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Slezská univerzita v Opavě Ústav cizích jazyků LINGVISTICKÁ PROPEDEUTIKA Studijní opora Opava 2006
Slezská univerzita v Opavě
Ústav cizích jazyků
LINGVISTICKÁ PROPEDEUTIKA
Studijní opora
Opava 2006
1
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Course Description ............................................................................................................ 2
Course Schedule ................................................................................................................ 3
Literature ........................................................................................................................... 5
Communication with Tutor ............................................................................................... 6
Units 1-12 .......................................................................................................................... 7
Sample Exam Test ........................................................................................................... 56
2
COURSE DESCRIPTION
The aim of the course is to provide participants with knowledge of linguistics as a
scientific study of language, basic linguistic terminology, with information about
English as a world language, current situation in English studies. Participants will be
encouraged to work with up-to-date reference literature and secondary sources so that
the course prepares them for further study of English.
3
COURSE SCHEDULE
Name
Session
Date
Homework
Due Date
Unit 1 Language and communication, Definition
of language, Language typology
Unit 2 English as a world language, Germanic
languages, Accents and standards
Unit 3 Linguistics – scientific study of language,
Structuralism, The scope of linguistics
Unit 4 Grammar, morphology, syntax
Unit 5 Phonetics and phonology
Unit 6 Word stock, lexicology and lexicography
Unit 7 The linguistic sign - semantics and
semiotics
Unit 8 Processing linguistic data – corpus
linguistics, Corpus annotation, Types of
corpora
Unit 9 Language and mind – psycholinguistics,
Idiolect, Speech disorders
Unit 10 Language and society – sociolinguistics,
Sociolect, Dialect
Unit 11 Language and logic – pragmalinguistics,
Cooperative Principle, Politeness Principle
4
Unit 12 Text linguistics and functional stylistics
Test/Exam
5
LITERATURE
Crystal, D. (1998): The Cambridge encyclopedia of language.
Černý, J. (1996): Úvod do studia jazyka.
Svoboda, A; Hrehovčík, T. (2006): An ABC of theoretical and applied linguistics.
Štekauer, P. (1993): Essentials of English Linguistics.
Yule, G. (1996): The Study of Language.
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COMMUNICATION WITH TUTOR
Channels of Communication
E-mail:
Telephone:
WWW: http://e-learning.ucj.fpf.slu.cz
7
UNIT 1
TOPICS
Language and communication
Definition of language
Language typology
KEYWORDS
agglutinating language
arbitrary
communication
inflecting language
isolating language
language definition
speech
systematic
writing
Lecture 1
Language and Communication
Language – [C] = a particular language – English, German, Czech, we can talk about languages
[U] = language as an abstract concept, does not form the plural
Definitions of language language < lingua (Lat. = tongue)
Language is a set of signals used to communicate / a specialised sound signalling
system
Language is purely human and non-instinctive method of communicating ideas,
emotions and desires by means of voluntarily produced symbols.
(E. Sapir, 1921)
A language is a system of arbitrary vocal symbols by which the members of society
interact in terms of their total culture. (G. Trager, 1949)
A language is a set (finite or infinite) of sentences, each finite in length and
constructed out of a finite set of elements. (N. Chomsky, 1957)
8
Language is the institution whereby humans communicate and interact with each
other by means of habitually used oral-auditory arbitrary symbols.
(R. Hall, 1964)
Language and communication
Verbal and non-verbal communication
we communicate by gestures, sighs, sobs, smiles, winks etc. (the psychology of communication)
Language of flowers – when a man gives flowers to a woman, it means something, it is
communication
Language of music – music communicates feelings, ideas...
Body language – the language of gestures, mimic
Sign language – the language of the deaf, traffic signs...
Other species also communicate – animals:
Bees “dance” = communicate about honey, whales produce squeaks and clicks, insects use special
substances called feromons to communicate
Important differences between human and animal communication:
1. Humans can communicate about past and future.
2. Humans can store their language in a (relatively) permanent way.
3. Humans can communicate even about things that are absent or abstract.
Language and communication – model
Producer information language (code) medium Receiver language (decode)
information (a medium itself)
speaker/writer —
—
message —
—
listener/reader
channel
verbal: speech, phone, media, computer, book, etc.
nonverbal: sign language, traffic lights, sound signals, etc.
9
code
natural language (English, Czech, Russian, etc.)
artificial language (Esperanto, Seaspeak, Braille, heraldry,
cryptology, etc.)
formalized language (C++, HTML, etc.)
contents
How did a language begin? Everything is PERHAPS!!!!
A very old question - The biblical story of the Tower of Babel
How?
There are a number of theories:
1. Language began by imitating sounds heard in the nature.
2. Language developed from interjections which expressed feelings and emotions.
3. Language began by imitating body movements (Charles Darwin).
When and where? perhaps 40,000 years ago, perhaps more places at the same time
Why? perhaps need of greater degree of cooperation in order to survive,
import factual knowledge, convey essential commands. It was also
very important in the sphere of feelings and emotions.
Man reached a stage when it was crucial to communicate during conscious activities.
Development:
man created sounds similar, later different from animals, imitates them and then creates his own,
learns to hear them and assigns various meanings to them, there was no grammar, all which was
said had the character of proclamation/challenge/appeal
later distinguished simple announcement, challenge, question; distinguished communicative
functions, improvement of stress, word intonation, sentence intonation, articulated differences
receive more and more communicative value
first and easiest vowels (cardinal vowels), then come plosives, later affricates and fricatives
most languages have in the older phases more glottals; alveolars and labials are distinguished later
on (therefore g, k are to be found in almost all languages, as well as b, p)
the languages of people who live near the sea usually have more vowels (Italian), on the continent
(especially in the mountains) there are more consonants and fewer vowels (Slavonic languages,
Caucasian (up to 80), east Slavonic – Russian distinguishes hard and soft)
What is language like?
Language is arbitrary and systematic:
10
- systematic = it consists of elements among which there are relations. This is
characteristic of any system.
- arbitrary = the elements of language are interchangeable. What the English call
“water”, the Czech call “voda”, Hungarians “víz”. But it always denotes one and the
same thing. We only “switch the code”.
Language can be characterised by structural dependence, creativity, displacement (being able to talk
about absent thinks) and cultural transmission. No two languages behave in exactly the same way.
Each language has its own, distinct rules.
Popular ideas about language
Primitive languages vs. languages of excellence
primitive conditions ≠ primitive language. No inferior or primitive languages. The language of
some tropical tribes in Africa has many ways of expressing various kinds of tropical fruit. The
language of Eskimos has over 10 different expressions for “snow”. How many do we have in
Czech, English...?
each culture that has ever been investigated into revealed that the people spoke a language which
was fully developed, with a complexity comparable to those of the so-called ‘civilized’ nations
The myth about language superiority is widespread but has no basis in linguistic fact, it is merely a
question of usefulness, prestige and preference
Languages of the world
Today (Crystal, D.: The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language. pp. 296-297, 300, 304)
Extinction of a language (Crystal – video in AVC)
Dead languages and of what use they can be today (e.g. Latin, Sanskrit etc.)
Typology of languages
isolating, agglutinating, inflecting, polysynthetic
most languages are not clearly distinguished as one type only, English tends to be an isolating language (=
separates grammatical and lexical meanings), Czech tends to be an inflecting language
language types:
─ isolating: The boy will ask the girl. The girl will ask the boy.
─ inflecting: The biggest boys have been asking.
