Exam 1 Flashcards
MASTERY
What is language?
the system that allows us to communicate with one another
what makes us human?
language distinguishes us from other creatures
what is a language (i)
i: a particular variety spoken in a community
what is a language (I)
I: The overarching system that encompasses human communication
how many human languages are there
7105 spoken/signed
Criteria for language distinction:
Mutual intelligibility: Two varieties are dialects if they are mutually intelligible; otherwise, they are different languages.
Political and cultural factors in language:
Quote: “A language is a dialect with an army and a navy.” – Max Weinreich
Arbitrariness in Language:
Concept: The sign-meaning relationship is arbitrary; different languages have different words for the same meaning.
Hierarchical organization of Language:
Example: Sounds form words, words form phrases, phrases form sentences.
Other properties of Language:
Displacement: Communicating about things not present.
Genetic endowment: All humans have an innate capacity to acquire language.
Rule-governed creativity in Language:
Definition: Creativity in language is constrained by grammar.
Competence vs. Performance:
Competence: Knowledge of language rules.
Performance: Actual use of language, which can be affected by various factors.
Key Focus Areas of Linguistics:
Organization of human language.
Modeling of language in the mind.
Language change over time.
Social factors affecting language use.
Language acquisition.
Unique Aspects of Human Language:
Key Points:
All humans use language to communicate, whether spoken or signed.
Animal communication systems do not match the complexity of human languages.
What is Linguistics?
Definition: The scientific study of human languages, focusing on properties and structures shared by all languages.
Common Features of All Languages:
More consonants than vowels.
Use of a finite set of sounds.
Presence of nouns and verbs.
Hierarchical structures.
Descriptivism vs. Prescriptivism:
Descriptivism: Understanding and describing how language is used in the real world.Prescriptivism: Advocating for “correct” ways of speaking and writing.
What Do Linguists Do?
Methods Used:
Corpora: Databases of language use.
Elicitation: Gathering judgments from speakers.
Experimentation: Measuring language production and perception.
Example of Descriptive Grammar:
Fact: The basic word order of English is Subject-Verb-Object, while Japanese follows Subject-Object-Verb.
Scenario of Descriptive vs. Prescriptive Rules:
Example: The use of “ain’t” in casual speech is a descriptive rule, despite prescriptive grammar suggesting it is inappropriate.
What Linguists Do Not Do:
Key Point: Linguists do not enforce grammar rules or correct language use; they study language as it is actually spoken.
Linguistic Diversity:
Definition: The challenge in defining languages due to political, religious, and social factors, often measured by mutual intelligibility.
Common Prescriptive Rules in English:
Don’t end sentences with a preposition.
Don’t split infinitives.
Avoid double negatives.
Origin of Prescriptive Rules:
Key Point: Many prescriptive rules come from Latin and Ancient Greek, influencing how modern English is modeled.
Major Languages in the World:
Fact: 2/3 of the world’s population speaks one of just 12 languages, while 1/4 of languages have fewer than 1,000 speakers.
Countries with Linguistic Diversity:
Example:
Papua New Guinea and Nigeria: Over 500 languages spoken.
Somalia: Only about 14 languages spoken.
Romance Languages:
Fact: Descendants of Proto-Germanic, divided into West Germanic (e.g., English, Dutch) and North Germanic (e.g., Swedish, Norwegian).
Language Families:
Definition: Groups of languages that share similar properties due to descent from a common ancestor.
Indo-European Languages:
Fact: These are descendants of Proto-Indo-European and include several subgroups like Romance, Germanic, Slavic, and Indo-Iranian.
Lingua Franca:
Definition: A common language used to facilitate communication in multilingual environments, e.g., English or Swahili in Kenya.
Case Study #3: Word Complexity:
Sino-Tibetan languages (e.g., Mandarin) have small, single-meaning words.
Native American languages (e.g., Onondaga) can have very long words representing complex thoughts.
Language Isolates:
Definition: Languages that are not genetically related to any other languages, such as Basque.
Case Study #1: Word Order:
Examples:
English: SVO (Subject-Verb-Object)
Japanese: SOV (Subject-Object-Verb)
Irish: VSO (Verb-Subject-Object)
Implications of Word Order:
Fact: Languages with SVO order tend to have prepositions, while those with SOV order usually have postpositions.
Linguistic Typology:
Definition: The classification of languages based on their grammatical properties, revealing possible patterns and structures.
Case Study #2: Sound Inventory:
Fact: Languages vary in the number of vowels; for example, Arabic has 3 vowels, while German has 14.
What is language policy?
Definition: An official mechanism by which a nation or group grants status or power to a particular language or variety, typically involving endorsement and enforcement by a governing body.
Language in the US:
Fact: The US has no official language; however, several states have adopted official languages, such as English, Hawaiian, and various Indigenous languages in Alaska.
Special Status of Languages:
Examples:
Louisiana recognizes French.
Oklahoma recognizes Cherokee.
New Mexico recognizes Spanish.
English Plus Movement:
Definition: A response to “English only” movements promoting linguistic diversity, acknowledging English as the de facto national language without official status in the Constitution.
Language and Power:
Key Point: Language has historically been used to establish dominance and suppress minority languages, as seen in the cases of Catalan and Basque in Spain.
