Linguistics Terms Flashcards
Rhotacism (rotacismo)
a. Loss of phonemic contrast between syllable-final /r/ and /l/. In Latin America this phenomenon is found basically in the Caribbean (Cuba, Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic, Venezuela); e.g.: mejor [me.’hol] ‘better’
i. Rhotacism, lateralization
This process occurred in the change from Latin sequences [min] to Spanish [mbr]. César Gutiérrez proposes that it hapened before syncope.
FEMINAM > hembra
LEGUMINEN > legumbre
HOMINEN > homne > homre > hombre
Usualmente, según historiadores, siguió el proceso de síncopa, disimilación de nasales, y epéntesis.
Por el proceso de disimilación, se añadió con la nasal labial en [r] originando en [mr].
Competencia comunicativa
Hymes
Sociolingüístico
Actuación: o Usar bien las formas en el contexto adecuado
conlleva saber no solamente el código lingüístico, sino también cómo usarlo de una manera apropiada a la situación dada—abarca todo lo que un hablante tiene que saber para poder comunicarse bien de una manera apropiada dentro de una comunidad de habla
La competencia gramatical
se refiere al nivel de dominio que el estudiante tiene sobre la gramática de la L2. Incluye el conocimiento del vocabulario, la pronunciación, la ortografía, la formación de palabras y la estructura de frases.
Assimilation
a phoneme is modified in one or more features in such a way that the phoneme becomes more similar to a neighboring phoneme Anticipatory assimilation: [k] led to [tS] –> [ts] CINQUE, CESTA, because of the front vowel after it. In areas where it was not followed by a front vowel, it remains unchanged: CAPANNA –> cabaña
Progressive or “lag” assimilation
The modification of phonemes under the influence of a preceding phoneme. With the sequence /mb/, the second phoneme is modified to /mm/, and later simplified to a single /m/. PALUMBA –> paloma
Mutual assimilation
Two adjacent phonemes each change to merge in a pronunciation that is intermediate. /AU/ –> /o/ in CAUSA –> cosa; AUDIRE –> oír
Dissimilation
Relates to the articulatory difficulty of coordinating the articulatory movement to repeat a phoneme, which often leads to the phoneme’s replacement or elimination. AUGUSTU –> agosto (elimination of the first occurrence)
ROBORE –> roble (replacement)
ARATRU–> arado (elimination of second occurrence)
Epenthesis
The insertion of a phoneme to facilitate the articulation between two different phonemes, (typically /b/ or /d/)
HUMERU –> hombro
INGENRARE–> engendrar
NOTE: Syncope eliminates the intertonic vowel first
Metathesis
The re-ordering of phonemes to facilitate articulation within a word GENERU-->yerno PRAESEPE--> pesebre PARABLA (O.S.)--> palabra PERIGLO (O.S.)-->peligro
Phonemic split
Infrequent in the history of Spanish; likely only occurred with the phonemes /h/ and /f/. The phoneme /h/, spelt f in Latin, had an allophone [ʍ]–a voiceless labiovelar fricative– in front of the glide [w], producing fuente, fuerte [ʍwente]. Thus, there was the distinction between fablar [hablar] and fuente [ʍwente]–and there may have even been a third allophone, (which I will return to later. ) The introduction of borrowings from other languages and Latin, introduced the idea of using [f + full-vowel]. As a result, the Latin FORMA was incorporated into Spanish as [‘forma], or Occitan faisan was included as [‘faisan]. The distinction arose between [h] and [f]: horma and forma, for example. The ultimate loss of /h/ in some varieties of Spanish does not affect the split mentioned here. (p. 37, Penny)
Phonemic merger
This is the neutralization of originally distinct phonemes so that they no longer form a contrast in the same position. This happened most clearly with the phoneme O. Sp. /b/, spelt b and /β/, spelt v. Spelling evidence suggests the two were neutralized when they occurred in consonant clusters; the spellings alba and alva alternate, as do enbiar and enviar. Word-initial position was neutralized as well, and n the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, intervocalic position was also neutralized. The merger is complete by the time Golden Age literature rolls around, as can be seen in the literature. The merger is therefore complete.
Analogy
The process by which related words become more alike in form, ‘related’ referring to either meaning or function.. Examples include suegra and nuera (from SOCRUS and NURUS), and diestro and siniestro (from DEXTRU and SINISTRU).
Learned/cultismos
Borrowed from Latin via writing: fábula (from FABULA) or regular (from REGULARIS). These words do not undergo the same changes as popular words, and retain a lot of features of the original Latin, only suffering moderate modifications to allow them to fit the patterns of Spanish.
Popular/vulgarismos
Words that have a continuous oral history, undergoing all the processes of modification to be expected in Spanish. Examples include FABULARI > hablar
REGULA > reja (ploughshare)
Semi-learned/semicultismos
Words that, although they have been transmitted orally from Latin, have been remodelled during the medieval period from influence from Latin as read aloud in the church or in law courts. Examples include cruz (which should have an “o” if it followed the regular pattern of Spanish vowel change), infierno (in which, although dipthongizatio occurs, there shouldn’t be -NF-; typically, that mergers via assimilation into ff); or octubre (which could have been ochubre, but, based on the influence of read aloud OCTOBER, stayed the same with /kt/.)
Doublets (dobletes)
Cases of double transmission of words–they often show a semantic difference in meaning, with the vulgarism showing a new meaning while the learned one retains the Latin meaning. Ex. is delgado vs. delicado (from DELICATUS) or artejo vs. artículo (from ARTICULUM)
Pitch
Musical frequency of a sound; tends to be higher in the accented syllable
Energy (stress)
The loudness of a phoneme, usually produced with more muscular force (stress) than the surrounding phonemes
Duration
Length of a phoneme
Pitch-accent
The relative heights of musical notes indicate where the accent lies (used to exist in Latin), since energy was uniform and duration couldn’t have been a factor, since length was one of the features of the vowel system.
Stress-accent
Characteristic of Romance languages (including Spanish) and even English. The accented syllable is mainly signaled by energy, a.k.a. stress. For this reason, very few syllables that use a hiatus have survived in Spanish–the few exceptions include dîa, mía, and vía. Since hiatus require the equal energetic strength which was not easy to produce in O.Sp., many originally hiatus words changed into single-vowel words or ended up as a glide.
Metaphony
Vowel-raising in anticipation of following, higher vowel phonemes (typically a high vowel or a glide.) The highest tonic vowels /i/ and /u/ were exempt from this process.The glide sometimes happens early on in the process, meaning the vowel palatizes with a consonant and loses its identity early on (this happened with the [j] + /k/ or /t// as in LENTEU > lienzo or FORTIA > fuerza. Spoken Latin /ɛ/ and /ɔ/ lost their identities and eventually went through the regular process of dipthongization typically experienced by these vowels.
Typically processes of metaphony (when a higher vowel follows the stressed vowel):
/e/ is raised to /i/ VENDĒMIA > vendimia
/ɛ/ is raised to /e/ MATERIA > madera
/a/ is raised to /e/ AREA > era
/ɔ/ is raised to /o/ FOLIA > hoja
/o/ is raised to /u/ *CUNEA > cuña
Glides + metaphony, according to the vowel
/a/
1. glide within the same syllable YES metaphony
Examples: CANTAVI > [kan.tai] > canté;
AREA > [aira] > era
BASIU > [baiso] > beso
SAPIAM > [saipam] > sepa
LACTE > [laite] > leche
MATAXA > [mataisia] > madexa > madeja
2. onset of next syllable contains the glide NO metaphony
Examples: LABIU > labio
FLACCIDU > [flattsio] > llacio > lacio (limp, lank)
3. after a [dj] or [gj] NO metaphony
4. after a [lj]
ALIU > ajo
5. concerned vowel is followed by [ɲ] NO metaphony
ARANEA > araña
/ɛ/
1. glide within the same syllable YES metaphony
Examples:
MATERIA > [matɛira] >madera
CERESIA > [ke’ɾɛisa] > O.Sp. ceresa, M.Sp. cereza (cherry)
DIRECTU > [de’ɾɛito] > derecho (law, straight)
LECTU > [‘lɛito] > lecho (bed)
INTÉGRU > [en’tɛiɾo] > entero (whole)
2. The following subject contains a glide from an earlier hiatus (typically a /e/ or an /i/)–YES metaphony
Examples:
SUPERBIA > soberbia (pride, vainglory), NERVIU > nervio (nerve; strength); PRAEMIU > premio (award, prize);
3. followed by a [dj] –YES metaphony
SEDEAT > {sej̆a] > sea
4. The vowel is followed by a [ʎ] (from earlier [lj]) or [kj] or [gj]–YES metaphony
SPECULU > [es’pɛʎo] > espejo (mirror) (but VECLU > (CL VETULU) > [βɛʎo] > viejo)
5. The vowel is followed by a ɲ–YES metaphony
INGENIU > O. Sp. engeño (‘siege engine’–although this specific example should be discarded, as it is semi-learned)
/ɔ/
1. The vowel is followed immediately by [i̯], by definition in the same syllable–YES metaphony.
Examples: OCTO > [ɔi̯to] > ocho (eight); NOCTE > [nɔi̯te] > noche (night); COXU > [kɔi̯so] > OSp. coxo > M.Sp. cojo (lame)
2. The onset of the following syllable contains a glide [j] followed by another phoneme–YES metaphony
Examples: OSTREA > ɔstria> later ostra
NOVIU > novio
3. After a [dj]/ j–YES metaphony
PODIU > [pɔ palatalization of dj to dz to y o] poyo ‘stone bench’
HODIE > [hɔ, palatization of dj], syncope of ‘e’] hoy ‘today’
4. The vowel is followed by a [ʎ] (from earlier [lj]) or [kj] or [gj]–YES metaphony
Examples:
FOLIA > [‘fɔʎa] > hoja; COLLIGIS > [kɔllees} > [kɔlljes] > [kɔʎes] > coges ‘you grasp’; OCULU > [ɔʎo] > ojo ‘eye’
5. Vowel is followed by a ɲ–NO metaphony
Examples:
SOMNIU > sueño ‘dream’ (unless this form is simply an semantically extended form of SOMNU, “sueño”, I sleep)