─ agglutinating: anti-dis-establish-ment-arian-ism
the character of English: collocations (to broaden experience, not heighten), analytic language
the trends in contemporary English
language change: inevitable, rarely predictable
deterioration or evolution?
decay and lower standards vs. “Let us preserve the tongue that Shakespeare spoke.”
Language, the media and the Internet
11
Unlike animals we can communicate not only about the present, we can transfer our language into
other media (writing, communication in time), speak about things which are absent or abstract
Human language is not a solely vocal system. It can be expressed by writing. Writing is (relatively)
not limited in time and space.
In ancient times media were e.g. parchments, stone tables, bones. The Inkas in America used
cords – the kippu script. Later paper was invented and gave rise to books. In the 20th
century LPs,
audio/video cassettes and floppy disks were invented (mechanical media). At present we use
CDs, DVDs... (digital media). More and more information can be stored in the memory of a
computer or on a hard disk.
1. When there was no script transferring information was very complicated (face to face
conversation only).
2. the invention of script = 1st information revolution – transfer still quite slow, media had to
be distributed personally.
3. the discovery of electricity = 2nd information revolution, it is still going on today,
information transferred at the speed of light!
4. TV, radio – one-sided media only (non-interactive), telephone – interactive but limited to
speech only, usually only possible for two persons to communicate at the same time
Attempts at starting interactive TV!
Internet can combine the features of many media (multi-medial). It is more interactive than any
medium used to be before. It can transfer many kinds of data – written texts, recorded speech, video
sequences. It is the latest development of the 2nd
information revolution. It enhances the speed of
communication.
It causes changes in language:
The language of e-mail – much different from the language of classical correspondence
Chat – a transition between e-mail and real conversation:
Real conversation – practically no time delay between uttering a sentence and its reception by the
listener
Chat – delay can be counted in minutes or seconds (depending on technological factors)
e-mail – receiving an answer can last days
new words (webliography, cyberspace, netspeak...), many acronyms (LOL – Laughing Out Loud,
POS), quick chages, unstable language
Speech and writing
1. Speech is the primary medium of language. It was here first. Children begin to learn the
language with the help of speech. Writing is a relatively new invention.
2. Some language communities still rely on speech only. (e.g. illiterate tribes)
3. All of us speak much more than write.
4. Learning to write is usually less spontaneous and automatic than learning to speak.
5. Speech and writing are complementary, not competitive. They are both needed in the same
way. They can function independently of each other.
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Speech Writing
composed of words composed of letters and signs
makes use of intonation, tempo, rhythm
(suprasegmentals)
makes use of punctuation and other
graphological devices
is perceived by ears is perceived by eye
addressee is usually present addressee is usually absent
is helped by gestures and body movements the meaning must be clear within the context –
no slips of the tongue
Origins of writing
At a certain level of the development the humans felt a need of non-contact communication, first
only grooves/notches, later pictograms originate from this
pictograms (today e.g. traffic signs)
ideograms (a symbol that is used in a writing system, for example Chinese, to represent the idea of
a thing, rather than the sounds of a word)
when a pictogram becomes an ideogram (picture represents/means sound, not image) we get a
simple writing system.
hieroglyphic writings: only pictures
cuneiform writing: signs (various placements) – klínové písmo
combination of both: e.g. Chinese system of writing
later the system of writing is simplified so that the number of signs is not extremely high
the original writing must have been syllabic – people recorded syllables
some languages indicate the vowel only by marginal diacritic signs (Arabic, Sanskrit, Hebrew, e.g.
YHVH)
first people to use discrete signs for vowels were the Phoenicians. Their writing was adopted and
modified by the Greeks and Armenians.
from Greek writing system two ways of development: Latin and Cyrillic alphabets
Today most languages use the Latin alphabet, but no 100% correspondence between writing and the
sound. (phoneme – grapheme correspondence). The spoken language always has more sounds than
the corresponding writing system based on the simple sounds has graphic symbols
Old Romans had only 5 vowels and circa 19-20 consonants, some only in borrowings [z].
-----BEGIN GEEK CODE BLOCK-----
Version: 3.1
13
GED/J d-- s:++>: a-- C++(++++) ULU++ P+ L++ E---- W+(-)
N+++ o+ K+++ w---
O- M+ V-- PS++>$ PE++>$ Y++ PGP++ t- 5+++ X++ R+++>$ tv+
b+ DI+++ D+++
G+++++ e++ h r-- y++**
------END GEEK CODE BLOCK------
Geek of:
education and law, punk dresser, torn jeans and shirts, body piercings, tattoos, a bit fat, wants to
lose weight, aged 20-24, doesn’t like Star Trek, likes X-Files, Dilbert and Doom, is dating noone,
quite perverse
Computers are a large part of my existence. When I get up in the morning, the first thing I do is log
myself in. I play games or mud on weekends
I've been known to make perverts look like angels
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UNIT 2
TOPICS
English as a world language
Standard English
Variations of English
Celtic languages
KEYWORDS
Basic English
Celtic languages
creole
Gaelic
lingua franca
minor forms
pidgin
Standard English
substandard
Welsh
Lecture 2
English as a world language
English
over 1 billion speakers: mother tongue (400m), second language (350m), foreign language (100m) –
and the number is increasing
official/semiofficial language of circa 60 countries, prominent in a further 20, in all continents
books, newspapers, air-traffic control, international business and organisations, academic
conferences, science, technology, medicine, diplomacy, sports, pop music, and advertising
1/3 of worlds scientists write in English
3/4 of all emails are written in English
80 % of all the information stored in the electronic retrieval systems is written in English
150 million people receive radio programmes in English in over 120 countries
Opposition to English
laws banning its use in certain public domains in France with sanctions for disregarding the
language norms, movements against English in Spain, Germany, Mexico, Québec but without much
effect
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Lingua franca
global language
Latin (the Middle Ages), Spanish (Central and South America), Chinese (only China)
political and military might, economic power and religious influence
English spoken
Nowadays, English is spoken in these states mainly:
United States 220 mil.
Great Britain 57 mil.
Canada 24 mil.
Australia 14 mil.
Ireland 5 mil.
New Zealand 3 mil.
India, South Africa (10% of the inhabitants)
former British colonies in Africa: Kenya, Zimbabwe
the Caribbean: Jamaica, Guyana, Belize
the Pacific: Papua-New Guinea, Fiji, Samoa
In Australia, there live the Aborigines who speak besides English their own mother tongue
(150, 000 Aborigines). In New Zealand there are the Maori (280, 000).
English and other Germanic languages
Our Father, who art in heaven English
Vater unser, Du bist im Himmel German
Undzer voter, vos bist im himl Yiddish
Onze vader, die in de hemelen zijt Dutch
Vor Fader, du som er i himlene Danish
Fader vår, du som er i himmelen Norwegian
Fader vår, som är i himmelen Swedish
Germanic languages
Western branch Afrikaans, Dutch, English, Flemish, Frisian, German, Yiddish
Northern branch Danish, Faeroese, Icelandic, Norwegian, Swedish
Eastern branch Gothic
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Most spoken world languages
16th
century 19th
century present
1. French 14 mil. 1. French 32 mil. 1. Mandarin Chinese 907 mil.
2. German 12 mil. 2. Russian 31 mil. 2. English 456 mil.
3. Italian 10 mil. 3. German 30 mil. 3. Spanish 362 mil.
4. Spanish 9 mil. 4. Spanish 26 mil. 4. Russian 293 mil.
5. English 5 mil. 5. Italian 25 mil. 5. Arabic 208 mil.
6. Russian 3 mil. 6. English 20 mil. 6. Bengali 189 mil.
Substandard English
Multiple negation He didn’t want no supper.
