Basic Terms
Geography Specific Terms
Random
Open-Ended
100
What is a linguist?
Someone who studies language
100
Why do languages diverge into regional dialects?
Patterns of settlement, migration, and geographical isolation
100
What demographic is a vocal fry typically used by?
It is a vocal pattern that characterizes how many college-age U.S. women, currently speak.
100
What is the difference between a “dialect” and a “standard language”? What dialects are spoken in the United States?
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200
What is language?
A means of communicating ideas or feelings by way of a conventionalized system of signs, gestures, marks, or articulate vocal sounds.
200
What is a lingua franca?
A common language among speakers whose native languages are different.
200
Where was one of the first documented graffiti? (We talked about this in class)
Ancient Pompeii
Open-ended: Is graffiti a type of regional dialect, why or why not?
200
What are five slang terms you and your colleagues use regularly? List them and trace the roots of their development?
300
What is a language family?
A collection of individual languages believed to be related in their prehistoric origin.
Open-ended: Name an example of a language family.
300
What is an example we talked about in class of a language that has changed very little?
Icelandic
300
What area do you think has the greatest diversity of accents/dialects?
The U.K.!
Open-ended: Name one!
300
Why might parents want their children to be proficient in a minority language even though most jobs, media, and public events are accessed through an official language?
400
What is a dialect?
Place-based speech patterns
Open-ended: What are some examples of dialects?
400
What is a toponym?
A living record of the previous occupants of a place and their ways of doing things.
Open-ended: Can you name an example of a toponym?
Ex. Manshack vs Menchaca
400
What is a mother tongue?
A language that a person has learned from birth or the first few years of life.
Open-ended: What is your mother tongue?
400
What is the role of the state in creating an official language? What do you think is gained in this process? What is lost?
500
Standard language is also known as?
Official language -
made in government offices, in the courts, and in the schools and is less alive and more artificial, though it, of course, also changes.
Open-ended: What is the standard language of the United States?
500
What is a language hearth?
A subset of cultural hearths; they are the source areas of languages.
500
Why do regional languages experience endangerment? What categorizes a language as endangered?
DAILY DOUBLE
The changing shape of communities and the economy, culturals having to adopt a more commonly used language.
Signs that a language is endangered include a relatively small number of speakers, declining numbers of speakers, and speakers all above a certain age (that is, children are not learning the language).
500
What is a language that has developed from the cultural mixing that comes from colonialism or forced migration? Come up with either a historical or current example.
Example from the textbook: the Garifuna language