Language and it's Structures
What is a a conventional system of signs that allow for creative communication of meaning?
Language
What is Synonymy?
Words where the meanings are the same
Big - large, elevator - lift
Habitual "be" is an English language trait commonly associated with...
A. African American Language
B. German --> English foreign language learners
C. Southern US dialect
D. Japanese --> English foreign language learners
African American English
True or False - Use of the 3rd person singular pronoun (they/them) is considered a new development in the English language.
False - there is certainly a recent uptick but we have used 3rd person singular they/them for hundreds of years.
According to Bergen (2016), what number of letters is most common for swears?
4
How many languages are there in the world today (give or take 500)
7100
Define prescriptive grammar.
Prescriptive grammar is a set of rules about language based on how people think language should be used. In a prescriptive grammar there is right and wrong language
A speech disorder that causes a sudden change to speech so that a native speaker is perceived to speak with a non-native accent.
Foreign Accent Syndrome (FAS)
Time's during a child/baby's development that are particularly important for language development are called...
Critical Periods
Name a specific part of the brain that is associated with language.
Broca's or Wernicke's area
What is Symbolic Language?
Symbolic - conventions/arbitrary, you have to memorize
Most of English
Ex: there is nothing about the word cat that is inherent to cats.
Define descriptive grammar.
Descriptive grammar is a set of rules about language based on how it is actually used. In a descriptive grammar there is no right or wrong language (just whether or not language is doing it's job).
In studies surveying the entire United States, which region's accent is deemed by other's to be "most correct"?
Midwest
What is the difference between language death and language extinction?
Death - No more native speakers
Extinction - lose the ability to faithfully recover/reproduce a langauge
What happens if someone has Broca's Aphasia?
No problem understanding - but difficulty putting words together (“syntactic disorder”).
What is semantics as it relates to langauge?
Semantics - How to interpret combinations of words (meaning)
Give an example of 2 hypernyms
Hyper = over.
So a hypernym is a superset of a smaller category.
So animal is a hypernym of dog which is a hypernym of Golden Retriever.
Name the author of 1 study about gender and language which we mentioned/discussed in class.
Jesperson (1922)
Fischer (1958)
Lakoff (1973)
Holmes (1984)
Kiesling (2001)
Queen (2005)
How many languages in the world today are considered endangered?
A. 217
B. 2895
C. 1421
D. 963
2895
What happens if someone has Wernicke's Aphasia?
No problem producing grammatical sentences but words are vague and incomprehensible - long non-sensical sentences.
"You know that smoodle pinkered and that I want to get him round and take care of him like you want before."
What is Iconic Language?
Iconic - representative of something, tied to the word used in some way.
Think some onomatopoeia
Ex: Donkeys say “hee-haww”
What is Polysemy?
Think of polysemy as 1 word with multiple meanings (that are related)
Words were the Sound + Form are the same.
These ARE semantically and/or historically related.
Crown (on top of tooth) and Crown (on top of head).
The tendency for people to seek out or be attracted to those who are similar to themselves is called.
Homophily
Name a language that has recovered from language death (or undergone language revitalization).
Hebrew
Cornish
Maori
A bunch of others
Describe the 2 common characteristics that Bergen (2016) identifies as patterns in swear words (NOT the amount of letters).
1. Monosyllabic
2. Ending in Closed Syllables
Will also accept Plosive consonants (Montell)