None of them can’t do it.
Past tense of verbs complete regularization: draw – drawed – drawed
only two verb forms: see – seen – seen, give – give - given
Ain’t There ain’t no cure for love.
We ain’t done it.
3rd
sg -s You likes him.
She want one.
Relative pronouns He’s the man (which/what/as/ø) done it.
Demonstratives They books over there.
Them books over there.
Adverbs He runs very quick.
She done it very clever.
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Various accents of English
pronunciation vocabulary grammar/spelling
Canada schedule
leisure
news
Br: tap,
railway
Am: gas,
sidewalk
Br: educated
language
Am: everyday
language
U.S. after, dance, half
dog, Tom,
stress -
advertisement
pants, gas,
garbage,
faucet, vest,
can, cookie
theater, humor,
dialog, ax, defense,
cigaret, esthetics
in the
hospital/church
Creole, pidgin simplified English mixed with other languages
(local, French, Spanish, Portugese, etc.) –
- Barbados, Jamaica, Bahamas
Australia see
immediate
dingo, koala, goodday, outback,
brush, station, paddock
New Zealand ships
city
this thing
kiwi, taboo
South Africa dinner
limited
Influence of Afrikaans
apartheid, trek, boer, dorp, robot
Ireland tea
join
thin, stop
Sean
stress shift:
educate, Belfast
Celtic words
cleeve, galore,
glow
Who’s this car
belonging to?
Scotland loch, technical
salt, stone
house
kirk, bonnie,
lad, aye, glen,
sporran, wee,
travel (= go on
foot)
leafs, wifes
gaed
sometimes no used
instead of not
Wales ... ... ...
England ... ... ...
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Minor forms of English
also called hybrids [haibridz]:
a) Pidgin English Pacific Ocean, Papua-New Guinea, Melanesia, Surinam,
b) Creole English the Antils
Pidgin – the Chinese pronunciation of the word “business”
simple phonetics and grammar
influenced by local languages
vocabulary: 80% English
10% local languages
10% German, Spanish and other “colonial languages”
HAUS I LIKLIK = The house is small (reduplication)
Pidgin is one of the official languages in Papua-New Guinea (Tok Pisin “Talk Pidgin” = the
Pidgin Language)
Basic English (1930s) – designed by C.K.Ogden and I.A.Richards
BASIC = British American Scientific International Commercial
simplified English – a basis of 850 words everything else explained by them
defining vocabulary - English dictionaries (Oxford, Longman)
(core vocabulary)
exx.: SELFISH – without sort of others
BEAFSTAKE – a cut from the back end of a male cow kept on the fire long enough
The need of a standard
attempts at founding a Language Academy in the 17th century already:
John Dryden (1631-1700), Daniel Defoe (1659-1731)
Dr Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) – 1755 published Dictionary of the English Language
variations: King’s / Queen’s / BBC English – standard speech based on RP Public School Pronunciation
Received Pronunciation (RP) – originally language of the educated around London
was important to be given an office (19th
cent.)
today: only 5% of speakers,
RP considered posh, upper-class, the Royal Family, elderly people
most people nowadays speak a regional accent, the media change too
Geordie accent – Newscastle Brummie (Birmingham) Scouse (Liverpool)
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dialects: Cockney – dialect spoken in London around the Church of St Mary-le-Bow in the East End
- characteristics:
o using the glottal stop (not pronouncing ‚h‘, dropping one's h's) – hair [eə], rain
[rain], fine [fon] milk [mjo:k]
o rhyming slang: feet = plates of meat, speak = bubble and squeak, kiss = hit or
miss
some G.B.Shaw’s and Dicken’s characters speak Cockney
other standards:
the US: General American – the Eastern type (Boston, New England)
(standard) - the Southern type (Virginia, Ohio, Mississippi)
General Australian, Standard West Indian English
Celtic languages
Goidelic group (Gaelic) Scottish Gaelic (Scots)
Irish Gaelic (Erse)
Manx (extinct)
Britannic group (Cymric) Cumbrian (extinct)
Welsh
Cornish (revived artificially)
Breton
Spoken in Scotland, Ireland, Wales and Cornwall
Celtic words – placenames: Thames, Severn, Dover, Kent, bard, druid
revival nowadays, in the history people fobidden to speak them
Scottish Gaelic – the Highlands – 90,000 speakers
Irish Gaelic – 4 mil. Speakers
Welsh
CYMRU
About 1.7 mil. speakers (northern part of Wales)
In 1851 – 90% spoke Welsh, today about 30%, practically all speakers are bilingual
1588 – Bible translation, 1960 – The Welsh Language Society
taught at schools
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UNIT 3
TOPICS
Linguistics – scientific study of language
KEYWORDS
diachrony
Ferdinand de Saussure
functional approach
langue
linguistics
Neo-grammarians
paradigmatic
parole
Prague School
structuralism
synchrony
syntagmatic
Vilém Mathesius
Lecture 3
Linguistics – scientific study of language
beginnings:
Ancient India – Panini – 4th
century B.C.: circa 400 rules to reform the old language of the Vedas
(the first external intervention in the language system) – concentrated on spoken language
Greek philosophers – Aristotel, Plato the first to have distinguished between verbs and nouns
13th
– 14th
century: monks studied texts in more detail, checking the originality and interpretations
of various writings (especially of religious and educational character)
18th
century: widespread travelling, Europeans discovered more advanced cultures and noticed their
languages were sometimes more advanced too
1786 – Sir William Jones offered his lectures on structural similarities between Sanskrit, Latin,
Greek and Germanic languages.
William Jones (1746 – 1794), first clear statement asserting the existence of Indo-European:
“The Sanskrit language, whatever be its antiquity, is of a wonderful structure; more perfect than the Greek,
more copius than the Latin, and more exquisitely refined than either, yet bearing to both of them a stronger
affinity, both in the roots of verbs, and in the forms of grammar, than could possibly have been produced by
accident; so strong, indeed, that no philologer could examine them all three without believing them to have
sprung from some common source, which, perhaps, no longer exists.”
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Two different scientific approaches – synchronic x diachronic
Synchronic (also vertical) – analyzes contemporary languages, compares languages
Diachronic (also horizontal) – studies historical development of language
19th
century = the golden age of diachronic linguistics = the age of Neo-Grammarians:
Jakob Grimm (1785 – 1863) Franz Bopp (1791 – 1867)
August Schleicher (1821 – 1868) Rasmus Rask (1787 – 1832) – Danish
Jakob Grimm + Karl Verner – two linguistic laws crucial for the development of Germanic
languages
Verner discovered the rules of development in the system of German consonants and explained
these changes
preceding/following stress developed differently: pa’ter – Vater, ‘frater – Bruder
August Schleicher – influenced by Darwinism, attempts to reconstruct the Proto-Indo-European
language, wrote a fable in it about a sheep and horses
Karl Brugmann (1849 – 1919) Hermann Osthoff (1847 – 1909)
Many well-known scholars trained in Neo-Grammarian linguistics:
Americans: Edward Sapir, Louis Bloomfield
Czech: Jan Gebauer – the founder of the Czech historical studies
Critics of neo-grammatians (Johannes Schmidt, Antoine Meillet et al.) pointed out that also the
external factors (especially psychological and social) are critical for language change.