Quebec Sovereignty Movement:
Fact: French culture and language are central to the separatist movement in Quebec, exemplified by Bill 101, which mandates that commercial signage must be in French.
Neocolonialism:
Definition: The official status of European languages in Africa reflects the lingering colonial influence, where indigenous languages have been discouraged.
Why is granting European languages official status problematic?
Key Point: It can lead to forced education in a second language, which may hinder learning as children learn best in their mother tongue.
Standard Language Challenges:
Definition: Granting official status to a “standard” variety of a language can be problematic as it might not represent the language spoken by the majority.
Language Planning:
Definition: Part of language policy that involves status planning, corpus planning, and acquisition planning to develop and promote a language.
Status Planning:
Focus Areas: Attitudes toward the language, intended environments of use, and the language’s status in regional and international communities.
Corpus Planning:
Components: Standardization of the language, status of the writing system, and modernization of the language.
Acquisition Planning:
Key Considerations: Literacy levels in the language, availability of teaching materials, and training for language educators.
What is a dialect?
Definition: Dialects are mutually intelligible forms of the same language that differ systematically.
Where do dialects come from?
Factors: Primarily geographic or political separation, along with social, historical, and religious factors.
Case Study: BCMS
Definition: Bosnian-Croatian-Montenegrin-Serbian (BCMS) illustrates a complex language vs. dialect situation due to ethnic and political factors following the breakup of Yugoslavia.
Case Study: Czech-Slovak
Fact: Czech and Slovak are mutually intelligible Slavic languages that were recognized as dialects of Czechoslovak before becoming separate official languages after the dissolution of Czechoslovakia.
Case Study: Arabic
Fact: Arabic has numerous dialects across a vast area, but a desire for cultural and linguistic unity leads to the use of a single shared language alongside unique regional varieties.
Dialect Continuum:
Concept: Language intelligibility is a cline; for example, Moroccan Arabic may be difficult to understand for speakers of Iraqi Arabic, but Moroccan and Libyan Arabic are more similar.
Role of Lingua Franca:
Definition: Standard Arabic serves as a lingua franca to manage variation between dialects, while Classical Arabic is primarily used in religious contexts.
English as a Global Lingua Franca:
Fact: English is used as a first language (L1) in countries like the US and UK and as a second language (L2) in regions such as South Asia and Africa.
Differences Between American and British English:
Examples:
Vocabulary: fries vs. chips
Spelling: color vs. colour
Grammar: “He is in the hospital” vs. “the team is/are winning”
Regional Dialects of English in the US:
Fact: Surveys have been conducted to analyze American English based on vocabulary and pronunciation, often represented on maps using isoglosses.
What is Accent?
Definition: Accent refers specifically to pronunciation differences within a dialect.
Northern Cities Vowel Shift:
Fact: This shift is associated with Chicago and has spread east, affecting regions like Syracuse.
Other Regional Accent Characteristics:
Examples:
West Coast: cot/caught merger
Southern: pen/pin merger
California: loss of vowel rounding
What is language endangerment?
Definition: A situation where languages face pressures (political, economic, environmental, religious) that hinder their transmission to children, leading to a loss of speakers.
Current Status of Languages:
Fact: Out of approximately 7,100 languages, 3,018 are considered endangered according to Ethnologue.
Political Pressure:
Key Point: Language endangerment can arise from pressure to adopt an official or lingua franca language, often seen in educational systems where indigenous languages are not used.
Economic Pressure:
Definition: Parents may prioritize teaching their children a dominant language perceived as necessary for success, often at the expense of their mother tongue.
Environmental Pressure:
Example: Environmental catastrophes and loss of land can lead to language endangerment, as seen with Native American populations forced onto reservations.
Religious Pressure:
Key Point: There can be pressure to adopt languages associated with dominant religions, complicating language preservation efforts for minority groups.
Language Revitalization:
Definition: A community effort, often with linguistic assistance, to reintroduce mother tongue transmission to children, starting with language documentation.
Stages of Endangerment:
Key Points:
A language is moribund when transmission from parent to child ceases.
It is classified as dead when there are no native speakers, though it may still be used as a second language.
Language Policy Components:
Components include:
Status planning
Corpus planning
Acquisition planning
Endangerment is Relative:
Fact: The number of speakers does not always correlate with the degree of endangerment; sociopolitical context plays a significant role.
Catalan vs. Spanish:
Example: Catalan has 4.1 million speakers but maintains a strong nationalist movement despite Spanish’s larger number of speakers.
Tamil vs. Hindi:
Example: Tamil, with 70 million speakers, may be considered a minority language compared to Hindi, which has over 500 million speakers.
Revitalization Efforts:
Examples:
Cornish
Hawaiian
Hebrew (Ulpan schools)
Maori
Irish (Gaeltacht areas)
Dead Languages:
Examples include:
Attic Greek
Latin
Church Slavonic
Sanskrit
Extinct Languages:
Examples:
Klallam (last speaker in 2014)
Yana (last speaker was Ishi)
Language Birth:
Fact: New languages can emerge, such as Fanagolo (from Zulu) and Iscamtho (used by gay and lesbian youth).
