Chapter 9 Language – Flashcards

Different languages have different sounds (called phonemes). The study of the ways in which phonemes can be combined in any given language constitutes the study of phonology phonology, the study of the systematic ways in which speech sounds are combined and altered in language. Linguists use the term phoneme to refer to the smallest unit of sound that makes a meaningful difference in a given language. So if one phoneme in a word is exchanged for another, the word itself is changed. Thus if the phoneme d is replaced with the phoneme t the word duck becomes tuck. These phonological rules also explain how to pronounce new words and how to pronounce prefixes and suffixes to words, such as plural or past-tense endings. To illustrate, the way to form a plural for an English word depends on the phoneme with which the singular form of the word ends. -different languages. different phonemes. do dif between lice and rice.

The term syntax refers to the arrangement of words within sentences or, more broadly, to the structure of sentences—their parts and the way the parts are put together. Syntactic rules, similar to phonological rules, govern the ways in which different words or larger phrases can be combined to form "legal" sentences in the language. Syntactic rules should meet two requirements: They should be able to describe every "legal" sentence, and they should never be able to describe an "illegal" sentence • Rules used to put words together for a sentence - Sentence = noun phrase + verb phrase • Noun phrase [NP] - Contains a noun and relevant descriptors • Verb phrase [VP] - Contains at least one verb and possibly objects it acts upon

Semantics, the study of meaning he sounds we produce are meant to communicate ideas, and for communication to take place, the listener (or audience) must somehow receive the speaker's (or sender's) meaning. • The study of meaning in a language - To best understand semantics, read the following sentences The honest umbrella is in the garage. The salty craftsman appreciates the quality of the product. Cindy slept badly due to the sniffing dream. - Knowing that the sentences do not make sense is your knowledge of semantics our understanding of the meaning of a sentence requires (a) an understanding of the meaning of each word in the sentence, (b) an under- standing of the syntax of the sentence, and (c) an understanding of the truth conditions of the sentence. truth conditions are simply the circumstances that make something true

• Self-contradiction: Why can't we say "My cat is not an animal"?

• Anomaly: Why can't we say "Chocolate ice cream can drive a car"?

Entailment (Why does "Pat is my uncle" mean that Pat is male?) Certain words entail other stuff.

Phoneme is the different sounds of which a language is composed. Morphemes are the smallest meaningful units of language. - Root words - Cake, chair, boy - Prefixes - pre- non- un- - Suffixes - ly - ist - ness

Pragmatics, these rules are the social rules of language; they include certain etiquette conventions, such as not interrupting another speaker and beginning conversations with certain conventional greetings (such as "Hi. How are you?"). Different kinds of utterances demand different responses from us. Assertive's: It's cold today. Directives: Open the window. Commissives: I promise to study tonight. • Expressives: I thank you for helping me. • Declarations: You're fired. Art you tired of feeling less than your best and having sniffles all winter. Take Eridicold as directed. People infer that will stop cold, but not directly stated.

Why does "John is not old enough" mean the same as "John is too young"?

Phonetic ambiguity Remember, a spoken sentence often contains many words not intended to be heard. Ream ember us poke can cent tense off in contains men knee words knot in ten did tube bee herd. Lexical ambiguity I've got to go to the bank this morning. I've got to go to First National this morning. or I've got to go to the river's edge this morning. Syntactic ambiguity Have the missionaries eaten. (Spoken by the bishop as a question or spoken by a cannibal chief as an order)

1. Maxim of quantity. Make your contribution as informative as required. Do not make your contribution more informative than is required. -Please come to my office door, and I will be standing 27 centimeters inside of it." 2. Maxim of quality. Try to make your contribution one that is true. Do not say what you believe to be false. Do not say that for which you have no evidence. -If you simply utter an untruthful response without letting your listener know you aren't being candid, then your conversation will not be successful, 3. Maxim of relation. Be relevant. TOM (looking around): Hey, Joe, have you seen my sweater? JOE (looking at Tom, and smiling): Lo, a flaming squirrel! 4. Maxim of manner. Be clear. Avoid obscurity of expression. Avoid ambiguity. Be brief. Be orderly. -speech to your audience based on their level of comprehension.

Broca's Area - Expressive aphasia - difficulties producing language. Wernickes Aphasia - Receptive Aphasia - Difficulties in comprehending language.

Kintsch and Keenan (1973) showed that two sentences of equal length might be differentially difficult to process. The source of the difficulty, they suggested, lies in the propositional complexity of the sentences, the num- ber of basic ideas conveyed. More propositions, more difficult to process. propositions are mentally represented in some sort of hierarchy, with more central propositions at the top of the hierarchy, as shown in Figure 10-6. The peripheral, lower-level propositions apparently serve the function of elaborating the more central propositions and so are less important to remember.

• The modularity hypothesis: - Language is domain specific. It operates with certain kinds of input and not others. - Language is informatonally encapsulated. It operates independently of your beliefs and knowledge. - Language, then, is a module that is set apart from other thought processes. Or at least some aspects of language are.

• Language determines thought. • If this is true, then the number of words that your language contains for different colors should determine how you perceive and remember colors. Does the evidence support Whorf? • Dani culture has only two words for color. • Test: Present a color chip, ask par?cipants to pick it out among a display of 160 color chips. • Dani speakers performed much like English speakers, in spite of their lack of color names in their language! • Language may make certain types of thought easier, but it doesn't absolutely determine thought.