THE SYNCHRONIC APPROACH
Wilhelm von Humboldt (1767 – 1835) – the only „defender” of synchronic approach in the 19th
century when synchronic studies were generally regarded as not scientific
von Humboldt: diachrony and synchrony are not in sharp contrast, they can be combined
beginning of the 20th
century – a new linguistic school combining both approaches
STRUCTURALISM
many approaches and schools (for examples see Dějiny lingvistiky by Jiří Černý)
structure (internal order, system)
The Geneva School
The father of structuralism = Ferdinand de Saussure (1857 – 1913) – had a revolutionary
influence on 20th
century linguistics
22
Saussure’s idea can be summarized in a series of dichotomies:
langue x parole
(jazyk) (promluva)
paradigmatic x syntagmatic
p
a Na <-> louce <-> se pase <-> bílý <-> kůň. -> syntagmatic
r U lesa černý (horizontal) relations
a strakatý
d
i
g
m (vertical) relations
a
t
i
c
signifier x signified
RADIO
signified signifier
de Saussure’s work: Cours de linguistique generale – A Course in General Linguistics –
published posthumously by his students (Charles Bally) The Geneva School
several structuralist schools:
THE PRAGUE SCHOOL OF LINGUISTICS
Vilém Matesius (1882 – 1945) – the founder of English studies in our country
the founder and the first president of the Prague Linguistic Society
potentiality
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work: A Functional Analysis of Present Day English on a General Linguistic Basis (1961)
members of the society:
Russians: Trubetzkoy (1890 – 1938), Jakobson (1896 – 1982)
Czechs: Bohumil Trnka (1895 – 1984)
Bohuslav Havránek (1893 – 1978)
issued linguistic papers: Travaux Linguistique de Prague
Otokar Vočadlo
Libuše Dušková
Eva Hajičová
Petr Sgall
František Daneš
Zdeněk Stříbrný
Martin Hilský
Josef Vachek
Jan Firbas
Josef Hladký
Aleš Svoboda
Josef Jařab
Jarmila Tárnyiková
Jaroslav Macháček
Ivan Poldauf
Jaroslav Peprník
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Teaching of the Prague School = structuralist & functional
Language is a system of phenomena that have different functions.
Example: velar “n” different functions:
Czech: [baka], [banka] – no difference
English: [sin], [si two different words! velar “n” has different functions in
Czech and in English
opposition marked x unmarked - a dichotomy introduced by Prague School
linguists
A language element is marked if it possesses a certain distinctive feature. The
distinction is the presence or absence of a particular linguistic feature:
e.g. waiter – unmarked for gender
waitress – marked for gender
car – unmarked for number
cars – marked for gender
centre x periphery - another dichotomy
(based on the frequency of use)
e.g. in lexis – central units = frequent words – “to be”, “to have”, modal verbs, names
of the main parts of human body, pronouns
peripheral units = rare words – gnome, gnu [nu:] – a species of African antilopes
in Czech “přechodník” = peripheral
in British English – subjunctive = peripheral
tradition of contrastive studies - what matters in English does not always matter in
Czech, languages can be compared
other structuralist schools:
THE DANISH GLOSSEMATIC SCHOOL - Luis Hjelmslev (1899 – 1965), very
formal branch of structuralism, using non-traditional terminology
THE AMERICAN DESCRIPTIVIST SCHOOL
Leonard Bloomfield – his work: Language (1933)
Whorf, Sapir
Noam Chomsky – his follower, wrote New Approach to Syntactic Structures (1957)
– a critic of structuralism – founded transformational generative linguistics
THE LONDON SCHOOL – J.R. Firth – Firthian and Neo-Firthian linguistics, accent
on the relation between language and culture
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Other linguistic approaches
Traditional linguistics: also called traditional grammar, based on old Latin tradition, its
terminology not precise, tends to be prescriptive (prescribes what should be said), pays
attention to form
Transformational generative linguistics: (N. Chomsky) formal, bears mathematic
features, is mentalistic – deals with language competence stored in human mind, the
realization of language = performance, makes use of intuition (what a native speaker
would say, is correct, needs no further evidence), language is an innate ability,
concentrates on syntax – “Each language can produce (generate) an infinite number of
sentences out of a limited number of elements.”
THE SCOPE OF LINGUISTICS
Linguistics- a systematic study of language
Some problems that provoke linguists:
What is a language? How does a language work?
What do all languages have in common?
How does human language differ from animal communication?
How does a child learn to speak?
Why do languages change?
Linguistics – descriptive x traditional grammar – prescriptive
THE SCOPE OF LINGUISTICS
PHONETICS study of human speech sounds
PHONOLOGY sound patterns of a language
MORPHOLOGY deals with meaningful combinations of
sounds
LEXICOLOGY deals with vocabulary (lexis) and word-
formation
LEXICOGRAPHY making dictionaries
SYNTAX deals with arrangement of words
SEMANTICS studies meaning
PRAGMALINGUISTICS
(Pragmatics)
how speakers use the language and
meaning in concrete situations
PSYCHOLINGUISTICS language and mind
SOCIOLINGUISTICS language and society
ANTHROPOLOGICAL
LINGUISTICS
language and culture
STYLISTICS language and literature
26
HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS the history and development of
language
COMPUTER LINGUISTICS CALL – Computer Assisted Language
Learning
E-learning
PHILOSOPHICAL LINGUISTICS language + logical thought
APPLIED LINGUISTICS
(methodology, didactics)
language and its teaching, ELT
CORPUS LINGUISTICS constitutes language corpora (samples
of language)
27
UNIT 4
TOPICS
Grammar, morphology and syntax
KEYWORDS
clause
conjugation
declination
descriptive
grammar
morphology
morpheme
prescriptive
sentence
syntax
Lecture 4 Grammar, morphology and syntax
Grammar - introduction
prescriptive (traditional grammar) descriptive (linguistics)
Swan, Quirk, Murphy, Dušková, Huddleston, etc.
Early 1970s – first Quirk’s grammar The comprehensive grammar of the English
language
shows language as it is, it is not prescriptive
Linguistics on the border between an exact science and a humanity – form (can be
measured) x meaning (cannot), both can be analysed, only the method has to be
appropriate
inexact methods – subjective – e.g. analyzing meaning
exact methods – high degree of objectivity
form meaning
28
pronunciation
(phonology) grammar
(syntax) meaning
(semantics)
substance
(phonetics)
relates to
(phonology) form
grammar + lexis
relates to
(semantics) extra-linguistic
reality
phonetics morphology syntax lexicology semantics pragmatics
MORPHOLOGY
Morphology = branch of linguistics that studies morphemes.
Morpheme = the smallest significant unit of grammar. It has its own meaning.
Morpheme – has meaning vs Phoneme – can distinguish meaning
Morphology + Syntax = traditional grammar.
Morphology deals with inflections and word forms.
morphemes: lexical (free) / grammatical (bound)
(= words) (inflections, grammatical endings)
lexical grammatical
goes, going go -es, -ing
fathers, fatherly father -s, -ly
oldest old -est
Affixes un-demand-ing (un- prefix, -ing suffix)
All affixes are bound morphemes, i.e. they cannot stand alone.
demand = lexical morpheme, i.e. it can stand alone as a separate word.
Morpheme structure
morpheme = formeme + sememe.