/e/
1. The vowel is followed immediately by [i̯], by definition in the same syllable–NO metaphony.
ESTRICTU > [estreito] > estrecho, CERVESIA > [kerβeisa. > cervesa (O. Sp.), cerveza (M. Sp.); PIGNORA > [pɾeina] > prenda
2. The onset of the following syllable contains a glide [j] followed by another phoneme–YES metaphony
VENDEMIA > vendimia ‘wine harvest’
LIMPIDU > lempeo > limpio ‘clean’
SEPIA > jibia ‘cuttlefish’
VITREU > βedrjo > vidrio
3. After a [dj]/ j–NO metaphony
CORRIGIA > [ko’ɾej̆a] > correa
VIDEAT > [βej̆a] >vea
4. The vowel is followed by a [ʎ] (from earlier [lj]) or [kj] or [gj]–NO metaphony
CILIA > ceja; CONSILIU > consejo; APICULA > [aβeʎa]> abeja; TEGULA > [teʎa] > teja
5. Vowel is followed by a ɲ–NO metaphony
LIGNA > leña
/o/
1. The vowel is followed immediately by [i̯], by definition in the same syllable–YES metaphony
LUCTA > [loi̯ta] > lucha
MULTU >[mou̯to} > [moi̯to] > mucho
AUSCULTAT > [as’kou̯tat] > [as’koi̯tat} > escucha
VULTURE > [βou̯ture} > [βoi̯ture} > [βoi̯tre} > buitre
IMPULSAT > empou̯sat > empoi̯sat > empuja
2. The onset of the following syllable contains a glide [j] followed by another phoneme–YES metaphony
Examples:
RUBEU > [ruβjo] > rubio
PLUVIA > [pʎoβja] > lluvia
5. Vowel is followed by a ɲ–YES metaphony
CUNEU > cuño; PUGNU > puño
Metaphony by final Ī
Infrequent, but did exist in Spanish:
/ɛ/ to /e/ VENI > ven! (come)
/e/ to /i/ VĒNĪ > vine ( I came); FĒCĪ > hice (I did); MIHĪ > mi, TIBĪ> ti
Dipthongs
pg. 51-53 of Penny
Dative
“The recipient of an action or object” Dative cases in Spanish are me, te, le, se, nos, os, les
The dative case is a grammatical case used to define the receptor of an action, or the argument affected by the argument. In Spanish, indirect objects are marked with dative case. Le envió una carta a mi madre.
Focus
Focus is a feature of language that can be realized through various processes. It draws attention to an argument in an utterance to either contrast (as in correcting previously mentioned information) or to highlight new information; these two forms of focus are respectively called Contrastive Focus and Informational Focus. From a phonological perspective, the suprasegmental stress can show the focused information. Syntactically, there are several strategies, such as raising that information to the beginning of a sentence. Compare “Juan compró ese libro” and “Ese libro, Juan lo compró”. In the second sentence, the phrase “ese libro” is the focused element, stressing the fact that the very book they are talking about is important. You can also state “Juan compró ESE libro”, for the in situ, phonological representation of focus.
Inacusatividad
Unaccusativity refers to a type of verb in which the subject of the intransitive verb in one sentence can be the direct object of the same verb in a transitive structure. El avión aterrizó; El piloto aterrizó el avión. This contrasts with unergative (inergativo) structures, in which the subject is the same for both the transitive and intransitive: Juan trabajó, Juan trabajó su tesis. Unaccusative verbs generally denote changes of state (romper-se, adelgazar) or position (entrar, caer), existence (existir, faltar, sobrar) or appearance (morir, nacer, aparecer, desaparecer).
F0 (fundamental frequency)
A fundamental frequency is the lowest frequency in a resonating system. We know that what we hear as a single sound or pitch when someone is speaking (for example, making the sound [i]) is really a fundamental frequency (determined by how many times the vocal folds vibrate in one second, and measured in cycles per second [cps], or hertz [Hz]) (named after the German physicist Heinrich Rudolf Hertz), plus a whole series of harmonics or overtones (these two terms do not mean exactly the same thing, but we will use them interchangeably for now; in fact the fundamental frequency is the first harmonic, the next octave up is the second harmonic or first overtone).The harmonics are multiples of the fundamental frequency.
Acusative
i. Accusative - me 1S, te 2S, lo 3SM, la 3SF, se 3S/P refl., nos 1P, os 2P, los 3PM, las 3PF
Acusative
i. Accusative - me 1S, te 2S, lo 3SM, la 3SF, se 3S/P refl., nos 1P, os 2P, los 3PM, las 3PF
Adstrate (adstrato)
An adstrate is a language contact situation in which two languages exist alongside one another, without one necessarily having power or prestige over the other. A modern case of this is Basque and Spanish, or Basque and French, in Euskal Herria (greater Basque Country, including parts of Navarra and 3 French departments). Another case historically would be Iberian Romances and Andalusian Arabic. In contrast to the terms substrate and superstrate, there is no reference to an invading/conquering language group.
Analogy (analogía)
Analogy is a process by which language changes through association with one form with another form. The first person plural pronoun nosotros was formed by analogy with vosotros (which itself is a compound of older vos + otros). A modern example is the addition of -s to the second person preterit verb form, dijistes for dijiste, due to analogy with the other tú verb forms, all of which contain -s.
Apherisis (aférisis)
Apheresis is a historical process by which the first sound(s) of a word are lost. This is not nor has ever been a very productive process in Spanish, however, there are cases, as in loanwords from Greek that start with the letter psi: (p)sicología, (p)sicólogo, (p)seudonimo. It can also be seen in certain lexical items, as in Antonio > Toño. (I have to look it up, but I think some of the object pronouns underwent apheresis from the Latin demonstratives: e.g. illu > lo)
Apocope (apócope)
Apocope is the loss of a word-final sound. In the history of Spanish, several phones have been susceptible to this process, notably -m, -s and -e. Sᴘᴇᴄᴜʟᴜᴍ > speculu (mod. espejo); ᴜʀꜱᴜꜱ > ursu (mod. oso); all Spanish infinitives with Latin roots underwent apocope of -e.
Assimilation (asimilación)
Assimilation is a process by which a sound adopts some or all traits of another phone it is in contact with. This has occurred many times in the history of Spanish, particularly in the case of nasals, sibilants and often triggered by palatals. Assimilation can be anticipatory (progressive) or regressive. The former is the assimilation of the first segment into the segment, as in ꜱᴇᴘᴛᴇ > sette. Regressive assimilation is the transfer of features to a later segment, as in the English plural marker -s, which adopts the voicing of the segment it follows: cat > ca[ts]; dog > do[gz]. Assimilation can be complete, as in the Romance example where the /p/ adopts all features of the /t/, or partial, as in the English example, where the only assimilated feature is voicing. (Kendall also cited the example of /mb/ > [mm] in Spanish, as in ᴘᴀʟᴜᴍʙᴀ > palomma (> paloma))
- Chain shift (push, pull) (Cadena de cambio (empuje, arrastre))
a. Chain shifts are series of changes that are caused by each other. An example of the chain shift is the series of lenition in Vulgar Latin/Spanish. In a Push Shift, one phone starts to converge onto another, but to maintain the distinction, the grammar continues to shift other sounds until the process ends; using the historical example, the /p/ lenites into a realization converging on /b/, which then lenites into a voiced bilabial fricative. In a Pull Shift, the opposite is true. The same example would have the bilabial fricative moving, leaving an open space for the /b/ to move, which coincidentally also leaves its old space open for /p/ to devoice.
- Comparative method (Método comparativo)
a. The Comparative Method is a manner of observing language change through comparing the living, real-life variety of (supposedly) related languages today. Through the Comparative Method, it is possible to reconstruct hypothetical proto-languages or postulate how an ancestral form of language was spoken. While we do not have living speakers of Latin, it is possible to create a reconstruction of its phonological system by comparing the systems of its daughter languages, the Romance languages.
- Deaffrication (Desafricación)
a. Deaffrication is a process by which affricates simplify by losing the stop segment, leaving only the fricative portion. Old Spanish /dz/ and /ts/ simplified to /z/ and /s/ respectively.
- Degemination
a. The geminate is a double consonant which sound is significantly longer than is normally the case; thus the /nn/ or /n:/ of Spanish innegable is geminate (in this case because of the prefix in-). In Latin this double consonant structure was common with many consonants and is related to the voicing of intervocalic stops. Once the intervocalic -p- became -b- the intervocalic -pp- (which was longer) was free to simplify/reduce/degeminate to a single -p-, thus economy of articulation was achieved. This was the case for /p:/, /t:/, /c:/ which all reduce or degeminate to a single shorter sound /p, t, c/. However this tendency had to apply to all geminates but phonemic distinction needed to remain causing intervocalic -s- to be voiced to [z] (this of course in MSp will again devoice to [s]) thus allowing /s:/ > /s/. In the case of voiced geminates /m:/, /d:/, /g:/ simply reduced to /m/ and /d/. /rr/ was unaffected. /ll/ and /nn/ palatalized /ʎ / and /ɲ / and thus maintain their distinction from the shorter /l/ and /n/. (Lloyd pp.242-244)
- Diphthongization
a. The Latin vowels E, AE = /ɛ/ and O = /ɔ/ in tonic position diphthongize in Spanish. /ɛ/ > /ie/ and /ɔ/ > /ue/. Example PERDO (tonic E) > pierdo ; SERVU > siervo ; PORTA (tonic O) > puerta. But there are exceptions, often the presence of a yod can cause the eligible tonic vowel to close rather than open as is the case of NERVIU. The E should become -ie- *niervio but the yod -I- causes the -E- = /ɛ/ to close > /e/. (Fernando’s handouts)
- Dissimilation
a. Any phonetic or phonological process in which a particular sound becomes more different from some other nearby sound (Penny p. 323). This is seen in unexpected vowel changes those that don’t follow the norm based on their traits and positions. Example: ROTUNDO we expect *rodondo because the first -O- is unstressed causing it to remain /o/ the -U- is short and tonic causing it to change to /o/ but in order to make these two/three -o-’s less similar, the first being unstressed undergoes dissimilation to /e/ with the MSp result of redondo (round). This is a case of replacement of a back vowel with a front vowel. Another option is elimination Example: AUGUSTU > agosto. The first -U- is eliminated. (Penny p. 32) (interestingly AU is a Latin diphthong and would have changed to O- however “when /au/ precedes a velar consonant followed by a /u/ it was simplified to /a/ in Late Latin” (Lloyd p.189). An example of consonant replacement is *RŌBORE > roble (r > l) the -O- being lost by the process of syncope (deletion of the post-tonic penultimate syllable vowel except for -a-). An example of consonant elimination is ARATRU > arado (elimination of the -R- followed by sonorization of the intervocalic -T- > d etc.) (Penny p. 32)
Epenthesis
a. “The insertion of a segment into the *middle of a word” (Penny, p.323, it doesn’t have to be the “middle” it could be at the beginning).
b. The addition of a new sound to a word.
i. Intrusive consonants: Example: (H)UMERU > hombro. Syncope of the -E- leaves -MR- the bilabial nasal nature of the /m/ followed by /r/ gives the acoustic impression of a bilabial occlusive /b/ hence its insertion.
