语言学问题汇总最终版

why do we say linguistics is a science? 1why do we say linguistics is a science? 2Is speech considered as the primary medium of language,why or why not? 3Langue&parole 4Competence&performance 5Synchronic&diachronic 6Prescriptive &descriptive A linguistic is descriptive if it describes and analyses facts observed.record what people do say or write that's "what is in language"or"what people actually say"; 7Linguistic potential It is similar to Sassure's langue and Chomsky's competence.Langue is a social property while linguistic potential is sth available for the speaker to select from. Competence is a form of "knowing" while potential is a set of possibility for doing. 8Competence&performance The distinction is one between what a person "knows"and what he "does". 9The linguistic potential&actual linguistic behaviour distinction The distinction is between what a person "can do"and what a person "does". 10Define the scope of phonetics description classification transcription 11How many parts of vocal organs can be divided into? Lung,vocal cords,resonating cavities 12What's the function of vocal cords? Obstruction 13How to describe consonants,vowels? 辅音：the state of vocal cords escaping of airstream the position of soft palate 元音：①the height of tongue:height of tongue rising,highest place of tongue. ②the opening of the mouth. ③lip-rounding ④the length of the second-tense ⑤long/short ⑥pure/glide ⑦oral/nasal 14How is the sound system organized? Phonology is the study of sound systems---the inventory of distinctive sounds that occur in a language and the patterns into which they fall. 15How is a phone different from a speech sound? Phonology and phonetics are both concerned with the study of speech sounds, but the two differ in perspectives. Phonetics, particularly articulatory phonetics, focuses on how speech sounds are produced, what phonetic features they have, and how to transcribe them. In phonetics, sound segments are assumed to be invariable; variations are overlooked.Phonology focuses on three fundamental questions. What sounds make up the list of sounds that can distinguish meaning in a particular language? What sounds vary in what ways in what context? What sounds can appear together in a sequence in a particular language? In short, phonology stresses the function of speech sounds in a language. 16How to find distinctive sound? Speech sounds, as we have seen, are different from each other in a number of ways, such as place of articulation, manner of articulation, voicing, nasality, tongue height, etc. Some of the differences are distinctive in that they serve to distinguish between words in a given language. In English, for example, the difference between /p/ and /b/,/i/ and /e/are distinctive. Substituting one for the other will change the meaning of a word: pin would become bin. Distinctive sounds of this kind are termed as Phonemes. 17Under what conditions,will two sounds be assigned to the same phoneme? A:free variation(different pronunciation)of the same word. B:complementary distribution. C:phonetic similarity If a sound difference does not cause a meaning difference in a language, then it is non-distinctive. For example, if the /p/ in the English word top is pronounced differently, and the substitution of , say, [p] for [ph], would not make a different word, though native speakers may find the pronunciation a bit strange. The non-distinctive sounds are members of the same phoneme, and are known as Allophones. 18Is the consonant/tƒ/classified into two phoneme,or only one? The term Pattern congruity has also been used in the sense that other things being equal, the more symmetrical a phonological system is, the better. In English, there is a pair of affricates/t/ and/d/. Why do we not treat them as combinations of single phonemes in the way /ts/ and /dz/ are treated? The reason is as follows: the sound /∫/ is used very frequently in English, we have words catch /k t∫/, cat /k t/, as well as cash / k ∫/; and chip / t∫ip/, tip /tip/, as well as ship /∫ip/. But the sound // has a limited occurrence. It only occurs in some particular contexts. It appears that the sound /d/ should be treated as a single phonme while / t∫/ could be treated as a combination of two phonemes. But if we did that, the pattern of English consonants would appear asymmetrical. p, t, k, f, θ , s, t∫ b, d, g, v, e, z, d On the grounds of pattern congruity, therefore, / t∫/ is better treated as a single phoneme too. 19What's the pattern congruity? 20Say something about function of approach to phonology. Archiphoneme;distinctive features Phonology focuses on three fundamental questions. What sounds make up the list of sounds that can distinguish meaning in a particular language? What sounds vary in what ways in what context? What sounds can appear together in a sequence in a particular language? In short, phonology stresses the function of speech sounds in a language. 21How do we determine word stress and sentence stress? 