Module 36 Flashcards
Language
our words and the ways we combine them to communicate meaning
Phoneme
the smallest distinctive sound unit
Morpheme
the smallest unit that carries meaning; may be a word or a part of a word (ex. prefix)
Grammar
a system of rules that enables us to communicate with and understand others.
Semantics
language’s set of rules for deriving meaning from sounds
Syntax
set of rules for combining words into grammatically sensible sentences
Babbling stage
around 4 months, the stage of speech development when an infant spontaneously utters various sounds, at first unrelated to the household language
One-word stage
the stage in speech development from age 1 to 2, when a child speaks mostly in single words
Two-word stage
beginning about age 2, the stage in speech development when a child speaks mostly in two-word statements
Telegraphic speech
early speech stage when a child speaks like a telegram, using mostly nouns and verbs (ex. “go car”)
Aphasia
impairment of language, usually caused by left hemisphere damage to Broca’s area (impairing speaking) or Wernicke’s area (impairing understanding).
Broca’s area
helps control language expression, that directs the muscle movements involved in speech
in area of the frontal lobe, usually in the left hemisphere,
Wernicke’s area
brain area involved in language comprehension and expression
usually in the left temporal lobe.
Linguistic determinism
the strong form of Whorf’s hypothesis—that language controls the way we think and interpret the world around us.
Linguistic influence
the idea that language affects thought (thus our thinking and world view is “relative to” our cultural language).
the weaker form of “linguistic relativity”