ii. Prothetic vowels: Example: SCHOLA > escuela. Word initial S- followed by a consonant developed a supporting vowel. In Spanish the vowel e- is used. (Lloyd p.8)
- Extreme apocope
a. the loss or omission of one or more sounds from the end of a word. (Penny p. 322) Example of normal apocope: ARBORE > árbol (apocope of the -e)
b. In MSp, apocope occurs in certain contexts: after “apical consonants” (Lloyd p.320). After /r,l,d,/
c. Finally extreme apocope was common in the 13th century perhaps due to the influence of French where apocope was extended to additional contexts, which is what is referred to as “extreme”. Very few of this extreme cases were made permanent all of which followed the -ç- /ts/ but the most common are FALCE > foçe > foz > hoz and PISCE > peçe > pez. French and Catalan embrace extreme apocope of -e where it occurs in a much larger set of contexts, including after /tʃ/: nocte > noche > noch; after -v-: nove > nove > neuf and so on. (Penny p. 58-9)
- Fortition
a. The consonantal change from a ‘weak’ sound to a ‘strong’ one, the opposite of the more common lenition. Fortition may occur in prominent positions, such as at the beginning of a word or stressed syllable. (wikipedia)
b. A sound is strengthened. Strengthening turns a less restricted sound (like an approximant or a fricative) into a more restricted one (like an affricate or a stop).
c. Example: /ʝ / in the subject pronoun “yo” in some dialects is strengthened to an affricate /d͡ʒ/. In English the same thing happens to /j/ in “you” is fortified to an affricate /d͡ʒ/ in the colloquial pronunciation “did ya?” [‘dɪʔdʒə].
d. (seeing as it isn’t in the index of either Penny or Lloyd I have my doubts it will be on the test. I am not sure if /ʎ/ > /ʒ/ counts as fortition in OCULUS > “oʎo” > “oʒo”.
e. Examples: ‘yerba’ [‘jeɾ.βa] > [‘ʝeɾ.βa] is fricativization through fortition.
- Fricativization
a. The process in which a unit of sound becomes a fricative, which is a consonantal sound produced from lightly obstructing the passage of air from the mouth. Fricativization can occur from both lenition and fortition. Examples: ‘yerba’ [‘jeɾ.βa] > [‘ʝeɾ.βa] is fricativization through fortition; ‘dado’ [‘da.do] > [‘da.ðo] is fricativization through lenition.
- Grammaticalization
a. The language change in which words like nouns or verbs become grammatical markers like affixes, auxiliaries, etc. Example: HABĒRE ‘to have’ became the auxiliary verb ‘haber’ in Spanish used for the formation of perfective tenses, such as the present perfect ‘he comido’, future perfect ‘habrá comido’, etc.
Learned word (cultismo)
a. A word whose morphology and phonology follows its etymological latin or greek origin without obeying the evolutionary changes of the language, which in the case of Spanish happened through Vulgar Latin. According to Lloyd (p. 151), learned words became increasingly frequent beginning in the 14th century with the great work of Alfonso X. Example: fragua ‘forge’ and fábrica ‘factory’ both come from the Latin FĀBRICA. The former went through the evolutionary changes while the latter was taken directly from Latin.
- Lenition (2)
a. The weakening of a consonant (Lloyd p. 145). Lenition can happen through simplification (of geminates), sonorization (of the voiceless), fricativization (of voiced plosives), and loss (of voiced fricatives) (Penny p.76). Example: ‘LATU’ > ‘lado’ [‘la.tu] > [‘la.do] > [‘la.ðo]. After the simplification (of geminates) no further lenition processes occur. Example: CUPPA > copa > *coba > *coβa > *coa. (Penny p. 77)
b. A phonological process of weakening typically one which affects intervocalic consonants in which a speech sound is changed to another sound which involved a less complete blockage of the airstream. (Penny p. 325)
- Lexical diffusion
a. When a sound change spreads from one morpheme to another rather than being used at once in all morphemes having the appropriate phonetic conditions in which it might appear. The effects of this type of extension are that at any one time and place some words may be pronounced with the older pronunciation, some with the new, and others with both. (Lloyd p. 21-22)
i. Chen (1972): Instead of changing a speaker’s entire vocabulary overnight, as it were, sound change begins as an innovative pronunciation of a single word or a group of words, and then progressively spreads to other portions of the lexicon… Exceptions… can be regarded as residual forms of a sound change which has not yet completed its course, or has come to a premature end, or has been thwarted by a competing sound change overlapping with it along the time dimension.
ii. Examples: In some dialects where there is intervocalic /d/ deletion, [‘a.ðo] > [a.o], with past participles, the phenomenon might still not occur in other contexts such as [pwe] for ‘puede’ instead of [‘pwe.ðe].
Metaphony (metafonía)
a. (Lloyd p. 308) The influence of a vowel on another vowel. In the case of Spanish, the most feature is the effect of final high vowels on a preceding vowel. In early Castilian, the evidence for metaphony is found mostly in verb forms as it was in the perfect that the high front vowel appeared in form 1. The effect of /-i/ was to raise the preceding stem vowel in anticipation of the final high vowel. Thus, the two verbs which conserve the last traces of the vowel gradation are affected by metaphony: fazer ‘to make, do’ < FACERE and venir ‘to come’ < VENĪRE:
i. FĒCĪ > fize; VĒNĪ > vine
- Metathesis (metátesis) (4)
a. (Lloyd p. 7-8) This is the change of the position of a sound in a word. For example: Lat. MĪRĀCULU ‘miracle’ > OSp. miraglo, metathesized the liquids producing the MSp. milagro. This specific example is reciprocal metathesis. If only one sound changes place, it is called simple metathesis, e.g., Late Lat. APPECTORĀRE ‘to hug’ > Sp. apretar ‘to squeeze’.
- Palatalization
a. Lloyd p.7) Occurs when a consonant adopts the palatal quality of a neighboring sound and often absorbs it completely. For example, Latin consonants followed by a palatal semivowel (or yod) became pronounced as palatals in Late Latin, e.g., Lat. VĪNEA ‘vineyard’ > Sp. viña.
- Proclisis
a. Pronunciation as a proclitic. Combination in pronunciation of unaccented word or particle with a following accented word.
Semi-learned form (semicultismo)
a. A much debated term, which Penny uses as an historical label applied to words which have been transmitted orally from Latin but which have undergone modification of their forms under the influence of the manner in which Latin was read aloud in the Middle Ages (Penny, 327)
- Sonorization
a. Sonority refers to the degree of openness. Segments can be ordered along a scale of sonority where low vowels have the highest degree of sonority (they are the most open segments) and plosives the lowest. The phonemes of a language can be arranged along a scale of sonority from most open or vowel-like to most closed or consonant-like. In Spanish on a scale from most-open to most-closed the following categorization of phonemes are organized:
i. Low vowel a
ii. Mid vowels e o
iii. High vowels i u
iv. Liquids l (ʎ) ɾ r
v. Nasals m n ɲ
vi. Obstruents f (θ) s x ʝ t⟆ b d g p t k (Hualde, 71-72)
- Substrate
a. Bynon (1977: 252) defines a linguistic substrate as ‘the survival of features typical of a language formerly spoken in an area in that language which has replaced it.’ Such relics are often particularly numerous in placenames; for instance, we know virtually nothing of the Pictish language (or languages) spoken in Scotland before Gaelic, but one placename element pit ‘a field’ survives in Pitlochry, Pittenweem, and others, giving us some clues as to the area which the Picts originally inhabited. However, substrate theory becomes increasingly speculative and dubious when used to account for the transfer of larger-scale linguistic features.
b. Linguistic features attributed to substrate influence:
i. F- > /h/
ii. Latin /u/ fronted to /y/ in French, Provencal, and some northern and western German dialects (previously inhabited by Celtic speakers) (McMahon 220-21)
- Supletismo (morfología) (Suppletion)
a. (supleción) Use of two or more distinct roots in a morphological paradigm. For instance, the verb ir ‘to go’ shows suppletion (voy, fui, iré) (Hualde, 301)
- Syllable-initial fortition
a. Consonantal change from ‘weak’ to ‘strong’ in syllable-initial position. Example: /ʝ/ in the subject pronoun “yo” in some dialects is strengthened to an affricate /d͡ʒ/.
Syncope (síncopa)
a. The loss of a segment, especially a vowel, from the middle of a word (Penny, 327). Typically postonic Ex. OCULU > okulu > oklu > etc but also pretonic Ex. BONITĀTE > bondad.
- Yod
a. A palatal glide, either opening [j] or closing [i] (Penny, 328)
b. Term used mostly in historical linguistics to refer to a palatal glide (Hualde, 302)
- Allophone (3) (alófono)
a. One of two or more realizations of a phoneme. Example: [b] and [ß] are allophones of the phoneme /ß/.
i. Faithfulness, underlying vs surface, give concrete examples, distribution, phonotactic environs, …
- Archiphoneme (2) (archifonema)
a. Due to neutralization of several phonemes, the archiphoneme represents several indistinguishable phonemes. It has certain specified features but not all. Example: /N/ is the archiphoneme of all possible surface representations of nasals in a given context. The archiphoneme /N/ specifies the manner of articulation [+nasal] but does not specify point of articulation.
- Assimilation (2) (asimilación)
a. A kind of sound change in which a sound segment becomes more similar to another sound segment. Ex. “enfermo” > /en.fer.mo/ > [eɱ.’fer.mo]
Assimilation in voicing (Voicing assimilation) (2) (asimilación de voz)
a. The change of the voice feature in a sound segment influenced by the voice feature of another sound segment so that both segments express the same voice feature. Ex. “mismo” > /mis.mo/ > [‘miz.mo]
- Ceceo (3)
a. A phenomenon in the Spanish language in which there is a loss of distinction between the letters “c +i ; e” “z” and “s” by pronouncing them all as [θ].
Geographic distribution
- Complementary distribution (2) (distribución complementaria)
a. The distribution of sounds so that one sound never appears in the same phonetic environment as another. Example: [ß] never appears in the same phonetic environment as [b], so they are in complementary distribution.
- Devoicing (Ensordecimiento)
a. The process of a voiced segment (in Spanish, generally a consonant) becoming devoiced, the opposite process of sonorization/voicing. This is to say that the vocal cords do not vibrate during the production of these phones. Although it is not a very productive process in Spanish, there are some varieties that have a tendency to devoice some word-final consonants, as /ð/ > [θ], edad [eðað] > [eðaθ]. Historically, Spanish’s voiced sibilants underwent devoicing (ex. /kaza/ > /kasa/) and currently Rioplatense Spanish is undergoing a similar process with ZH > SH.
- Diphthong (Diptongo)
a. Diphthongs are tautosyllabic sequences of two vowels, or rather, a vowel and a semivowel. Diphthongs are split into two categories–rising (creciente) and falling (decreciente). In rising diphthongs, the weaker semivowel /i̯/ or /u̯/ leads into the stronger, nucleic vowel /a, e, i, o, u/ (ex. /i̯e/ in siete), while in falling diphthongs, the opposite is true (ex. /ei̯/ in peinar). Examples such as huevo and hierba are sometimes not considered to be diphthongs, as the first segment is often classified as a semiconsonant, rather than a semivowel: [weßo, jerßa].
