语言学课后习题答案

Chapter 1

Introduction

1. De?ne the following terms brie?y.

(1) linguistics: the scienti?c or systematic study of language.

(2) language: a system of arbitrary vocal symbols used for human communication.

(3) arbitrariness: the absence of similarity between the form of a linguistic sign and what it

relates to in reality, e.g. the word dog does not look like a dog.

(4) duality: the way meaningless elements of language at one level (sounds and letters)

combine to form meaningful units (words) at another level.

(5) competence: knowledge of the grammar of a language as a formal abstraction and

distinct from the behavior of actual language use, i.e. performance.

(6) performance: Chomsky‘s te rm for actual language behavior as distinct from the

knowledge that underlies it, or competence.

(7) stylistics: the study of how literary effects can be related to linguistic features.

(8) phatic communion: Language is used to establish an atmosphere or maintain

social contact between the speaker and the hearer.

(9) functionalism: the study of the forms of language in reference to their social function in

communication.

(10) formalism: the study of the abstract forms of language and their internal relations.

(11) synchronic linguistics: the study of language and speech as they are used at a given

moment and not in terms of how they have evolved over time.

(12) diachronic linguistics: the study of linguistic change over time in contrast to looking at

language as it is used at a given moment.

2. No, language is human-speci?c. Human language has seven design features, including arbitrariness, duality, productivity, interchangeability, displacement, specialization and cultural transmission. These features are found utterly lacking in do gs‘ or pigs‘ noises and thus set human language apart from animal cry systems.

3. Arbitrariness refers to the fact that there is no logical or intrinsic connection bet ween a particular sound and the meaning it is associated with. For example, for the same animal dog, in English we call it /d0g/, in Chinese as ―gou‖, but ―yilu‖ in Japanese; it barks wow wow in English but wang wang in Chinese. Of course, onomatopoetic words such as ―quack-quack‖ and

―bang‖ are exceptions, but words like these are re latively few compared with the total number of words in a language.

4. A human baby does not speak any language at birth. What language the baby is going to speak is determined by the culture he is born into. A Chinese baby born and brought up in London by an English family will speak English, while an English child brought up in Beijing by a Chinese aunt will speak Chinese. That is to say, language cannot be transmitted through heredity. It is culturally transmitted.

5. Firstly, linguistics describes languages and does not lay down rules of correctness while traditional grammar emphasizes correctness. Secondly, linguistics regards the spoken language as primary, while traditional grammar emphasizes the priority of the written language. Thirdly, traditional grammar is based on Latin and it tries to impose the Latin categories and structures on other languages, while linguistics describes each language on its own merits.

6. A descriptive approach attempts to tell what is in the language while the prescriptive approach tells people what should be in the language. Most modern linguistics is descriptive, whereas traditional grammars are prescriptive.

7. Synchronic linguistics studies language at one particular time while diachronic linguistics studies language developments through time. Synchronic linguistics focuses on the state of language at any point in history while diachronic linguistics focuses on the differences in two or more than two states of language over decades or centuries.

8. No, human language has the design feature of specialization. It refers to the fact that man does not have a total physical involvement in the act of communication. For example, a mother can tell a story to her child while slicing up a cake. However, wolves can only respond to a stimulus and is totally involved physically in the communication process. Thus, a wolf cannot have a language similar to man‘s, even though it could express a thousand different emotions. Besides, the aspect of productivity also distinguishes human language from wolf ‘s postures.

Chapter 2

The Sounds of Language

1. De?ne each of the following terms brie?y.

(1) articulator: the tongue, lips, and velum, which change the shape of the vocal tract to

produce different speech sounds.

(2) assimilation: a phonological process whereby a sound becomes phonetically similar (or

identical) to a neighboring sound, e.g. a vowel becomes [+nasal] when followed by a

[+nasal] consonant.

(3) consonant: a speech sound produced by partial or complete closure of part of the vocal

tract, thus obstructing the air?ow and creating audible friction. Consonants are

described in terms of voicing, place of articulation, and manner of articulation.

(4) elision: the leaving out of a sound or sounds in speech.

(5) intonation: the variation in pitch and stress which gives beat and rhythm to the tune the

voice plays in ordinary speech.

(6) phoneme: the abstract element of a sound, ident i?ed as being distinctive in a particular

language.

