E.g. nasalize a vowel when it is followed by a nasal sound.
③ deletion rule-Elision
Definition: the omission of a sound segment which would be present in deliberate pronunciation of a word in isolation
E.g. delete a [g] when it occurs before a final nasal consonant
[I] Suprasegmental features
① Stress
Word stress & sentence stress
The stress of the English compounds always on the first element
② Tone
Definition: Tones are pitch variations, which are caused by the differing rates of vibration of the vocal cords.
Pitch variations can distinguish meaning just like morphemes.
Tone language, like Chinese, has four tones.
Level, rise, fall-rise, fall
③ Intonation
When pitch, stress and sound length are tied to the sentence rather than the word in isolation, they are collectively known as intonation.
English: the four basic types of intonation, or the four tones
The falling tone, the rising tone, the fall-rising tone, and the rise-fall tone
Chapter 4 Morphology
[A] The definition of morphology
Morphology is a branch of grammar which studies the internal structure of words and the rules by which words are formed.
Inflectional morphology
Derivational morphology (lexical morphology)
Morpheme: the smallest meaningful components of words
(A minimal unit of meaning or grammatical function)
[B] Free morphemes & bound morphemes
Free morphemes: can stand by themselves as single words
à Lexical morphemes [n.a.v] & functional morphemes [conj.prep.art.pron.]
Bound morphemes: can not normally stand alone, but which are typically attached to another form
à Derivational morphemes----àaffix (suffix, infix, prefix) + root
à Inflectional morphemes à 8
8 types of inflectional morphemes in English
Noun+ -’s, -s [possessive; plural]
Verb+ -s, -ing, -ed, -en [3rd person present singular; present participle; past tense, past participle]
Adj+ -er, -est [comparative; superlative]
[C] Derivational vs. inflectional
Inflectional morphemes never change the grammatical category of a word
Inflectional morphemes influence the whole category;
Derivational morphemes are opposite
Order: root (stem) + derivational + inflectional
[D] Morphological Rules
N. +lyà a.; A. +lyà adv.; guard overgeneralization
[E] Morphs and allomorphs
Morphs: the actual forms used to realize morphemes
Allomorphs: a set of morphs, all of which are versions of one morpheme, we refer to them as allomorphs of that morpheme.
[F] Word-formation process
① Coinageàthe invention of totally new terms
② Borrowingàthe taking over of words form other languages
Loan-translation (Claque)à a direct translation of the elements of a word into the borrowing language
Stand alone to be the opposite of word-formation
③ Compoundingà a joining of two separate words to produce a single form
Features of compounds
a) Orthographically, a compound can be written as one word, with or without a hyphen in between, or as two separate words.
b) Syntactically, the part of speech of the compound is generally determined by the part of speech of the second element.
c) Semantically, the meaning of a compound is often idiomatic, not always being the sum total of the meanings of its components.
d) Phonetically, the stress of a compound always falls on the first element,
While the second element receives secondary stress.
④ Blendingà taking over the beginning of one word and joining it to the end of other word
⑤ Clippingà a word of more than one syllable reduced to a shorter form
⑥ Back formationà a process by which new words are formed by taking away the suffix of an existing word
Hypocorismsàclipping or +ie
⑦ Conversionà category change, functional shift
⑧ Acronymsà new words are formed from the initial letters of a set of other words
⑨ Derivationà the new words are formed by the addition of affixes to the roots, stems, or words
⑩ Abbreviationà a shortened form of a word or phrase which represents the complete form
Analogy
Chapter 5 Grammar
[A] Types of grammar
The study of grammar, or the study of the structure of expressions in a language, has a very long tradition.
① Mental grammar: a form of internal linguistic knowledge which operates in the production and recognition of appropriately structured expressions in that language. à Psychologist
② Linguistic etiquette: the identification of the proper or best structures to be used in a language. à Sociologist
③ The study and analysis of the structures found in a language, with the aim of establishing a description of the grammar of English, e.g. as distinct from the grammar of Russia or French. à Linguist
[B] The parts of speech
Nouns, adjectives, verbs, adverbs, prepositions, pronouns, conjunctions
à the grammatical categories of words in sentences
[C] Traditional grammar (Categories and analysis)
Other categories: number, person, tense, voice and gender
Agreement:
English languageßnatural gender
Grammatical genderà French
[D] Types of grammar concerning analysis
The prescriptive approach: The view of grammar as a set of rules for the proper use of a language
The descriptive approach: analysts collect samples of the language they are interested in and attempt to describe the regular structures of the language at it is used, not according to some view of how it should be used.