Formeme = the form of the morpheme (i.e. the combination of letters or sounds
respectively)
Sememe = the meaning of the morpheme
MORPHEME STRUCTURE
TABLES TABLE -S
lexical morpheme inflectional morpheme
formeme: table s
sememe: a piece of furniture that consists
of a flat top supported by legs
plural, more than one
29
Allomorph (allomorpheme) = variation of a morpheme
e.g. “-ed” different formemes [t], [d] or [id] but the same meaning.
il- legal different formemes
im- possible the same sememe = negation
in- complete
ir- regular
inflectional morphology vs derivational morphology
derivational morpheme derives a new word class by means of affixation
-en strength strengthen - derivational suffix
inflectional morpheme used to decline and conjugate, form grammatical categories
book books no change in word class
book’s
conjugational paradigm e.g. the verb to book (present tense paradigm)
I book we book
you book you book
he/she/it books they book
paradigm = a set of all different forms of a word.
book – 4 forms: book, books, booked, booking (typical of English)
write – 5 forms: write, writes, wrote, written, writing (richer)
be – 8 forms: be, am, is, are, was, were, been, being (the richest English verb)
grammatical categories
nouns – number, gender, case verbs – tense, aspect, mood, voice
traditional word classes
verb
noun
adjective
adverb
pronoun
numeral (number)
preposition
conjunction
interjection
article
30
SYNTAX
Syntax = branch of linguistics that studies words, their combinations, and relations
between them. (syntagmatic, horizontal relations)
basic category: sentence
no universally accepted definition of the sentence
Sentence
the principal syntactic unit which expresses an idea (togetherness among the
sentence constituents)
a linguistic unit which begins with a capital letter and ends with a full stop
an elementary communicative utterance through which the speaker reacts to
reality (Mathesius)
the longest unit of grammatical description (Lyons)
Sentence types:
declarative Peter goes to school.
interrogative May Peter go to school?
exclamatory What a lovely picture!
imperative Stop asking me questions!
In traditional syntax the sentence consists of units (phrases):
I have known that lady for many years.
subject
noun phrase (NP)
predicate
verb phrase (VP)
predicate
prepositional phrase (PP)
I
have known that lady for many years.
determiner modifier head
noun phrase: a good boy
In English syntax the verb is the core of a sentence.
Sentences consist of elements = parts of the sentence
subject verb object adverbial
I have known that lady for many years.
Some verbs require an object, some do not:
The sun is shining. does not require an object is intransitive
The sun is melting the ice. requires an object is transitive
*The sun is melting.
31
Types of sentences
Simple sentence: The sun gives us warmth.
main clause dependent clause
Complex sentence: The sun gives us what we need. – functions as an object = object
clause
Clause = a group of words containing a verb.
Verbs – finite, non-finite (infinitives, participles)
Opening his suitcase, he took out a revolver. – participle clause
(common in English, rare in Czech)
Altough eighty, she can run very fast. – verbless clause
A complex sentence consists of clauses. A compound sentence consists of main
clauses.
The most important elements of English sentences are the subject and the verb. They
are called obligatory sentence elements.
sentences are
anal
ysed
into
are
used
to
build
sentences
clauses clauses
phrases phrases
words words
morphemes morphemes
LOGICAL vs GRAMMATICAL SUBJECT
grammatical s. logical s.
The letter was written by Peter.
Functional Sentence Perspective (FSP)- CZ aktuální členění větné, funkční větná
perspektiva
developed by the Prague School
each sentence consists of a theme (known information) and a rheme (new information)
the logical process is to proceed from the theme towards the rheme, from old to new
rheme theme rheme
Once upon a time there was a king. The king had three daughters.
The theme usually comes at the beginning of the sentence, the rheme at the end. If it is
not so, it shows some abnormality:
Three daughters he had. rheme at the beginning emphasis
32
UNIT 5
TOPICS
The sounds of language – phonetics and phonology
KEYWORDS
assimilation
consonant
diphthong
phoneme
phoneme – grapheme correspondence
phonetics
phonology
transcription
vowel
Lecture 5
The sounds of language - phonetics and phonology
Phonetics = study of production, transmission and reception of speech sounds.
(articulatory) (acoustic) (auditory)
(some physiology) + (some physics)
articulatory production how the speaker produces the sounds, articulatory organs
acoustic transmission sound spectrographs, spectrograms, i.e. sound pictures
auditory reception how the listener’s brain identifies what it receives from the ear
practical applications: ELT, speech recognition technology
Writing - spaces between words
Speech - no spaces
For somebody who doesn't understand the language it can be an uninterrupted
continuous stream of sounds. Words are linked together in speech.
Even if we hear only a part of the sentence our brain is often able to deduce what has
been said. (there’s more to language than just the form)
All human beings are alike but every human being has a different and unique set of
fingerprints. Idiolect – the language of an individual
There are hundreds of languages. Each of the languages uses a distinctive and
different system of sounds.
33
Speech consists of consonants and vowels
vowels – mouth is open, no obstruction to the sound
consonants – sound not allowed free passage
English – 24 consonants Czech – 22 consonants
English – 20 vowel sounds Czech – 5 vowel sounds
but only 5 letters for vowels – phoneme – grapheme correspondence
how much we „pronounce as we write“
(English far from it, Czech almost 100% correspondence)
e.g. [i:] – ee (been), eo (people), ie (field), ei (receive)
ea (leaf), uay (quay), ey (key), i (machine)
Why is this?
diphthongs, triphthongs
(8) (4)
GHOST = [fiš] ! enough, women, sure, listen
phonetic transcription – the „language of phonology“, sometimes the only means to
identify the word (many homophones)
English – some consonants are aspirated (p, t, k), voiced, voiceless
vowels can be – open – close, front – back, short - long
In English – characteristic - the so called consonant clusters. It is a group of
consonants existing together without a vowel:
sixth - the cluster is [ksө]; also glimpsed, strengths
Interesting is this: If we have in English a word with three consonants at the
beginning, the first consonant is always "s", the second either "p", "t" or "k" and the
third can be "r", "l", or "w".
Phonology = study of sounds and sound patterns of a specific language
phoneme (elementary unit) = the smallest segment of sound that can distinguish
meaning.
(= the sounds of a language)
We have 44 phonemes in English. Some languages have few phonemes, e.g. 14
phonemes only (in Hawaii) or in the area of Caucasus - even 89 phonemes.
(form differs but function stays the same – to communicate)
Human beings are capable of producing an infinite number of sounds. Each language
uses only a small proportion of it. There are no two languages which use the same set of
sounds.
allophone = variation of a phoneme, a distinguished sound but cannot distinguish the
meaning.
e.g. dull [l] vs [ł] (dark l) or [p] - [ph] port – sport
in fluent speech – intonation – each language different intonation patterns (often
makes problems to learners)
assimilation – sound become more similar when close to each other
34
let you out – [letšu’aut]
35
UNIT 6
TOPICS
Word stock, lexicology and lexicography
KEYWORDS
dictionary
glossary
lexicography
lexicology
lexicon
word
word formation
wordstock
Lecture 6
Word stock, lexicology and lexicography
Lexicon, lexis – words stock, a set of all words of a given language
Lexicology is the study of words. Lexicology – lexical morphemes
Morphology – mainly inflectional morphemes
No unified definition of word. Several theories e.g.:
Word is an expression which can stand in isolation. (what about speech?)
Word is an expression which has one meaning. (words with more meanings What is
meaning?)
