English Linguistics - Basic Facts and Beyond PDF

lOMoARcPSD|43645142 Summary: English Linguistics - Basic Facts and Beyond English Linguistics: The Basics (Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München) Scanne, um auf Studocu zu öffnen Studocu wird von keiner Universität gesponsert oder unterstützt...

lOMoARcPSD|43645142 Summary: English Linguistics - Basic Facts and Beyond English Linguistics: The Basics (Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München) Scanne, um auf Studocu zu öffnen Studocu wird von keiner Universität gesponsert oder unterstützt. Heruntergeladen durch Samana Müller ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|43645142 Summary English Linguistics Basic Facts and Beyond Introduction: Linguistics = the scientific study of language(s) What is language? Language is a human non-instinctive method of communicating ideas, emotions and desires by using a system of voluntary produced symbols. The symbols are auditory and are produced by the speech organs (Sapir) Language family = a group of languages arose from a single source and have come from a common ancestor. Example : proto-indo-european (PIE) -> Germanic -> English, Dutsch, Frisian, Low German, High German, Yiddish Linguistic family trees don’t take loan words into account, aren’t accurate as there are no clean cuts between different languages Chinese & German → speak English → pidgim language (simplified version of English) → their children use that as native language and it turns to creole language human capacity non-instinctual primacy of spoken language arbitrary vocal symbols → no necessary connection between expression and meaning (no reason why “pen” is called “pen” different modes: speech, sign, writing The sign (Charles Sanders Peirce) a) Icon: words can be represented by acoustic sounds (wuff wuff =dog) or pictures icon for dog, people don’t have to know the icon because it represents what it’s supposed to mean b) Symbols: have to be conventionalized, we have to learn what the symbol stands for (for example street signs) c) Index: if one thing leads to another, part of the whole effect → it points/references to sth.: smoke is a cause of fire, tears for sadness, fiever is an index for illness; it indeces illness 1 Heruntergeladen durch Samana Müller ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|43645142 4. Ferdinand de Saussure (1857-1913) 4.1. Model of the linguistic sign signified The basic idea; meaning signifier Expression [tri:] Bilateral (it has two sides) & bidirectional (arrows: goes in two directions) mentalistic inseparable arbitrary → relation between signified and signifier is random. There is no reason we call it a tree linear → one sound at a time (like a flute not a piano) differential → a sign is defined by its relation to other signs → the word tree only means tree so that we can differentiate it from bush or flower Odgen & Richards semiotic Triangle (1923) In contrast to Saussure they added a third dimension the object of reference called ‘referent’ to their model. As there is no direct relation between the symbol and the referent, the meaning / concept has to be uncoded first. You know what it means Arbitrary → no actual connection You look for the actual object Hear the sound → “sound sequence” They say when we speak we mostly refer to a specific thing, not just the concept. If we for example say “We meet at the big tree next to city hall” the listener not only pictures any regular tree, but the specific one the other person talked about. The Representation (symbol) is the sound image of the word tree. The referent is the specific tree next to city hall. 2 Heruntergeladen durch Samana Müller ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|43645142 Structuralsim: fundamental concepts Langage = human capacity for language Langue = idealized language system (e.g. dictionary) of a speech community (focus on function) → abstract Parole = concrete realization (very individual) , observable language amterial (focus on form) → concrete langage– langue– parole descriptivism (describe what’s there → the way it is → no judgement) vs. prescriptivism (judgement and evaluation included) syntagmatic vs. paradigmatic relations diachrony & synchrony spoken vs. written language arbitrariness of the linguistic sign Synchronic = analysis of language (phenomena) at a specific point in time (Querschnitt) Diachronic = analysis of the development of language (phenomena) across time (Längsschnitt) Karl Bühler`s Organon Modell 1934: focus on language use (communicative functions, context, …) central questions: why is language the way it is? Why do you express yourself in the way you do? Expressive function: someone talks about one’s attitudes, beliefs, emotional sates Representative function: talking about things / world Appellative function: addressing requests, commands, wishes Example: Where are you? 1. Referential: you aren’t here yet, there is a delay. 