[E] Structural and immediate constituent analysis (IC Analysis)
Structural analysis: to investigate the distinction of forms (e.g. morphemes) in a language
IC Analysis: how small constituents (Components) in sentences go together to form larger constituents
[F] Labeled and bracketed sentences
Hierarchical organization of the constituents in a sentence
Label each constituent with grammatical terms such as Art. N. NP
Chapter 6 Syntax
[A] The definition of syntax
A subfield of linguistics that studies the sentence structure of language
[B] The basic components of a sentence
Sentence
Subject Predicate
Referring expression comprises finite verb or a verb phrase and says something about the subject
[C] Types of sentences
Simple sentence: consists of a single clause which contains a subject and a predicate and stands alone as its own sentence.
Coordinate (Compound) sentence: contains two clauses joined by a linking word called coordinating conjunctions, such as “and”, “by”, “or”…
Complex sentence: contains two, or more, clauses, one of which is incorporated into the other
Embedded clauseßà matrix clause
① subordinator ②f unctions as a grammatical unit ③ may be complete
[D] The linear and hierarchical structures of sentences
When a sentence is uttered or written down, the words of the sentence are produced one after another in a sequence, which suggests the structure of a sentence is linear.
But the superficial arrangement of words in a linear sequence does not entail that sentences are simply linearly-structured; sentences are organized with words of the same syntactic category, such as NP or VP, grouped together.
Tree diagram of constituent structure
Brackets and subscript labels
[E] Some categories
Syntactic categories: refer to a word or a phrase that performs a particular grammatical function, such as the subject or the predicate
Lexical categories: (parts of speech)
Major lexical categories (open categories):
N. V. Adj. Adv.
Minor lexical categories (closed categories):
Det. Aux. Prep. Pron. Conj. Int.
Phrasal categories: NP, VP, PP, AP
[F] Grammatical Relations
The structural and logical functional relations of constituents
It concerns the way each noun phrase in the sentence relates to the verb
Subject of and direct object of
Structural subject, structural object
Logical subject (the doer of the action), the logical object (the recipient of the action)
These two groups of subjects and objects may have different positions
[G] Combinational rules
Are small in numberà Yield all the possible sentences
Rule out the impossible ones
① phrase structure rules (rewrite rules)
Sà NP VP
(A sentence consists of, or is rewritten as, a noun phrase and a verb phrase)
NPà (Det.) (Adj.) N (PP) (S)
An optional determiner….and obligatory noun,
VPà V (NP) (POP) (S)
APà A (PP) (S)
PPà P NP
② the recursiveness of phrase structure rules
Significantly, the above rules can generate an infinite number of sentences, and sentences with infinite length, due to their recursive properties.
③ X- bar theory
Headà an obligatory word that givers the phrase its name
XP or X-phrase
XPà (Specifier) X (complement)
Formula:
X”à Spec X’
X-bar theory (X-bar schema)
X’à X compl
Tree diagram
X”
Specifier X’
X complement
[H] Syntactic movement and movement rules
Syntactic movement: occurs when a constituent in a sentence moves out of its original place to a new place
Transformational rules
① NP-movement and WH-movement
NP-movement: active voice à passive voice
Postposing, preposing
WH-movement: affirmativeà interrogative
Leftward matter to the sentence initial-position
② Other types of movement
Aux-movement: the movement of an auxiliary to the sentence-initial position
③ D-structure and S-structure
Two levels of syntactic representation of a sentence structure:
One that exists before movement takes place
The other that occurs after movement takes place
Formal linguistic exploration:
D-structure: phrase structure rules + lexicon
Sentence at the level of D-structure
The application of syntactic movement rules transforms a sentence from
D-structure level to S-structure level
Transformational-generative line of analysis
④ Move α– a general movement rule
Move any constituent to any place
Certain constituents can move to only certain positions
[I] Universal Grammar (UG)
Principles-and-parameters theory:
UG is a system of linguistic knowledge and a human species-specific gift which exits in the mind or brain of a normal human being and which consists of some general principles and parameters about natural languages.