- F0 (fundamental frequency, frecuencia fundamental)
a. The fundamental frequency is the lowest acoustic frequency of a given waveform. The frequency is the number of vibrations of the soundwave within a given timeframe, which is measured in hertz (Hz). The soundwaves that create vocalizations are comprised of this fundamental frequency along with other harmonic frequencies (frecuencias armónicas) in a compound wave (onda compuesta)
- Free variation (2) (Variación libre)
a. Free variation is when a speaker or group of speakers can vary between different grammars randomly or pragmatically, generally unconsciously deciding on one form over the other. In terms of phonology, a speaker can pronounce a word with a certain series of segments or a separate, distinct series. An example from Spanish would be syllable-final /N/, which for some speakers can alternate between [n] and [ŋ].
- Glides (2) (Semivocal/semiconsonante, deslizada)
a. Glides, also called semivowels (and by some definitions, occasionally semiconsonants), are phones that do not act solely as the nucleus of a syllable, but rather work in conjunction with the nuclear vowel as part of the nucleus. Some definitions use semiconsonants for pre-vocal glides and semivowel is used for post-vocalic. /i̯/ or /u̯/ vs /j/ or /w/
- Hiatus (Hiato)
a. A hiatus is a context in which two vowels in contact with each other but the point of contact is at a syllable break, in contrast to a diphthong where they are tautosyllabic. In rapid, colloquial speech, hiatuses can become diphthongs, including in cases where one vowel is not a high vowel /i, u/ (ex. poema /po.ema/ > [pwema]). Examples of hiatuses include the imperfective past verbal inflection -ía /i.a/ and two sequential vowels in which neither is a high vowel, as in the -oo- of zoológico [θo.o’lo.xi.ko].
- Manner of articulation (3) (Modo de articulación)
a. Feature which refers to the type of obstruction that is created in the articulation of a consonant (Hualde, 41). The following classes of consonants are distinguished according to Manner of articulation:
i. Plosives (oral stops) / oclusivas [p, t, k, b, d, g]
ii. Fricatives / fricativas [f θ s z ʒ ʝ x h ʃ]
iii. Approximants / aproximantes [β δ ɣ]
iv. Affricates / africadas [tʃ]
v. Nasals / nasales [m n ɲ ŋ]
vi. Laterals / laterales [l ʎ]
vii. Rhotics / vibrantes [ɾ r̄]
- Minimal pair (2) (par mínimo)
a. Pairs of words that differ only in that one member of the pair has one phoneme and the other has the other (Hualde, 6) i.e. cara/para
b. Two words that differ in a single consonantal or vocalic segment and have different meaning. Minimal pairs are useful for establishing the phonemic inventory of a language. For instance the minimal pair [‘ma.ta] ‘bush’ and [´na.ta] ‘cream’ shows that /m/ and /n/ are contrasting consonants in Spanish. Minimal pairs can also be used to show the contrasting value of suprasegmental features such as stress and tone (in tone languages)
- Nasal assimilation (2) (asimilación nasal)
a. Assimilation is a process by which a segment acquires some features from another segment, becoming more similar to it (Hualde, 107). Nasals assimilate in place of articulation due to an immediately following consonant, as in un perro [‘um ‘pe.r̄o] (p is bilabial, therefore the nasal is articulated as bilabial)
- Neutralization (Neutralización)
a. Loss of phonemic contrast in a given context. For instance, in Spanish the contrast between two phonemes /p/ and /b/ is neutralized in the coda of the syllable. An important phenomenon in Spanish is the neutralization of nasals in the coda.
- Neutralization of liquids (Neutralización de líquidas)
a. Loss of phonemic contrast between syllable-final /r/ and /l/. In Latin America this phenomenon is found basically in the Caribbean (Cuba, Puerto Rico 🇵🇷yassss , Dominican Republic, Venezuela); e.g.: mejor [me.’hol] ‘better’
i. Rhotacism, lateralization
- Oxytone stress (Palabra oxítona, aguda)
Stressed on the last syllable; e.g. camión, lealtad
- Phoneme (fonema)
a. A unit of sound in a language. Although a phoneme can represent different phones (sounds), they are the underlying forms of these sounds. Example: /f/ is a phoneme in Spanish, but it is realized as [v] before voiced consonants, such as in the word Afganistan, although the underlying form is /f/.
- Phonotactics (fonotáctica)
a. A branch of phonology that deals with the restrictions a language imposes on the arrangement of phonemes. Example: /s/+C is not a permissible consonant cluster in Spanish.
- Strengthening (of phonological segments; also fortition) (fortición)
A sound change in which a consonant becomes more strong articulated. Example: In several Spanish dialects, when /j/ or /ʝ/ is in the attack position of a syllable, it experiences fortition by become /dʒ/. ‘Llamar’ > /ja.mar/ > [dʒa.’mar]
- Tone (2) (tono)
a. The pitch of a syllable that can be capable of distinguishing the meaning of a word. In Chinese, tone is enough to distinguish two words containing the same phones.
- Yeísmo (3)
a. A phenomenon in the Spanish language in which the distinction between the letters “ll” and “y” has been lost and are therefore pronounced the same. The realization of the two can vary however depending on the dialect as some can pronounce it as [j] and others as [ʝ].
- Žeísmo
a. The practice of pronouncing the letters “ll” and “y” as [ʒ]. It is commonly found in Uruguay and Argentina.
- Allomorph
a. A phonological variant of a morpheme. In certain languages, a morpheme can have different phonological realizations without changing its meaning or function. For example, [a.o] and [a.ðo] are both allomorphs of -ado, the past participle ending for -ar verbs. Aspiration/loss of -s for plurals, tú verbal forms. -es/-s for plurals.
- Anáfora (anaphora–phenomenon; anaphor–specific NP; in Spanish, anáfora refers to both)
a. An NP that obligatorily gets its meaning from another NP in the same clause, which is also the antecedent (Carnie P148-149). Examples are reflexive pronouns, such as herself, himself, etc., and reciprocal pronouns, such as each other. “Sí (mismo)” is an example in Spanish. Obligatorily bound within its domain.
- Aspect (4)
a. Aspect is a grammatical category that expresses how an action, state, or event denoted by a verb extends over time. Examples are the preterite and imperfect aspects of Spanish while “comía” means “I used to eat” and does not have a definite end, “comí” meaning “I ate” marks a definite point in time. (For more info Carnie P259)
- case (little C)
a. The morphology associated with grammatical relations, which represent how a DP is functioning in the sentence syntactically (Carnie P335). Some examples of cases are the nominative case which represents the subject, the accusative case which represents the object, and the genitive case which represents the possessor.
i. Example:
1. PUELL-AM PUELL-A PULS-AT
2. girl-ACC girl-NOM hit-3.SG.PRES
“The girl hits the girl”
Big C Case
a. the abstract, null Case that doesn’t necessarily have morpho-phonological realizations. Little C is the morpho-phonological
- Clitic (2)
a. A morpheme that has syntactic qualities of a word but is said to be phonologically bound to another word or phrase. Example: The possessive “ ‘s “ in English is a clitic that marks ownership.
b. Attachment to N or NP
i. The student’s assignment
ii. - The student of psychology’s assignment
iii. - The student that we invited’s assignment
iv. - The student dressed in red’s assignment
v. - The student who went out’s assignment
- Clitic pronoun
a. A clitic that substitutes for a noun or noun phrase. Example: In Spanish, there are clitic object pronouns which are clitic pronouns with accusative or dative case. In the examples below “te” and “lo” are both clitic pronouns.
i. “Quiero dártelo”
ii. Quier-o dá-r-te-lo
iii. Want-1.SG.PRES Give-INF-2.SG.DAT-3.SG.ACC
Clitic
a. The term “clitic” refers to elements which are syntactically independent words or phrasal constituents, but which are phonologically dependent. Phonological dependence typically implies that the clitic undergoes phonological word-formation so that it joins a constituent which bears stress. For example, English contracted auxiliaries cliticize to a preceding constituent (e.g., She’ll leave). Phonological and syntactic conditions of cliticization vary from language to language, as do the inventories and properties of particular clitics. In Spanish:
i. Nominative - se - 3rd. Sg. ‘one’
ii. Accusative - me 1S, te 2S, lo 3SM, la 3SF, se 3S/P refl., nos 1P, os 2P, los 3PM, las 3PF
iii. Dative - me, te, le, se, nos, os, les
- Copula (2)
a. A copula is a type of verb that indicates a membership or description of the subject and the predicate. In general, they are to be verbs in several languages, such as English or Spanish (e.g., yo soy estudiante); in other languages like Russian, the copula is null (e.g., ya student). It does not denote any action. The copular verb is a main verb, meaning it does not take on auxiliary roles such as in progressive or passive structures. Compare copular “I was a student”, progressive “I was studying” and passive “In the research project, I was studied”.
- Derivational morphology
a. Derivational morphology is a type of morphology by which morphemes are added to a word to create a new word, often in a new lexical class. For example, you can add the derivational morpheme -(i)dad to the adjective feliz to create the noun felicidad. This contrasts to inflectional morphology, which utilizes morphemes to denote plurality (-s), verbal tense-aspect (verb endings); inflectional morphemes always maintain the lexical class.
Topic
a. presupposed, old information known by both speaker and hearer; Focus–new (corrective/asserted) information
i. Susana leyó el diario esta mañana
ii. Esta mañana leyó el diario Susana.
iii. SUSANA (y no Juan) leyó el diario esta mañana. (contrastive)
iv. (Zagona pp. 48-49)
- Mood (3)
a. Mood “refers to the speaker’s perspective on the event”. A speaker of Spanish can express information with objectivity or certainty (from their perspective) by using the indicative mood or express hypotheticals, possibilities, doubts and more with the subjunctive mood. In English, the distinction is not so clear with verbal forms; however, by using modal verbs (can, could, may, should, will…), a speaker of English can equally express these two moods. Imperatives also fall into another category of mood, frente a the indicative and subjunctive moods, as they express need or obligation.
- Morfema libre (free/unbound morpheme)
a. Esto mejor se entiende contrastado con morfemas ligados (bound morpheme). Vemos ejemplos de morfemas ligados en la palabra “renacer” “re”, “e” y “r” son morfemas ligados al raíz “nac”. “Re” brinda el significado de ‘otra vez’ “e” es el vocal temático y “r” final denota el infinitivo. Sin estos morfemas ligados “nac” tampoco constituye una palabra entera. Al contrario, los morfemas libres pueden existir independientemente de morfemas ligados por ejemplo “mar”, “pan” y “sol”. Obviamente a estos se les puede agregar morfemas afijos plurales ‘-es’ pero si el morfema estando libre de otros morfemas ligados constituye una palabra por sí sola es un morfema libre. También cabe mencionar que “sol” es un morfema libre por sí solo pero ligado en el contexto de “solar”.
b. Los morfemas independientes (también llamados Libres) son aquellos morfemas que no necesitan ir unidos a ningún lexema, sino que forman por sí solos una palabra. Admiten inserción entre ellos y los lexemas de otros morfemas
c. son morfemas independientes los siguientes:
i. los determinantes → el, ella, ese, un, una, etc.
ii. las preposiciones → a, con, de, desde, en, etc.
iii. las conjunciones → y, e, o, pero, aunque, etc.
iv. pronombres → él. ella, etc.