1) Word stress: First, the syntactic class of a word provides some clue to the position of stress. Second, the morphological make-up of a word affects its stress pattern. 2) Sentence stress: First, sentence stress depends on the relative importance of the word. Second, rhythmic considerations influence the placement of stress. Third, the syntactic structure of a sentence has a bearing on its stress pattern. Sentence stress differs from word stress in two ways. (1) monosyllabic words may take sentence stress, (2) polysyllabic words may have the stress on a different syllable from where it is in isolation or they may lose it completely. 22What's morphology?How many types can it be subdivided into?what are they? ①inflectional morphology ②derivational morphology(word-formation) Morphology is the branch of linguistics that studies internal structure of words and the rules by which words are formed. It can be subdivided into two types. They are inflectional morphology and derivational morphology. 23Besides number,person,and case,what other aspects should be included in inflection? finiteness and aspect Besides number, person and case, finiteness and aspect should also be included in inflection. 24How many types can word-formation be sub-classified into?What are they? Compositional type;derivational type Word-formation can be subdivided into two types. They are compositional type and derivational type. 25What are the relationships between the following terms: (1) Morpheme vs phoneme Phoneme is the smallest meaningful unit of sound, morpheme is the smallest meaningful unit in grammar. A single phoneme may represent a single morpheme; A single phoneme may stand foe multiple morpheme. (2)Morph, morphemes vs allomorph Morphemes are abstract units, morphs are discrete units. Morpheme is realized in speech by morph. An allomorph refers to a member of a set of morphs, which represent the same morphemes. For example: {would} ／ ／ ＼ ＼ morph morph morph morph →allomorph /wud/ /wəd/ /əd/ /d/ (3) Free morpheme vs bound morpheme Free morphemes refer to those that may occur alone, that is, those which may make up words by themselves. Bound morphemes refer to those that must appear with at least another morpheme. (4) Root vs stem Root is the base form of a word that cannot be further analyzed without destroying its meaning. Stem is any morpheme or combination of morphemes to which an inflectional affix can be added. A stem may be the same as a root, whereas a stem may contain a root and one, or more than one, derivational affix. 26How many types of affix,what are they? Prefix Suffix Infix foot---feet goose---geese Prefix—prefixes in English are all derivational, i.e. they are used to form new words. Suffix—both derivational and inflectional Infix—an affix which is inserted within a stem 27Describe the morphological rules concerned in the following pairs of examples? injustice --- imperfect &ten sense ---ten percent are phonological conditioning. Ox- --oxen & cow---cows are morphological conditioning Cooking –cookin &I’s pose- Is’uppose are stylistic conditioning 28What are the domains of syntax? ①rules governing sentence formation. ②interralationship between element(word,word group,and phrase) 29Say something about how the generative transformational is developed.Do you think it is universal or English---specific? 30What are the meta functions of language according to Halliday's systemic--functional grammar? ①ideational ②interpersonal ③textual function 31 What's called transitivity in systemic--functional grammar?p312huzhuangling The ideational function mainly consists of transitivity and voice. This function not only specifies the available options in meaning but also determines the nature of their structure relations. Transitivity is simply the grammar of the clause in its ideational aspect. It consists of six different processes: material process, behavioral process, mental process, verbal process, relational process and existential process. 32How many components do processes consists of,what are they? process itself participants in the process circumstance associative with the process 33How many process types,what are they?p312hu Material,mental,relational,verbal,behavioural,exirtential 34.How many sub-divisions can semantics be classified into,what are they? Semantics can be sub-classified into linguistic semantics and logic semantics. Linguistic semantics is the approach in which more attention is paid to the meaning of linguistic units themselves, words and sentences in particular. Logic semantics is the approach more concerned with the relationship between linguistic expressions and the phenomena in the world to which they refer, and the conditions under which such expressions can be said to be true or false. 35.Make comments on different views about meaning. Pay more attention to semantic triangle,stimulus reaction model. 