(7) phonetics: the study of linguistic speech sounds, how they are produced,

how they are perceived, and their physical properties.

(8) phonology: the study of the abstract systems underlying the sounds of language.

(9) stress: the prominence given to certain sounds in speech.

(10) voicing: the vibration in the larynx caused by air from the lungs passing

through the vocal cords when they are partly closed; speech sounds are said to be either

voiced or voiceless.

(11) voiceless: When the vocal cords are spread apart, the airstream from the

lungs is not obstructed at the space between vocal cords and passes freely.

The sounds produced in this way are described as voiceless sounds.

(12) vowel: a speech sound produced without signi?cant constriction of the air ?owing

through the oral cavity.

2. Minimal pair test or substitution test.

Minimal pair test or substitution test is to see whether substituting one sound for 4another results in a different word. If it does, the two sounds represent different phonemes. For example, as to the English word bear, if we substitute p for b, we get the word pear, the two are different words. Then /b/ and /p/ represent different phonemes. Other examples are chunk/junk, ban/bin, bet/beat, ?ne/vine, side/site, etc.

3. Take the word big for example, in the word big /big/, /b/ is the onset, /i/ is the nucleus and /g/ is the coda. The difference between open syllables and closed syllables is whether the words have codas. If there are codas, they are closed syllables, such as pig, hat and at; if not, they are open syllables, such as do, I, tea and key.

4. (1) stop, consonant

(2) back, rounded, vowel

5. (1) voiceless / voiced

(2) bilabial / labiodental

(3) close / semi-open

(4) stop / nasal

(5) alveolar / palatal

(6) alveolar / dental

(1) kit/git, bucker/bugger, bag/back

(2) mark/nark, smack/snack, sum/sun

(3) best/vest, ober/over, lib/live

(4) bore/more, abate/amate, mob/mom

(5) pat/fat, apt/aft (AmE), harp (BrE)/half

7. (1) The stresses are placed on the second syllable except for ―promise‖. We may easily conclude that the verbs usually are stressed on the second syllable.

(2) Syllable representations of the words:

collide [k2#laid] elect [i#lekt] consider [k2n#sid2]

Chapter 3

Morphology

1. De?ne the following terms brie?y.

(1) morphology: the study of the structure of words.5

(2) morpheme: the smallest unit of language that carries meaning or serves a

grammatical function.

(3) free morpheme: a morpheme that can stand alone as a word.

(4) bound morpheme: a morpheme that can not stand alone as a word, e.g.

ment (as in establishment), and -er (as in painter).

(5) morph: the smallest meaningful phonetic segments of an utterance on the level

of parole.

(6) allomorph: a phonetic form in which a morpheme is realized, e.g. -s, -es, and en are all

allomorphs (in writing) of the plural morpheme.

(7) derivation: the formation of new words by adding af?xes to other words or morphemes in

morphology and word formation.

(8) clipping: the process by which parts of a word of more than one syllable have been cut

off, and reduced to a shorter form.

(9) acronym: words which are composed of the ?rst letter of a series of words and are

pronounced as single words. Examples: NATO, radar and yuppy.

(10) initialism: Some new words are composed of the ?rst letters of a series of words

and pronounced by saying each letter in them. Such words are called initialism.

(11) blending: A single new word can be formed by combining two separate forms.

Typically, blending is ?nished by taking only the beginning of one word and

joining it to the end of another word. For example, brunch is formed by the

shortened forms of breakfast and lunch.

(12) root: the morpheme that remains when all af?xes are stripped from a complex word, e.g.

system from un- + system + atic + ally.

(13) stem: the base to which one or more af?xes are attached to create a more complex

form that may be another stem or a word. For example, book is the stem of bookish. (14) pre?x: Af?xes can be joined to the beginning of the root or stem, in which case

t hey are called pre?xes.

(15) suf?x: Af?xes can be joined to the end of the root or stem, in which case they are called

suf?xes.

