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Chapter 1 Language and Linguistics
Outline 1. Language and grammar1.1 Language
1.1.1 Language and writing systems1.1.2 Language and symbol
1.2 Grammar1.2.1 Prescriptive grammar1.2.2 Descriptive grammar
2. Grammar and linguistic knowledge2.1 Lexical knowledge2.2 Phonological knowledge2.3 Syntactic knowledge
3. Universal Grammar4. Language and society
4.1 Language and cultures4.2 Social factors
5. Summary
•To what extent can it be meant to know a language? (In linguistics)
To get the linguistic knowledge of that
language, including phonological, syntactic, morphological, and semantic knowledge.
the linguistic intuition or competence (a) produce all the grammatical and acceptable
sentences (b) prevent any ungrammatical sentences from being produced
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•To what extent can it be meant to know a language? (In linguistics)
To get communicative competence which involved with language used from social and cultural (psychological) perspectives.
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•Historical linguistics: the findings of 1. theoretical linguistics (competence) 2. applied linguistics (performance)
1. Language and Grammar
1.1 Language1.1.1 Language and writing systems1.1.2 Language and symbol
1.2 Grammar1.2.1 Prescriptive grammar1.2.2 Descriptive grammar
Language and Grammar•Contemporary linguistics
▫Noam Chomsky (1957)- Aspects of Syntactic Structure
▫Two issues to be addressed: (a) to what extent is it meant to know a
language (b) why can children acquire a language in
such a short time?
Language and Writing Systems•All the languages can be spoken, but not
all languages can be written. Ex:
▫A lot of Indian languages without being written
▫Languages used to be spoken by Pingpu here in Taiwan are now fading away
•IPA: Used to transcribe languages without a
writing system by way of field work.
Language and Writing Systems
•Some writing system stops being used although the language is still spoken.▫Ex: the writing system of Naxi language
languages are natural
writing systems are artificial (invented)
languages precede writing systems
Language and Writing Systems•Natural languages can be spoken out in a
speech community, and acquired naturally for native speakers.
•Artificial languages are not acquired in natural environments.
Ex:▫1. Without sounds:
Sign language for the blind or the deaf.▫2. Only expressed in written forms but not
spoken out: Most languages used for computer
programmers
Language and Symbol•Symbols used to transcribed language
without writing systems:
▫Oracle Bone Script (Jiaguwen)▫IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet):
•3 types of symbols: icon, index, and symbol.▫Icon (something substantial)
▫Index (signs used for information)
▫Symbol (associated some specific reference)
, there is a restaurant ahead
Language and Symbol
@, it occurs to us that it is an e-mail address , we know that ahead is a curve
‘book’ (book is a symbol) for the reference of
‘ 書’ for the same reference in Chinese
The association is
entirely arbitrary
Scholars founded an
association for the invention of
symbols for phonetic
transcription
Language and Symbol•IPA:
1. The association (1897) called International Phonetics Association
2. The phonetic system called International Phonetics Alphabet
•K. K. Phonetic symbols:▫The system used for the transcription of
English sounds in Taiwan ▫J. S. Kenyon and T. A. Knott▫A Pronouncing Dictionary of American English
Grammar•Pedagogical or prescriptive grammar:
concerned with pedagogy
•Theoretical grammar: used in this chapter
Prescriptive Grammar• Usually adopted in schools• Requiring the students to memorize a lot of
grammatical rules, even if some rules are out of date.
• Also pedagogical grammar• Still prevailing for grammar schools or in the
schools teaching English as a foreign languagee.g. Taiwan, Japan, and Korea.
Ex: the past tense of dream → dreamt too strict to be followed
Descriptive grammar begins to attract attentions
Descriptive Grammar•Aims to describe what has been spoken or
what has been written in English.
•All the possible sentences are collected and analyzed.
2. Grammar and Linguistic Knowledge
2.1 Lexical knowledge2.2 Phonological knowledge2.3 Syntactic knowledge
Grammar and linguistic knowledge
•What is language knowledge?•It is composed of lexical, phonological,
syntactic, and semantic knowledge.
