4. What is linguistics?
----Linguistics is the scientific study of language.
----A person who studies linguistics is known as a linguist. 5 The scope or major branches of linguistics Theoretical linguistics
1). Phonetics----speech sound (description, classification, transcription): articulatory phonetics, acoustic phonetics, auditory phonetics.
2). Phonology----sound patterns of languages 3). Morphology----the form of words
4). Syntax----the rules governing the combination of words into sentence. 5). Semantics----the meaning of language.
6). Pragmatics----when the meaning of language is conducted in the context of language use.
Use of linguistics
1). Applied linguistics----linguistics and language teaching
2). Sociolinguistics---- social factors (e.g. class, education) affect language use
3). Psycholinguistics----linguistic behavior and psychological process
4). Stylistics----linguistic and literature
5) Some other applications like Anthropological linguistics, Neurolinguistics, Computational linguistics (e.g. machine translation)
6. Some important distinctions in linguistics 1) Descriptive vs prescriptive
Descriptive ---- describe/analyze linguistic facts observed or language people actually use (modern linguistic)
Prescriptive ----lay down rules for “correct” linguistic behavior in using language (traditional grammar) 2) Synchronic vs diachronic
Synchronic study---- description of a language at some point of time (modern linguistics)
Diachronic study---- description of a language through time (historical development of language over a period of time)
3) Speech vs writing
Speech ---- primary medium of language Writing ---- later developed
4) Langue vs parole (F. de Saussure)
Langue ---- the abstract linguistic system shared by all members of the speech community. Parole ---- the realization of langue in actual use.
Saussure takes a sociological view of language and his notion of langue is a matter of social conventions.
5) Competence and performance (Chomsky)
Competence ---- the ideal user’s knowledge of the rules of his language
Performance ---- the actual realization of this knowledge in linguistic communication
Chomsky looks at language from a psychological point of view and to him competence is a property of the mind of each individual.
6) Traditional grammar vs modern linguistics
Traditional grammar ---- prescriptive, written, Latin-based framework
Modern linguistics ----- descriptive, spoken, not necessarily Latin-based framework
Chapter 2 Phonology
1. Language is primarily vocal.
The primary medium of human language is sound. Linguists are not interested in all sounds, but in speech sounds----sounds that convey meaning in human communication.
2. Phonetics
----A branch of linguistics which studies the phonic medium of language; it is concerned with all the sounds that occur in the world’s languages. 2.1 Three branches of phonetics
2.1.1 Articulatory phonetics----from the speakers’ point of view, “how speakers produce speech sounds”
2.1.2 Auditory phonetics----from the hearers’ point of view, “how sounds are perceived”
2.1.3 Acoustic phonetics----from the physical way or means by which sounds are transmitted from one
to another.
Articulatory phonetics
Speech organs: three important areas: pharyngeal cavity—the throat(咽腔); oral cavity—the mouth(口腔); nasal cavity — the nose(鼻腔)
The speech organs:Lips,Teeth, Teeth ridge (alveolar), Hard palate, Soft palate (velum), Uvula, Tip of tongue, Blade of tongue, Back of tongue, Vocal cords, Pharyngeal cavity, Nasal cavity
Orthographic representation of speech sounds
---- A standardized and internationally accepted system of phonetic transcription is the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA). The basic principle of the IPA is using one letter to represent one speech sound.
?Broad transcription ---- used in dictionary and textbook for general purpose, without diacritics, e.g. clear [ l ], [ pit ]
? Narrow transcription ---- used by phonetician for careful study, with diacritics, e.g. dark [ l ], aspirated [ p ]
Some major articulatory variables ---- dimensions on which speech sounds may vary:
?Voicing---- voiced & voiceless
?Nasality ---- nasal & non-nasal
?Aspiration ----- aspirated & unaspirated
Classification of English speech sounds
---- English speech sounds are generally classified into two large categories: Vowels and Consonants (Note: The essential difference between these two classes is that in the production of the former the airstream meets with no obstruction of any kind in the throat, the nose or the mouth, while in that of the latter it is somehow obstructed.)