- Noncyclic event
a. A cyclic event cannot be labeled or described until its termination has been reached and therefore cannot be extended or repeated without going through all of the phases of the cycle again, a non-cyclic event is observable at the instant of its initiation and can, in theory be extended indefinitely. Aspectual. Noncyclic can be imperfect in Spanish; preterit generally are cyclic. Perfective vs imperfective may be related to it? (Papers from the XIIth Linguistic Symposium on Romance Languages Silva-Corvalan April 1982)
- Papel temático (theta role)
a. A bundle of thematic relations associated with a particular argument (DP, PP, or CP) (Carnie p.240)
b. Thematic relations: Semantic relations between the predicate and the argument - used as a means of encoding selectional restrictions. Examples are: agent, experiencers, themes, goals, recipients, source, location, instrument, and beneficiary. (Carnie p 229-31)
c. Selectional restrictions are semantic restrictions on arguments. (Carnie p.240)
- Perfective
a. El perfectivo es un aspecto flexivo contrastado con el aspecto imperfectivo que en el español son aspectos de distintos puntos de vista. Es común nombrar los dos aspecto del tiempo pasado pretérito y imperfecto cuando en realidad son el pretérito perfecto y el pretérito imperfecto. El aspecto perfectivo denota los eventos completos con una duración determinada y con principio y final. Esta realidad se contrasta con el aspecto imperfectivo en que los eventos son incompletos en los que no se considera su principio o su fin. Corrió (evento acabado) vs corría (evento intermedio sin enfocar en su principio o final. (Bosque & Gutierres-Rexach p. 297-98)
- Reduplicative predicate (2)
a. an act or instance of doubling (part of) the predicate which prompts semantic changes of duration or repetition, or intensity.
b. I asked Grant and this is what he responded: “…The verb is the head of the entire VP so it still counts as part of a predicate. One type of reduplication involves simple doubling the verbal head and nothing else gets repeated. This could also be the case for intensification of adjectives like “limpio limpio” and others. The adjective is a predicate and is doubled but other parts of it are not as far as I know “la cubeta está LLENA llena de agua” With adjectives rather than increase the number of events or intensity of the action, it increases the degrees - it’s a colloquial way of saying “very/completely full””
- Sufijo derivativo
a. Los sufijos derivativos son afijos que suceden a la raíz o a otro sufijo para formar una nueva palabra a partir de la primera. Preceden a los sufijos flexivos (género y número) si los hay. Esta derivación puede suponer un cambio de categoría gramatical entre la palabra original y la resultante (crear un sustantivo a partir de un verbo COMER-COMIDA). Una de las particularidades de los sufijos derivativos es que aportan, por sí mismos, la categoría gramatical de la palabra creada y, en la mayoría de los casos, le aportan un cambio de sentido regular. Los sufijos derivativos son uno de los mecanismos léxico-genéticos más productivos de la lengua, por su capacidad de crear una multitud de términos a partir de una sola palabra.
Theme vowel/Thematic vowel (of verbs)
a. La vocal temática constituye el primer sufijo de un verbo, por ejemplo: /a/ en el verbo ‘comprar’ o en el verbo ‘vender’ puede ser -e- si el verbo está en forma infinitiva o presente, -í- si está en forma del imperfecto, o -ie- si está en forma del pretérito de 3ra persona plural. La forma básica de la vocal temática corresponde a la que acompaña la marca del infinitivo y varía según el sufijo que se le añada. La vocal temática de la primera conjugación sufre pocos cambios y es clave para distinguir entre el modo indicativo y subjuntivo del presente. Los anglohablantes suelen confundir las vocales temáticas ya que escuchan varias formas verbales en el input que reciben. (Koike & Klee, 80-81)
Transitive
a. The property of transitivity refers to how many arguments follow the verb. Predicates that take two obligatory arguments have a valency of 2; some examples are hit, love, see, kiss, admire, etc. These predicates are said to be transitive, because they have a single argument after the verb (the other argument precedes the verb. (Carnie, 58)
Voz media (Middle voice)
a. Middle/passive constructions are formed with the clitic se with an active verb form. The clitic which appears in this construction is homophonous with reflexive clitics. The following sentence can be read as (1) transitive reflexive, (2) passive voice and (3) intransitive middle voice:
i. El coche se movió.
b. In middle/passive construction, the verb is in active form. It agrees in person and number with the derived subject, and the clitic agrees in person and number with the derived subject. Middle and passive constructions are superficially identical, but they can be differentiated on the basis of their argument structure and associated temporal properties. Passives, but not middles, have an implicit agent.
i. Passive: El coche se movió voluntariamente. “The car was moved voluntarily”, not “The car moved voluntarily”
ii. Middle: El coche se movió para evitar un accidente. “The car was moved to avoid an accident,” not “The car moved to avoid an accident.” (Zagona, 41)
Propositions and sentences
● A proposition is that aspect of the meaning of a sentence which allows us to say “Yes, that’s true” or “No, that’s false”. It describes a state of affairs that holds in the world, and its correspondence with that state of affairs allows us to attribute truth or falsity to the proposition.
● A sentence is a grammatically complete series of words consisting of a subject and predicate.
Acceptability
● Acceptability is simply whether or not an utterance is accepted in a language.
grammaticality
● Grammaticality is grammatical correctness. Language requires a particular relationship to hold between words and that relationship is grammaticality.
stars
● Stars mark ungrammatical sentences
Tacit Knowledge
a kind of implicit knowledge. It is that feeling one gets when they know a sentence is incorrect but cannot explain why.
Poverty of the Stimulus
attempts to show that children are in possession of kinds of knowledge about their language which simply isn’t plausibly in the input data that they hear
I-language
a speaker’s tacit knowledge of their native language
Competence
I-language
Performance
putting the I-language to use
Recursion
A sentence can have a structure in which what follows the verb is another sentence: Dorothy thinks witches are dangerous, in which the sentence witches are dangerous occurs in the larger one
Vowel change
man>men
Suplletion
■ when the whole word changes, so that you can’t tell by the form of the words that they are related. Scottish Gaelic: Wife > bean Wives >mnaoi
Feature systems
○ What are features?
● Plural, singular
■ Feature systems
● Feature bundles: [singular, plural] = dual
● Values: Whether or not a feature is positive or negative
● Fully valued: In dual languages [+sing, +plr] and [-sing, -plr] is allowed. These are fully valued.
■ Interface rules
● Rules that map from a syntactic structure consisting of features to a morphological and eventually phonological structure on the one hand, and to a semantic interpretation on the other. Example: Pronounce a noun specified with [plural] by pronouncing the noun stem and then s.
Motivating features
We can motivate a feature if there is a variation in morphological form that makes no difference to semantic interpretation (form without meaning); or if there is an effect on semantic interpretation, but none on morphological form (meaning without form); or even if there is an effect on neither semantic interpretation nor on morphological form, but the feature must be posited because a syntactic relation must be established or the wrong prediction about grammaticality will result.
Motivating features
We can motivate a feature if there is a variation in morphological form that makes no difference to semantic interpretation (form without meaning); or if there is an effect on semantic interpretation, but none on morphological form (meaning without form); or even if there is an effect on neither semantic interpretation nor on morphological form, but the feature must be posited because a syntactic relation must be established or the wrong prediction about grammaticality will result.
Major category features
Category features are responsible for separating words into the traditional word classes of noun, verb, adjective, etc.
[N], [V], [A]
Lexical item
a single word, a part of a word, or a chain of words that forms the basic elements of a language’s lexicon
Autonomy of Syntax Hypothesis
The idea that syntactic relations hold between purely syntactic features
Phi-features
person, number, and gender
Substitution Test
replace a string of a number of words with a single word
Constituent
A group of words which can be picked out in this way (i.e. via substitution)
Clefting test
(22) It’s [Anson] that I like
(23) It’s [under the bed] that’s the best place to hide
(24) It was [Julie and Jenny] that arrived first (25) It was [over the hill and through the woods] that they came running
Fundamental notions of syntactic objects
■ Merge- Joining two syntactic objects together
● Z
/ \
X Y
● MZ is the mother of X and Y, and X and Y are the daughters, and they are each other’s sisters.
● Nodes are the branches. Terminal nodes are the lowest and root nodes are the topmost.
Theta roles
○ 0-place predicates ex. It rained, It snowed.
○ 1-place predicates: Alison collapsed, Anson appeared, The horse fell
■ One-place predicates which combine with an Agent are called Unergative predicates, while one-place predicates which combine with a Theme are called Unaccusative predicates.
○ 2-place predicates: Anson kicked the cat, Jenny swallowed the fly, and Truman punched Johnson
■ These are transitives
○ 3-place predicates: Arthur gave the tapestry to Lancelot, The butler sent the poison to Dinah
■ These are ditransitives
Unique Theta Generalization
Each theta role is assigned to exactly one constituent in the sentence.
However, althoughevery theta role must be assigned to a constiuent, not all constituents are assigned theta roles.
Argument
a constituent in a sentence which is assigned a theta role by a predicate.
Unassigned theta roles
● There are some predicates that seem to allow their θ-roles to remain unassigned. Examples include the verb donate: (97) The landlord donated a helicopter. Donate is a 3-place predicate, but only two of its θ-roles have been assigned in (97). There does not appear to be a constituent that is assigned the Goal θ-role. But notice that this sentence has to be contextualised. It isn’t acceptable to utter it to someone out of the blue. The person who is being spoken to must know where the helicopter is being donated to.
● These verbs are ambiguous
Unassigned theta roles
● There are some predicates that seem to allow their θ-roles to remain unassigned. Examples include the verb donate: (97) The landlord donated a helicopter. Donate is a 3-place predicate, but only two of its θ-roles have been assigned in (97). There does not appear to be a constituent that is assigned the Goal θ-role. But notice that this sentence has to be contextualised. It isn’t acceptable to utter it to someone out of the blue. The person who is being spoken to must know where the helicopter is being donated to.
● These verbs are ambiguous
Categorial selectional features
c-selectional features): a categorial feature on a lexical item, which does not determine the distribution of the lexical item itself, rather it determines the category of the elements which will be able to Merge with that lexical item. Ex. “kissed” can join with nouns but not verbs… kissed pigs but not *kissed eat.