2. (3), (5), (7)

3. (1) simple: ?y tree suite

(2) bound morpheme root

?y / ?y

reuse re- use

spiteful -ful spite

preplan pre- plan

desks -s desk

triumphed -ed triumph

suite / suite

optionality -ality option

untie un- tie

delight de- light

fastest -est fast

prettier -ier pretty

tree / tree

justly -ly just

deform de- form

mistreat mis- treat

dislike dis- like

payment -ment pay

disobey dis- obey

premature pre- mature

4. (1) Column I: ablaut (vowel modi?cation)

Column II: suppletion

Column III: stress modi?cation

(2) The process in the Column I is ?nished by changing the vowel of each word, while in

Column II, the process is ?nished by changing vowe l and consonant of each word.

(3) Column I: awake/awoke bear/bore arise/arose

blow/blew bite/bit hide/hid

lie/lay know/knew foot/feet

goose/geese tooth/teeth louse/lice

Column II: bad/worse are/were many/more

Column III: ?combine/com‘bine ?compress/com‘press7

?conduct/con‘duct ?insert/in‘sert

?insult/in‘sult ?intern/in‘tern

5. (1) Omitted.

(2) Other examples:

?rerun (n.) –re‘run (v.) ?contrast (n.) –con‘trast (v.)

?convert (n.) –con‘vert (v.) ?desert (n.) –de‘sert (v.)

?export (n.) –ex‘port (v.) ?increase (n.) –in‘crease (v.)

?conduct (n.) –con‘duct (v.) ?object (n.) –ob‘ject (v.)

?content (n.) –con‘tent (v.) ?protest (n.) –pro‘test (v.)

?insult (n.) –in‘sult (v.) ?produce (n.) –pro‘duce (v.)

When a word belongs to different word classes, the stress of the word will be sometimes placed on different syllables. When all the words above are stressed on t he ?rst syllables, they are nouns, but if they have the second syllables stressed, the words become verbs.

6. (1) It means ―the inhabitant of ‖.

(2) It means ―the person who does‖.

(3) The morphological rule working here is ―n. + -er ––n.‖, and the last

phoneme of the noun, which the suf?x -er is added to, should be a consonant. (4) The rule in (3) doesn‘t work in the word discoverer because the last phoneme

of discoverer is a vowel /2/.

7. (1) in?ection (2) derivation (3) in?ection (4) in?ection (5) derivation

Chapter 4

Syntax

1. De?ne the following terms brie?y.

(1) syntax: the term used to refer to the structure of sentences and to the study of sentence

structure.

(2) word class: a group of words which are similar in function; words which are grouped into

word classes according to how they combine with other words, how they change their

forms, etc.

(3) prescriptive approach: This view regards grammar as a set of rules for

the 8“proper‖ use of a language, that‘s to say, it tries to lay down rules to tell people

how to use a language.

(4) descriptive approach: the approach of linguistic studies, with which linguists collect

samples of the language they are interested in and attempt to describe the regular

structures of the language as they are used, not according to some view of how they

should be used.

(5) IC analysis: the approach to divide the sentence up into its immediate constituents

by using binary cutting until obtaining its ultimate constituents. For example, the

immediate constituents of ―The man bought a car‖ are the man and bought a car. The

immediate constituents of the man are the and man, and so on until no further cuts

can be made. The ultimate constituents of ―The man bought a car‖ at the word level are

the, man, bought, a, and car.

(6) structural analysis: a type of descriptive approach to study the distribution of linguistic

forms in a language through such me thods as the use of ―test frames‖.

(7) immediate constituent: Linguistic units can be divided into small constituents, which

can be further analyzed into smaller constituents. This process continues until no further divisions are possible. The ?rst division or units are known as immediate

constituents.

(8) ultimate constituent: Linguistic units can be divided into small constituents, which can

be further analyzed into smaller constituents. This process continues until no

further divi sions are possible. The ?nal division or units are known as ultimate

constituents.

(9) constituent structural grammar: It refers to a grammar which analyzes sentences using

only the idea of constituency, which reveals a hierarchy of structural levels.

(10) transformational grammar: a type of grammar which attempts to de?ne and describe by a

set of rules or principles all the grammatical sentences (without ungrammatical ones) of a language.

(11) ideational function: the use of language as a means of giving structure to our experience of

the real or imaginary world.

(12) interpersonal function: the use of language for maintaining social roles and interacting

with others.

(13) textual function: to create written or spoken texts which cohere within themselves and

which ?t the particular situation in which they are used.

2. Yes. As we know, morphology is the study of the internal structure, forms and 9classes of words, while syntax focuses on the structure and ordering of components within a sentence. The major distinction between morphology and syntax is that the former is concerned with the internal composition of a word, while the latter is concerned with the combination of words.