Classification of consonants
---- English consonants may be classified according to two dimensions:The manner of articulation and The place of articulation
Classification of vowels
---- English vowels can be divided into two large categories: Monophthongs or pure/single vowels 单元音and Diphthongs or gliding vowels双元音
Exercises: underline the words that begin with a sound as required. 1.A bilabial consonant: mad sad bad cad pad had lad 2.A velar consonant: nod god cod pod rod
3.Labiodental consonant: rat fat sat mat chat vat pat 4.An alveolar consonant: nick lick sick tick kick quick
5.A palato-alveolar consonant: sip ship tip chip lip zip 6.A dental consonant: lie buy thigh thy tie rye 7.A glide: one war yolk rush
Underline the words that end with a sound as required: ?A fricative
pay horse tough rice breath push sing wreathe hang cave message ?A nasal
train bang leaf limb ?A stop
drill pipe fit crab fog ride laugh rack through tip
?An affricate: rack such ridge booze
Underline the words that contain the sound as required: ?A central vowel:
mad lot but boot word ?A front vowel:
reed pad load fate bit bed cook ?A rounded vowel:
who he bus her hit true boss bar walk ?A back vowel:
paid reap fool top good father
Phonology
?Phonology studies the patterning of speech sounds, that is, the ways in which speech sounds form systems and patterns in human languages.
Phonetics & phonology
?Both are concerned with the same aspect of language----the speech sounds. But they differ in their approach and focus.
?Phonetics is of general nature; it is interested in all the speech sounds used in all human languages; it aims to answer questions like: how they are produced, how they differ from each other, what phonetic features they have, how they can be classified, etc.
?Phonology aims to discover how speech sounds in a language form patterns and how these sounds are used to convey meaning in linguistic communication.
Complementary distribution：allophones of the same phoneme are in complementary distribution. They do not distinguish meaning. They occur in different phonetic contexts, e.g. dark [l] & clear [l], aspirated [p] & unaspirated [p].
Minimal pair：when two different forms are identical (the same) in every way except for one sound segment which occurs in the same place in the strings, the two sound combinations are said to form a minimal pair, e.g. beat, bit, bet, bat, boot, but, bait, bite, boat. Some rules of phonology
1） Sequential rules：the rules that govern the combination of sounds in a particular language, e.g.
in English, “k b i l” might possibly form blik, klib, bilk, kilb.
If a word begins with a [l] or a [r], then the next sound must be a vowel.
If three consonants should cluster together at the beginning of a word, the combination should obey the following three rules, e.g. spring, strict, square, splendid, scream. a) the first phoneme must be /s/,
b) the second phoneme must be /p/ or /t/ or /k/,
c) the third phoneme must be /l/ or /r/ or /w/.
* [ ?] never occurs in initial position in English and standard Chinese,but it does occur in some dialects, e.g. in Cantonese: “牛肉，我， 俄语……”
2） Assimilation rule同化：assimilates one sound to another by “copying” a feature of a sequential
phoneme, thus making the two phones similar, e.g. the prefix in is pronounced differently when in different phonetic contexts:
Indiscreet： alveolar [in] Inconceivable： velar [i ] Input： bilabial [im??] （Assimilation in Mandari：好啊 hao wa；海啊 hai ya；看啊 kan na；唱啊 chang ?a?；跳啊 tiao wa……）
3） Deletion rule： it tells us when a sound is to be deleted although it is orthographically represented,
e.g. design, paradigm, there is no [g] sound; but the [g] sound is pronounced in their corresponding forms signature, designation, paradigmatic.
4） Suprasegmental features----the phonemic features that occur above the level of the segments
( larger than phoneme): stress，tone，intonation.
a. Syllable (what is syllable?)
Ancient Greek: a unit of speech sound consisting of a vowel or a vowel with one or more than one consonant.
Dictionary: word or part of a word which contains a vowel sound or consonant acting as a vowel. The syllable consists of three parts: the ONSET, the PEAK, the CODA, e.g. [m?n].