① general principles of UG
Case condition principle: a noun phrase must have case and case is assigned by V or P to the object position or by Aux to the subject position
Adjacency condition or Case assignment: a case assignor and a case recipient should stay adjacency to each other.
It is strictly observed in English well-formed sentences, not other languages (no other phrasal category can intervene between a verb and its direct object)
The Adjacency condition must be subject to parametric variation in order to explain the apparent adjacency violations such as in French.
② The parameters of UG
Parameters are syntactic options of UG that allow general principles to operate in one way or another and contribute to significant linguistic variations between and among natural languages.
[+strict adjacency]
Adjacency parameter
[-strict adjacency]
[Rightward directionality]
The Directionality Parameter à involves word order
[Leftward directionality]
En: VP word order VPà V NP
Jp: VP word order VPà NP V
Natural languages are viewed to vary according to parameters set on UG principles to particular values.
Chapter 7 Semantics
[A] The definition of semantics
Definition: the study of meaning from the linguistic point of view
[B] Some views concerning the study of meaning
① the naming theory: The linguistic forms or symbols, in other words, the words used in a language are taken to be labels of the objects they stand for; words are just names or labels for things.
② the conceptualist view: There’s no direct link between a linguistic form and what it refers to (i.e. between language and the real world); rather, in the interpretation of meaning, they are linked through the mediation of concepts in the mind.
Thought/reference à concept
Symbol/Form (words) Referent à(real object)
Proposed by Ogden & Richards
③ contextualism: John Firth
The situational context: in a particular spatiotemporal situation
Linguistic context (co-text): the probability of a word’s co-occurrence or collocation with another word
④ behaviorism à Bloomfield based on contextualist view
Behaviorists define meaning of a language form as the situation in which the speaker utters it and the response it calls forth in the hearer
S: stimulus r: response
Jill Jack
S---------r………s---------R
(the small letters r, sàspeech)(the capitalized letter R, Sàpractical events)
[C] Sense and reference
Sense: is concerned with the inherent meaning of the linguistic form, abstract and de-contextualized.
Reference: means what a linguistic form refers to in the real, physical world; it deals with the relationship between the linguistic element and the non-linguistic world of experience
Moving star I once was bitten by a dog.
Morning star Mind you. There is a dog over there.
[D] Major sense relations
① synonymyà the sameness or close similarity of meaning
a. dialectal synonyms——synonyms used in different regional dialects
b. stylistic synonyms——synonyms differing in style
c. synonyms that differ in their emotive or evaluative meaning
d. collocational synonyms
e. semantically different synonyms
② polysemy——one word that has more than one related meaning
③ homonymy
Homophones: when two words are identical in sound
Homographs: when two words are identical in spelling
Complete homonyms: when two words are identical both in spelling and in
Sound
Etymology
④ hyponymy—— inclusiveness
The word which is more general in meaning is called the superordinator.
The word which is more specific in meaning is called hyponym.
Co-hyponym
⑤ antonymy——oppositeness
Gradable antonyms
Complementary antonyms
Relational opposites: pairs of words that exhibit the reversal of a relationship between items
⑥ metonymy
Meaning based on a close connection in everyday experience, of which can be based on a container-contents relation, a whole-part relation, or a representative-symbol relationship
⑦ collocation
Organize the knowledge of words in terms of frequently occurring together
⑧ prototypes
The concept of a prototype helps explain the meaning of certain words, not in terms of component features, but in terms of resemblance to the clearest exemplar.
[E] Sense relations between sentences
① X is synonymous with Y
② X is inconsistent with Y
③ X entails Y (Y is an entailment of X)
④ X presupposes Y (Y is a prerequisite of X)
⑤ X is a contradiction
⑥ X is semantically anomalous
[F] Componential analysisàa way to analyze lexical meaning
Semantic features: the meaning of a word can be dissected into meaning components, or semantic features
Phonemeà distinctive features
Show how those words are related in meaning
[G] Predication analysisàa way to analyze sentence meaning proposed by British linguist G. Leech
① the meaning of a sentence is not the sum total (of the meanings of all its components)
② Grammatical meaning and semantic meaning
Grammaticality selectional restrictions
