5版,杨忠《语言学概论》笔记(24页)

Chapter 1 Introduction

Ⅰ.What is language?

1. Different definitions of language

(1) Language is a system whose parts can and must be considered in their

synchronic solidarity. (de Saussure, 1916)

(2) [Language is] a set (finite or infinite) of sentences, each finite in length and

constructed out of a finite set of elements. (Chomsky, 1957)

(3) Language is a purely human and non-instinctive method of communicating

ideas, emotions and desires by means of voluntarily produced symbols.

2. Each of the definitions above has pointed out some aspects of the essence of

language, but all of them have left out something. We must see the multi-faceted nature of language.

3. As is agreed by linguists in broad terms, language can be defined as a system of

arbitrary vocal symbols used for human communication.

Ⅱ.Features of human language

1. Creativity

(1) Language provides opportunities for sending messages that have never

been sent before and for understanding brand new messages.

(2) The grammar rules and the words are finite, but the sentences are infinite.

Every speaker uses language creatively.

2. Duality

(1) Language contains two subsystems, one of sounds and the other of

meanings.

(2) Certain sounds or sequences of sounds stand for certain meanings.

(3) Certain meanings are conveyed by certain speech sounds or sequences

of speech sounds.

3. Arbitrariness

(1) The relationship between the two subsystems of language is arbitrary.

(2) There is no logical connection between sound and meaning.

4. Displacement

(1) There is no limit in time or space for language.

(2) Language can be used to refer to things real or imagined, past, present or

future.

5. Cultural transmission

(1) Culture cannot be genetically transmitted. Instead, it must be learned.

(2) Language is a way of transmitting culture.

6. Interchangeability

All members of a speech community can send and receive messages.

7. Reflexivity

(1) Human languages can be used to describe themselves.

(2) The language used to talk about language is called meta-language.

Ⅲ.Functions of language – three meta-functions

1. The ideational function

To identify things, to think, or to record information.

2. The interpersonal function

To get along in a community.

3. The textual function

To form a text.

Ⅳ.Types of language

1. Genetic classification

2. Typological classification

(1) Analytic language –no inflections or formal changes, grammatical

relationships are shown through word order, such as Chinese and

Vietnamese

(2) Synthetic language – grammatical relationships are expressed by changing

the internal structure of the words, typically by changing the inflectional

endings, such as English and German

(3) Agglutinating language – words are built out of a long sequence of units,

with each unit expressing a particular grammatical meaning, such as

Japanese and Turkish

Ⅴ.The myth of language – language origin

1. The Biblical account

Language was God’s gift to human beings.

2. The bow-wow theory

Language was an imitation of natural sounds, such as the cries of animals, like quack, cuckoo.

3. The pooh-pooh theory

Language arose from instinctive emotional cries, expressive of pain or joy.

4. The yo-he-ho theory

Language arose from the noises made by a group of people engaged in joint labour or effort – lifting a huge hunted game, moving a rock, etc.

5. The evolution theory

Language originated in the process of labour and answered the call of social need.

Ⅵ.What is linguistics?

1. Linguistics is the scientific study of language.

(1) Observing & questioning

(2) Formulating hypotheses

(3) Verifying the hypotheses

(4) Proposing a theory

2. Branches of linguistics

(1) Internal branches: intra-disciplinary divisions

?Phonetics

?Phonology

?Morphology

?Syntax

?Semantics

(2) External branches: inter-disciplinary divisions

?Pragmatics

?Psycholinguistics

?Sociolinguistics

?Applied linguistics

?Computational linguistics

?Neurolinguistics

3. Features of linguistics

(1) Descriptive

(2) Dealing with spoken language

(3) Synchronic

Chapter 2 Phonetics

Ⅰ.What is phonetics?

1. Phonetics is termed as the study of speech sounds.

2. Sub-branches of phonetics

(1) Articulatory phonetics – the production of speech sounds

(2) Acoustic phonetics – the physical properties of speech sounds

(3) Auditory phonetics – the perceptive mechanism of speech sounds

Ⅱ.The speech organs

1. Where does the air stream come from?

From the lung

2. What is the function of vocal cords?

Controlling the air stream

3. What are the cavities?

(1) Oral cavity

(2) Pharyngeal cavity

(3) Nasal cavity

Ⅲ.Transcription of speech sounds

1. Units of representation

Segments (the individual sounds)

2. Phonetic symbols

(1) The widely used symbols for phonetic transcription of speech sounds is the

International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA).

(2) The IPA attempts to represent each sound of human speech with a single

symbol and the symbols are enclosed in brackets to distinguish

phonetic transcriptions from the spelling system of a language.