The peak is the essential part. It is usually formed by a vowel. But [l], [n] and [m] might also function as peaks as in “ apple, hidden, communism”. b. Stress: (Word stress & Sentence stress)
Word stress: The location of stress in English distinguishes meaning, e.g. a shift in stress in English may change the part of speech of a word:
verb: im?port; in?crease; re?bel; re?cord … noun: ?import; ?increase; ?rebel; ?record …
Similar alteration of stress also occurs between a compound noun and a phrase consisting of the same elements:
compound: ?blackbird; ?greenhouse; ?hotdog… noun phrase: black ?bird; green ?house; hot ?dog…
The meaning-distinctive role played by word stress is also manifested in the combinations of -ing forms and nouns:
modifier: ?dining-room; ?readingroom; ?sleepingbag… doer: sleeping baby; swimming fish; flying plane…
Sentence stress: the relative force given to the components of a sentence. Generally, nouns, main verbs, adjectives, adverbs, numerals and demonstrative pronouns指示代词 are stressed. Other categories like articles, person pronouns, auxiliary verbs, prepositions and conjunctions are usually not stressed. Note: for pragmatic reason, this rule is not always right, e.g. we may stress any part in the following sentences.
He is driving my car.
My mother bought me a new skirt yesterday. c. Tone
Tones are pitch variations,which are caused by the differing rates of vibration of the vocal cords. English is not a tone language, but Chinese is. ma 妈 (level)
ma 麻 (the second rise) ma 马 (the third rise) ma 骂 (the fourth fall) d. Intonation
When pitch, stress and length variations are tied to the sentence rather than to the word, they are collectively known as intonation.
English has three types of intonation that are most frequently used: falling tone (matter of fact statement) rising tone (doubts or question) the fall-rise tone (implied message)
For instance, “That?s not the book he wants.” Grammatical functions of intonations
----Intonation plays an important role in the conveyance of meaning in almost every language, esp. in English.
a) It may indicate different sentence types by pitch direction.
b) It may impose different structures on the sentence by dividing it into different intonation units, e.g. “John didn?t come because of Marry”
Within one intonation unit, it means: John came, but it had nothing to do with Marry. With two intonation units, it means: Marry was the reason why John didn?t come.
Exercises: Think of the utterance in different intonations: “Those who bought quickly made a profit.”
c) It can make a certain part of a sentence especially prominent by placing nucleus on it, e.g. Jack came yesterday by train. d) Its attitudinal functions.
Falling tone ---- matter-of-fact statement, downright assertion, commands.
Rising tone ----politeness, encouragement, pleading.
Note: these can only be very general indications. The specific attitudinal meaning of an intonation pattern must be interpreted within a context.
Chapter 3 Morphology
Morphology refers to the study of the internal structure of words and the rules by which words are formed.
1. Open class word and closed class word
5） Open class words----content words of a language to which we can regularly add new words, such
as nouns, adjectives, verbs and adverbs, e.g. beatnik(a member of the Beat Generation), hacker, email, internet, “做秀，时装秀…” in Chinese.
6） Closed class words----grammatical or functional words, such as conjunction, articles, preposition
and pronouns.
2. Morpheme--the minimal unit of meaning
---Words are composed of morphemes. Words may consist of one morpheme or more morphemes, e.g. 1-morpheme boy, desire
2-morpheme boy+ish, desir(e)+ble
3-morpheme boy+ish+ness, desir(e)+bl(e)+ity
4-morpheme gentle+man+li+ness, un+desir(e)+abl(e)+ity 5-morpheme un+gentle+man+li+ness
6-morpheme anti+dis+establish+ment+ari+an+ism
3. Affix
1) Prefix ---- morphemes that occur only before others, e.g. un-, dis, anti-, ir-, etc.
2) Suffix ---- morphemes that occur only after others, e.g. -ful, -er, -ish, -ness, -able, -tive, tion, etc.
4. Free morpheme & bound morpheme
1) Free morpheme----is one that may constitute a word (free form) by itself, such as bed, tree, sing,
dance, etc.