Anthro chapter 5 What is Human Language?

Langauge ideology

A marker of struggles between social groups with different interests, revealed in what people say and how they say it.

Linguistic relativity principle

A position, associated with Edward Sapir and Benjamin Whorf, that asserts that language has the power to shape the way people see the world.

Grammar

A set of rules that aim to describe fully the patterns of linguistic usage observed by members of a particular speech community.

Discourse

A stretch of speech longer than a sentence united by a common theme.

Ethnopragmatics

A study of language use that relies on ethnography to illuminate the ways in which speech is both constituted by and constitutive of social interaction.

Communicative competence

A term coined by anthropological linguist Dell Hymes to refer to the mastery of adult rules for socially and culturally appropriate speech.

Linguistic competence

A term coined by linguist Noam Chomsky to refer to the mastery of adult grammar.

Language revitalization

Attempts by linguists and activists to preserve or revive languages with few native speakers that appear to be on the verge of extinction.

Morphology

In linguistics, the study of the minimal units of meaning in a language.

Pidgin

Language with no native speakers that develops in a single generation between members of communities that posses distinct native languages.

Linguistics

The scientific study of language.

Pragmatics

The study of language in the context of its use.

Semantics

The study of meaning.

Syntax

The study of sentence structure.

Phonology

The study of the sounds of language.

Language

The system of arbitrary vocal symbols we use to encode our experience of the world.

Design features

Those characteristics of language that, when taken together, differentiate it from other known animal communication systems.