Types of words with regards to different points of view:
1. orthographic word - has spaces on either sides
IT IS A WORD - there are four words here
2. morphological word
BULL, BULLS - there are two words here, we speak about two unique forms
3. lexical word (dictionary entries, lexical items, the point of view of lexicology)
36
CHAIR, CHAIRS - there is only one word here, the form doesn't matter
4. semantic word
TABLE - a peace of furniture or a list of facts and figures arranged in an ordered
way
2 words
5. phonological word
FLOOR, FLAW 1 word [flo:]
Word formation
forming new words, enriching the lexicon
the majority of new words are nouns
DERIVATION prefixation untrue
suffixation feverish
affixation distasteful
CONVERSION export [ekspo:t] - noun
export [iks'po:t]- verb
COMPOUNDING wall + paper = wallpaper
BORROWING arena, jungle, harem, pasta
INVENTION wireless, television
BACKFORMATION television to televise
baby-sitting baby-sit
shortening, clipping
popular pop
BLENDING smoke + fog = smog
Channel + tunnel = Chunnel
SHORTENING abbreviation USA, CNN
acronym UNESCO
NATO
OPEC
Lexicography
Dictionaries – lists of words of one or more languages, usually in alphabetical order
37
Originally glossaries – explaining difficult words in Homer’s plays, Latin psalters etc.
Lexicography – making dictionaries,
Famous lexicographers: Dr Samuel Johnson (1709-1784)
James Murray (1837-1915) – Oxford English Dictionary
Noah Webster (1758-1843) – An American Dictionary of the English
Language
American English identity
Merriam-Webster International Dictionary of the English Language
size: large dics: 260,000 headwords, medium 90,000, small 40,000
multilingual dictionaries, pictorial dictionaries, encyclopaedic dictionaries
dictionaries of synonyms, of collocations
dictionaries for special purposes – medicine, chemistry etc.
corpus-based dictionaries, CD-ROM (cross-references)
38
UNIT 7
TOPICS
The linguistic sign – semantics and semiotics
KEYWORDS
antonymy
collocation
connotation
denotation
homograph
homophone
hyperonym
hyponym
C. K. Ogden
polysemy
semantics
sememe
semiotics
synonymy
Lecture 7
The linguistic sign - semantics and semiotics
Semantics
Deals with meaning. Meaning is vague, intangible (nehmatatelný), and often relative:
cold weather vs cold coffee
The green ideas are flying furiously. meaningful words, but no sense (sentence
meaning)
Flying planes can be dangerous.
The teacher said the pupil is stupid.
polysemy – many connected meanings: star (object in the sky, an entertainer)
homonymy – one form but different meanings: pupil (a student at basic school, in the
eye)
hyperonymy/hyponymy
39
HYPERONYM
(superordinate expression)
FLOWER
HYPONYMS
(subordinate expressions)
tulip daisy rose forget-me-not
antonymy - opposite meanings big x small young x old
synonymy - a relationship in which two or more words have the same or similar
meaning.
2 types of synonymy - total (is more an ideal, than a reality)
partial - is always partial (not interchangeable in all contexts)
tall, high – almost 100%
collocation peel – skin: potatoes: boiled (skin), raw (peel)
banana: skin/peel
sentence synonymy John sold it to me. x I bought it from John.
homophones – weather/whether[weə] wear/where[weə]
homographs – bow [bəu] [bau] wind [wind] [waind][waund]
etymology (history) of the expression - what was at the origin.
orchard Latin hortus (garden) + OE geard (garden)
(horticultural college)
orangutan Malay orang hutan (man of the forest)
idioms - groups of words the meaning of which cannot be explained by translating the
individual parts of it.
to spill the beans to reveal a secret
to kick the bucket to die (not *to kick the pail)
a close shave a narrow escape
a banana skin something that could cause difficulty
Meaning – signifier signified
relationship between expression and object
a semantic relationship: smoke fire
a red light stop!
40
The semantic triangle Ogden / Richards
THOUGHT
(reference)
symbolises refers to
no direct connection
SYMBOL REFERENT
(“word”) (“thing”)
A limited number of linguistic signs must refer to reality that is potentially infinite.
Semantic analysis sememe – a set of semes (minimal units of meaning)
morpheme
formeme + sememe
semes
male bovine
bull + +
cow - +
calf ± +
not dry not wet
wet moist dampish dry
a. b. c. d.
It’s quite moist – in fact it’s rather wet.
It’s not wet, just moist.
It’s somewhere around moist or dampish.
It is neither wet nor dry, just dampish.
41
Denotative and connotative meaning
denotation – what the word really means
vessel – a hollow, usually curved, utensil for holding a liquid or loose material,
a container
a large hollow structure designed to float on and move through water carrying
crew, passengers or cargo, a ship
a tube in which body liquid is contained and coveyed or circulated, a vein
connotation – emotive meaning, associative meaning
ox – clumsy, strong, dull fox – sly, cunning
42
UNIT 8
TOPICS
Processing linguistic data – corpus linguistics
KEYWORDS
annotation
British National Corpus (BNC)
corpus
Czech National Corpus
lemmatisation
tagging
Lecture 8
Processing linguistic data – corpus linguistics
Corpus = a collection of texts (latin „body“ = a body of text)
Used for stylistic or conversational analysis
Corpus used for linguistic analysis – must be representative (broad range of authors and
genres), preferably stored in an electronic form
Corpora are finite x language is infinite (chomsky)
Average size of a corpus 1,000,000 words
Monitor corpus – new texts added steadily
Annotation of corpus – adding linguistic information, adding tags
e.g. „gives“ – „gives_VVZ", VVZ indicating that it is a third person singular present
tense (Z) form of a lexical verb (VV).
