Week 1.2 Language

Language
WEEK 1 SESSION 2
DR. RUSSELL RODRIGO

Core Components of Language
u Grammar
u Lexicon
u dictionary of arbitrary signs

Language is arbitrary.
u Arbitrary refers to the fact that the meaning is not
in any way predictable from the form dictated by
the meaning.

Evidence of arbitrariness of language
u Cross linguistic comparisons
u Words with the same meaning usually have different forms in
different languages and similar forms usually express different
meanings.

Any other examples of arbitrariness?
English words:
u Table
u Understand
u Books
u School
u Beautiful

Nonarbitrariness/Iconic:
Onomatopoeia
Words that are imitative of natural sounds or have meanings that are associated
with sounds of nature.
1. Silence your cellphone so that it does not beep during the movie.
2. The best part about music class is that you can bang on the drum.
3. Both bees and buzzers buzz.
4. The bird’s chirp filled the empty night air.
5. If you want the red team to win, clap your hands right now!
6. Daryl gargled the mouthwash.
7. Vince gulped down the Mountain Dew.

Cross-linguistic examples of onomatopoeia

Nonarbitrarines: Sound Symbolism
u The partial representation of the sense of a word by its sound (as in bang,
fizz and slide)”
u Certain sounds occur in words not by virtue of being directly imitative of
some sound but rather simply by being evocative of a particular meaning.
u [i] symbolizes ‘smallness’ to be motivated because [i] is a high-pitched
vowel and so more like the high pitched sounds given off by small objects.

Nonarbitrariness: Sound Symbolism
Examples
English words:
uTeeny (extra small)
uPetite
uWee (small)
uLeetle (for little)
Other languages:
u Mikros (small)
u Perrito ( little dog, ito – is a suffix
indicating little.

Sound Symbolism: Clustering
u Words that share
a sound
sometimes have
something in
common
u Language
dependent

How sound symbolism
can be useful?
u To choose a brand name
u In poetry
u To learn a new language

Now we'll
show how
sound
symbolism
helps in
language
acquisition:
u Sound symbolism help them to make
associations between word and meaning and
let child the invariance and learn what is
referent of novel name.
u Sound symbolism scaffold acquisition of word
meaning:
u establishing word-referent associations
u Research have shown that sound symbolism take
part in language development process, especially
in early stages of development.
u Brain working during processing sound symbolic
associations between word and meaning
u Sound symbolism is important for the evolution of
language

Language File Exercises p.34-35
Consider this sign meaning ‘no-smoking.’ The sign has
two components:
meaning ‘no,’ and a picture of a cigarette meaning
‘cigarette/smoking.’
Does each of the components have an arbitrary or an
iconic relation with its meaning?
Please briefly explain your answer. Be sure to discuss
each of the two elements separately.

Are these arbitrary or iconic?

Traffic signals and signs are an example of a
communication system that combines both
arbitrary and nonarbitrary elements. Give two
examples of traffic signs that are arbitrary and
two that are iconic. Explain why you think each
of your examples is arbitrary or iconic.

Annotate on the poster cover of all the signs that as Linguistic students could
analyze. (10 minutes)

Common Misconceptions of
Language
u Writing is a language.
u Corrections
u Writing is a product of language.
u Language exists without writing.
u Language, but not writing, is learned
without explicit instruction.
u Language obeys grammar.
u Corrections
u Language obeys one’s mental grammar.
u Prescriptive grammars attempt to shape
language.
u Prescriptive grammars involve largely
arbitrary rules.

Prescriptive vs. Descriptive Grammar

Some Basic
Facts about
Language
u All languages are systematic.
u Despite appearances, languages are
surprisingly similar.
u All living languages are constantly changing.
u Human infants acquire language quickly
despite its complexity.
u Human infants acquire language without
explicit instruction.
u Any normal child can learn any human
language.

What Is Linguistics?
u The scientific study of language.
u Linguistics is not simply the study of foreign languages.
u Linguistics does not preach about so-called ‘proper’ language.
u Linguistics does focus on describing actual language use.
u Linguistics does attempt to understand how language is
represented in the mind.

How Can
We Study
Language?
Linguists examine language from
the outside (our words, sentences,
pronunciation, etc.) to discover the
internal language mechanism.
The following are just a few
examples of what provides us clues
about language.

Ambiguity
I shot the bear in my pajamas.
i. I am in my pajamas.
ii. The bear is in my pajamas.
(2) The door is unlockable.
i. unable to be locked
ii. able to be unlocked
(3) Everyone loves someone.
i. For every person x, there exists some person
that x loves.
ii. There is some person y such that every person
loves y.

Ungrammaticality
(4)
a. Who did you say he saw ?
b. Who did you say that he saw ?
c. Who did you say saw him?
d. Who did you say that saw him?
(5)
a. Sarah plays the trumpet.
b. What does Sarah play ?
c. Sarah plays the trumpet and the clarinet
d. What does Sarah play the trumpet and ?
(6)
a. Did the Johnsons want to see them? (‘them’ ‘the
Johnsons’)
b. Who did the Johnsons want to see them? (‘them’ can =
‘the Johnsons’)

Sound Structure / Intuitions
(7) Which are possible English words?
a. blick
b. ngaught
c. redokz
d. twiggle
e. bhasa
f. wug

Sound Structure / Mistakes
Mistakes follow specific patterns.
uLikely: dear old queen → queer old dean
uUnlikely: dear old queen → near old queed

u Go to the Links page for Chapter 1 and listen to “Grammar
Girl” (free podcasts). Decide whether she’s talking about
prescriptive or descriptive grammar. How do you know?

P. 35
In Chinese, expressions for moving from one city to another by
way of yet another city must take the form
‘from X pass-through Y to Z’ and cannot be expressed as
‘from X to Z pass-through Y’; this is illustrated in the examples
below.
Which of the two sentences is unacceptable in a language?

A. Ta cong Sanfanshi jingguo Zhijiage dao Niuyue
u He from San Francisco pass-through Chicago to New York
u He went from San Francisco through Chicago to New York.
B. Ta cong Sanfanshi dao Niuyue jingguo Zhijiage
Ø He from San Francisco to New York pass through Chicago.
Ø He went from San Francisco to New York through Chicago.
How would you characterize the form-meaning relationship exhibited by these Chinese
Expressions?
Hint: Look at the ordering of places in the sentences, and compare that to the journey
being described.

Week 1.2 Language

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Week 1.2 Language