What Is Language? PDF

What is Language? Agenda — Building blocks of language — Competence/performance — What does a linguist mean by grammar? ¡ Descriptive vs. prescriptive grammar Warm-up — Which of the following areas of linguistics focuses on rules for combining sounds? ¡ ¡ ¡ ¡ A. Phonetics B. Phonology C. Morph...

What is Language? Agenda — Building blocks of language — Competence/performance — What does a linguist mean by grammar? ¡ Descriptive vs. prescriptive grammar Warm-up — Which of the following areas of linguistics focuses on rules for combining sounds? ¡ ¡ ¡ ¡ A. Phonetics B. Phonology C. Morphology D. None of the above Review ¡ When we try to understand what language is, at the very least we are trying to the answer to the question: ÷ What do you KNOW when you know a language? ¡ This question is essential because all speakers have knowledge of their language. ÷ Often this knowledge is implicit. What is Language? ¡ So, what do you KNOW when you know a language? ¡ You know a lot of things. In particular: ÷ You have a finite set of building blocks and rules. ÷ You know how to use them. ¡ Let’s look at some examples. We will focus on English, but if you speak another language, see if you can find similar examples in your native language. What kind of Building Blocks & Rules? — You understand the inventory of sounds in your language: Phonetics is the study of these sound building blocks. ¡ [f] is an English sound. ¡ [x] is not an English sound, but it is used in Spanish as in the name José [xose].