unfortunately not yet one general standard
text header annotation:
<A CHARLES DICKENS> = author: Charles Dickens
<N LITTLE DORRIT> = name of the document
<O 1857> = date of origin
<V PROSE>
<I formal/informal>
43
<T> type of text <T LET PRIV> = private letter <X FEMALE> Sex of author
part of speech annotation: Perdita&NN1-NP0; ,&PUN; covering&VVG; the&AT0; bottom&NN1; of&PRF;
the&AT0; lorries&NN2; with&PRP; straw&NN1; to&TO0; protect&VVI;
the&AT0; ponies&NN2; '&POS; feet&NN2; ,&PUN; suddenly&AV0; heard&VVD-
VVN; Alejandro&NN1-NP0; shouting&VVG; that&CJT; she&PNP; better&AV0;
dig&VVB; out&AVP; a&AT0; pair&NN0; of&PRF; clean&AJ0; breeches&NN2;
and&CJC; polish&VVB; her&DPS; boots&NN2; ,&PUN; as*CJS; she&PNP;
'd&VM0; be&VBI; playing&VVG; in&PRP; the&AT0; match&NN1; that&DT0;
afternoon&NN1; .&PUN;
The codes used are:
AJ0: general adjective
AT0: article, neutral for number
AV0: general adverb
AVP: prepositional adverb
CJC: co-ordinating conjunction
CJS: subordinating conjunction
CJT: that conjunction
DPS: possessive determiner
DT0: singular determiner
NN0: common noun, neutral for number
NN1: singular common noun
NN2: plural common noun
NP0: proper noun
POS: genitive marker
PNP: pronoun
PRF: of
PRP: prepostition
PUN: punctuation
TO0: infintive to
VBI: be
VM0: modal auxiliary
VVB: base form of lexical verb
VVD: past tense form of lexical verb
VVG: -ing form of lexical verb
VVI: infinitive form of lexical verb
VVN: past participle form of lexical verb
Lemmatisation = reduction of the words in a corpus to their respective lexemes N12:0510g - PPHS1m He he
N12:0510h - VVDv studied study
N12:0510i - AT the the
N12:0510j - NN1c problem problem
N12:0510k - IF for for
N12:0510m - DD221 a a
N12:0510n - DD222 few few
N12:0510p - NNT2 seconds second
N12:0520a - CC and and
N12:0520b - VVDv thought think
N12:0520c - IO of of
N12:0520d - AT1 a a
N12:0520e - NNc means means
44
N12:0520f - IIb by by
N12:0520g - DDQr which which
N12:0520h - PPH1 it it
N12:0520i - VMd might may
N12:0520j - VB0 be be
N12:0520k - VVNt solved solve
N12:0520m - YF +. -
Types of annotation: parsing = involving a tree
Semantic tagging:
And 00000000
the 00000000
soldiers 23241000
platted 21072000
a 00000000
crown 21110400
of 00000000
thorns 13010000
and 00000000
put 21072000
it 00000000
on 00000000
his 00000000
head 21030000
and 00000000
they 00000000
put 21072000
on 00000000
him 00000000
a 00000000
purple 31241100
robe 21110321
The numeric codes stand for: 00000000 Low content word (and, the, a, of, on, his, they etc)
13010000 Plant life in general
21030000 Body and body parts
21072000 Object-oriented physical activity (e.g. put)
21110321 Men's clothing: outer clothing
21110400 Headgear
23231000 War and conflict: general
31241100 Colour
discoursal and text linguistic annotation:
cohesion, anaphoric reference
A039 1 v (1 [N Local_JJ atheists_NN2 N] 1) [V want_VV0 (2 [N the_AT (9
Charlotte_N1 9) Police_NN2 Department_NNJ N] 2) [Ti to_TO get_VV0
rid_VVN of_IO [N 3 <REF=2 its_APP$ chaplain 3) ,_, [N {{3 the_AT
Rev._NNSB1 Dennis_NP1 Whitaker_NP1 3} ,_, 38_MC N]N]Ti]V] ._.
The above text has been part-of-speech tagged and skeleton parsed, as well as
anaphorically annotated. The following codes explain the annotation:
(1 1) etc. - noun phrase which enters into a relationship with anaphoric elements
in the text
45
<REF=2 - referential anaphor; the number indicates the noun phrase which it
refers to - here it refers to noun phrase number 2, the Charlotte Police
Department
{{3 3}} - noun phrase entering in equivalence relationship with preceding noun
phrase; here the Rev Dennis Whitaker is identified as being the same referent as
noun phrase number 3, its chaplain
phonetic transcription corpora
prosodically annotated corpora - stress, intonation and rhythm
1 8 14 1470 1 1 A 11 ^what a_bout a cigar\ette# . /
1 8 15 1480 1 1 A 20 *((4 sylls))* /
1 8 14 1490 1 1 B 11 *I ^w\on't have one th/anks#* - - - /
1 8 14 1500 1 1 A 11 ^aren't you .going to sit d/own# - /
1 8 14 1510 1 1 B 11 ^[/\m]# - /
1 8 14 1520 1 1 A 11 ^have your _coffee in p=eace# - - - /
1 8 14 1530 1 1 B 11 ^quite a nice .room to !s\it in ((actually))# /
1 8 14 1540 1 1 B 11 *^\isn't* it# /
1 5 15 1550 1 1 A 11 *^y/\es#* - - - /
The codes used in this example are: # end of tone group
^ onset
/ rising nuclear tone
\ falling nuclear tone
/\ rise-fall nuclear tone
_ level nuclear tone
[] enclose partial words and phonetic symbols
. normal stress
! booster: higher pitch than preceding prominent syllable
= booster: continuance
(( )) unclear
* * simultaneous speech
- pause of one stress unit
The use of corpora:
In speech research – samples of real, natural language, conversation studies
In lexicography – making dictionaries
In grammar – to check the rules in practice
In applied linguistics – language teaching based on new textbooks using real natural
language instead of invented examples based on intuition, use of examples
In dialectology
Cultural studies
Leech and Fallon (1992) used the results of these earlier studies, along with KWIC
concordances of the two corpora to check up on the senses in which words were being
used. They then grouped the differences which were statistically significant into fifteen
broad categories. The frequencies of concepts in these categories revealed differences
between the two countries which were primarily of cultural, not linguistic difference.
For example - travel words were more frequent in American English than British
English, perhaps suggestive of the larger size of the United States. Words in the
domains of crime and the military were also more common in the American data, as was
"violent crime" in the crime category, perhaps suggestive of the American "gun
46
culture". In general, the findings seemed to suggest a picture of American culture at the
time of the two corpora (1961) that was more macho and dynamic than British culture.
Although this work is in its infancy and requires methodological refinement, it seems to
be an interesting and promising area of study, which could also integrate more closely
work in language learning with that in national cultural studies.
BNC – British National Corpus
Czech National Corpus – linguists in Prague – Hajič
47
UNIT 9
TOPICS
Language and mind - psycholinguistics
KEYWORDS
behaviorism
language acquisition
mentalism
speech disorders
Lecture 9
Language and mind – psycholinguistics
- what goes on in the human mind when an individual acquires, comprehends, produces
and stores language
Language acquisition
children learning to speak ELT – adults learning a foreign language
How does a child acquire language?
2 theories.
Mentalism: In the mind of each human being there is some input programme which
helps the child to talk. They compare this ability to talk with the ability to walk.
Children are genetically programmed to talk.
When a child is not exposed to language, it will not learn it because it needs an
example.
- „wolf children“ – Kaspar Hauser
Behaviourism: B. F. Skinner (1957): The Verbal Behaviour
stress the importance of behaviour
no innate programme - language learning in children can be explained in the same way
as learning of a dog to stand begging for a biscuit
learning a language involves: training, stimulation, immitation, motivation and
repetition
48
All children of all races and nationalities, no matter what their intelligence, class or sex
is, learn language in regular steps. They start form babbling to one-word utterances
and then they combine the words together.
1st year
producing sounds - babbling, articulating syllables
necessary to speak to the child but not insist on him/her speaking early, the child
acquires a sound prior to being able to express it
1.5 – 2 years: short words
2 – 3 years
the fastest development
grammar rules, joining words into sentences, distinguishing present, past, distinguishing
gender
after 5:
can understand utterances which he has never heard
can also produce sentences totally new
can use his knowledge of speech to acquire new skills
human mental lexical capacity (active/passive 10-50 thousand to 250-500 thousand
words)
memory: long-term, short-term, sensoric memory
sensoric m. – remembers picture of the world around (0.1-0.5 sec)
looking into a campfire, watching a burning stick
short-term – much limited, able to store 5 or 6 latest portions of info (question of
minutes)
does not remember the sounds but the meaning
long-term – remembers events from recent or less recent past
is theoretically unlimited in space (human brain capacity)
difficulties with transferring info from short-term to long-term memory
forgets the most recent events first – old people remembering their childhood
learning strategies and methods – special ones: superlearning, learning subconsciously
Adults learning a foreign language – never so quick as small children
ideal start at elementary school, at 16-17 at latest
mistakes because of interference of the mother tongue
visual types – need pictures to remember the words
audial types – need to listen and repeat aloud
those who need movement or activity – play with the words
Speech disorders
a) disphasia - bad speech, the person can't speak properly
b) dyslexy - word blindness, the person can't read
c) aphasia - without speech, the loss of language because of age or some accident, a
stroke, problems caused by being tired, getting old etc.
d) anomia - problems in finding words, without naming ability.
e) aggrammatism - the person doesn't use proper grammar
49
UNIT 10
TOPICS
Language and society - sociolinguistics
KEYWORDS
bilingualism
code-switching
dialect
idiolect
language
multilingualism
society
sociolect
sociolinguistics
Lecture 10
Language and society – sociolinguistics
language and society, language in society
How do people use language when they interact with other members of society?