Interpretable features
features which have an effect on the semantic interpretation of a category
Full Interpretation
The structure to which the semantic interface rules apply contains no uninterpretable features.
The Checking Requirement
Uninterpretable (c-selectional) features must be checked, and once checked, they can delete.
Grammatical gender
a. Grammatical gender is a type of noun class that divides nouns into different groups. In general, languages with grammatical gender (especially in Indo-European languages) can have two or three noun classes, although some (like Bantu languages, as Swahili) can have over a dozen. Different languages can have different parameters for how gender is perpetuated throughout the system. Grammatical gender, in Spanish, requires agreement between the noun, its associated determiners and adjectives, third-person pronouns (él, ella) and clitics (lo, la, los, las). In other languages, the verb can show gender, as in the past tense of Russian–poshol (masculine) vs shla (feminine) vs poshlo (neuter).
Laísmo
a. The rarest of the leísmo, loísmo, laísmo group. This phenomenon shows preference for la and las over le and les as an indirect object pronoun. It is attested primarily in Central Peninsular dialects, such as that of Madrid and Castilla-León.
Leísmo
a. Se denomina leísmo al uso de las formas de dativo le/les en lugar de las de acusativo lo/los, la/las. Esto es más aceptado cuando el objeto directo es una persona (animada) masculino singular ‘lo’ es reemplazado por “le”, y menos aceptado en plural (les por los), aún menos aceptado en lugar de OD cuando son personas femininas (le/les por la/las) y todavía menos aceptado en lugar de cosas inanimadas. (Nueva Gramatica basica de la Lengua Española, RAE p.105)
Pragmatics (2)
a. Analiza el sentido no codificado de los mensajes lingüísticos en relación con el hablante, el oyente y diversos factores relativos al contexto y la situación. (Nueva Gramatica basica de la Lengua Española, RAE p. 2)
b. Tiene que ver con el uso de la lengua de acuerdo con el contexto social de la interacción, la relación entre los participantes y lo que se considera apropiado en cada cultura, entre otros factores. Ejemplos son: Si lo que se dijo se debe interpretar como una sugerencia (sarcástica), un desvío total del tema original o un insulto (KK p. 157-58).
Rhizotonic preterite (root-stressed preterite)
a. “Strong” preterites. In Latin, majority of rhizotonic preterite replaced by regular ones. Stress falls on stem in forms 1 and 3 (yo and él/ella/ud); all other forms stressed on ending, exactly as in “weak” conjugation. Personal ending for form 1 is phonetically regular, /-i:/ > /-e/. Ending for 3 is analogical /-a:-ut/, /-i:ut/ adopted from Late Latin (Lloyd, 303)
b. Form with stress on the root. In Spanish irregular preterites, the first and third person singular forms are rhyzotonic. (Hualde, 300)
Markedness
a. Markedness refers to the way words are changed or added to give special meaning. The unmarked form is the “normal” meaning. In Spanish, for example, the word gato is unmarked because it does not have changes, such as to mark gender, or additions, such as to mark plurality.
El análisis contrastivo
las partes de la lengua que no son iguales en una lengua a otra (por ejemplo, un estudiante va a tener más dificultad con adquirir aquellos elementos de la L2 que son muy diferentes a la L1, que funcionan de maneras diferentes en las dos lenguas o que no existen en una de las dos lenguas.
Por ejemplo, es más difícil adquirir el imperfecto, el pretérito, los pronombres enclíticos, el subjuntivo, los verbos copulativos ser vs estar y la flexibilidad del orden
Jerarquía de dificultad
según el análisis contrastivo, lo más fácil de aprender si se sigue la jerarquía es aquello que cuenta con un par (match) en la otra lengua
Enunciado
Utterance
La pragmática
el signficado de un enunciado según su contexto de uso; la relación entre un enunciado y su contexto
Gramática:
las reglas que dictan la realización apropiada de la lengua
El enfoque en la forma:
un estudiante dirige su atención a las formas gramaticales durante una actividad que se concentra en el significado; por ejemplo, cuando la clase discute una lectura sobre algún tema, y puede haber una pausa para explicar una forma gramática
El enfoque en la formaS
asume que el aprendizaje de una L2 tiene que ver con el aprendizaje de habilidades y destrezas –no es posible aprender las formas por medio de input no enfocado en esos puntos gramaticales, sino solo puede enfocarse en el contexto en el que aparecen y el significado general de un discurso; por ejemplo, una lectura
La hipótesis relacionada al input
o Krashen—la importancia para el estudiante del input comprensible y fácil de internalizar
o El hecho de que los estudiantes pueden crear frases que no escuchan en el input, por lo que no se puede decir que toda la adquisición se deriva necesariamente solo del input
¬ Factores que influyen la adquisición de “ser” y “estar”
o La simplificación: usar solo un verbo copulativo
o El valor comunicativo de la palabra: usar un verbo si no existe un contraste de significado
o La frecuencia
o La transferencia: “es” es muy parecido a “is” en inglés
El análisis de errores
¬ Los errores no se derivan siempre del contraste entre las dos lenguas
¬ El análisis contrastivo no proveía una explicación adecuada para explicar la secuencia de adquisición
La hipótesis de fijar la atención (noticing hypothesis)
o El estudiante no usa todo el input que escucha
o El maestro puede ayudar al estudiante a fijar la atención
o El enfoque en la forma versus el enfoque en las formas
La hipótesis interaccionista
o El estudiante aprende através de la interacción con otras personas
o Negociación de significado
o Peticiones de esclarecimiento: clarifying petitions
Competencia lingüística
• Chomsky (reacción a Hymes)
• Generativista
• Prerrequisito para competencia comunicativa
o Usar bien las formas, juzgar si la forma es correcta
Acto de Habla
- Contexto de una interacción
- Tipo y función del enunciado (pregunta, statement)
- Como formular un enunciado, como está entendido
- Lo lingüístico, unidad de análisis
- Lo qué logra hacer y qué quiere lograr hacer
Funciones que desempeñan los actos de habla
• Mandato, promesas, disculpas, peticiones, sugerencias…
Clasificaciones de actos de habla
• Directivos (mandato) ♣ Tómate otro vinito • compromisivos (promesa) ♣ te lo tengo listo para lunes • expresivos (queriendo una reacción, una meta) o ¡Cuidado! o Buenos días o Sarcasmo • declaraciones (lo que se dice se logra/hace; se supone cierta autoridad) o perdonar, declarar, prometer, confesar – en 1ª persona singular, en presente indicativo (tiene que referirse al punto inmediato) ♣ Le declaro la guerra • asertivos (informativo) ♣ Le declaró la guerra ♣ Mi hija está enferma
La cortesía verbal
- Suavizar / ternar cualquier tipo de enunciado / mensaje
- Tú vs Ud.
- “No se preocupe, ya se sabe que la circulación está fatal
- incluso gestos, actos paralingüísticas
- lo sociopragmático – las convenciones sociales
Aspecto verbal
• Aspecto léxico (+clasificaciones)
• Aspecto gramatical (+clasificaciones)
o Perspective
o 1r plano vs segundo plano (fore vs background)
Telicidad
Un objeto tiene un punto final inherente
Los aspectos léxicos (clasificaciones de Aristóteles)
- Estado (ser) – atélico
- Actividad (correr) –esfuerzo – atélico
- Evento télico (escribir una carta) / logro – télico
- Evento puntuales – instantáneos – (darse cuenta)
Lexical Aspect Hypothesis (LAH)
Preterite stems from telic verbs, imperfect stems from atelic verbs in SLA
Similarities
Telic = foreground
Atelic = background
Distributional Bias Hypothesis
Distriibution in L1 bias that same use for L2
Topic/comment
The topic is the phrase in a discourse that the rest of the discourse is understood to be about, and the comment is what is being said about the topic. “The dog kicked the little girl”, the topic is dog and the comment is kicking the girl.
Voz media
: Existe un intermedio que comparte características con la voz activa y la voz pasiva. Esta construcción sólo se puede realizar con algunos verbos transitivos y consiste en que para el sujeto de la oración, (al igual que en las construcciones perifrásticas y reflejas) existe una oración correspondiente en voz activa cuyo complemento directo es dicho sujeto. Por ejemplo para una oración en voz activa como la siguiente: Rompe el cristal, existe una oración en voz media: El cristal se rompe fácilmente. El verbo nunca es pasivo en las oraciones medias. La interpretación es distinta respecto a la oración pasiva. (Rodríguez Ramalle, Capítulo 5: p.429)
Cuantificador de grado
un buen número de adjetivos admiten especificadores que aportan valores relativos al grado y a la cuantificación. Ej. muy, tan, más/menos, demasiado, considerablemente, bastante, ¡qué pesada es María!
Morphophonemic change
Unlike orthographic changes, morphophonemic changes alter the phonemes themselves, not merely their spelling. Examples: e >ue, e > ie whenever they are stressed. For example pensar > pienso because the e is in a tonic position. Novénta > nuéve. Dentísta—diénte. Or, it can be progressive assimilation.
Supletismo (morfología
es un proceso mediante el cual una palabra adopta raíces diferentes para un mismo paradigma, lo que, según la norma general, requeriría únicamente la sustitución de un morfo por otro. Ej. ir > voy, fue; ser > soy, era (a diferencia de un verbo como cantar que solamente tiene una raíz)
–cuando hay varios alomorfos de una raíz verbal (ser)
Analogy (analogía):
influencia de una forma en la pronunciación de otra (según Profe Tejedo); often serves to restore or maintain the similarity between members of the same paradigm. Analogy is the process whereby forms which are related in grammatical function come to have a similar form (113).
● nivelación: (un ejemplo de analogía); la reducción o disminución de alomorfia
● Ejemplos
○ LUNAE > lunes the /s/ was added because of the other forms
○ cambio de la acentuación: fácimus, légimus > hacémos, leémos
○ pēnsare: vemos una diptongación donde no la esperaríamos y se explica por una forma de analogía
○ SOCRUS > suegra and NURUS > nuera: did not expect the diphthong in NURUS –> similar grammatical function comes to have a similar form (Penny 38)
Apocope (apócope):
Omission of a word-final vowel or syllable: VERITATE > verdad. Greek for ‘cutting off’. (Alkire and Rosen 2010)
Extreme Apocope (apócope extrema):
the dropping of /-e/ after any consonant regardless of its point of articulation, and even after consonant groups like /-nt/, /-rt/, /-lt/ (Lloyd p. 209)
Assimilation (asimilación):
Process by which a segment becomes more similar to a neighbouring segment. (Hualde 2005) Ej. diente –> la /n/ se aproxima a un punto de articulación dental porque precede la /t/, fonema dental. [di̯en̪.te].
Nasal Assimilation (asimilación nasal
an example of nasal assimilation is vowel assimilation. It a vowel is followed by a nasal its production is more of a nasal. In some cases the nasalized vowel remains even after the nasal sound has been deleted.