(3) In more detailed transcription (narrow transcription) a sound may be

transcribed with a symbol to which a smaller is added in order to mark

the finer distinctions.

Ⅳ.Description of speech sounds

1. Description of English consonants

(1) General feature: obstruction

(2) Criteria of consonant description

?Places of articulation

?Manners of articulation

?V oicing of articulation

(3) Places of articulation

This refers to each point at which the air stream can be modified to

produce a sound.

?Bilabial: [p] [b] [m] [w]

?Labiodental: [f] [v]

?Interdental: [ ] [?]

?Alveolar: [t] [d] [s] [z] [l] [n] [r]

?Palatal: [?] [?] [t?] [d?] [j]

?Velar: [k] [g] [?]

?Glottal: [h]

(4) Manners of articulation

This refers to how the air stream is modified, whether it is completely

blocked or partially obstructed.

?Stops: [p] [b] [t] [d] [k] [g]

?Fricatives: [s] [z] [?] [?] [f] [v] [ ] [?] [h]

?Affricates: [t?] [d?]

?Liquids: [l] [r]

?Glides: [w] [j]

?Nasals: [m] [n] [?]

(5) V oicing of articulation

This refers to the vibrating of the vocal cords when sounds are

produced.

?V oiced sounds

?V oiceless sounds

2. Description of English vowels

(1) General feature: without obstruction

(2) Criteria of vowel description

A. Part of the tongue that is raised

?Front

?Central

?Back

B. Extent to which the tongue rises in the direction of the palate

?High

?Mid

?Low

C. Kind of opening made at the lips

D. Position of the soft palate

(3) Single vowels (monophthongs) and diphthongs

Ⅴ.Phonetic features and natural classes

1. Classes of sounds that share a feature or features are called natural classes.

2. Major class features can specify segments across the consonant-vowel

boundary.

3. Classification of segments by features is the basis on which variations of sounds can

be analyzed.

Chapter 3 Phonology

Ⅰ.What is phonology?

1. Phonology is the study of sound systems and patterns.

2. Phonology and phonetics are two studies different in perspectives, which are

concerned with the study of speech sounds.

3. Phonology focuses on three fundamental questions.

(1) What sounds make up the list of sounds that can distinguish meaning in

a particular language?

(2) What sounds vary in what ways in what context?

(3) What sounds can appear together in a sequence in a particular language Ⅱ.Phonemes and allophones

1. A phoneme is a distinctive, abstract sound unit with a distinctive feature.

2. The variants of a phoneme are termed allophones.

3. We use allophones to realize phonemes.

Ⅲ.Discovering phonemes

1. Contrastive distribution – phonemes

(1) If sounds appear in the same environment, they are said to be in contrastive

distribution.

(2) Typical contrastive distribution of sounds is found in minimal pairs and

minimal sets.

A. A minimal pair consists of two words that differ by only one sound in

the same position.

B. Minimal sets are more than two words that are distinguished by one

segment in the same position.

(3) The overwhelming majority of the consonants and vowels represented by

the English phonetic alphabet are in contrastive distribution.

(4) Some sounds can hardly be found in contrastive distribution in English.

However, these sounds are distinctive in terms of phonetic features.

Therefore, they are separate phonemes.

2. Complementary distribution – allophones

(1) Sounds that are not found in the same position are said to be in

complementary distribution.

(2) If segments are in complementary distribution and share a number of

features, they are allophones of the same phoneme.

3. Free variation

If segments appear in the same position but the mutual substitution does not result in change of meaning, they are said to be in free variation.

Ⅳ.Distinctive and non-distinctive features

1. Features that distinguish meaning are called distinctive features, and features do

not, non-distinctive features.

2. Distinctive features in one language may be non-distinctive in another.

Ⅴ.Phonological rules

1. Phonemes are abstract sound units stored in the mind, while allophones are the

actual pronunciations in speech.

2. What phoneme is realized by what allophones in what specific context is

another major question in phonology.

3. The regularities that what sounds vary in what ways in what context are

generalized and stated in phonology as rules.

4. There are many phonological rules in English. Take the following ones as

examples.

A. [+voiced +consonant] – [-voiced]/[-voiced +consonant]_

B. [-voiced +bilabial +stop] – unaspirated/[-voiced +alveolar +fricative]_ Ⅵ.Syllable structure

1. A syllable is a phonological unit that is composed of one or more phonemes.

2. Every syllable has a nucleus, which is usually a vowel.

3. The nucleus may be preceded by one or more consonants called the onset and

followed by one or more consonants called the coda.

Ⅶ.Sequence of phonemes

1. Native speakers of any language intuitively know what sounds can be put

together.

