Chapter 4: Language Flashcards
Arbitrariness
The relationship between a symbol and its referent (meaning), in which there is no obvious connection between them.
Bound Morpheme
A unit of meaning that cannot stand alone; it must be attached to another morpheme.
Closed System
A form of communication that cannot create new meanings or messages; it can only convey pre-programmed (innate) messages.
Code-Switching
Using two or more language varieties in a particular interaction.
Creole
A language that developed from a pidgin when the pidgin becomes so widely used that children acquire it as one of their first languages.
Critical Age Range Hypothesis
Research suggesting that a child will gradually lose the ability to acquire language naturally and without effort if he or she is not exposed to other people speaking a language until past the age of puberty. This applies to the acquisition of a second language as well.
Cultural Transmission
The need for some aspects of the system to be learned; a feature of some species’ communication systems.
Design Features
Descriptive characteristics of the communication systems of all species. Including that of humans, proposed by linguist Charles Hockett to serve as a definition of human language.
Dialect
A variety of speech. The term is often applied to a subordinate variety of a language. Speakers of two dialects of the same language do not necessarily always understand each other.
Discreteness
A feature of human speech that they can be isolated from others.
Displacement
The ability to communicate about things that are outside of the here and now.
Duality of Patterning
At the first level of patterning, meaningless discrete sounds of speech are combined to form words and parts of words that carry meaning. In the second level of patterning, those units of measuring are recombined to form an infinite possible number of longer messages such as phrases and sentences.
Gesture-call System
A system of non-verbal communication using varying combinations of sound, body language, scent, facial expression, and touch, typical of great apes and other primates, as well as humans.
Historical Linguistics
The study of how languages change.
Interchangeability
The ability of all individuals of the species to both send and receive messages; a feature of some species’ communication systems.
Kinesics
The study of all forms of human body language.
Language
An idealized form of speech, usually referred to as the standard variety.
Language Death
The total extinction of a language.
Language Shift
When a community stops using their old language and adopts a new one.
Language Universals
Characteristics shared by all linguists.
Larynx
The voice box, containing the vocal bands that produce the voice.
Lexicon
The vocabulary of a language.
Linguistic Relativity
The idea that the structures and words of a language influence how its speakers think, how they behave, and ultimately the culture itself (also known as the Whorf Hypothesis)
Middle English
The form of the English language spoken from 1066 AD until about 1500 AD.
Minimal Response
The vocal indications that one is listening to a speaker.
Modern English
The form of the English language spoken from about 1500 AD to the present.
Morphemes
The basic meaningful units in a language.
Morphology
The study of the morphemes of a language.
Old English
English language from its beginnings to about 1066 AD.
Open System
A form of communication that can create an infinite number of new messages; a feature of human language only.
Oralist Approach
An approach to the education of deaf children that emphasizes lip reading and speaking orally while discouraging use of signed language.
Palate
The roof of the mouth.
Paralangauge
Those characteristics of speech beyond the actual words spoken, such as pitch, loudness, tempo, etc.
Pharynx
The throat cavity, located above the larynx.
Phonemes
The basic meaningless sounds of a language.
Phonology
The study of the sounds of language.
Pidgin
A simplified language that springs up out of a situation in which people who do not share a language must spend extended amounts of time together.
Pragmatic Function
The useful purpose of communication. Usefulness is a feature of all species’ communication systems.
Pragmatics
The study of the social use of space, including the amount of space an individual tries to maintain around himself in his interactions with others.
Proxemics
The study of the social use of space, including the amount of space an individual tries to maintain around himself in his interactions with others.
Register
A style of speech that varies depending on who is speaking to whom and in what context.
Semanticity
The meaning of signs in a communication system; a feature of all species’ communication systems.
Semantics
How meaning is conveyed at the word and phrase level.
Speech Act
The interaction or goal of an utterance; the intention may be different from the dictionary definitions of the words involved.
Standard
The variant of any language that has been given special prestige in the community.
Symbol
Anything that serves to refer to something else.
Syntax
Anything that serves to refer to something else.
Taxonomies
A system of classification.
Universal Grammar
A theory developed by linguist Noam Chomsky suggesting that a basic template for all human languages is embedded in our genes.
Unbound Morpheme
A morpheme that can stand alone as a separate word.
Vernaculars
Non-standard varieties of a language, which are usually distinguished from the standard by their inclusion of stigmatized forms.