Lexical Diffusion
in addition to an extension of a new pronunciation to new phonetic conditions, it appears that a sound change often spreads from one morpheme to another rather than being used at once in all morphemes having the appropriate phonetic conditions in which it might appear (Lloyd 21). The sound change begins as an innovative pronunciation of a single work or group of words and then progressively spreads to other portions of the lexicon. Ej. aspiration of /h/ and its deletion (Penny, Variation)–both can occur at the same time, and then one takes over the other; imperfect endings: ía vs. íe/ié
Extensión semántica
pierden algunas características, generalizándose; transferencia de significados a significantes ya existentes en español. Ej. aplicación ‘application’ vs. solicitud, moverse ‘to move’ vs. mudarse, atender ‘to attend’ vs. asistir.
Calque (calco)
una palabra construida a través de una traducción literal, es decir, palabra por palabra. Ej. hot dog > ‘perro caliente’.
Register (registro):
a variety of language used for a particular purpose, e.g. colloquial, legal, journalistic, etc.; formal vs. informal. Ej. aspiración de /s/ según ciertas situaciones
–important factors: field-subject matter of the discourse; tenor-relation between the participants; mode-medium employed
Diglosia (diglosia)
Primero se refería a una lengua con dos variedades distintas con funciones distintas; Fishman (1971) extendió el término a dos lenguas completamente distintas con funciones diferentes. Ej. Guaraní en Paraguay: ambas lenguas oficiales; una se habla en casa y la otra en cuestiones oficiales.
Covert prestige
linguistic characteristics perceived by the dominant group as inferior, but within a closed community have status and are a sign of membership (identity) within that group. Outside of the group it is not prestigious. Ej. Spanglish, ceceo, lleísmo
Overt prestige
linguistic characteristics that are widely recognized, typical of the culturally dominant group. Ej. distinción, seseo (in Sevilla, the Americas), yeísmo
Pragmatics (pragmática)
Pragmatics is a subfield of linguistics that studies the ways in which context contributes to meaning. Part of communicative competence; the conventions for putting language to appropriate use; focuses on two key factors: the nature of the transaction (the linguistic business that a speaker is trying to conduct in negotiation with the hearer(s)) and the context (situational information that speakers take into account when encoding a message and that hearers use in decoding it) (Whitley 2002: 235-236). Depending on intonation, which is suprasegmental, a certain phrase could be interpreted in various ways, such as sarcasm, humor, a question, or a declarative. Ej. María viene mañana. This could be a declarative, it could contain sarcasm, or it could be an interrogative depending on the intonation.
Transfer (from L1 to L2/L2 to L1) (transferencia de L1/L2)
Students form an interlanguage, one that combines both L1 and L2, and many times transfer syntax, lexicon, etc, from L1 to L2 or vice versa. Ex. *yo veo tú, *expectar, *involver.
La incorporación de rasgos de un idioma a otro, con una consecuente reestructuración de los subsistemas involucrados. No obstante, el problema es que la transferencia NO LÉXICA es difícil de demostrar (lo más común son préstamos)
Simplificación lingüística
La reducción del inventario de formas lingüísticas, del enlace semántico o de las funciones de la lengua, y la eliminación de estructuras alternativas en ciertos niveles. (e.g. subjunctive and indicative)
Variable (sociolingüística) (variable sociolingüística)
dos o más maneras de decir la misma cosa (variantes de una variable); variantes son iguales en cuanto a su referencia; se oponen en cuanto a su significado social y estilístico. Ej. aspiración de /s/, distinción/ceceo
Intransitive verb (verbo intransitivo)
un verbo que no toma objeto directo/indirecto. Ej. morir, nacer, llover. Ej. comer (can also be transitive when used with a direct object)
mass noun
nouns that are measurable entities, cannot be counted or organized in terms of the number system and cannot be pluralized; ex., el azúcar, sugar
Referent differentiators
mark differences in reality and differences in meaning—set up minimal pairs
Syntactic differentiators
word parts which have this function are neither referent differentiators nor independent. They mark the combinatory potential of the form.
Symbols
carry meaning, but are not differentiators
● The differences between una papa and unas papas, like the difference between unas papas and las papas, does not change the meaning of papa. The suffix s is not a referent differentiator. It provides additional meaning of its own, the notion of plurality.” (Bull p.93)
idiolect:
una variedad de lengua de una persona específica
Interference vs. transfer
: interference = temporary, a characteristic of interlanguage (describes the language of a learner who has not yet mastered the target language), Ej. Yo me llamo; Intralanguage= a system of its own, with the difference that intralanguage errors are based on L2, Ej. Fuistes comparison w/ present form of tú transfer- Ej. SV order in English applied to Spanish
headless relative
una cláusula que le falta un antecedente; ej. “El que está a la derecha es mi tío”
lengua franca
un pidgin, criollo u otra lengua ya existente que se escoge como sistema de comunicación común entre varios grupos que poseen lenguas distintas (e.g. El inglés como lengua de tecnología)
criollo
cuando una lengua pidgin se estabiliza y socialmente se adapta como lengua materna (e.g. el criollo en Haití – proviene del Francés)
pidgin
una variedad interlingüística, una lengua mixta y mezclada que no es adquirida como lengua materna por ningún grupo social.
Cambio de código
el uso alternado de dos lenguas por el mismo hablante en un hecho de habla. Intraoracional→ ocurre dentro de la misma oración (Ayer fui a la store).
Interoracional → ocurre fuera de la oración. (Me gustan los aretes. How much do they cost?).
Bilingüismo
dos o más lenguas que están en contacto cuando conviven en el mismo espacio geográfico y son usados por los mismos individuos (e.g. español e inglés en los Estados Unidos); Un individuo es bilingüe cuando tiene cierto grado de competencia en el uso de dos lenguas como vehículos de comunicación sin que este grado de competencia tenga necesariamente que ser igual al que posee un hablante de la variedad estándar.
Stressed-Timed language
Has a rhythm based on the regularly recurring stresses of groups of syllables called FEET. Each foot leads off with one strongly stressed syllable followed di-DUM-di-DUM-di-DUM. (English: Germanic Language)– the stressed syllable is lengthened; distance between each stressed syllable has relatively the same duration.
Syllable-Timed language
Has a rhythm ticked off by relatively even syllables, each syllable whether stressed or not receives one quick beat called a MORA: dot-dot-dot-dot (Spanish: Romance Languages); distance between the nucleus of each syllable has relatively the same duration.
Unstressed vowels (vocales átonas)
a vowel or syllable that is not produced as loudly in comparison with stressed vowels.
Proparoxytone
(esdrújula) antepenúltima
Oxytone
(aguda) última sílaba
Paroxytone
(llana) penúltima
Stressed vowels (vocales tónicas):
a vowel or syllable around it that is pronounced more loudly than its neighbors
Tone (tono):
Use of pitch as a contrastive feature at the lexical level (Hualde 2005)
Phonotactics (fonotáctica)
The study of how sounds combine and where they may or may not occur in the language, such as the following phonotactic considerations in Spanish: consonant clusters have only two phonemes, whether word- or syllable-initial or word- or syllable-final; /s/ is never the first member of a word- or syllable-initial consonant cluster; tap /r/ never occurs at the beginning of a word. (Dalbor 1997) The constraints on how phonemes combine to form words. (Whitley 2002:33)
Glides
(semivocal, deslizada): Vocalic segment immediately preceding or following a syllable peak and creating a single complex nucleus with it. Non peak element in a diphthong or triphthong. (Hualde 2005) Include sounds such as the [j] beginning English you and the [w] of English we. The key difference between [i] and [j] and [u] and [w], is therefore the syllabicity of the vowel (Whitley 2002: 12). Spanish glides are pronounced with greater articulatory tension and friction in most regions: Between vowels or another glide (ej. Chihuahua, ayudar); Word initially (ej. hueso, huevo). Contrast semi-vocal with semi-consonante.
Diphthong (diptongo):
Sequence including a vowel plus a glide within one syllable. If the glide occurs before the vowel, as in [i̯a], it is called a rising diphthong (because there is an increase in sonority or aperture). If the glide occurs after the vowel, as in [ai̯], it is a falling diphthong. (Hualde 2005)
Syneresis (sinérisis)
fusion of hiatus into a diphthong (Whitley 2002:31).
Hiatus (hiato)
Sequence of two vowels belonging to different syllables. The Spanish word María [ma.ɾí.a] has a hiatus; whereas Mario [má.ɾ i̯o], has a diphthong. (Hualde 2005)
Ceceo
In Spanish dialectology, pronunciation in which a fricative that auditorily resembles Castilian /θ/ is used for orthographic c(e,i), z and orthographic s. Like in seseo, there is a single phoneme instead of the two phonemes /s/ and /θ/ of the Northern-Central Peninsular Spanish, referred to as distinción. Ceceo is found in parts of Andalusia and is also common as a variable phenomenon in parts of Central America. (Hualde 2005)
Žeísmo
realización de variación diatópica donde hay rehilamiento del sonido africado sonoro palatal con más fricción con una especial caracterísitica acústica (grooved fricative) como en inglés: pleasure; esta realización ocurre en el Cono sur [ʒ]. Contraste con lleísmo y yeísmo.
Lleísmo
Conservative Spanish pronunciation that includes a palatal lateral phoneme /ʎ/, corresponding to orthographic ll. In most present-day Spanish dialects the phoneme /ʎ/ has disappeared, merging with /ʝ/. Nowadays lleísmo is found only in parts of northern Spain, the Andean region and Paraguay. But even in most of these areas, younger speakers no longer employ lleísmo. Opposed to yeísmo. (Hualde 2005)
Yeísmo
Majority pronunciation in Spanish in which the older palatal lateral phoneme /ʎ/ has merged with /ʝ/, so that orthographic ll is given the same value as orthographic y. The merger of these two older phonemes in a single strident fricative /ʒ/, as in River Plate Spanish, is known as yeísmo rehilado or žeísmo. See also/contrast with lleísmo. Hualde (2005)
Loísmo
With its feminine counterpart laísmo, it is a feature of certain dialects where the pronouns ‘lo’ or ‘la’ (which are normally used for direct objects) in place of the pronoun ‘le’ (which is used for indirect objects). An example of loísmo would be saying lo hablé (I spoke to him), where a dialect without loísmo would say le hablé (I spoke to him/her), which would be the prescriptive use due to the fact that the situation requires an indirect object.
Leísmo
is a dialectical variation that occurs in Spain where the indirect masculine object ‘le’ is used for the direct object pronoun ‘lo’, especially when the direct object refers to a male person. An example would be veo al chico –> le veo (instead of lo veo). It is generally used with male animate objects.
