English Language - Definitions (mostly grammar)

English Language is alright ig mate

Prescriptivism

The belief that there is a right way and wrong way to use language.

It can be both an activity and an ideology and includes judging and correcting language.

This can be very harmful, especially towards minority dialects but can also be helpful, especially towards languages with not many speakers, as helps to help it alive

Nouns

Labels for places, people, things, ideas or concepts

Proper Nouns

Nouns that are specific (e.g. Sarah’s mum or Tesco) and are signified by capital first letters

Common Nouns

Anything that isn’t a proper noun

Countable Nouns

Nouns that you can place a number in front of (e.g. coins)

Non-countable nouns

Nouns that you cannot place a number in front of (e.g. money)

Concrete nouns

Things that you can measure and see (e.g. cow)

Abstract nouns

Unobservable ideas (e.g. justice)

Verbs

Actions, occurrences or a state of being

Main Verbs

Verbs that express the main action or state of being (most verbs)

Modal Auxiliary verbs

Verbs that imply the likelihood of an event (e.g. will, might, should, could, etc.)

Auxiliary Primary verbs (Helper verbs)

Verbs that show time and contiunity (e.g. be, have, do) and are used to construct compound tenses

Tenses

Past, Present, Future

Aspects

Simple, Progressive, Perfect, Perfect Progressive

Expected Written Word Aspects

Planned, Distant, Formal, Permanent, Transactional, Delayed, Standard

Expected Spoken Word Aspects

Spontaneous, Close, Informal, Ephemeral, Interactional, Immediate, Non-standard

Superlatives

An adjective or adverb that expresses being more in particular quality than anything else of that same type (e.g. finest, greatest, worst)

Representation

The description or portrayal of someone or something in a particular way through words and images

Tenor

The relationship between the writer and reader

Field

the content of the text

Mode

How the text is produced (spoken, written, mixed mode)

Adjectives

Words that modify nouns (answer questions like, what kind, which one, how many/much, whose etc)

Attributive/Pre-modifying adjectives

Adjectives placed before the noun (e.g. the hungry girl)

Predicative/Post-modifying adjectives

Adjectives placed after the noun (e.g. the girl was hungry)

Descriptive adjectives

Literally most traditional adjectives (e.g. comfortable, pink, large etc)

Articles (adjectives)

Definite: The

Indefinite: A, An

Determiners (adjectives)

Demonstratives: This, That, These, Those

Pronouns + Possessive Determiners: My, Your, Her, It's, Our, Sarah's

Quantifiers: a few, a little, much, many, a lot of, most

Numbers: one, ten, thirty

Lexis

The words used in text or spoken data

Choices of lexis

Euphemisms, dysphemisms, archaisms, jargon, slang, dialect, colloquialism, swearing, taboo terms, cliches

Morphology (grammar)

Refers to the way words are formed and structured

Syntax (grammar)

The arrangement of words and phrases to create sentences

Collocations

Common language phrases e.g. takes your breath away

Graphology

The layout, font, colour and images used in the text (Visual aspects of technical design and appearance of a text that help to communicate meaning.)

Phonetics, phonology, prosodics

How speech sounds are articulated and analysed

Hermeneutical disarmament

The process in which a person is rendered less able to communicate ideas and experiences due to drastic linguistic meaning change

Register

A type of language used for a particular purpose or setting (about the speaker’s choice of lexis)

Semantics

How meaning is created through words (by context and association)

Idiolect

The individual’s unique way of speaking (comparable to style in writen language)

Sociolect

A social dialect or variety of speech used by a particular group such as working-class or upper-class speech

Genderlect

An outdated term to describe the lexical choices made between men and women

Hypernym

a word with a broad meaning (allows words to fall into its category/a umbrella term) (e.g. hair)

Hyponym

a word of a more specific meaning (e.g.curly)

Semantic reclamation

when individuals and groups use and take ownership of derogatory words that have been used to oppress that group

Intersectionality

The theory that everyone has a unique, highly specific experience because they have many different identities that merge together (e.g. can't assume that everyone that is gay will use language thr same)

Indexicality

A linguistic expression that states that language we use can be linked to our identities.