Grammar in
modern linguistic
descriptive
prescriptivelinguistic knowledge language
faculty
linguistic intuition
Lexical knowledge•The basic unit of a language Ex: Baby : What is this? (babbling) Parents : Milk, mi-l-k. / Table, ta-ble. (reply by a baby directive language)
mental lexicon insert to the terminal nodes of an X-bar structure
Lexical knowledge•From the lexical input, children would
generate some morphological rules:
a. That book interested me.
b. That book was interesting.
c. I was interested in that book.
d. I had great interest in that book.
interest
interest + ed (past tense)
interest + ing (adj.) be interested in
(experience)interest (noun)
Phonological knowledge•Phonological knowledge is composed of
phone/segment, phonemes, syllables, and stress.
•The basic unit of phonetic sounds Ex: [bk]→[b], [], [k]
Phonological knowledge•Phonological knowledge is composed of
phone/segment, phonemes, syllables, and stress.
•Some phones are phonemic, while others are not.
•24 English phonemes constitute English phonetic inventories.
Phonological knowledge•Phonological knowledge is composed of
phone/segment, phonemes, syllables, and stress.
•All the phonemes can be syllabified into a syllable according to the phonotactic rules or constraints.
Ex:
C0-3VC0-3
0-3 consonants at the onset0-3 consonants at the coda
ten, please, spring, hand, attempt
Phonological knowledge•Why are the syllables
in ungrammatical in English?syllables impossible in
English: a. nkelt b. pkrotec. sdockd. spomte.sputr
violate the sonority sequencing principle
1st consonant < 2nd consonant
an accidental gap
Language intuition:We may not be able to say why they are ungrammatical in English. However, we are sure that they do not occur in English.
Syntactic knowledge•How to build a sentence on the basis of
available lexica?Ex: John, likes, the, dog
Logically, there are 24 possible order (4!=4x3x2x1=24)
a. John likes the dog. b. The dog likes John. c. *John the dog likes. d. *Likes the dog John. e. *The like John dog.
Acceptable (SVO order)
Unacceptable
3. Universal Grammar
Universal Grammar•Why can a child acquire a language in so
short a time?
LAD (language acquisition device)
Innateness Hypothesis
in English environments
acquire English grammar
in Japan speak Japanese
Universal grammar
Universal Grammar•Chomsky-
• There are different languages in the world. However, all the languages share a common core grammar, which is universal, although there are different parameter settings.
What we need is a language exposure or a key to the parameter settings.
Universal grammar
Some parts shared with a certain languages
Specific language
Universal Grammar
different similarLanguages
Japanese (SOV)Chinese (SVO)English (SVO)
Japanese (head-final)Chinese (head-initial)English (head-initial
VP (verb phrase) PP (preposition phrase)
Races blackwhite yellow
bloodorgans
Chinese 買書 at TaipeiEnglish buy a book at Taipei Japanese 本を買う Taipei at
Universal Grammar•When a child is put in whatever language
environments, he is able to acquire that language in a short time.
Language is acquired, not learned
Mandarin Chinese
Southern Min
4. Language and Society
4.1 Language and cultures4.2 Social factors
Language and cultures•What language conveys for communication
is subject to society and cultures.▫In Eskimo, there are different types of
vocabulary related to snow.▫In Taiwanese, there are different types of
vocabulary related to rice.
Language is cultural based
Language and cultures•The language reflects its cultures.
Mandarin (Taiwan)
(Mainland)
1939identical now
differentvocabulary phonology
syntax
Colonized by Japanleft a lot of Japanese
vocabularyDemocratic country:
yielding various slogans for election
Governed by the Communist Party: does not allow any
competition
Social factors• Language identity would motivate sound change as
revealed in William Labov’s studies on the vowel reduction of Martha’s Vineyard.
• Gender plays a key role of language use.
Female expressions (uncertainly):
I am wondering..I am not sure…
May I…
Male expressions (certainly):
I am pretty sure..I guarantee…Of course…graceful or gentle strong or ambitious
What makes female differ from male in the use of language?