COMD 2050 Exam 2

Roman Jakobson

'Language without meaning is meaningless' -

functional morphemes

(closed class), can not add a concept or to dictionary (prepositions: of, over, under)

lexical morpheme

(open class), concrete concepts, can be created and added to dictionary (nouns, verbs, words)

Prescriptive Approach and Descriptive Approach

2 types of Grammatical Approach:

lexical and functional

2 types of free morphemes

derivation and inflectional

2 types of morphemes and bound morphemes

free and bound

2 types of natural morphemes

prefix and suffix

2 types of positional morphemes

Polysemy

A single word has multiple related meaning All the words are considered to be etymologically related Example: 1) Head - The top part of our body/ Head: A person top of a company or department

Non-gradable Antonym

Are direct opposites It has complementary pairs, so these are called complementary antonyms. Example: dead/alive Comparative constructions are not normally used. Example: dead(correct),deader(incorrect), more dead(incorrect)

Gradable Antonym

Are opposites along a scale. It is used in comparative construction. Example: 1) I am bigger than you. 2) George is younger than Harry. The negative of one member of a gradable pair doesn't necessarily imply the other.

Conceptual Meaning/ Denotative Meaning

Can find in the dictionary

Associative Meaning/ Connotative Meaning

Can not find in the dictionary

Henry sweet, Curme, Jesperson

Descriptive Approach studied and established by

Grammatical Gender

Does not exist in english, does not follow biological gender distinction.

Surface Structure

Every deep structure has multiple________structure forms.

Deixis

Greek word means 'pointing' via language There are certain words which can not be interpreted unless the context is known

Semantikos

Greek word means to show

Homonyms

Have separate meaning but identical form Example: 1) Bank - Financial institution/ Bank - Edge of a river

Semantic features

Help to explain that nouns have certain orders to be used in a sentence with other words. Those features are animate, human, female, adult etc.

Coined by philosopher Charles Morris (1930) Latin Pragmaticus, means 'fit for action'

History of Pragmatics

Structural Ambiguity

If one surface structure has two different deep structure representations

Antonymy

Is a Greek word, which means opposite or different name; are two forms with different meaning. Example: dead/alive, big/small, tall/short, buy/sell etc. It is divided into two groups. Gradable and Non-gradable antonyms.

Phrase Structure Rules

It helps to present the information of tree diagram in a different format

Structural analysis

It investigate the distribution of forms in a language.

Deep Structure

It is the abstract level or the underlying level.

Descriptive Approach

It is the objective study of what speakers actually know. It does not presume to tell them how to use their language

Syntax

It is the study of the relationships between the words within a sentence

Tree Diagram

It is the way of representing the hierarchical presentation of a structure or phrase.

Recursion

Means 'repeatable any number of times', Essential feature of grammar, Helps us to generate certain grammatical structure repetitively, Applies mostly on prepositional phrases and complex sentences

Can sometimes be a word, not always ex: cut, went

Morpheme = Word?

Aristotle, Varro, Priscian

Prescriptive approach studied and established by

Hyponymy

Shows the relations between the general term and the specific instances of it. The meaning of one form is included in the meaning of another. Example: 1) Rose and flower 2) Carrot and vegetable

Collocation

Some words are most commonly found paired with other words, to create a semantic unit. ex: salt and pepper

Pragmatics

Systematic way of explaining language use in context. It exists between the speaker and the hearer

the Latin and Greek

The ancient traditional grammar came from

Linguistic Context

The set of words or phrases used in a context Example: 1) I am going to the bank Unaware of what bank she is going to Just a sentence

generative grammar

The small and finite set of rules is described as:

Morpheme

The smallest unit of a word which has a meaning or a grammatical function

Context

The speaker The sentence which is uttered The act performed in the uttering of sentence The hearer

semantics

The term used to refer to the study of meaning of human language

Linguistic context (Co-text) Physical context

There are two types of context:

Constituent analysis

This approach is designed to show how small constituents in sentences go together to form larger constituents.

Person deixis : He, she, I, you, we Spatial deixis : this, that, there, here Temporal deixis : now, then

Three types of deixis:

1) Direct speech act and 2) Indirect speech act

Two types of speech act:

Speech Acts

Type of action performed by speakers with their utterances The word coined by philosopher John Austin, It helps to analyze different types of actions such as, requesting, commanding, questioning or informing etc

Number (Singular, Plural) Person (First, Second, Third) Tense ( Past, Present, Future) Voice (Active, Passive) Gender (Masculine, Feminine, Neuter, Common)

Types of agreement:

Movement Rules

Underlying or deep structure has a fixed word order

Presupposition

What a speaker assumes is true or is known by a hearer Example: Your brother is waiting outside. Therefore, You have a brother

Physical Context

Where the conversation takes place What objects are present What actions are taking place Example: Bank Actually deciphering what bank

Semantic features

Word as a Container

Lexical relation

Word as a member (Relationship with other words)

Semantic roles

Word as a performer (Roles they fulfill)

lexical relation

Words are described not in terms of component features, but in terms of relationship to other words.

morph

actual representation of a grammatical function

free

can always stand alone Ex: bus, tree

bound

can not stand alone Ex: es, s, ed, en

part of speech

category means

Descriptive Approach

describe the structure of the native languages of North America; No rules., Relatively new grammar, Established by 20th century grammarians, It focuses on the actual usage of language rather focusing on the prescriptive rules, Analysts collected the samples of language and describe the structure of it.

Prescriptive approach

doesn't focus what people are doing with language rather it focuses what people ought to do with it, as per to the pre-established status

For example, Who did you go with? With whom did you go? Me and my family My family and I

example of Prescriptive Approach

plural markers, past tense markers, continues markers, negative markers

example of morphemes

s, es, en (plural marker morphs)

examples of allomorphs

Prescriptive Approach

follows the Latin structure, Traditional grammar, Established by 18th century grammarians, It is the collection of prescriptive rules and concepts about the structure of language

Direct speech act

has direct relationship between the structure and its communicative function Example: Open the door!

Indirect speech act

has relation between the structure and the function (polite) Example: Can you open the door for me?

Homophones

have same pronunciation but different spelling Example: I/eye, Bear/bare, Meet/meat, Right/write, Flour/flower, To/too/two etc

Synonymy

is a Greek word, which means same name.; are two or more words with a closely related meaning. Example: big/large, buy/purchase, freedom/liberty, taxi/cab, politician/statesman etc

Antecedent

is first time mentioned is often indefinite (a puppy, a boy)

Anaphora

is referring back It is a reference to an already introduced entity (the puppy, he, it)

Agreement

is the condition between the noun and its verb. It defines the relationship between the phrases within a sentence.

Semantic Roles

is the underlying relationship that a participant has with the main verb in a sentence

prefix

offered at the beginning Ex: negative marker non-,dis-,a-,un-im-

suffix

offered at the end Ex: cont. marker (-ing),past tense marker (-ed), noun marker (-ness,-tion), plural marker (-s,-es,-en)

complement phrase

rewrites as a complementizer, i.e.: that

derivation

suffix only and involved in the change of word category

grammar

systematic study and description of language

Noam Chomsky

the creator of generative grammar

inflectional

the suffix and the prefix do not change the word category,

Structural analysis and Constituent analysis

types of descriptive approach