1. The naming theory. This theory is proposed by Plato. According to this theory, the words used in a language are simply labels of the objects they stand for. So words are just names for things. But this view has some limitations. First, it seems applicable to nouns only, but verbs, adjectives, adverbs are definitely not labels of objects. Second, they are nouns which denote things that do not exists in the real word such as "dragon", and "ghost". 2. The conceptualism. This is best illustrated by the classic semantic triangle proposed by Ogden and Richards. In the diagram, the “symbol” or “form” refers to the linguistic elements (word, sentence, etc.), the “referent” refers to the object in the world of experience, and “thought” or “reference” refers to concept. Thus, the symbol a word signifies “things” by virtue of the “concept”, associated with the form of the word in the mind of the speaker of the language. The “concept” thus considered is meaning of the word. The limitation is that for what is precisely the link between the symbol and the concept remain unclarified. 3. Behaviorism. This theory is proposed by Bloomfield. He suggests that the meaning of a language form as the "situation in which the speaker utters it and the response it calls forth in the hearer. It is best illustrated by the stimulus reaction model. The meaning of the linguistic form is realized by the behaviour of the hearer when he receives the verbal stimulus. 4. Functionalism. Meaning can be interpreted from its use or function in social life. 36. How many kinds of meaning are there based on different interest of researchers or different aims of researches? 1. Traditional approach: it focuses on the lexical or structural meaning. It concentrate on words and sentences, their grammaticality rather than any other. 2.‚functional approach: it mainly deals with G•Leech’s 7 meanings. They are conceptual meaning, connotative meaning, social meaning, affective meaning, reflected meaning, collocative meaning and thematic meaning. 3.ƒpragmatic approach: it mainly deals with sentence or utterance meaning, it pays more attention to its use in social circumstances rather than any other. 37.As for sense relations, Do you think they are real synonyms?why or why not? They are not real synonyms. According to the way they differ, synonyms can be divided into the following groups: 1Dialectal synonyms.（synonyms used in different regional dialects). For example, autumn and fall, lift and elevator. They share the same meaning but used in in British English and American English respectively. 2Stylistic synonyms ( synonyms differing in style). Some words having the same meaning may differ in style. Some words tend to be more formal,others causal, and still others neutral in style. For example, start (causal), begin (neutral) and commence (formal). 3. Synonyms differs in emotive and evaluative meaning. Some words bearing the same meaning but express different emotions of the user. For instance, the two words " collaborator" and " accomplice" share the meaning of " a person who helps another", but " a collaborator" means one helps another in doing something good, while " an accomplice" means one helps another in a criminal act. 4. Collocational synonyms. Some synonyms differ in their collocation. For example, we can use '' accuse", "charge" and " rebuke" to say that someone has done something wrong or even criminal, but they are followed by different prepositions-- accuse...of, charge...with, rebuke...for. 38.Say sth about semantic analysis including compotential analysis and predication analysis. Componential analysis is a way by the structural semanticists to analyze word meaning. The approach is based upon the belief that the meaning of a word can be dissected into meaning components, called semantic features. Plus and minus signs are used to indicate whether a certain semantic feature is present or absent in the meaning of a word. For example, the word “man” is analyzed as comprising the features of +HUMAN, +ADULT, +ANIMATE, +MALE. One advantage of the Componential analysis is that by specifying the semantic features of certain words. It will be possible to show how these words are related in meaning, it provides an insight into the meaning of words and a way to study the relationships between words that related in meaning. Predication analysis is proposed by the British linguist G . Leech. In his framework of analysis, the basic unit is called predication, which is the abstraction of the meaning of a sentence, including statement, imperative and interrogative forms, a predication consists of argument and predicate. An argument is a logical participant in a predication, largely identical with the nominal elements in a sentence. A predicate is something said about an argument or it states the logic relation linking the arguments in a sentence, for example, the predicate of the sentence “Tom smokes” is said to consist of the argument “Tom” and the predicate “smoke”, and the predication can be written as Tom(smoke). In some sentences contain more than one argument, for example “Kids like apples”. Some sentences have none. We classify the predications into two-place predication, one-place predication and no-place predication. Although predicate and argument are the same unit in terms of the componential make-up of a sentence, they have different roles in the predication. The predicate can be regarded as the main elements, for it includes tense, modality, etc. and it may also be said to govern the argument for it determines the number and nature of the argument. 