Preformativty

A theory that gender and sexuality aren't necessarily things that you are born with but rather social constructs

Structuralists

Believed that society and identity are rigid and fixed

Post-structuralists

Believe that identities are complex and that society wants to create boxes for the characteristics we have

Adverbs

Words that modify verbs, adjectives and other adverbs

Types of adverbs

Manner (slowly, quickly), Degree (completely), Frequency (weekly, daily), Time (later, earlier), Place (outside, inside), Comment (unfortunately, half-heartedly), Interrogative (questions)

Discourse

The structure of the text

Discourse markers

Words that signal the direction of a text to a reader (e.g. however, therefore, later, secondally, so)

Cohesion

The way a text fits together to form a logical whole

Adjunts

Non-essential elements (usually adverbials) that can be omitted in a sentence

Disjuncts

Sentence adverbs that signal and attitude towards the rest of the sentence (e.g frankly, unfortunately)

Anaphoric

Refering back to something already mentioned using using pronouns (e.g. Bubbles is alright. She's sometimes late)

Cataphoric

Refering to something not yet mentioned (e.g. He’s a nice lad, that Even)

Exophoric

Making reference to something outside the text (often references to the speaker’s environment (e.g. Look at this!)

Types of Cohesion

Lexical, Grammatical, Phonological, Graphological

Sentence Functions/Moods

Interrogative, Declarative, Exclamative, Imperative

Simple sentence

Tells only one piece of information. It has one verb

Compound sentence

One which you join two sentences together (and, but, so, ; -)

Complex sentence

When you add extra information into a sentence (main clause + subordinate/dependent clause or phrase)

Pronoun

A word that replaces a noun or noun phrase

Personal Pronouns - Subjective Pronouns

“_ did it”

Personal Pronouns - Objective Pronouns

“Happened to _”

Personal Pronouns - Possessive Pronouns

“it is _”

Personal Pronouns - Possessive Adj Pronouns

“_ pen”

Personal Pronouns - Reflective Pronouns

Myself, Ourselves, Yourself ,Yourselves, Theirself, Themselves, Herself, Himself, Itself

Demonstrative Pronouns

This, that, these, those

Indefinite Pronouns

Everyone, no-one, neither, non, all, anything etc

Subject

The thing doing the verb

Clause

Has to have a subject (noun, pronoun, etc) and a verb

Phrase

Not a clause and doesn't include both a subject and a verb

Conjunctions

A word that links parts of a sentence together

Coordinating Conjunctions

FANBOYS (For, And, Nor, But, Or, Yet, So)

Subordinating Conjuctions

Although, Because, Since, If, Unless

Prepositions

A word that explains how an object relates to space and time (in, around, on, under, after, before, at, by)

Perfect Tenses

Describes a finished action (Present Perfect - I have walked) (Past Perfect - I had walked) (Future Perfect - I will have walked)

Progressive Tenses

Describes a continuous action (Present Progressive - I am walking) (Past Progressive - I was walking) (Future Progressive - I will be walking)

Perfect Progessive Tenses

Describes an action that was in progessive but was then finished or still continuing (Present Perfect Progressive - I have been walking) (Past Perfect Progessive - I had been walking) (Future Perfect Progessive - I will have been walking)

Phonology

Study of speech sounds and their effects

Phonemes

One sound ‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’/basic until of sound

Syllables

E.g. Void (2 syllables)

Prosody

Tone and inflection (where you place emphasis on sound)

Onomatopoeia

Words like ‘bang’, ‘chirp’, ‘moo’

Alliteration

Words that have a similar starting sound and are put together (slimy snakes)

Assonance

Similar vowel sounds within it + repetition (cow, pow)

Phonetics

Sounds that letters make

Monopthongs

Single vowel sounds (a, oo)

Dipthongs

Vowels that glide from one to another (oi, ai)

Vowels

Sounds made from the vocal core without any friction or interference

Consonants

Sounds made by the mouth obstructing the flow of air from the lungs

Active voice

The subject of the sentence is the performer of an action (e.g Cats chase mice)

Passive voice

The receiver of the action becomes the subject (e.g. Mice are chased by cats)