2. Expressive: I have been waiting for you I’m annoyed / worried… 3. Appellative: why are you late, you should be on time, you should have left earlier 3 Heruntergeladen durch Samana Müller ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|43645142 Phonetics and Phonology Definitions Phonetics: the study of the physical characteristics of speech sounds Phonology: the study of the function of these sounds within languages Basic terminology: Phones concrete, individual, unique realization of… Phonemes smalles meaning-distinguishing units Allophones: are a group of phones represented by the same phoneme Branches of phonetics: Articulatory phonetics: sound production (anatomy, physiology) Acoustic phonetics: sound transmission (physics) Auditory phonetics: sound perception and processing (physiology, psychology) Minimal pairs test Phonemes are inventoried using comparisons between two words that differ in only one sound occupying the same position. If changing one sound results in a different meaning, that sound is a phoneme. Examples: (6) bed [bed] – dead [ded] → minimal pair, /b/ and /d/ are phonemes (7) bit [bɪt] – bat [bæt] → minimal pair, /ɪ/and /æ/ are phonemes (8)blood [blʌd] – broad [brɔːd] → not minimal pairs (2 sounds are different) Articulatory phonetics Speech organs 4 Heruntergeladen durch Samana Müller ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|43645142 Vowels are produced without blocking of the airflow Consonants are produced by (partial) blocking of the airflow Semi-vowels are produced like vowels but are used at the syllable boundary (like consonants), not in the middle like full vowels. Vowels Monophthongs + Diphthongs (tongue moves from one position to another) Closing diphthong = tongue moves upwards, mouth closes, e.g.. /aɪ/ Centering diphthong = tongue moves to the central schwa (/ə/), e.g. /ɪə/ 4.2.2. Description (distinguishing features) 1. Monophthong vs. diphthong 2. Height of the tongue (high, mid, low) 3. Part of tongue (front, central, back) 4. Length (short, long) (5. Lip-rounding) → in English, all back vowels are rounded (6. Tense vs. Lax) → lax = short monophthongs Examples: (1) /i:/ is a long, high front monophthong (2) /ʊə/ is a centering diphthong (diphthongs are always long!) (3) 5 Heruntergeladen durch Samana Müller ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|43645142 Consonants Description (distinguishing features) 1. Place of articulation (columns in the table above: bilabial, velar, etc.) 2. Manner of articulation (rows in the table above: plosive, lateral, etc.) 3. Voiceless vs. Voiced (vocal cords vibration) 4. Fortis vs. Lenis (muscle tension mirrors voicing in English = not needed in description) Examples: (3) /h/ is a voiceless glottal fricative (4) /f/ is a voiceless labio-dental fricative (5) /ŋ/ is a velar nasal (sonorants are always voiced in English) Suprasegmental phonology Connected speech effects: Assimilation (ten bags, open): neighbouring sounds become more similar to ease pronunciation Liaison or linking: insertion of additional sounds between two vowels (hiatus) Reduction & deletion: vowel weakening consonant cluster reduction 6 Heruntergeladen durch Samana Müller ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|43645142 Syllables Open syllables = end in vowel (no coda) Closed syllables = end in consonant The nucleus is obligatory and is usually a vowel Types of syllables: o minimum syllable: V o canonical syllable: CVC o syllable with coda = closed syllable o syllable without coda = open syllable Restriction of phoneme combination and position Consonant clusters in the onset: CCC (street) Consonant clusters in the coda: CCCC (texts) Defective distribution: o /ŋ/ not in the onset, /h/ not in the coda o /r/ not in the coda in British English RP (non-rhotic accent) 7 Heruntergeladen durch Samana Müller ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|43645142 Syntax Basics Syntax is the system of rules that encode the relations between words in a sentence. Those rules enable us to combine smaller units into bigger ones (i.e. sentences). A sentence is made up of clauses, which are made up of phrases, which are made up of words. Sentence constituents (Satzglieder): have a strong internal bond can come in various forms can be interchanged for other elements without harming the grammaticality of a sentence Sentence constituents can be analyzed based on their form (internal structure such as noun phrase, verb phrase…) or on the basis of their function (subject, object…) Form Endocendric/headed phrases Noun Phrase = NP Determinative: articles, genitives (Alice’s; that; a) Premodification: optional (wonderful; good) Head: pronoun/noun (him; Peter; wedding; girl; trip) Postmodification: optional (with the red hair; that I once had) Verb Phrase = VP Auxiliary/-ies: (was; has been; must have been; may have been being) Main verb: (sank; sinking; sunk) Head = always verb Adjective Phrase = AdjP Premodification: (incredibly) Head: (pleaasant; hot) Postmodification: (enough) Adverb Phrase = AdvP Premodification: (quite; very) Head: (yesterday; often; severly) Postmodification: (indeed) 8 Heruntergeladen durch Samana Müller ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|43645142 noun phrase (NP) → determinative (dtm), premodifier (premod), head (h), postmodifier (postmod) verb phrase (VP) → auxiliary verb (Vaux), modal verb (Vmod), main verb (mv) adjective phrase (AdjP) → premodifier (premod), head (h), postmodifier (postmod) adverbial phrase (AdvP) → premodifier (premod), head (h), postmodifier (postmod) Prepositional Phrase = PreP I met her…. Preposition: (for; at; on; by) Prepositional complement: (lunch; the corner of the street; Saturday morning; a strange coincidence) prepositional phrase (PP) → preposition (prep), prepositional complement (Cprep) e.g. “this short statement” → Noun Phrase → Determinative: determiner (this) → premodification: adjective phrase → head: adjective (short) → head: noun (statement) Function Subject – S Verb – V Object: direct O (Od) ; indirect O (Oi) ; prepositional = (Oprep) The entity affected by the action; comes directly after the verb Complement: subject c (Cs) ; object c (Co) Has a relation with the subject or the object and is mandatory to give meaning Adverbial: A Provide information about the circumstances of an action 9 Heruntergeladen durch Samana Müller ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|43645142 Clause Types Type example SV The sun (s) is shining (V1) SVO The lecture (s) bored (V2) me (Od) SVC Your dinner (S) seems (V3) ready (Cs) SVA My office (s) is (V3) in the next building (Aplace) SVOO I (s) must send (v4) my parents (Oi) an anniversary card (Od) SVOC Most students (s) have found (v5) her (Od) reasonably helpful (Co) SVOA You (s) can put (v5) the dish (Od) on the table (Aplace) Formal classes of subordinate clauses finite clauses (tensed/gebeugtes verb): You can come and pick it up whenever you want. infinite/nonfinite clauses (infinitive, participle): Knowing my temper , I didn’t reply. → not tensed, don’t know about the tense verbless clauses: File the edges until [they have become] smooth. Verb classes: Intransitive Verb: no object needed “Tim sleeps”. Monotransitive Verb: needs a direct object “Tim reads a book”. Copula Verb: links the subject with a adjective or predicate noun. “The sky is blue”. Ditransitive Verb: needs direct and indirect object “Peter gives his sister a book”. Complex transitive Verb: needs direct object and complement “The jury declared him the winner”. Case Grammar: → Charles Fillmore’s theory was criticized to be difficult to differentiate because the semantic roles are vague. Agentive: who is doing the action “John is singing”. Who → John. Instrumental: with what (force or object involved in the action) “John is opening the door with a key (instrument) Dative: with indirect object I show them (dative) my new watch. Factitive: verbs that function as the complement of the object such as named, judged…. “The jury (A) judged (F) the defendant (O) not guilty. Locative: is the where “They were singing on stage (L) Objective: is the what “They (A) opened the door (O) with the key (I) for them (D) in the basement (L) 10 Heruntergeladen durch Samana Müller ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|43645142 Main word classes (or parts of speech): adjectives → attributive (as premodifier) and/or predicative (as C s or Co) nouns → proper nouns, common nouns pronouns → you, yours, who, that, many, everybody... adverbs → there, here, soon, tomorrow, very, gently verbs → primary (be, do, have), modal (must, can, will, should...), full/lexical (play , eat , etc). prepositions → at, of, for, in, since, before, after... conjunctions → and, or, but, while, although... determiners → a, an, the, her, all, every, two (numeral)... interjections → ah, uhm, oh... Syntactic analysis (tree) 2.1. First level The evenings have turned very cold just recently S:NP V:VP Cs:AdjP A:AdvP I admire her reasoning but I reject her conclusions S:NP V:VP Od:NP Conj. S:NP V:VP Od:NP Although I admire her reasoning I reject her conclusions A:finite clause S:NP. V:VP Od:NP 11 Heruntergeladen durch Samana Müller ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|43645142 Morphology → Morphology is the study of the internal structure of words (inflectional morphology) and the formation of new words. → Difference: Word formation = affixation which creates new words (no dictionary entry: gebeugtes Wort (teaches – verb) Morphology = suffixation that adds grammar → new dictionary entry (teacher – noun) Basic terminology: The morpheme is the smallest meaning-bearing unit of a language. elected → {ELECT} + {ED} A morph is the actual realization of a morpheme (just like phones are the realization of phonemes) Allomorphs are concrete realizations of a morpheme on the level of parole For example, the plural morpheme {S} is most often realized as either /s/, /z/ or /ɪz/ : forks /fɔːks/, tables /'teɪbᵊlz/, boxes /'bɒksɪz/ Phonological conditioning: the choice of allomorph is based on its phonological environment, e.g. the form of plural {S} depends on the sound it follows (s;z;iz) Morphological conditioning: the morpheme that is the “base” of a word depends on the presence of another morpheme: courage = /'kʌrɪdʒ/ → courageous = /kəˈreɪdʒ-/ + /-əs/ wife = /waɪf/ → wives /waɪv-/ + /-z/ Morpheme types Free Bound Lexical Table, walk, pretty Pre-, -ness, -less, -er, -ful (create a new entry in the dictionary) → derivational Grammatical A, for, must -ed, -s, -ing (inflection) 12 Heruntergeladen durch Samana Müller ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|43645142 Free morphemes are lexemes: o Free lexical morphemes encompass lexical word classes (nouns, lexical verbs, adjectives), i.e. open