2. Some sequences are not possible in English. The impossible sequences are

called systematic gaps.

3. Sequences that are possible but do not occur yet are called accidental gaps.

4. When new words are coined, they may fill some accidental gaps but they will never fill systematic gaps.

Ⅷ. Suprasegmental features

1. Features that are found over a segment or a sequence of two or more segments

are called suprasegmental features.

2. These features are distinctive features.

3. Stress

(1) Stress is the perceived prominence of one or more syllabic elements

over others in a word.

(2) Stress is a relative notion. Only words that are composed of two or more

syllables have stress.

(3) If a word has three or more syllables, there is a primary stress and a

secondary stress.

(4) In some languages word stress is fixed, i.e. on a certain syllable. In

English, word stress is unpredictable.

4. Intonation

(1) When we speak, we change the pitch of our voice to express ideas.

(2) Intonation is the variation of pitch to distinguish utterance meaning.

(3) The same sentence uttered with different intonation may express

different attitude of the speaker.

(4) In English, there are three basic intonation patterns: fall, rise, fall-rise.

5. Tone

(1) Tone is the variation of pitch to distinguish words.

(2) The same sequence of segments can be different words if uttered with

different tones.

(3) Chinese is a typical tone language.

Chapter 4 Morphology

Ⅰ.What is morphology?

1. The total number of words stored in the brain is called the lexicon.

2. Words are the smallest free units of language that unite sounds with meaning.

3. Morphology is defined as the study of the internal structure and the

formation of words.

Ⅱ.Morphemes and allomorphs

1. The smallest meaningful unit of language is called a morpheme.

2. A morpheme may be represented by different forms, called allomorphs.

3. “zero” form of a morpheme and suppletives

(1) Some countable nouns do not change form to express plurality. Similarly,

some regular verbs do not change form to indicate past tense. In these

two cases, the noun or verb contains two morphemes, among which there

is one “zero form” of a morpheme.

(2) Some verbs have irregular changes when they are in past tense. In this case,

the verbs also have two morphemes. Words which are not related in form

to indicate grammatical contrast with their roots are called suppletives. Ⅲ.Free and bound morphemes

1. Some morphemes constitute words by themselves. These morphemes are called

free morphemes.

2. Other morphemes are never used independently in speech and writing. They are

always attached to free morphemes to form new words. These morphemes are called bound morphemes.

3. The distinction between a free morphemes and a bound morpheme is whether it

can be used independently in speech or writing.

4. Free morphemes are the roots of words, while bound morphemes are the affixes

(prefixes and suffixes).

Ⅳ.Inflexional and derivational morphemes

1. Inflexional morphemes in modern English indicate case and number of nouns,

tense and aspect of verbs, and degree of adjectives and adverbs.

2. Derivational morphemes are bound morphemes added to existing forms to

construct new words.

(1) English affixes are divided into prefixes and suffixes.

(2) Some languages have infixes, bound morphemes which are inserted into

other morphemes.

(3) The process of putting affixes to existing forms to create new words is

called derivation. Words thus formed are called derivatives.

Ⅴ.Conclusion: classification of morphemes

Morphemes

(1) Free morphemes

(2) Bound morphemes

A. Inflexional

B. Derivational: affixes

?Prefixes: -s, -’s, -er, -est, -ing, -ed, -s

?Suffixes

?

Ⅵ.Formation of new words

1. Derivation

(1) Derivation forms a word by adding an affix to a free morpheme.

(2) Since derivation can apply more than once, it is possible to create a derived

word with a number of affixes. For example, if we add affixes to the

word friend, we can form befriend, friendly, unfriendly, friendliness,

unfriendliness, etc. This process of adding more than one affix to a free

morpheme is termed complex derivation.

(3) Derivation does not apply freely to any word of a given category.

Generally speaking, affixes cannot be added to morphemes of a different

language origin.

(4) Derivation is also constrained by phonological factors.

(5) Some English suffixes also change the word stress.

2. Compounding

(1) Compounding is another common way to form words. It is the combination

of free morphemes.

(2) The majority of English compounds are the combination of words from the

three classes –nouns, verbs and adjectives –and fall into the three

classes.

(3) In compounds, the rightmost morpheme determines the part of speech of

the word.

(4) The meaning of compounds is not always the sum of meaning of the

components.

3. Conversion

(1) Conversion is the process putting an existing word of one class into another

class.

(2) Conversion is usually found in words containing one morpheme.

4. Clipping

(1) Clipping is a process that shortens a polysyllabic word by deleting one or

more syllables.

(2) Clipped words are initially used in spoken English on informal occasions.