3. (2) Instead of using the form ―suggest somebody to do something‖, we usually

use ―suggest + that-clause‖ or ―suggest doing‖, here we‘d better substitute

“advise‖ for ―suggest‖

(4) The word ―request‖ is a transitive verb which should take an object directly, so the word

―for‖ should be omitted.

(6) The word ―donate‖ cannot be followed by double objects as ―donate somebody

something‖. Instead we always use ―donate something to somebody‖.

(10) The subject of the verb ―write‖ is usually a human; an ―article‖ cannot write itself. In this

case the passive construction is normally used: The article was very well writen.

(11) Usually we don‘t use ―be bored of something/somebody‖, but ―be bored with

something/somebody‖ which means losing interest in somebody/something.

(13) Here ―myself ‖ is a re?exive pronoun, which can‘t be used as subject, and it should

be replaced by ―I‖.

(14) The word ―surprise‖ is usually used as a transitive verb, so the expression

“…surprise for you‖ is ungrammatical, and it can be replaced by ―surp rise

somebody (with something)‖ or ―I was surprised by your getting married.‖

(15) The word ―sleep‖ is usually used as an intransitive verb, which can‘t take an object.

The cases of ―sleep‖ being used as a transitive verb are semantically limited, as in ―to sleep a good sleep‖ or ―the room can sleep 3 people‖.

4. It‘s ungrammatical, because ―us‖ is the objective case which can‘t serve as the subject, while

―she‖ is the subjective case which can‘t serve as the object. The sentence should be ―We

visit her on Sundays‖. The personal pronouns ―you‖ and ―it‖ have the same form whether

used as the subject or object.

5. (1) NP: A Guns ―N‖ Roses concert, an arena, some 2500 fans, a full-?edged riot, A Guns ―N‖ Roses concert at an arena , A Guns ―N‖ Roses c oncert at an arena near ST. Louis ,The trouble, venue security, a camera, the front, the stage, the front of the stage. PP: at an arena, at an arena near ST. Louis, near ST. Louis, in disaster, near the front, of the stage, near the front of the stage. VP: staged a full-?edged riot, asked venue security, con?scate a camera.

(2) N: Guns, Roses, concert, arena, ST. Louis, disaster, fans, riot, trouble, Axl

10Rose, venue, security, camera, front, stage. Prep: at, near, in, of. V: end, stage, start, ask,

con?scate, see.

6. (1) You mustn‘t end a sentence with a preposition.

You mustn‘t split in?nitives

7. (i)

(ii)

8. (1) a. Terry loves his wife and I love his wife, too. b. I

love my wife as well as Terry loves his wife.

(2) a. It‘s yesterday that they said she would go. b. She

would go yesterday as they said.

(3) a. The governor is a street ?ghter who is dirty.b. The governor is a ?ghter in a dirty

street.

(4) a. The design has squares and circles, both of which are big. b. The design has big

squares, and it also has some circles. (The sizes of the circles are not mentioned.)

Chapter 5

Semantics

1. De?ne the following terms brie?y.

(1) semantics: the study of linguistic meaning.

(2) truth-conditional semantics: an approach that knowing the meaning of the sentence

is the same as knowing the conditions under which the sentence is true or false, and

knowing the meaning of a word or expression is knowing the part that it plays in the

truth or falsehood of the sentence containing it.

(3) naming theory: the view that the meaning of an expression is what it refers to, or names.

(4) behaviorist theory: the view that the meaning of a linguistic form is de?ned as observable

behaviors which is an approach drawing on psychology.

(5) use theory: the semantic theory according to which the meaning of an

expression is determined by its use in communication and more generally, in

social interaction.

(6) sense: the inherent part of an expression‘s meaning, together with the context,

determines its referent. For example, knowing the sense of a noun phrase

such as the president of the United States in 2004 allows one to determine that George

W. Bush is the referent.

(7) reference: (in semantics) the relationship between words and the things,

actions, events and qualities they stand for. An example in English is the relationship

between the word tree and the object ―tree‖ (referent) in the real world.