classes: you can easily create new nouns, adjectives, etc. o Free grammatical morphemes encompass grammatical or functional word classes (articles, pronouns, auxiliaries, prepositions, etc.), i.e. closed classes: you can't make up prepositions on the spot Bound morphemes are affixes, they cannot stand alone: o Bound lexical morphemes, or derivational affixes, are affixes (prefixes or suffixes) which create lexemes, i.e. new dictionary entries. o Bound grammatical morphemes, or inflectional affixes, are suffixes that produce word forms. Special types allomorph: the conrete realization of a morpheme on the level of parole portmanteau form: unsegmentable morpheme carrying two or more meanings at the same time taught = {teach} + {-ed} (irregular forms) suppletion: replacive form without similarity to the original lexeme was = {be} + {-ed} zero-allomorph: a change in a word-form without formal marking, constructed unit with parallel function to regular morphemes, indicated with ∅ {hit} {ed} langue {hit} Ø parole Langue: Morpheme {teach} {3rd p.} (express the idea of: plural, genitive,..) Parole: Morph {teach} {es} Structure of a word-form Lexeme: technical term for a word on the level of langue (what you find in the dictionary) o complex: consists of more than one lexical morpheme o simple: only one lexical morpheme Stem: is what remains if you delete all grammatical bound morphemes. It can itself be a complex lexeme Root: is what remains if ALL bound morphemes have been deleted. It must be a simple (and usually free) lexeme. 13 Heruntergeladen durch Samana Müller ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|43645142 Word-formation → derivational morphology, i.e. creating lexemes Derivation Prefixation → often class-maintaining: impossible, misspeak, disable, empower Suffixation → often changes word-class: legalize, global, rainy, greenish Compounding → two or more free morphemes form one complex free morpheme → compounds are not separable and their first element cannot be modified Endocentric compound (determinative): the modifier modifies the head, e.g. a smartphone is a special kind of phone; mousemat Exocentric compound (bahuvrihi): head is unexpressed, e.g. a skinhead is not a special kind of head; egghead Appositional compound (dvandva): different descriptions of the same referent, e.g. singer-songwriter Conversion (aka ‘zero-derivation’) → creation of a new lexeme from an existing one as is, without affixing → can be total (cough → to cough) or partial (belief → to believe) (Shortenings) Clipping: deleting a part of a long lexeme, e.g. sci-fi, exam, gym, flu close the door) they are a dismatch between locution and illocution. Or explicit/ direct (close the door) locution corresponds directly to their illocution. Indirect speech acts "... cases in which one illocutionary act is performed indirectly by way of performing another" (Searle 1975) Dual illocution: o literal intention = sentence meaning (secondary illocutionary act) o non-literal intention = speaker meaning (primary illocutionary act) (→ more important) There is no milk in the fridge. literal: I hereby state that there is no milk in the fridge. non-literal: I hereby complain that there is no milk in the fridge. secondary illocutionary act: representative primary illocutionary act: expressive 23 Heruntergeladen durch Samana Müller ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|43645142 Cooperative principle (Grice) → any “communicative event” happens assuming that participants want to cooperate, i.e. that hearers/readers look for meaning → Speak in a way that fits the situation and helps the conversation move forward, based on what people expect in that type of talk. 4 conversational maxims: 1. Maxim of quality: Do not say what you believe to be false. Do not say that for which you lack adequate evidence (Don’t say wrong things; Say things you have evidence for) 2. Maxim of quantity: Make your contribution as informative as is required for the current purposes of the exchange and not more informative as required (Contribution should be as detailed as needed; Don’t say more than what is needed) 3. Maxim of relation: Be relevant. Do not change the topic 4. Maxim of manner: Avoid obscurity of expression, avoid ambiguity (doppeldeutigkeit), be brief, be orderly → The maxims are a description of our behavior: these are guidelines we tend to follow, and when we don't it is generally on purpose and for a reason. Because hearers cooperate, they are able to find what that reason is and make communication succeed. Face – Brown/Levinson’s approach Face is what we call our public self-image, which we try to mutually protect in interactions with other people. We use devices like indirect speech acts because they protect our interlocutor's face, while direct requests are perceived as face-threatening (e.g. “impolite”, undermining). Hence the expression to lose face! Negative face: “Don’t tell me what to do” Positive face: → finding similarities Face threatening acts (FTAs) = those acts that by their nature run contrary to the face wants of the addressee and/or of the speaker, indicating that some acts are intrinsically threatening to face 24 Heruntergeladen durch Samana Müller ([email protected])