(3) Some clipped words have become widely accepted, and are used even in

formal styles. For example, the words bus (omnibus), vet (veterinarian),

gym (gymnasium), fridge (refrigerator)and fax (facsimile)are rarely used

in their complete form.

5. Blending

Blending is a process that creates new words by putting together non-morphemic parts of existing words. For example, smog (smoke + frog), brunch (a meal in the middle of morning, replacing both breakfast and lunch), motel(motor + hotel). There is also an interesting word in the textbook for junior middle school students –“plike” (a kind of machine that is like both a plane and a bike).

6. Back-formation

Back-formation is the process that creates a new word by dropping a real or supposed suffix. For example, the word televise is back-formed from television. Originally, the word television is formed by putting the prefix tele-(far) to the root vision (viewing). At the same time, there is a suffix -sion in English indicating nouns. Then people consider the -sion in the word television as that suffix and drop it to form the verb televise.

7. Acronyms and abbreviations

(1) Acronyms and abbreviations are formed by putting together the initial

letters of all words in a phrase or title.

(2) Acronyms can be read as a word and are usually longer than abbreviations,

which are read letter by letter.

(3) This type of word formation is common in names of organizations and

scientific terminology.

8. Eponyms

Eponyms are words that originate from proper names of individuals or places. For example, the word sandwich is a common noun originating from the fourth Earl of Sandwich, who put his food between two slices of bread so that he could eat while gambling.

9. Coinage

(1) Coinage is a process of inventing words not based on existing morphemes.

(2) This way of word formation is especially common in cases where industry

requires a word for a new product. For example, Kodak and Coca-cola.

Chapter 5 Syntax

Ⅰ.What is syntax?

1. The term syntax is from the ancient Greek word syntaxis, which literally means

“arrangement” or “setting out together”.

2. Traditionally, it refers to the branch of grammar dealing with the ways in which

words, with or without appropriate inflexions, are arranged to show connexions of meaning within the sentence.

3. Syntax is a branch of linguistics that analyzes the structure of sentences. Ⅱ.What is a sentence?

1. Syntax is the analysis of sentence structure. A sentence is a sequence of words

arranged in a certain order in accordance with grammatical rules.

2. A sequence can be either well-formed or ill-formed. Native speakers of a

language know intuitively what strings of words are grammatical and what are

ungrammatical.

Ⅲ.Knowledge of sentence structure

1. Structural ambiguity

Structural ambiguity is one or more string(s) of words has/have more than one meaning. For example, the sentence Tom said he would come yesterday can be interpreted in different ways.

2. Word order

Different arrangements of the same words have different meanings. For example, with the words Tom, love and Mary, we may say Tom loves Mary or Mary loves Tom.

3. Grammatical relations

Native speakers know what element relates to what other element directly or indirectly. For example, in The boats are not big enough and We don’t have enough boats, the word enough is related to different words in the two sentences.

4. Recursion

The same rule can be used repeatedly to create infinite sentences. For example, I know that you are happy. He knows that I know that you are happy.

She knows that he knows that I know that you are happy.

5. Sentence relatedness

Sentences may be structurally variant but semantically related.

6. Syntactic categories

(1) A syntactic category is a class of words or phrases that can substitute for

one another without loss of grammaticality. For example, consider the

following sentences:

◆The child found the knife.

◆ A policeman found the knife.

◆The man who just left here found the knife.

◆He found the knife.

(2) All the italicized parts belong to the same syntactic category called noun

phrase (NP). The noun phrases in these sentences function as subject. The

knife, also a noun phrase, functions as object.

Ⅳ.Traditional grammar

1. In traditional grammar, a sentence is considered a sequence of words which are

classified into parts of speech.

2. Sentences are analyzed in terms of grammatical functions of words: subjects,

objects, verbs (predicates), predicatives, ....

3. Compulsory elements of a sentence: subject, verb, object, complement,

adverbial...

4. Nouns: number, case, gender...

5. Verbs: tense, aspect, voice...

6. Adjectives and adverbs: comparative and superlative degrees

7. Agreement in number/person/gender

8. Parsing: trying to make detailed analysis in structure

Ⅴ.Structural grammar

1. Structural grammar arose out of an attempt to deviate from traditional grammar.

It deals with the inter-relationships of different grammatical units. In the concern of structural grammar, words are not just independent grammatical units, but are inter-related to one another.

2. Form class

(1) Form class is a wider concept than part of speech in traditional grammar.

(2) Linguistic units which can appear in the same slot are said to be in the

same form class. For example, a(n), the, my, that, every, etc. can be

placed before nouns in English sentences. These words fall into one form

class.

(3) These linguistic units are observed to have the same distribution.