39.What does sociolinguistics mainly deal with?How many sub-categories is it divided into based on different angles? Sociolinguistics is the field that studies the relationship between language and society, between the uses of language and the social structures in which the users of language live. The scope of sociolinguistics includes linguistic situation, which covers the establishment of stable bilingualism or diglossia, the division of languages into identifiable dialects, language in communication, language attitude and its effect, language contact and language change, language planning and language standardization. The field of study is focused on variations in language that may be shown to be closely related to variations in society. Sociolinguistics is a field of study that assumes that human society is made up of many related patterns and behaviors, some of which are linguistic. 分类：If we want to know more about a given society or community by examining the linguistic behavior of its members, we are doing a sociolinguistic study of society. That is to say, we are doing sociolinguistics at a macro level of investigation. At this level of discussion things that we are interested in include bilingualism or multilingualism, language attitude, language choice, language maintenance and shift, language planning and standardization, vernacular language education, etc. On the other hand, if we want to know more about some linguistic variations in language use by turning to potential socio-cultural factors for a description and explanation, we are doing a sociolinguistic study of language. Consequently, we are more interested in examining micro linguistic phenomena such as structural variants, address forms, gender differences, discourse analysis, Pidgin and Creole languages, and other more language-related issues. 40Make comments on the claim:"language is a scientific system on the one hand ,social activities on the other?" If we want to know more about a given society or community by examining the linguistic behavior of its members, we are doing a sociolinguistic study of society. That is to say, we are doing sociolinguistics at a macro level of investigation. At this level of discussion things that we are interested in include bilingualism or multilingualism, language attitude, language choice, language maintenance and shift, language planning and standardization, vernacular language education, etc. On the other hand, if we want to know more about some linguistic variations in language use by turning to potential socio-cultural factors for a description and explanation, we are doing a sociolinguistic study of language. Consequently, we are more interested in examining micro linguistic phenomena such as structural variants, address forms, gender differences, discourse analysis, Pidgin and Creole languages, and other more language-related issues. 34What's the difference between standard language,national language and official language? A standard language (also standard dialect, standardized dialect) is a language variety used by a group of people in their public discourse.[1] Alternatively, varieties become standard by undergoing a process of standardization, during which it is organized for description in grammars and dictionaries and encoded in such reference works.[1] Typically, varieties that become standardized are the local dialects spoken in the centers of commerce and government, where a need arises for a variety that will serve more than local needs. A national language is a language (or language variant, i.e. dialect) which has some connection—de facto or de jure—with a people and perhaps by extension the territory they occupy. The term is used variously. A national language may for instance represent the national identity of a nation or country. National language may alternatively be a designation given to one or more languages spoken as first languages in the territory of a country. An official language is a language that is given a special legal status in a particular country, state, or other jurisdiction. Typically a nation's official language will be the one used in that nation's courts, parliament and administration.[1] However, official status can also be used to give a language (often indigenous) a legal status, even if that language is not widely spoken. For example, in New Zealand the Māori language has official status under the Māori Language Act 1987 even though it is spoken by less than fi