- Yeah, it is on the table.
The second underlined referring expression is an example of anaphora and the first mention is called antecedent. “ Book “ is antecedent, “ it “ is the anaphoric expression.
Presupposition
Speakers design their linguistic messages on the basis of assumptions about what their hearers already know. What a speaker assumes is true or known by the hearer can be described as presupposition.
e.g. Your brother is waiting for you. – There is a presupposition that you have a brother.
“ Constancy under negation “ test is applied for presupposition.
My car is wreck. / my car is not wreck. => “ I have a car “ remains true in both.
Speech Acts
The use of the term “ speech act “ covers actions such as requesting , commanding, questioning, informing. We use some linguistic forms with some functions.
When a speaker does not know sth and asks the hearer to provide the information, she typically produce a direct speech act.
e.g Can you ride a bike ?
Some questions are not about your ability to do sth.
You would not treat it as a question at all. Such an expression is described as an indirect speech act.
e.g. Can you pass the salt ?
Politeness
Politeness is showing awareness of another person’s face. Your face is your public self-image. Face – threatening act represents a threat to another person’s self image. Whenever you say sth that lessons the possible treat to another’s face . It is called a face – saving act.
You have both a negative and a positive face. Your negative face is the need to be independant and to have freedom from imposition. Your positive face is your need to be connected, to belong, to be a member of the group.
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