Introduction to Linguistics: Quiz 3

Noun

Person, Place, or Thing

EX: money, gravity, science, proper nouns (names), happiness, friends.

Verb

Action words and helpers.

EX: IS, AM eats, play, sleep, etc.

Adjective

Describe the noun. Can be placed before or after the noun.

Adverb

Usually end in -ly.

Describe the verb (action).

EX: poorly, well, too, rarely, sometimes, often, fast, slowly

Determiners

Another word for articles. Words come before a noun and provides info about the noun.

EX: a, my, her, the, etc.

Person Agreement

Who is the reference

1) First Person

2) Second Person

3) Third Person

First Person

I and We

Sharing opinions.

Second Person

You

Third Person

They, he, she

Objective.

Preposition

Connecting words that share location, direction, or placement.

EX: On, over, with, between, at, to, from

Conjunctions

Connects two sentences

FANBOYS: for, an, nor, but, or, yet, so, though, while

Verb Tense

Past: -ed ending

Present: currently doing

Future: will/have/had before the verb

Verb Aspect

Simple

Progressive

Perfect

Simple Aspect

Something you do habitually.

Present Simple: I play tennis every single day or every Thursday.

Progressive Aspect

Action taking place right now — -ing ending in sentence.

Past Progressive: I was playing tennis yesterday when my sister called.

Present Perfect Progressive: I have been studying English for a very long time.

Perfect

Focused on the experience, but doesn’t tell you when.

Contains will have (future) and had (past) before the verb in a sentence.

Future Perfect: I will have graduated from college when I am 63.

Past Perfect: I had studied finance for 10 years when I started my work on Wallstreet.

Word Order

Every Language has verbs and objects. Subjects are common but not required.

Subject, Object, Verb (SOV) is the most common.

Anything that starts with O, OSV and OVS (object) is the least common.

IN ENGLISH: Subject, Verb, Object (SVO) — very common.

We start with subject because we like to know the point. We think about subjects first and objects last.

Syntax

Knowledge of sentences structures.

Diagram — split Noun Phrase and Verb Phrase.

• Then make sub categories for the article, noun, verb, so on so on. Proper Nouns (Names), Pronouns (it, you), and Adjectives are also included.

Semantics

The study of morphemes, words, phrases, and sentences.

Thematic Roles

The relationships between the arguments of the verb and the situation the verb describes. Focus on the noun phrase (NP).

7 different ones:

1) Agent

2) Theme

3) Goal

4) Source

5) Instrument

6) Experiencer

7) Location

Agent

The doer of the action — boy, dog.

Theme

The undergoer of the action (who got squash) — boy, dog.

Goal

The endpoint of a change in location or possession — Des Moines, Home.

Source

Where the action originates — Ames, School.

Instrument

The means used to accomplish an action (thing we used to hit) — crayon, sword, wand, fork.

Experiencer

Receiving sensor input passively, verbs that impact one’s mental state. EX: awaken, frighten, experience, feel, see, hear.

Location

Where an entity is — in the room.

Synonyms

Words or expressions that have the same meaning in some or all contexts.

According to Linguistics, we don’t have a word that means that exact same things as ___, it wouldn’t exist.

Antonyms

Words of opposite meaning.

Non-gradable: Feature is present or absent (truly opposite) — legal/illegal, dead/alive, false/true

Gradable: No absolute scale, up to interpretation — rude/polite, fast/slow, happy/sad, hot/cold

Reversive: Do the reverse of — dress/undress

Hyponymy

The meaning of one form is included in the meaning of another.

Tree Diagrams — Types of Flowers (Rose, iris, daisy) or Desserts (cake — tres leches, ice cream — vanilla, cookie — oreo, pie — apple)

Homophones

Two or more words that sound the same.

EX: Two, to, too.

Homonyms

One word that has two different meanings.

EX: Bat, Pen, Race

Polysemy

Words with the same form and have related meanings 

Head — body part, the leader, top of a page.

Deixis

Refers to words and expression whose reference depend on the context of the situation.

Person, Time, and Place Deixis.

Person Deixis

Meaning depends on who is being discussed or present.

EX: I, you, she, that man, those girls

Time Deixis

Meaning depends on when something was said or what period of time it’s being discussed.

EX: Now, then, tomorrow, yesterday

Place Deixis

Meaning depends on where it was said or what place was being discussed.

EX: Here, there, yonder mountains

Implicature

Implied meanings. Inferences that can be based on context.

Grice’s Maxims of Conversation

1) Maxim of Quality

2) Maxim of Quantity

3) Maxim of Relation

4) Maxim of Manner

Maxim of Quality

Truth — sayings things that are truth or things that you believe are true.

Maxim of Quantity

Information — do not give more information than is needed

Maxim of Relation

Relevance — only say what is relevant to the communication.

Maxim of Manner

Clarity — clear, brief, and orderly

Idioms

Phrases cannot be predicted based on the meanings of individual words. Semantic rules for combining meanings don’t apply.

To understand or teach idioms:

1) Know the individual words

2) Know the meaning of the expression

3) Have cultural background

EX: Piece of cake, hit it off, drop the ball, put his foot in his mouth