Summary 1 Flashcards

1
Q

What are the two types of classification of languages?

A

Genetic and by types (typological)

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2
Q

What is genetic classification + example?

A

Historical classification based on common ancestry

example: latin- parent language, french- daughter language, french and romanian- sister languages

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3
Q

what is the most common type of language classification?

A

genetic!

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4
Q

what are the problems with genetic classification?

A

The daughter languages do not split off from the parent language so neatly

Heavy borrowing from other (non-related) languages may obscure the relationship.

It assumes a clear distinction between a language and a dialect.

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5
Q

what is a recent phenomenon?

A

standardized language- dialects are the norm!

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6
Q

what is an example of a standardized force?

A

writing

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7
Q

what are The earliest attempts at classifying languages in the nineteenth century?

A

Languages by types (typological)

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8
Q

what kinds of typological classification are there?

A

isolating, inflecting, aggultinating

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9
Q

what does isolating mean?

A

No endings, mostly monosyllabic, unbound morphemes. Words have the same form regardless of their grammatical use. Grammar = word order.

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10
Q

what does Inflecting (flectional) mean?

A

Words have inflectional endings each of which may have several grammatical meanings at once. The inflections can show great variation.

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11
Q

what does Aggultinating mean?

A

Words have one stem and several affixes (bound morphemes) and are built up by adding units. Each unit has its own grammatical meaning. The affixes are very regular

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12
Q

example languages of isolating types?

A

Example languages: Chinese, Vietnamese, Samoan, other???

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13
Q

example languages of inflecting types?

A

Example languages: Latin, Greek, Arabic, other???

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14
Q

example languages of aggultinating types?

A

Example languages: Turkish, Finnish, Japanese and Swahili

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15
Q

what’s a problem with the type classification?

A

A lot of languages are combinations of two or more types:

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16
Q

exampled of A lot of languages are combinations of two or more types:

A

polysynthetic or incorporating, Example languages: Inuit, Mohawk, Australian aboriginal

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17
Q

english examples of all types of typological classification?

A

Isolating: The boy will ask the girl.
Inflecting: The biggest boys had been asking.
base form: big boy have be ask
Agglutinating: anti-dis-establish-ment-arian-ism

18
Q

analytic vs. synthetic?

A
  • Analytic: fewer bound morphemes, more reliance on word order:
    English
  • Synthetic: more bound morphemes, freer word order: Latin
19
Q

true of false: Languages are classified along a scale indicating the degree of these characteristics. They may be more or less analytic or synthetic.

A

TRUE

20
Q

is English more analytic or synthetic?

A

analytic!

21
Q

is French more analytic or synthetic?

A

middle

22
Q

is latin more analytic or synthetic?

A

synthetic!

23
Q

what are Other methods of typological classification:

A
  • Typology: Order of subject, verb, and object

* Head-first/last

24
Q

difference between head-first and head-last?

A
  • Head-first: The head of the phrase is first and the modifiers follow:
    the table with the broken leg that I want to throw away
  • Head-last: The head is last in the phrase and the modifiers precede: the big round wooden table
25
Q

what is The Comparative Method:

A

Comparing the words and forms of languages in order to

  • determine their (possible) genetic relationship
  • attempt to reconstruct the parent language (if it no longer exists)
26
Q
  • The first clear statement about the genetic relationship and common origin of Sanskrit, Greek, Latin, most European languages, and other languages came from who and when?
A

William Jones in 1876.

27
Q

why was The original (proto) language was named “Indo-European”?

A

since the languages in this group stretched from India to Europe (and later to the new world).

28
Q

In the absence of written records, any reconstruction of an extinct parent language has to be considered:

A

hypothetical!

29
Q

what’s a famous example of the comparative method?

A

Grimm’s Law

30
Q

what’s grimm’s law?

A

Indo-European p, t, k are found regularly as f, th, h (/χ/) in Germanic: example: pater-father

31
Q

complete the sentence: English adopted the Latin alphabet with :

A

CHRISTIANITY

32
Q

the latin alphabet replaced the:

A

fuþork alphabet

33
Q

what is Comparative reconstruction:

A

Working back from languages in which the letter – sound correspondences are known. Limit on how far back we can go

34
Q

facts about IE:

A
  • Probably in the area north of the Black Sea and west of the Caspian Sea (Ukraine), possibly Anatolia
    (Turkey)
  • 3,500 – 4,000 BC
35
Q

IE is associated with the:

A

Kurgan culture (Gimbutas)

36
Q

in IE, there were - No words for _____which suggests that ____________

A

ocean, sea, lions, tigers, elephants, camels,

they lived inland in a more
temperate area.

37
Q

In contrast, Germanic languages have unique words for _______________ which
suggests that ____________.

A

ships & seafaring (ship, sail, boat, keel, sea),

they moved to a coastal area near a larger body of water.

38
Q

Archeological evidence suggests that they (or their languages) reached central and southern Europe and
Persia (Iran) by about : (when)

A

1500 BC

39
Q

did the IE people spread for reasons of conquest?

A

hard to imagine this as the only reason
- no abundance of words for warfare.
- There probably were not enough of them to conquer large areas of Asia (Iran, Afghanistan, India)
and all of Europe.

40
Q

the migration was probably a combination of:

A

conquest, spread of agriculture and mobility (horses and wheeled vehicles)

41
Q

Indo-European was highly __________

A

inflected

42
Q

nouns in IE had _______ gender, not _____ gender

A

grammatical, biological