Proclisis
Una anteposición en la precedencia del infinitivo provoca la proclisis del pronombre átono; en cambio, la enclisis se impone cuando el complejo verbal con infinitivo desempeña libremente un papel de sustantivo por su función. Ejs. (1) a. Voy a decírtelo mañana. b. Te lo voy a decir mañana. (2) a. Juan insistió en hacerlo. b. *Juan lo insistió en hacer.
Clitic/Clitic Pronoun (pronombre clítico)
a specific class of pronouns that behave like verb affixes. They cannot stand alone and cannot be conjoined, modified, or moved to sites other than their allotted position. Typically they cannot be stressed (Alkire and Rosen 2010). Grammatical elements that can be written as a word that either attach themselves to a word, or come before a word. Phonologically they are not independent from neighboring words. Ex. Dámelo, or cómetela. The syntactic order of clitics depends on the sentence, for example, in affirmative commands the clitic is placed after the verb, and negative commands, before.
Allophone (alófono):
Distinct variant of a phoneme. For example, in Spanish the consonant phoneme /s/ has a voiced allophone [z] that occurs before a voiced consonant. (Hualde 2005)
Allomorph (alomórfo)
Distinct variant of a morpheme. For example, the root morpheme of the verb ‘to be able’ has allomorphs /pod-/ and /pued-/. To give another example, both /-s/ and /-es/ are allomorphs of the plural suffix. (Hualde 2005)
Derivational Morphemes (morfología derivacional)
Morphemes that derive a new word from another one. E.G. pre+histor+ic+o –> Pre: derivational prefix meaning ‘before’, Histor(ia): stem, Ic: derivational suffix forming an adjective from a noun, O: inflectional suffix marking gender
Inflectional Morphemes (morfología flexional):
Affixed morphemes that express syntactic properties such as person, number, tense and case; changes within a paradigm. Ej. hablábamos: habl-: raíz léxico, á : vocal temática, ba : aspectual marker, -mos: person/number marker
Morpheme (morfema)
The basic unit of morphology. It is any minimal form (word or part of a word) with its own meaning, function, and combinatory potential, whether stem (root) or affix (prefix or suffix). Also called FORMATIVES (because they are building blocks of word and phrase formation).
Minimal Pair (par mínimo):
Two words that differ in a single consonantal or vocalic segment and have different meaning. Minimal pairs are useful for establishing the phonemic inventory of a language. For instance the minimal pair [máta] ‘bush’ - [náta] ‘cream’ shows that /m/ and /n/ are contrasting consonants in Spanish. Minimal pairs can also be used to show the contrasting value of suprasegmental features such as stress and tone (in tone languages). (Hualde 2005)
Archiphoneme (archifonema)
In Prague school or European structuralism, the phonological result of the neutralization of two or more phonemes in a given position. For instance, since in Spanish /p/ and /b/ do not contrast in the coda of the syllable, an archiphoneme /P/ is postulated in the phonemic representation of words like apto /áPto/, obtiene /oPtiéne/. (Hualde 2005)
Phoneme (fonema
Contrastive segment. Minimal contrastive unit of sound. (Hualde 2005)
Manner of Articulation (modo de articulación
The manner in which the articulators contact or approach each other and modify the airstream in the production of consonants; stop, fricative, affricate, etc. (Dalbor 1997)
Grammatical gender (género gramatical)
Every noun in Spanish is considered to have either masculine or feminine gender for grammatical purposes. Grammatical gender in Spanish must not be equated with sex, although most nouns referring to male persons are grammatically masculine, and most referring to females are feminine. Exceptionally, persona (‘person’) and víctima (‘victim’) are always feminine, even when they refer to a male. Words are marked as feminine or masculine (which is also the default).
Case (caso):
The case of a noun or pronoun is an inflectional form that indicates its grammatical function in a phrase or sentence. Nouns, pronouns, and adjectives must be ‘declined’ in order to serve a grammatical function. In Latin there are seven grammatical cases.
Theme vowel/thematic vowel (vocal temática)
The theme vowel identifies the conjugational class, the -a-, -e-, or -i- of verbs. The -r- is the infinitive suffix, and therefore various authors discuss that -r- in–ar, -er, -ir verbs isn’t necessary. The theme vowel of hablar is ‘a’, of comer is ‘e’, and of vivir is ‘i’.
Free Variation (variación libre):
Two or more allophones of a phoneme are said to be in free variation in a given context if all of them may occur in that context. For instance, in some Spanish dialects [s] and [h] are in free variation word finally. Very often apparent free variation is actually stylistically conditioned. (Hualde 2005)
Defective distribution (distribución defectivo)
The distribution of a sound is said to be defective when it does not occur in some environments where phonetically similar sounds may occur. An example of an English consonant sound with a defective distribution is [ŋ], whereas [m n] may occur both in the onset and in the coda of a syllable, [ŋ] may occur only in the coda. Ej. In word initial position after a pause, [rr] can occur, while [r] cannot. This makes the distribution of [r] defective.
Complementary distribution (distribución complementaria)
the relationship between two different elements, where one element is found in a particular environment and the other element is found in the opposite environment. As Dalbor puts it, it is the name given to the predictable occurrence of the allophones of one phoneme. Ej. With the phoneme /b/, there are the allophones [b] and [β]. There is a rule that states that [b] is found after a nasal, pause, and that [β] is found elsewhere, aka in all other situations.
Non-systemic uses of verb tenses (usos no-sistémicos)
language stretches to conform to its users’ needs, and just as the literal denotation of a word expands to cover figurative meanings, the systemic (basic) meaning of a tense can spread to express other characterizations of events; includes specialized functions it has acquired outside that system by way of extension. ej. anticipatory present (Salgo mañana), historical present, future of probability (¿Quién será) and conditional (¿Te gustaría…? → mitigation, and contrary-to-fact statements)
Systemic use of verb tenses (usos sistémicos)
most common uses of verb tenses, where the verb tense agrees with the actual time constraints given by the paradigm; the meaning each category has within the overall system. ej. present: Salgo ‘I leave’, future: Saldré ‘I will leave’
Mood/Mode (modo
a tense system, like the indicative, shifted to another mode or kind of perspective. Therefore, in Spanish there is the indicative mood, and the subjunctive mood. Aspect is never differentiated in the subjunctive mood.
Arrhizotonic preterite (arrizotónico):
Son los pretéritos débiles, donde no tienen el acento en la raíz; en cambio, el acento cae en las desinencias. Hay más pretéritos arrizotonicos que rizotónicos.
Rhizotonic preterite (rizotónico):
Son los pretéritos fuertes, donde el acento cae en la raíz de la palabra. Ej. tuve, estuve, pude, puse, etc.
Perfective
a grammatical aspect used to describe a situation viewed as a simple whole–a unit without internal structure; refers to the beginning or the end of an event; ej. se representa con el pretérito
Aspect (aspecto):
Refers to (1) the nature of the event being described (e.g., instantaneous and pointlike vs. enduring or recurring) and (2) which part of the event is being depicted at recalled point (RP) (e.g., ongoing or ended). (1) is called lexical aspect since it is held to be a lexical property of the verb itself and (2) is called discourse aspect or viewpoint aspect since it is a function of how the speaker is choosing to present the event during a story. (Whitley 2002: 117)
Cyclic event (evento cíclico):
event represented with a verb that must be fully completed before it can begin again; related to the perfective aspect (el pretérito); ej. Miguel se cayó.
Transitive (transitivo):
A transitive verb is a verb that can take at least one object. For example, “Como una hamburguesa”, donde “como” es transitivo porque puede tomar un objeto directo.
Intransitive verb (verbo intransitivo):
un verbo que no toma objeto directo/indirecto. Ej. morir, nacer, llover. Ej. comer (can also be transitive when used with a direct object)
Variable (sociolingüística) (variable sociolingüística)
): dos o más maneras de decir la misma cosa (variantes de una variable); variantes son iguales en cuanto a su referencia; se oponen en cuanto a su significado social y estilístico. Ej. aspiración de /s/, distinción/ceceo
Simplificación lingüística
La reducción del inventario de formas lingüísticas, del enlace semántico o de las funciones de la lengua, y la eliminación de estructuras alternativas en ciertos niveles. (e.g. subjunctive and indicative)
Transfer (from L1 to L2/L2 to L1) (transferencia de L1/L2)
Students form an interlanguage, one that combines both L1 and L2, and many times transfer syntax, lexicon, etc, from L1 to L2 or vice versa. Ex. *yo veo tú, *expectar, *involver.
Pragmatics (pragmática)
Pragmatics is a subfield of linguistics that studies the ways in which context contributes to meaning. Part of communicative competence; the conventions for putting language to appropriate use; focuses on two key factors: the nature of the transaction (the linguistic business that a speaker is trying to conduct in negotiation with the hearer(s)) and the context (situational information that speakers take into account when encoding a message and that hearers use in decoding it) (Whitley 2002: 235-236). Depending on intonation, which is suprasegmental, a certain phrase could be interpreted in various ways, such as sarcasm, humor, a question, or a declarative. Ej. María viene mañana. This could be a declarative, it could contain sarcasm, or it could be an interrogative depending on the intonation.
Overt prestige
: linguistic characteristics that are widely recognized, typical of the culturally dominant group. Ej. distinción, seseo (in Sevilla, the Americas), yeísmo
Covert prestige
linguistic characteristics perceived by the dominant group as inferior, but within a closed community have status and are a sign of membership (identity) within that group. Outside of the group it is not prestigious. Ej. Spanglish, ceceo, lleísmo
Diglosia (diglosia)
Primero se refería a una lengua con dos variedades distintas con funciones distintas; Fishman (1971) extendió el término a dos lenguas completamente distintas con funciones diferentes. Ej. Guaraní en Paraguay: ambas lenguas oficiales; una se habla en casa y la otra en cuestiones oficiales.
Register (registro
a variety of language used for a particular purpose, e.g. colloquial, legal, journalistic, etc.; formal vs. informal. Ej. aspiración de /s/ según ciertas situaciones
–important factors: field-subject matter of the discourse; tenor-relation between the participants; mode-medium employed
Calque (calco):
una palabra construida a través de una traducción literal, es decir, palabra por palabra. Ej. hot dog > ‘perro caliente’.
Extensión semántica
pierden algunas características, generalizándose; transferencia de significados a significantes ya existentes en español. Ej. aplicación ‘application’ vs. solicitud, moverse ‘to move’ vs. mudarse, atender ‘to attend’ vs. asistir.
Lexical Diffusion
in addition to an extension of a new pronunciation to new phonetic conditions, it appears that a sound change often spreads from one morpheme to another rather than being used at once in all morphemes having the appropriate phonetic conditions in which it might appear (Lloyd 21). The sound change begins as an innovative pronunciation of a single work or group of words and then progressively spreads to other portions of the lexicon. Ej. aspiration of /h/ and its deletion (Penny, Variation)–both can occur at the same time, and then one takes over the other; imperfect endings: ía vs. íe/ié