(8) conceptual meaning: It means the meaning of words may be discussed in terms of

what they denote or refer to, also called denotative or cognitive meaning. It is the

essential and inextricable part of what language is and is widely regarded as the

central factor in verbal communication. For instance, the conceptual meaning of ―he‖ in

English is any male person or male animal.

(9) connotative meaning: It is the communicative meaning that a word or a

combination of words has by virtue of what it refers to, over its purely conceptual

meaning. For example, the connotative meaning of ―woman‖ is emotional, frail,

inconstant, irrational, etc.

(10) semantic field: the organization of related words and expressions into a

system which shows their relationship to one another. For example, kinship terms such

as father, mother, brother, sister, uncle, aunt belong to a semantic ?eld whose relevant

features include generation, sex, membership of the father‘s or mother‘s side of family.

(11) lexical gap: the absence of a word in a particular place in a semantic ?eld of a language.

For instance, in English we have brother versus sister, son versus daughter, but no

separate lexemes for ―male‖ and ―female‖ cousin.

(12) componential analysis: (in semantics) an approach to the study of meaning which analyzes

a word into a set of meaning components or semantic features. For example,

the meaning of the English word boy may be shown as [+human][+male][-adult]. (13) semantic feature: the smallest units of meaning in a word. The meaning of word

may be described as a combination of semantic components or features. For

example, the feature [+male] is part of the meaning of father, and so is the

feature [+adult], but other features are needed to make up the whole meaning of father.

Often, semantic features are established by contrast and can be stated in terms of [+] and

[-], e.g. woman has the semantic features [+human], [-male] and [+adult].

(14) synonym: the sense relations of equivalence of meaning between lexical items,

e.g. small/little and dead/deceased.

(15) antonym: the sense relation of various kinds of opposing meaning between lexical items,

e.g. big/small, alive/dead and good/bad.

(16) hyponymy: the sense relation between terms in a hierarchy, where a more

particular term (the hyponym) is included in the more general one (the superordinate): X

is a Y, e.g. a beech is a tree, a tree is a plant.

(17) meronym: the sense relation between body and its parts which are not only sections of

the body but de?ned in terms of speci?c functions. For example, the head is the part of

the body which carries the most important sense organs, i.e. eyes, ears, nose and tongue.

(18) semantic role: the way in which the referent of a noun phrase is involved in the situation

described or represented by the clause, for example as agent, patient, or

cause.

(19) entailment: the relationship between two sentences where the truth of one (the

second) is inferred from the truth of the other, e.g. Corday assassinated Marat and Marat

is dead; if the ?rst is true, the second must be true.

(20) presupposition: implicit assumptions about the world required to make an utterance

meaningful or appropr iate, e.g. ―some tea has already been taken‖ is a presupposition of

―Take some more tea!‖

2. (1) He waited by the bank.

a. He waited by the ?nancial institution which people can keep their money in or borrow

from.

b. He waited by the bank of the river.

(2) Is he really that kind?

a. Is he really that type of person?

b. Is he really that kind-hearted?

(3) We bought her dog biscuits.

a. We bought dog biscuits for her.

b. We bought biscuits for her dog.

(4) He saw that gasoline can explode.

a. He saw that gasoline container explode.

b. He saw that gasoline may explode.

(5) Fifty soldiers shot three wild foxes.

a. Fifty soldiers shot three wild foxes in total.

b. Each of the ?fty soldiers shot three wild foxes.

(6) He saw her drawing pencils.

a. He saw her pencils for drawing.

b. He saw her drawing the picture of pencils.

3. (2) (4) (5) (8) are antonyms; (1) (3) (6) (7) are synonyms.

4. charity: kindness, sympathy, church, helpful

iron: strong, brave, hard, determined

mole: traitor, betrayal, spy

snow: pure, virgin, clean

street: homeless, living hard, pitiable

5. (1) a. hoard b. scribble c. barn, method d. olfactory

(2) a. acquire b. tell c. way d. smell

(3) a. buy, win, steal. b. talk, tell c. road, way, path d. smell

These words are less marked in their sets because they are more usual and tend

to be used more frequently. They consist of only one morpheme and are easier to

learn and remember than others. They are also often broader in meaning and cannot be

described by using the name of another member ofthe same ?eld.

6. homophones: sea-see, break-brake; polysemies: sea, break, prayer, mature, trace, house

homonyms: ear.

