Chapter 9: Language Flashcards
Exam 3 Study Guide
Langauge
a shared symbolic system for communication
Linguistics
the academic discipline that studies language
Psycholinguistics
the study of language as it is used, and learned, by people
Phonology
the study of the production and perception of language sounds
Syntax
the study of the structure of sentences and the rules determining the order of words in those sentences
Conceptual
analysis of sentence and phrase meaning
Belief
analysis of sentence and discourse meaning with reference to one’s own beliefs
Competence
the internalized knowledge of language and its rules
Performance
the actual language behavior that a speaker might generate
Wharf’s Hypothesis
language affects thinking, and one cannot have language without thought
Phonemes
the basic sounds that compose a language (categorical perception); there are approx. 200 phonemes present in all known languages; English contained 46
SVO (subject-verb-object)
“garden path” syntax (e.g., Mary hugged her dog)
Sentence Levels
deep, surface, and phrase
Transformational Grammar
the rules for generating active versus passive, affirmative versus negative, and like sentences
Cognitive Role of Syntax
we use syntax to help listeners figure out meaning and to minimize the processing demands of comprehension