3. Immediate constituent (IC) analysis

(1) Structural grammar is characterized by a top-down process of analysis.

(2) A sentence is seen as a constituent structure. All the components of the

sentences are its constituents. A sentence can be cut into sections. Each

section is its immediate constituent. Then each section can be further cut

into constituents. This on-going cutting is termed immediate constituent

analysis.

(3) Examples:

?Old men and women: old | men and women, old || men | and women.

?The ||| little || girl | speaks || French.

(4) In this way, sentence structure is analyzed not only horizontally but also

vertically. In other words, IC analysis can account for the linearity and

the hierarchy of sentence structure.

?I will suggest | that this || in itself reflects ||| a particular ideology

|||| about gender ||||| that deserves to be re-examined.

(5) Two advantages of IC analysis:

A. It can analyze some ambiguities.

B. It shows linearity and hierarchy of one sentence.

Ⅵ.Transformational-generative (TG) grammar

1. Background and the goal of TG grammar

(1) Chomsky (1957) – grammar is the knowledge of native speakers.

?Adequacy of observation

?Adequacy of description

?Adequacy of explanation

(2) Writing a TG grammar means working out two sets of rules –phrase

structure rules and transformation rules – which are followed by speakers

of the language.

(3) TG grammar must account for all and only grammatical sentences.

2. Syntactic categories

?Noun Phrase (NP) ?Verb Phrase (VP) ?Sentence (S) ?Determiner (Det) ?Adjective (Adj) ?Pronoun (Pro)

?Verb (V)

?Auxiliary Verb (Aux) ?Prepositional Phrase (PP) ?Adverb (Adv)

3. Phrase structure (PS) rules

◆S → NP VP

(Det) (Adj) N

◆N P →

Pro

◆VP → (Aux) V (NP) (PP)

◆PP → P NP

4. Tree diagrams (omit)

5. Recursion and the infinitude of language

S contains NP and VP and that S may be a constituent of NP and VP. NP and PP can be mutually inclusive. If phrasal categories appear on both sides of the arrow in phrase structure rules, the rules are recursive. Recursive rules can be applied again and again, and the phrase structure can grow endlessly.

6. Sub-categorization of the lexicon.

The process of putting words of the same lexical category into smaller classes according to their syntactic characteristics is called sub-categorization.

7. Transformational rules (T-rules)

(1) Particle movement T-rule

John turned the machine off. John turned off the machine.

(2) Replacement T-rule

John beat Tom. He beat Tom.

The house needs repairing (to be repaired).

(3) Insertion T-rule

A fish is swimming in the pond. There is a fish swimming in the pond.

(4) Deletion T-rule

They came in and (they) sat down.

(5) Copying T-rule

He is coming, isn’t he?

He has finished his homework, hasn’t he?

(6) Reflexivization T-rule

I wash me (myself).

8. TG grammar accounts for the mental process of our speaking.

Ⅶ.Systematic-functional grammar

1. Background and the goal of systemic-functional grammar

?M. A. K. Halliday

(1) Language is a system of meaning potential and a network of meaning

as choices.

(2) Meaning determines form, not vice versa. Meaning is realized through

forms.

(3) The goal of systemic-functional grammar is to see how function and

meaning are realized through forms.

(4) The three meta-functions of language

A. Ideational function

B. Interpersonal function

C. Textual function

2. The transitivity system of language

(1) Elements

?Process

?Participants

?Circumstances

(2) Categorization of reality

A. Doing – material process

?Processes involving physical actions: walking, running,

throwing, kicking, wrapping, etc.

?Actor, goal and circumstance

B. Being – relational process

?Processes representing a relation being set up between two

separate entities.

?Be (identifying), have (attributive)

?Carrier/possessor and attribute/possessed

C. Sensing – mental process

?Processes of sensing, including feeling, thinking, perceiving,

imagining, wanting, liking, etc.

?Senser and phenomenon

D. Less central types of linguistic process

?Verbal processes – saying something

Sayer and receiver

?Behavioural processes – active conscious processes

Behaver and range

?Existential processes – existence of an entity

Existent

3. Mood and modality

(1) Mood expresses the speaker’s attitude and serves for interpersonal function.

It is a syntactic constituent made up of the subject and the finite.

(2) Modality is the degree of certainty or frequency expressed by the

grammatical forms of finite. It can be categorized by modalization and

modulation.

4. Theme and rheme

(1) Theme is the given information, while rheme is the new information.

(2) Examples:

?John | is my friend.

?He | should have replied to my letter.

Chapter 6 Semantics

Ⅰ.What is semantics?

1. Semantics is defined as the study of meaning. However, it is not the only

linguistic discipline that studies meaning.