7. In a semantic ?eld, not all lexical items necessarily have the same status. The less marked

members of the same semantic ?eld (1) are usually easier to learn and

remember than more marked members; (2) consist of only one morpheme in

contrast to more marked members; (3) cannot be described by using the name of another

member of the same ?eld; (4) tend to be used more frequently than more marked terms;

(5) broader in meaning than more marked members; (6) are not the result of the

metaphorical usage of the name of another object or concept, but more marked are.

8. (1) a. bachelor, man, son, paperboy, pope, chief

b. bull, rooster, drake, ram.

The (a) and (b) words are male.

The (a) words are human.

The (b) words are animals.

(2) a. ask, tell, say, talk, converse

b. shout, whisper, mutter, drawl, holler

The (a) and (b) words are realized by sounds.

The (a) words are normal voice quality.

The (b) words are produced by modifying one‘s normal voice quality.

(3) a. walk, run, skip, jump, hop, swim

b. ?y, skate, ski, ride, cycle, canoe, hang-glide

The (a) and (b) words are sports (movement).

The (a) words are sports without instruments.

The (b) words are sports with instruments.

Chapter 6

Pragmatics

1.De?ne the following terms brie?y.

(1) pragmatics: a branch of linguistics that studies language in use.

(2) deixis: the marking of the orientation or position of entities and situations with

respect to certain points of reference such as the place (here/there) and time (now/then) of utterance.

(3) reference: (in semantics) the relationship between words and the things, actions, events,

and qualities they stand for.

(4) anaphora: a process where a word or phrase (anaphor) refers back to another word or

phrase which was used earlier in a text or conversation.

(5) presupposition: implicit assumptions about the world required to make an

utterance meaningful or appropriate, e.g. ―some tea has already been taken‖ is a

pres upposition of ―Take some more tea!‖

(6) Speech Act Theory: The theory was proposed by J. L. Austin and has been developed

by J. R. Searle. Basically, they believe that language is not only used to inform or to

describe things, it is often used to ―do things‖, to perform acts. In saying

―Sorry‖, you are performing an act of apology.

(7) indirect speech act: an utterance whose literal meaning (location) and

intended meaning (illocution) are different. For example, Can you pass the salt?

is literally a yes/no question but is usually uttered as a request or polite directive for

action.

(8) the Cooperative Principle: a principle proposed by the philosopher Paul Grice

whereby those involved in communication assume that both parties will

normally seek to cooperate with each other to establish agreed meaning. It is composed of

4 maxims: quality, quantity, relation and manner.

(9) the Politeness Principle: politeness is regarded by most interlocutors as a means

or strategy which is used by a speaker to achieve various purposes, such as

saving face, establishing and maintaining harmonious social relations in conversation.

This principle requires speakers to ―minimize the expression of impolite beliefs‖. It is

composed of 6 maxims: Maxims of Tact, Generosity, Approbation, Modesty, Agreement and Sympathy.

(10) conversational implicature: the use of conversational maxims in the Cooperative

Principle to produce extra meaning during conversation.

2. Deictic expressions: I, now, you, that, here, tomorrow.

3. Anaphoric expressions: she, him, it.

4. (1) He bought the beer.

(2) You have a watch.

(3) We bought a car.

5. Direct acts: (1)/(5); Indirect acts: (2)/(3)/(4)

6. (a) The Maxim of Quality: (1) Do not say what you believe to be false; (2) Do not say that

for which you lack adequate evidence.

(b) The Maxim of Quantity: (1) Make your contribution as informative as is required (for the

current purpose of the exchange); (2) Do not make your contribution more informative than is required.

(c) The Maxim of Relation: Be relevant.

(d) The Maxim of Manner: Be perspicuous (1) Avoid obscurity of expression; (2) Avoid

ambiguity; (3) Be brief (avoid unnecessary prolixity); (4) Be orderly.

7. The speaker is particularly careful about the maxim of Agreement in PP. The

response begins with ―well‖ rather than ―no‖ in order to minimize disagreement between the speaker and hearer.

8. It is an indirect speech act. Carol invites Lara to a party, but Lara wants to decline the

invitation. To be polite, she doesn‘t choose a direct refusal, instead she says “I‘ve got an exam tomorrow‖ as a reasonable excuse to decline the invitation. In this way, she minimizes the expression of impolite beliefs, thus the utterance conforms to PP

Chapter 7

Discourse Analysis

1. De?ne the following terms brie?y.

(1) discourse: a general term for examples of language use, i.e. language

pro-duced as the result of an act of communication. It refers to the larger units of language such as paragraphs, conversations and interviews.