William Labov – USA, the 1950s: Different social classes have different kind of
language.
recorded shop assisstants in a department store
Language as a means of social stratification.
Types of language variation:
1. geographic variation - dialect – variation of a language spoken in a region
dialectology, isoglosses – fuzzy border areas
interdialects – combination of dialects, larger areas
the border between dialects and languages: Czech / Slovak – mutually understandable
politically and historically
different
dialects of Chinese – mutually unintelligible, common script only
variations of dialects – two villages, two variations of a dialect (Slovacko)
Dialects may differ in phonetics, lexis and grammar.
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2. social variation
l
different social groups - sociolects
slang of Czech students (pařba, opruz, týpek, vychytávka, výpitek, zápich, kolo, to
nedám, nechytám se)
slang of soldiers, sportsmen, railway personnel – professional language
the language of internet chat
language of lawyers – legalese language of journalists – journalese
3. functional variation – functional styles
Factors that influence the language of an individual:
age young people more innovative, old people conservative
sex the language of women / men
female topics: housework, children (feminism!!!)
male topics: sport, politics, women
ethnicity
social-economic background (in Britain class distinctions)
education
Bilingualism / multilingualism
bilingualism: one area with more than one language in normal communicative
situations
both languages are equal - e.g. in Belgium, Canada, Switzerland
languages are not equal - e.g. the British Isles, people can usually speak both, but
choose to speak English as the first language
one language in official contact with strangers (education, officiality)
another at home – a signal of friendliness – e.g. German and Italian in Northern Italy
Guaraní and Spanish in Paraguay
code-switching
Language death - language planning for endangered languages (Crystal)
(culture death!)
In bilingual areas it is the language which people understand the best, when another
language becomes more prestigeous, people often claim it is their mother tongue.
A language lives by use in communicative situations, the more varied the
communicative functions, the more it is protected from extinction.
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UNIT 11
TOPICS
Language and logic - pragmalinguistics
KEYWORDS
Cooperative principle
G. Leech
H. P. Grice
maxim
Politeness principle
Lecture 11
Language and logic – pragmalinguistics
- how people use the language in concrete situations
- study of meaning as communicated by a speaker and interpreted by a listener
- what is meant but is not said (the girl next door the girl exists!)
Uttering a true sentence changes the entire world. (L. Wittgenstein)
Saying it don’t make it so. (folk saying)
human communication is subject to a few principles:
H.P.Grice (1975) – Cooperative Principle:
It is assumed that both parties of communication cooperate and contribute to the
common verbal exchange in a sensible way.
Grice’s maxims – quantity, quality, relation, manner – how people should behave to
make their communication work – people deliberately disrespect them
e.g.
“Give as much information as is required for the current purposes of the exchange.”
“Do not say that for which you lack adequate evidence.”
“Be relevant. Speak to the topic.”
“Be orderly. Avoid ambiguity.”
Violating the maxims:
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A: What’s the time? B: Five to six.
B: In five minutes the film begins. (context !!!)
B: The same as yesterday. - teasing
SKI SERVICE
A: Good morning. Do you repair skis? B: When would you like to come for them?
A: Can I offer you some wine? B: Well, I’ve got my car outside.
A: We’re going to miss Annie and Paul. B: Well, we’re going to miss Annie.
This cake is really nothing special, but I would be very happy if you tried a piece.
Geoffrey Leech (1983) – Politeness Principle
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UNIT 12
TOPICS
Text linguistics and functional stylistics
KEYWORDS
anaphora
cataphora
cohesion
coherence
context
deixis
discourse
formal
informal
metaphor
metonymy
reference
register
style
text
Lecture 12
Text linguistics and functional stylistics
Text linguistics also discourse analysis
discourse – another name for text, means interpersonal communication
text = more than just a written passage, can be either spoken or written
conversation, monologue – are text too!
Text linguistics fashionable since the 1970s: Anthony van Dijk
Karel Hausenblas
František Daneš
line: speech sound (phoneme) morpheme phrase sentence text
Text or not?
? Kjhaskja kjhkj wqtwafc cnljpq dcslqdqjn.
? Fan black devotee eight grasp since revolver.
? I suppose we know each other. Ben Nevis is slightly higher than Lysa hora.
Everybody likes James Bond films. Don’t count your chicken before they hatch.
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? A week has seven days. Every day I feed my cat. Cats have four legs. The cat is
on the mat. Mat has three letters.
? Once upon a time there was a kingdom. In that kingdom there was a king. The
king...
had three daughters. Their names were Susan, Maggie, and Kate.
Relations within a text:
cohesion & coherence the semantic hanging together of a text
language devices hang together
(discourse markers, conjunctions) – linking devices
Firstly, in conclusion, well, let me see, as it were...
ideas have to hang together, too!
reference connecting together what is communicated
anaphoric pointing backward in the text
Several people approached. They seemed angry.
cataphoric pointing forward in the text
Listen to this: John’s getting married.
Pronouns play an important role:
Paul awoke and found he couldn't go back to sleep again.
exophoric referring outside the text, e.g. to some object from
extralinguistic reality
deixis reference to time and space
here – there, now - then
context = environment in which words are written or spoken
linguistic, situational, extralinguistic
Incoherent text:
Place made me think of that I suppose. All tarred with the same brush. Wiping pens in
their stockings. But the ball rolled down to her as if it understood. Every bullet has its
billet. Course I never could throw anything straight at school.
[Ulysses by James Joyce]
Stylistics
Style = purposelful choice of language means with regards to situation and practical
need
Ways of using form to appeal to reader / listener.
In Western philology usually usage of punctuation – commas, brackets, dashes etc.
- different from functional styles (What purpose does the language serve to?)
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administrative style language of science language of journalism
language of fiction language of law language of sport
stylistic levels formal / informal style, colloquial, slang
also called register
No sharp borders between functional styles.
Crystal & Davy: Investigating English Style.
Urbanová: Úvod do anglické stylistiky.
stylistic figures - metaphor – based on association of similarity between objects
similarity of shape a head of cabbage
teeth of a saw
similarity of function head of department
similarity of position foot of a mountain
metonymy She was wearing a fine fox.
house - a building
- people living in the building
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SAMPLE EXAM TEST
SAMPLE TEST - Introduction to English studies
1. Explain in English within the space provided.
root ________________________________________________________________
progressive_____________________________________________________________
sociolect_______________________________________________________________
hybrid ________________________________________________________________
intransitive _____________________________________________________________
homograph _____________________________________________________________
lingua franca ___________________________________________________________
collocation _____________________________________________________________
synonym ______________________________________________________________
interrogative ____________________________________________________________
2. Fill in the missing words in this table. What origin are these borrowings?
BORROWINGS IN THE ENGLISH WORD STOCK
................ kindergarten, sauerkraut, blitzkrieg, to plunder
………… zero, algebra, alchemy, alcohol;
harem, sofa, sultan, sultana
………… jungle, yoga, maharaja
………… ketchup