2. Semantics answers the question “what does this sentence mean”. In other words,

it is the analysis of conventional meanings in words and sentences out of context.

Ⅱ.Reference and sense

1. Linguistic expressions stand in a relation to the world. There are two aspects of meaning.

2. Reference is the relation by which a word picks out or identifies an entity in the

world. But the referential theory fails to account for certain kinds of linguistic expression.

(1) Some words are meaningful, but they identify no entities in the real world,

such as the words dragon, phoenix, unicorn, and mermaid.

(2) It is not possible for some words to find referent in the world, such as the

words but, and, of, however, the, etc.

(3) Speakers of English understand the meaning of a round triangle although

there is no such graph.

3. Sense is the relation by which words stand in human mind. It is mental

representation, the association with something in the speaker’s or hearer’s mind.

The study of meaning from the perspective of sense is called the representational approach.

Ⅲ.Classification of lexical meanings

1. Referential meaning (denotative meaning) – central meaning of words, stable, universal

2. Associative meaning – meaning that hinges on referential meaning, less stable, more culture-specific

(1) Connotative meaning –the communicative value an expression has by

virtue of what it refers to, embraces the properties of the referent,

peripheral

(2) Social meaning (stylistic meaning) –what is conveyed about the social

circumstances of the use of a linguistic expression

(3) Affective meaning – what is communicated of the feeling or attitude of the

speaker/writer towards what is referred to

(4) Reflected meaning –what is communicated through association with

another sense of the same expression

?Taboos

(5) Collocative meaning – the associated meaning a word acquires in line with

the meaning of words which tend to co-occur with it

Ⅳ.Lexical sense relations

1. Synonymy

(1) Synonyms are words which have different forms but similar meanings.

?Dialectal synonyms –lift/elevator, flat/apartment

?Synonyms of different styles –gentleman/guy

?Synonyms of different registers –salt/sodium chloride

?Synonyms differing in affective meaning –attract/seduce

?Synonyms differing in collocation –beautiful/handsome,

able/capable

(2) Synonyms are frequently used in speaking and writing as a cohesive

device. In order to avoid repetition the writer/speaker needs to use a

synonym to replace a word in the previous co-text when he/she wants to

continue to address that idea. The synonyms together function to create

cohesion of the text.

2. Antonymy

(1) Antonyms are words which are opposite in meaning.

?Gradable antonyms – pairs of words opposite to each other, but the

positive of one word does not necessarily imply the negative of the

other. For example, the words hot and cold are a pair of antonyms,

but not hot does not necessarily mean cold, maybe warm, mild or

cool. Therefore, this pair of antonyms is a pair of gradable antonyms.

?Complementary antonyms –words opposite to each other and the

positive of one implies the negative of the other: alive/dead

?Reversal (relational) antonyms – words that denote the same relation

or process from one or the other direction: push/pull, up/down,

teacher/student

(2) Antonymy is frequently utilized as a rhetorical resource in language use.

Oxymoron and antithesis based on antonymy. Gradable antonyms may

give rise to fuzziness.

3. Homonymy

(1) Homonyms are words which have the same form, but different meanings.

?Homographs – words which are identical in spelling, but different in

meaning and pronunciation: tear [ ] v. /tear [ ] n.

?Homophones –words which are identical in pronunciation, but

different in spelling and meaning: see/sea

?Full homonyms –words which are identical in spelling and

pronunciation, but different in meaning: bear (v.to give birth to a

baby/to stand)/bear (n. a kind of animal)

(2) Rhetorically, homonyms are often used as puns.

4. Polysemy

◆ A polyseme is a word which has several related senses.

◆Polysemy is based on the intuition of native speakers as well as the

etymology or history of words.

5. Hyponymy

◆Hyponymy is a relation of inclusion.

◆Tiger, lion, elephant and dog are hyponyms of the word animal. Words

like animal are called superordinates.

◆This kind of vertical semantic relation links words in a hierarchical

Ⅴ.Componential analysis

1. Componential analysis is the approach that analyze word meaning by

decomposing it into its atomic features. It shows the semantic features of a word.

2. Examples:

?Man: +HUMAN +MALE +ADULT

?Boy: +HUMAN +MALE –ADULT

?Father: +HUMAN +MALE +ADULT →PARENT

?Daughter: +HUMAN –MALE 0ADULT ←PARENT

Ⅵ.Words and concepts

1. Categorization

(1) Categorization refers to the process by which people use language to

classify the world around and inside them.

(2) It is fundamental to human cognition.

(3) In the past two decades cognitive psychologists and cognitive linguistics

have gained new insights into the nature of categories.

