Flashcards
1001LAL - Linguistics 1A Definitions
Flashcards do conjunto (76)
- 1LinguisticsThe scientific study of 'natural language'.
- 2Natural languageA system of symbols (spoken or signed) used by humans
- 3ArbitraryNo natural or intrinsic relationship between pronunciation and meaning of a word.
- 4OnomatopoeiaWords whose pronunciations suggest their meaning
- 5CreativityAbility to combine finite number of linguistic units to produce and understand an infinite range of sentences.
- 6Linguistic competenceKnowledge of a language represented by the mental grammar that accounts for speakers' linguistic ability and creativity.
- 7Linguistic performanceUse of linguistic competence in the production and comprehension of language.
- 8GrammarThe mental representation of a speaker's linguistic competence; what a speaker knows about a language.
- 9Descriptive grammarA linguist's description or model of the mental grammar, including units, structures and rules.
- 10Prescriptive grammarRules of grammar brought by grammarian's attempts to legislate what grammatical rules for speakers should be, rather than what they are.
- 11Universal grammar (UG)The innate principles and properties that pertain to the grammars of all human languages.
- 12DiscretenessLetters and words can be rearranged to form new words and sentences.
- 13DisplacementAbility to talk or sign about entities that are not related to the present - but can relate the past, and express the future.
- 14Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis (SWH)The notion that the semantic structure of the language that a person speaks either determines or limits the way they are able to form conceptions of the world they live in.
- 15Linguistic determinismThe strongest form of the SWH, the language we speak establishes how we perceive and think about the world.
- 16Linguistic relativismA weak form of SWH, the different languages encode different categories and that speakers of different languages therefore think about the world in different ways.
- 17NeurolinguisticsThe study of brain mechanisms that underlie the acquisition and the use of human language.
- 18Corpus callosumA broad band of nerve fibers joining the two hemispheres of the brain.
- 19LateralisationCognitive functions localised to one or the other side of the brain.
- 20ContralateralThe stimuli that travel between one side of the body and the opposite cerebral hemisphere.
- 21AphasiaLanguage loss or disorders following brain damage.
- 22Broca's aphasia Agrammatic aphasiaLanguage disorder resulting from damage to Broca's region where the patient has difficulty with certain aspects of syntax, especially functional categories.
- 23Wernicke's aphasia Jargon aphasiaThe type of aphasia resulting from damage to Wernicke's area where an individual is unable to understand language in its written or spoken form.
- 24PlasticityThe ability of the brain to modify its own structure and function following changes within the body or in the external environment.
- 25HemispherectomyA surgical procedure where a half of the brain is removed or disabled.
- 26Split brainThe result of an operation for epilepsy where the corpus callosum is severed, thus separating the brain into its two hemispheres.
- 27Dichotic listeningExperimental method for brain research in which subjects hear different auditory signals in the left and right ears.
- 28Event-related brain potentials (ERPs)The electrical signals emitted from different areas of the brain in response to different kinds of stimuli.
- 29Specific Language Impairment (SLI)Difficulty in acquiring language but no other cognitive deficits is present.
- 30Critical age hypothesisThe ability to acquire language is biologically linked to age.
- 31InnatenessThe theory of which some knowledge about language exists in humans at birth.
- 32Content words (Open-class)Words that denote objects, actions, attributes and properties.
Nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs...etc. - 33Function words (Closed-class)Words that have little or no semantic content.
Conjunctions, prepositions, articles, pronouns, etc. - 34VerbsRefer to actions, events and states.
(Kick, go, arrive, love, know) - 35AdjectivesRefer to qualities or properties, describe nouns.
(Old, young, tall, short) - 36Nouns (Common)Refer to a person, place, thing, event, substance, quality, quantity, etc.
- 37Nouns (Proper)Refer to particular individuals.
(Kevin, Tony, Marcus, Australia, New Zealand, etc.) - 38MorphologyThe study of the structure and content of word forms
- 39MorphemeThe smallest grammatical or meaningful unit in a language.
- 40RootLexical content morpheme that cannot be analyzed into smaller parts.
- 41StemRoot morpheme combined with at least one affix.
- 42BaseAny root or stem where an affix is attached.
- 43AffixesBound morphemes that are attached to base.
- 44PrefixesPrecede other morphemes.
(Pre-, Un-, In-, Im- etc.) - 45SuffixesFollows other morphemes
(-ly, -ious, -er, -ist etc.) - 46InfixesInserted into other morphemes.
- 47CircumfixesAttached to base morphemes both initially and finally.
- 48Cranberry morpheme/SemimorphemeMorpheme that cannot be assigned an independent meaning or grammatical function, but nonetheless serves to distinguish one word from the other.
- 49Agentive morpheme, -erOne who does something.
(teacher, singer, painter etc.) - 50Comparative morpheme, -erIndicates the comparative degree of an adjective.
(nicer, prettier, smaller etc.) - 51DeixisWords and phrases, such as “me” or “here”, that cannot be fully understood without additional contextual information.
- 52Person deixisAny expression used to point to a person. (me, you, her, them etc.)
- 53Space deixisWords used to point to a location.
(here, there, this, that etc.) - 54Time deixisUsed to point to a time.
(now, then, tonight, yesterday) - 55SpecificityWhether or not a specific entity is referred to.
- 56DefinitenessWhether or not the reference is to an entity which the speaker thinks their addressee knows about.
- 57TenseExpresses the time when a state or action denoted by a verb occurs.
- 58AspectA component of the conjugation of a verb, having to do with the internal temporal flow of an event.
- 59MoodA set of morphologically distinctive forms that are used to signal modality.
- 60ModalityAttitudes and involvement such as desire, ability, obligation and likelihood.
- 61PolarityThe distinction of affirmative and negative.
- 62ReduplicationWhole root, or part of the root, is repeated, or duplicated, within the same word.
- 63Lexical gapsAccidental gaps in lexicons, words that are well-formed not non-existing.
- 64CompoundTwo or more words are joined to make one longer word. The meaning of the compound may be similar to or different from the meanings of its components in isolation.
- 65Back-formationCreation of a new word by analysing a word as a derivation and removing apparent affixes.
- 66EponymsWords coined from proper names.
- 67BlendsCombination of two words with parts of combined words removed.
- 68ClippingsAbbreviation of longer words into shorter ones.
- 69AcronymsWords derived from the initials of several words and are pronounced as the spelling indicates.
- 70Alphabetic abbreviationsWords derived from the initials of several words and are each element in the string is pronounced separately.
- 71SyntaxThe set of rules, principles, and processes that govern the structure of sentences in a given language, specifically word order.
- 72PhraseOne or more words forming a single unit (‘constituent’) in the syntax of a sentence.
- 73SentenceThe largest independent unit in the grammar of a language.
- 74Transitive verbsTakes a Direct Object, the under-goer of the action is described by the verb is expressed in the object.
- 75Intransitive verbsDoes not have a Direct Object, only the subject is given.
- 76Ditransitive verbsVerbs that take an Indirect Object and a Direct Object.