English Unit 1 and 2 metalanguage

Phono

sound

Phoneme

the distinctive sound units in a language

How many phonemes does the english language have?

44

Phonetics

the study of spoken sounds, how they are made and how they are transmitted and received

Phonology

the study of a sound system of a particular language

IPA

International Phonetic Alphabet, an alphabet of all the phonemes in the English Language

Prosodic features (PISTV)

the features of speech

PISTV (P)

pitch

PISTV (I)

intonation (change in pitch)

PISTV (S)

stress (emphasis on a word)

PISTV (T)

tempo (speed of what is said)

PISTV (V)

volume

Connected speech processes

assimilation, vowel reduction, elision, insertion

Assimilation

connected speech process where speakers make a sound segment similar to a neighbouring one

Assimilation example

butter → budder

Vowel reduction

clean vowel sound becomes clear and relaxed “uh”

Vowel reduction example

water → watah

Elision/ellipsis

speaker drops a sound segment (phoneme)

Elision/ellipsis example

library → libry

Insertion

adding a phoneme where there isn’t usually one

Insertion example

pavlova → pavalova

Phonological patterning

alliteration, assonance, consonance, onomatopoeia, rhythm, rhyme

Alliteration

same letter occurs for two or more words in a row

Alliteration example

silly sausage

Assonance

repetition of vowel sounds within a word (rhymes)

Assonance example

hear the mellow wedding bells

Onomatopoeia

lexemes that indicate sound

Onomatopoeia example

BANG, BOOM, WOOSH

Rhythm

pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables in speech

Rhythm example

shall I compare thee to a summer's day?

Rhyme

the repetition of word endings that have the same/similar vowel and consonant sounds

Rhyme example

little miss Muffet sat on a tuffet

Morphology

the study of how words are formed

Morphological changes

words have a stem that can be altered by adding a prefix or a suffix

Root

a single morpheme that contains the primary meaning of the word

Stem

a word consisting one or more morphemes that can have an affix attatched to them

Adding "ed" to the end of a word

changes a word to make it past tense

Morpheme

the smallest unit of meaning

Morpheme example

card (it cant be altered)

Free morpheme

a morpheme that can stand alone as a word

Bound morpheme

a morpheme that must be attached to another morpheme to make a word

Free/bound morpheme example

unable (un is bound and able is free)

Affix

a prefix, infix or a suffix that is attached to a free morphine

Prefix

a morpheme that is attached to the front of the stem

Infix

an affix inserted inside an existing word

Suffix

a morpheme attached to the end of the stem

Inflectional/grammatical morpheme

change the grammatical function but not the class/meaning and is always a suffix

Inflectional/grammatical morpheme example

walk---->walked (meaning stays the same but is past tense)

Derivational morpheme

changes class/meaning of a word and is always a prefix or a suffix

Derivational morpheme example

build---->builder (noun to a verb)

possible---->impossible (opposite meaning)

Types of morphological patterning

affixation, abbreviation, shortening, compounding, blending, backformation, conversion of word class, initialism, acronym, contraction

Affixation

process of adding affixes to create new words

Affixation examples

govern-ment

un-natural

Abbreviation

shortened form of a word or a phrase

Abbreviation examples

Mister → Mr, Doctor → Dr

Shortening

cutting words into smaller forms

Shortening example

laboratory → lab

Compounding

adding two whole words together

Compounding examples

book-case eye-ball

Blending

adding together parts of two different words

Blending examples

smoke and fog → smog

breakfast and lunch → brunch

Backformation

process of removing mistakenly thought affixes

Backformation examples

typewriter → typewrite

editor → edit

Conversion of word class

process of using a word in different parts of speech

Conversion of word class examples

email (noun or a verb)

google (noun or a verb)

Initialism

taking the first letter of each word from a phrase and pronouncing them individualism

Initialism examples

USA

BRB

WTF

Acronym

taking the first letter of each word and pronouncing them as a whole word

Acronym examples

ASAP

LOL

Contraction

removing letters of words and turning them into apostrophes (‘)

Lexicology

study of words, where they came from and what they mean

Lexicographer

studies words, compiles dictionaries

Lexeme

the basic unit of meaning in a language

Word classes

a group of words that behave the same as each other gramatically (e.g. noun, verb, adjective)

Lexicon

words a person uses due to their language or accent

Lexicon example

slang

Noun

person, place animal or thing

Noun example

girl, forest, tiger, table

Common noun

general name for a person, place, thing, or idea

Common noun example

city, makeup

Pronouns

words or phrases that substitute for nouns

Pronouns example

"I" "them"

Proper nouns

a specific noun

Proper nouns example

New York, Facebook

Abstract noun

names an idea, a feeling, a quality, or a characteristic

Abstract noun example

love, hope, kindness

Verbs

doing or action words

Verbs example

run, see, buy, is (form of “to be”)

Participle

a form of verb that has many functions that are used to construct certain tense and aspect forms

Participle example

writ-ing writ-ten

Infinitive

a verb that can be used as a noun, adjective or adverb, that typically has the word "to" in front of it

Infinitive example

to go, to eat

Adverb

word that describes a verb

Adverb example

she ate SLOWLY

Auxiliary verb types

primary and modal

Auxiliary verb

helps verb to determine inflectional form of the verb that follows them

Auxiliary verb example

had, were, do, is, were, does

Modal verb

a verb that expresses necessity

Modal verb example

must, may, should, would, could, will, won't

Preposition

words used before noun to show direction