2. Prototypes

A prototype is a set that has typical, central features. Others are peripheral

features, which are not typical but related.

3. Hierarchies

Conceptual network

Ⅶ.Sentencial sense relations – semantic relations of sentences

1. Sentences may be related in sense. I will illustrate sense relations within and between sentences.

?Tautology: The bachelor is unmarried.

?Contradiction: The bachelor is married.

?Inconsistency: John is single. /John is married.

?Synonymousness: John broke the glass. /The glass was broken by John.

?Entailment: The meeting was chaired by a spinster. /The meeting was

chaired by a woman.

?Presupposition: Sam has returned the book. /Sam borrowed the book.

2. These semantic relations are found within or between meaningful sentences.

There are sentences which sound grammatical but meaningless. These sentences are said to be semantically anomalous. For example:

?Colourless green ideas sleep furiously.

?The pregnant bachelor killed some phonemes.

Ⅷ.Metaphors

1. From rhetorical device to cognitive device

(1) The classical view sees metaphor as a kind of decorative in addition to

ordinary language, a rhetorical device that makes language use colourful.

(2) Another view of metaphor, which has become more influential in the past

two decades, holds that metaphors are a cognitive device. Metaphor is an

essential element in our categorization of the world and our thinking

(3) Cognitive linguistics has shown that metaphor is not an unusual or deviant

way of using language. The use of metaphor is not confined to literature,

rhetoric and art. It is actually ubiquitous in everyday communication.

2. The components of metaphors

(1) Target domain – tenor

(2) Source domain – vehicle

3. Features of metaphors

(1) Metaphors are systematic.

(2) Metaphors can create similarities between the two domains involved.

(3) Metaphors are also characterized by imaginative rationality.

Chapter 7 Pragmatics

Ⅰ.What is pragmatics?

1. Pragmatics can be defined as the analysis of meaning in context.

2. Pragmatic analysis of meaning is first and foremost concerned with the study of

what is communicated by a speaker/writer and interpreted by a listener/reader.

3. Analysis of intentional meaning necessarily involves the interpretation of what

people do through language in a particular context.

4. Intended meaning may or may not be explicitly expressed. Pragmatic analysis

also explores how listeners/readers make inferences about what is communicated.

Ⅱ.What are the differences between the two linguistic studies of meaning –semantics and pragmatics?

1. Semantics studies literal, structural or lexical meaning, while pragmatics

studies non-literal, implicit, intended meaning, or speaker meaning.

2. Semantics is context independent, decontextualized, while pragmatics is

context dependent, contextualized.

3. Semantics deals with what is said, while pragmatics deals with what is

implicated or inferred.

Ⅲ.Deixis and reference

1. Deixis is a word originally from Greek. It means pointing via language. An

expression used by a speaker/writer to identify something is called deictic expression.

2. Out of context, we cannot understand sentences containing deictic expressions,

because we do not know what these expressions refer to respectively.

3. According to referential content, deixis can be put into person deixis, place

deixis, time deixis and discourse deixis.

(1) Person deixis: I, we, you, me, he, etc.

(2) Place deixis: here, there, above, over, this, that...

Proximal and distal terms

Proximal terms are used when something is close to the speaker,

while distal terms when something is away from the speaker.

(3) Time deixis: next..., by..., before..., etc.

?Tenses: coding time

(4) Discourse deixis

A. Anaphoric: backward reference

B. Cataphoric: forward reference

4. The deictic centre – ego-centric centre

Ⅳ.Speech acts

1. In linguistic communication, people do not merely exchange information. They

actually do something through talking or writing in various circumstances.

Actions performed via speaking are called speech acts.

2. Performative sentences

?Implicit performatives –It’s cold here.

?Explicit performatives – Please close the door.

3. Types of speech acts

?Locutionary speech act – the action of making the sentence

?Illocutionary speech act – the intentions

?Perlocutionary speech act – the effects

?Of these dimensions, the most important is the illocutionary act.

4. In linguistic communication people respond to an illocutionary act of an

utterance, because it is the meaning intended by the speaker.

5. If a teacher says, “I have run out of chalk” in the proce ss of lecturing, the act of

saying is locutionary, the act of demanding for chalk is illocutionary, and the effect the utterance brings about –one of the students will go and get some chalk – is perlocutionary.

6. In English, illocutionary acts are also given specific labels, such as request,

warning, promise, invitation, compliment, complaint, apology, offer, refusal, etc.

these specific labels name various speech functions.

7. As functions may not correspond to forms, speech acts can be direct and

indirect.

(1) Searle: two ways of communication (performing acts)

?Direct speech act: Close the door.