(2) discourse analysis: the study of how sentences in written and spoken

language form larger meaning units such as paragraphs, conversations and interviews.

(3) given information: the information that the addresser believes is known to

the addressee.

(4) new information: the information that the addresser believes is not known to the

addressee.

(5) topic: the main center of attention in a sentence.

(6) cohesion: the grammatical and/or lexical relationships between the different elements of

a text. This may be the relationship between different sentences or different parts of a

sentence.

(7) coherence: the relationship that links the meanings of utterances in a

discourse or of the sentences in a text.

(8) discourse marker: the technical term for all the items that are used to help

construct discourse, such as signifying the beginning or ending of a paragraph or

a turn in conversation. They are commonly used in the initial position of an utterance and

are syntactically detachable from a sentence, such as well, I mean, now, then, ?rst, second, ?nally.

(9) adjacency pair: a set of two consecutive, ordered turns that ―go together‖ in a

conversation, such as sequences of question/answer, greeting/greeting, invitation/

acceptance, criticism/denial.

(10) preference structure: in the conversations there can be several second parts

related to one ?rst part, but they are not of equal status. The structural likelihood is called preference, and this likely structure is the preference structure that divides second parts

into preferred and dispreferred. The former is the structurally expected and the

latter unexpected. In answering the question “Have you got a li ght?‖, the reply

―Here you are‖ is preferred and ―Sorry, no, I don‘t smoke‖ is dispreferred.

(11 presequence: the opening sequences that are used to set up some special potential actions,

such as greetings before formal conversations. ―What are you doing tonight?‖ can be used

as a presequence if it is followed by ―If nothing special, come over and have dinner with us please.‖

(12) critical discourse analysis: the analysis of language use directed at, and committed to,

discovering the concealed ideological bias, injustice, inequality in the power

relations among speakers and hearers.

2. In the study of discourse, cohesion refers to the grammatical and/or lexical relationships

between the different parts of a text. This may be the relationship between different sentences or different parts of a sentence. It concerns the question of how sentences are

explicitly linked together in a discourse by different kinds of overt devices. Such cohesive devices include reference, substitution, ellipses, conjunction and lexical cohesion.

3. one→the look-out

4. them (line 4)→plant and animal species (line 3)

that (line 7)→“Every ecosystem everywhere can’t be preserved intact.”

it (line 7)→“Every ecosystem everywhere can’t be preserved intact.”

it (1st one, line 8)→how can it be made consistent with the earlier objective?

it (2nd one, line 8)→to deprive some people in some parts of the world of a piece of their

ecosystem but not others.

5. It is not a coherent discourse. Although it has connection words such as a Ford ––a

car and black –– Black, which look like cohesive devices, they refer to entirely different

things. There is a total lack of internal relation among the sentences. A text can‘t be only based on super?cial connec tions between the words to pursue coherence; there must be some relationship that links the meanings of the sentences in a text, too.

This text is not in line with our real experience of the way the world is. Thus, we can‘t

make sense of it directly unless we are laborious to create meaningful connections which are not actually expressed by the words and sentences. So it‘s not a coherent discourse.

6. Coherence is the relationship that links the meanings of utterances in a discourse or of the

sentences in a text. This extract is coherent. All the sentences (questions in fact) are

organized around the topic ―interview‖, and they are arranged from the general to the more speci?c in a logical order so that the text is easy to follow.

Chapter 8

Sociolinguistics

1. De?ne the following terms brie?y.

(1) sociolinguistics: the study of the relationship between language and society, that is,

how social factors in?uence the structure and use of language.

(2) standard language: the variety of a language which has the highest status in a community

or nation and which is usually based on the speech and writing of educated native speakers of the language.

(3) dialect: a language variety characteristic of a particular social group; dialects can be

characteristic of regional, social, temporal, occupational or gender groups.

(4) register: a language variety associated with a particular situation of use, e.g. baby talk

and legal language.

(5) pidgin: a variety of language that is not a native language of anyone, but is

learned in contact situations.

