AP Hug Unit 3 Langauge

Accent – Way of pronouncing words in a language.

Example: British vs. American English accent.

Anatolian Hypothesis – Theory that Indo-European languages spread from Anatolia (Turkey) with farming.

Example: Early European languages derived from Anatolian farmers.

Creole – Stable, full language developed from a mixture of languages.

Example: Haitian Creole (French + African languages).

Dialect – Regional version of a language with unique vocabulary/grammar.

Example: Southern American English vs. Northern American English.

Extinct Language – Language no longer spoken.

Example: Latin (as a spoken language).

Ideogram – Symbol representing an idea or concept.

Example: Chinese characters.

Indo-European – Large language family including most of Europe and South Asia.

Example: English, Hindi, Russian.

Nostratic Hypothesis – Theory that many Eurasian language families share a common ancient ancestor.

Example: Connection between Indo-European and Uralic languages.

Isogloss – Geographic boundary of language feature.

Example: Line separating “soda” vs. “pop” usage in the U.S.

Isolated Language – Language not related to any others.

Example: Basque in Spain/France.

Kurgan Hypothesis – Theory that Indo-European languages spread via migration from the Pontic-Caspian steppe.

Example: Indo-European languages spread by horseback-riding nomads.

Language – System of communication using words and symbols.

Example: English.

Language Branch – Subdivision of a language family; related languages.

Example: Germanic branch of Indo-European (English, German, Dutch).

Language Family – Group of related languages with a common ancestor.

Example: Indo-European.

Language Group – Smaller subset within a branch with similar grammar/vocabulary.

Example: West Germanic group (English, German, Dutch).

Lingua Franca – Common language for speakers of different native languages.

Example: English for international business.

Literary Tradition – Written works passed across generations in a language.

Example: Shakespeare’s works in English.

Monolingual – Speaking one language.

Example: Someone only speaking Spanish.

Bilingual – Speaking two languages.

Example: Spanish + English speaker.

Multilingual – Speaking multiple languages.

Example: Fluent in French, Spanish, English, and German.

National Language – Language officially associated with a country.

Example: Hindi in India.

Orthography – System of writing/spelling rules.

Example: English spelling rules.

Pidgin – Simplified language for communication between groups with different languages.

Example: Tok Pisin in Papua New Guinea.

Polyglot – Person fluent in many languages.

Example: Someone speaking 5+ languages fluently.

Slang – Informal, nonstandard vocabulary.

Example: “Lit” meaning cool or exciting.

Standard Language – Official form of a language used in government, schools, media.

Example: Standard British English.

Syntax – Rules for sentence structure in a language.

Example: English uses subject-verb-object order.

Toponym – Place name.

Example: “Mississippi” or “Mount Everest.”

Trade Language – Language used to conduct business between speakers of different languages.

Example: Swahili in East Africa.

Vernacular – Everyday spoken language of a region.

Example: Local dialects in rural Italy.

Vocabulary – Set of words in a language.

Example: English vocabulary includes words like “computer,” “tree,” “run"