?Indirect speech act: It’s cold in here.

(2) Why do people often speak indirectly in social communication?

?Different social variables: age, sex, social condition

?Politeness: communicative strategy

(3) Indirect speech acts are related to appropriateness.

?Indirect speech acts are made for politeness, not vice versa. To

make appropriate choices does not necessarily mean indirect

speech acts.

Ⅴ.Cooperation and implicature

1. Conversational Implicature

(1) In our daily life, speakers and listeners involved in conversation are

generally cooperating with each other. In other words, when people are

talking with each other, they must try to converse smoothly and

successfully. In accepting speakers’ presuppositions, listeners have to

assume that a speaker is not trying to mislead them. This sense of cooperation is simply one in which people having a conversation are not normally assumed to be trying to confuse, trick, or withhold relevant information from one another.

(2) However, in real communication, the intention of the speaker is often not

the literal meaning of what he or she says. The real intention implied in the words is called conversational implicature. For example:

[1]A: Can you tell me the time?

B: Well, the milkman has come.

(3) In this little conversation, A is asking B about the time, but B is not

answering directly. That indicates that B may also not no the accurate time, but through saying “the milkman has come”, he is in fact giving a rough time. The answer B gives is related to the literal meaning of the words, but is not merely that. That is often the case in communication.

The theory of conversational implicature is for the purpose of explaining how listeners infer the speakers’ intention through the words.

(4) The study of conversational implicature starts from Grice (1967), the

American philosopher. He thinks, in daily communication, people are observing a set of basic rules of cooperating with each other so as to communicate effectively through conversation. He calls this set of rules the cooperative principle (CP) elaborated in four sub-principles (maxims), that is the cooperative principle.

2. The Cooperative Principle

(1) Make your conversational contribution such as is required, at the stage at

which it occurs, by the accepted purpose or direction of the talk exchange in which you are engaged. The maxims are:

A. Quantity

?Make your contribution as informative as is required (for the

current purposes of the exchange).

?Do not make your contribution more informative than is

required.

B. Quality – Try to make your contribution one that is true.

?Do not say what you believe to be false.

?Do not say that for which you lack adequate evidence.

C. Relation – Be relevant.

D. Manner – Be perspicuous.

?Avoid obscurity of expression.

?Avoid ambiguity.

?Be brief (avoid unnecessary prolixity).

?Be orderly.

(2) We assume that people are normally going to provide an appropriate

amount of information, i.e. they are telling the relevant truth clearly. The cooperative principle given by Grice is an idealized case of communication.

(3) However, there are more cases that speakers are not fully adhering to the

principles. But the listener will assume that the speaker is observing the

principles “in a deeper degree”. For example:

[2] A: Where is Bill?

B: There is a yellow car outside Sue’s house.

(4) In [2], the speaker B seems to be violating the maxims of quantity and

relation, but we also assume that B is still observing the CP and think

about the relationship between A’s question and the “yellow car” in B’s

answer. If Bill has a yellow car, he may be in Sue’s house.

(5) If a speaker violate CP by the principle itself, there is no conversation at all,

so there cannot be implicature. Implicature can only be caused by

violating one or more maxims.

3. Four Cases of “Violating” the maxims given by Grice and Conversational Implicature

(1) The people in conversation may violate one or more maxims secretly. In

this way, he may mislead the listener.

?For this case, in the conversation [2] above, we assume that B is

observing the CP and Bill has a yellow car. But if B is intentionally

trying to mislead A to think that Bill is in Sue’s house, we will be

misled withou t knowing. In this case, if one “lies” in conversation,

there is no implicature in the conversation, only the misleading.

(2) He may declare that he is not observing the maxims or the CP.

?In this kind of situation, the speaker directly declares he is not

cooperating. He has made it clear that he does not want to go on

with the conversation, so there is no implicature either.

(3) He may fall into a dilemma. For example, for the purpose observing the

first principle of the maxim of quantity (make your contribution as

informative as is required), he may be violating the second principle of

the maxim of quality (do not say that for which you lack adequate

evidence).

A. For this case, Grice gave an example:

[3]A: Where does C live?

B: Somewhere in the south of France.

B. In [3], if B knows that A is going to visit C, his answer is violating the

maxim of quantity, because he is not giving enough information

about where C lives. But he has not declared that he will not

observe the maxims. So we can know that B knows if he gives more

information, he will violate the principle “do not say that for which

you lack adequate evidence”. In other words, he has fallen into a

“dilemma”. So we can infer that his implicature is that he does not

know the exact address of C. In this case, there is conversational

implicature.

(4) He may “flout” one or more maxims. In other words, he may be obviously not observing them.