(6) creole: a language that begins as a pidgin and eventually becomes the ?rst

language of a speech community through its being learned by children.

(7) language planning: planning, usually by a government or government agency,

concerning choice of national or of?cial language(s), ways of spreading the use of a language, spelling reforms, the addition of new words to the language, and other language problems.

(8) diglossia: a situation when two distinct varieties of the same language are

used, side by side, for two different sets of functions.

(9) bilingualism: the use of at least two languages either by an individual or by a group of

speakers, such as the inhabitants of a particular region or a nation.

(10) code-switching: the movement back and forth between two languages or dialects

within the same sentence or discourse.

(11) taboo: a word or expression that is prohibited by the polite society from general use.

(12) euphemism: a word or phrase that replaces a taboo word or is used to avoid reference to

certain acts or subjects, e. g. ―powder room‖ for ―toilet‖.

2. Idiolects are varieties of a language used by individual speakers, with peculiarities of

pronunciation, grammar and vocabulary.

3. A president who did not have an accent may refer to a president who speaks the standard

language. The standard language is a particular variety of a language that is of?cially given a status higher than any other, and therefore a dominant o r prestigious

variety. The standard language is usually based on the speech and writing of educated native speakers of the language and is generally used in government documents,

education, broadcasting and printing. A good president is expected to speak the

prestigious variety of his language.

4. Language planning is usually done by a government or government agency which concerns

the choice of national or of?cial language(s), ways of spreading the use of the language(s), spell reforms, the addition of new words to the language, and other language problems. In order to carry it out effectively, the of?cial attempt may concentrate on either

the status of a language with regard to some other language or variety or its

internal condition with a view to changing it. Language planning usually involves two

aspects: status planning and corpus planning. Status planning changes the function of a

language or a variety of a language and the right of those who use it. And corpus planning seeks to develop a variety of language or a language, usually to standardize it, that is, to

provide it with the means for serving most language functions in society. Governments may take both sides into consideration.

5. A pidgin is a special language variety that mixes or blends languages and it is used by people

who speak different languages for restricted purposes such as trading. Pidgin arose from a blending of several languages such as Chinese dialects and English. Typically pidgins have

a limited vocabulary and a much reduced grammatical structure characterized by the loss

of in?ections, gender and case. When a pidgin has become the primary language of a

speech community, and is acquired by the children of that speech community as their

native language, it is said to have become a creole. The structure of the original pidgin is expanded to enable it to ful?ll its new functions. The vocabulary is vastly enriched, and new syntactic-semantic concepts developed. Notable examples of

creole are the English-based creole of Haiti.

6. There are man y euphemisms for toilet, such as WC, powder room, Men‘s room, Ladies‘

room, Gentlemen, bathroom, restroom and so on. In many cultures, people avoid referring to this place by ―toilet‖ or ―lavatory‖ because they are unpleasant to the ear. The use of

euphe misms re?ects social attitudes or social customs. We choose the words or expressions of euphemism because they are more polite or pleasant to use without embarrassing others.

7. There are two possible reasons. One reason is that women are usually more

status-conscious than men and they are aware of their lower status in society and as a

result, they may use more standard speech forms in their attempt to claim

equality or even achieve a higher social status. The other reason might be attrib-uted to the education. Women are educated to behave ―like a lady‖ when they are little girls, and

语言学习题答案

1. Q: What is the scope of linguistics? The scope of linguistics can be illustrated as: 1) General linguistics: the study of language as whole. It deals with the basic concepts, theories, descriptions, models and methods applicable in any linguistic study. 2) Phonetics: the study of sounds used in communication. 3) Phonology: the study about how sounds are put together and used to convey meaning in communication. 4) Morphology: the study of the way in which symbols/morphemes are arranged to form words. 5) Syntax: the study of the rules about the combination of words to form permisible sentences. 6) Semantics: the study of meaning. 7) Pragmatics: the study of meaning in the context of use. And the Interdisciplinary branches. 1) Sociolinguistics 2) Psycholingu istics …………… 2. Q: What makes modern linguistics different from traditional grammar? Modern linguistics differs from traditional grammar in several basic ways: firstly, modern linguistics is descriptive, it describes the language as it is; while traditional grammar is prescriptive, it

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(完整版)语言学练习题及答案

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语言学概论试题及答案

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