Exam 1 Review

Question 1

Arbitrariness of language

Answer 1

the relationship between speech sounds and the words they refer to has no natural reason

Question 2

creativity of language

Answer 2

each language has an infinite combination of sentences

Question 3

displacement

Answer 3

spatial or temporal; talk about something that is not present

Question 4

sound symbolism

Answer 4

words that imitate the sounds associated with the actions or objects they refer to

Question 5

descriptive grammar

Answer 5

true model of mental grammar of native speakers

Question 6

prescriptive grammar

Answer 6

“proper” grammar

Question 7

Kanzi

Answer 7

learned 200 symbols (slower than children) but created word order rules or used fixed formulas

Question 8

Nim Chimpsky

Answer 8

learned 125 ASL signs, created different sign sequences but with no rules

Question 9

Alex the parrot

Question 10

Rico the border collie

Question 11

linguistic determinism theory

Answer 11

language determines how you perceive the world, more words for snow means you see different types

Question 12

morpheme

Answer 12

smallest unit of linguistic meaning or grammatical function

Question 13

free morpheme

Answer 13

can be words by themselves

Question 14

bound morpheme

Answer 14

must be affixed to another morpheme

Question 15

root

Answer 15

smallest word, no affixes

Question 16

stem

Answer 16

root + affix

Question 17

affix

Answer 17

bound morphemes used to create new words

Question 18

types of affixes

Answer 18

prefix, infix, suffix, circumfix

Question 19

derivational morphemes

Answer 19

change part of speech or meaning

Question 20

inflectional morphemes

Answer 20

solely grammatical, no change to meaning or part of speech

Question 21

allomorph

Answer 21

same meaning, but different sound or spelling

Question 22

affixation

Question 23

compounding

Answer 23

joins together two previously existing words

Question 24

blending

Answer 24

joining only parts of existing words

Question 25

back-formation

Answer 25

new word from subtracting an affix

Question 26

acronyms

Answer 26

initials of several words

Question 27

abbreviations

Answer 27

shortening existing words

Question 28

eponyms

Answer 28

words derived from proper names

Question 29

reduplication

Answer 29

doubling an entire free morpheme or part of it

Question 30

birdsong similarities to humans

Answer 30

have regional dialects, are passed down in families, and can only be acquired up to a certain age

Question 31

differences in ape and human language

Answer 31

in apes: variable acquisition, copying, repeating signs, no babbling