LING 103 Introduction to English Linguistics 2017 LING

LING 103 Introduction to English Linguistics 2017

LING 103: INTRODUCTION TO ENGLISH LINGUISTICS Lecturer / tutor: Dr Keith Montgomery Office: Rm. 320 Arts 2; phone: ext. 82798 Email: k. montgomery@auckland. ac. nz Office hours: Monday 11 -12 Tuesday 11 -12 Lecture times Room Monday Thursday 303 -102 (Sci. Maths & Physics, Rm 102) 106 -100 (Biology Building, Rm 100) 13: 00 - 14: 00 10: 00 - 11: 00 Tutorial times Room Monday 16: 00 - 17: 00 104 -G 07 (Old Choral Hall, Room G 07) Tuesday 10: 00 - 11: 00 810 -332 (1 -11 Short Street, Room 332) Wednesday 16: 00 - 17: 00 421 W-501 (Architecture - West, Room 501) PRESCRIBED TEXT Kuiper, Koenraad and Scott Allan. An Introduction to English Language: Word, Sound and Sentence. 4 th Ed.

Tutorials will begin in WEEK 2 You are expected to take an active part in all tutorials Tutorial purpose is to refine lecture material by questioning discussion practical exercises

What is Language? Language is a complex communication system, unique to humans. The estimated 7000 natural languages on the planet are: a. endlessly creative b. recursive c. exhibit displacement We combine these traits (universals) in unique ways every day and create a range of expressions far beyond any other known system of animal communication Can or will animals speak? No They lack genetics physiology There just must be some way to mutate our FOX 2 P gene

Why study linguistics? You may simply wish to study language and its structure for its own sake. But consider the following quotation Language acquisition “is doubtless the greatest intellectual feat any one of us is ever required to perform. ” Leonard Bloomfield: Language (1933) We do not all perform this equally well. Amongst other things, your study of linguistics will give you tools to help others and to teach language – either first or second restore language – speech therapy etc. preserve language – record and preserve one of the many endangered languages on the planet – devise written forms for languages without them create language – artificial languages, computer / speech recognition software

Spoken vs. Written language Spoken language is: ‘Human communication using a range of sounds that speakers share, formed into units that are meaningful to the speakers, delivered in patterns that are accepted by the speakers’ The definition highlights four basic building blocks all spoken languages sounds = phonology formed = morphology in patterns = syntax meaningful = semantics

Spoken vs. Written language: ‘A written language is the representation of a spoken language by means of a commonly accepted writing system. Written language must be actively taught. No natural language is purely written’ Not all languages have a written form. Those that do find that their written language does not keep pace with their spoken form e. g. knight Middle English /knɪxt/ > Modern English /naɪt/ English spelling is littered with these relics of its older forms (the study of which falls under Historical Linguistics)

What does linguistics involve? Linguists investigate and record language. It is a truism that ALL languages constantly change overtime. Amongst other things, linguists look for: Innovations Long term changes How language is or was being used Linguistic research is descriptive. Description vs. Prescription The attempt to control how you use a language by ‘rules’ is a prescriptive approach to language. Typical prescriptive rules include; Do not use double negatives. Do not start a sentence with and, or, but. . . etc. The key difference? A prescriptivist seeks to prevent or correct your language ‘errors. ’ Linguists investigate what you are saying and how and perhaps why you are saying it. They do not prescribe what you should or should not say.

Speakers of all languages know a lot about their languages, usually without knowing that they know it! Exercise 1: With your neighbour, read the sentence below aloud and decide how many individual sounds are used to create it. Divide them into consonant and vowel sounds. The aardvark is a medium–sized, burrowing, nocturnal mammal native to Africa. Total number of sounds? _______ 55 – 59 depending on your accent (dialect) 19 11 In this total, there are different consonants and different vowels Surprise! In total, English speakers use up to 44 individual sounds (24 consonants and 20 vowels) which we try to represent with an alphabet of just 26 letters.

Morphology Exercise 2. How many individual meaningful items are used to create the sentence? The aardvark is a medium–sized, burrowing, nocturnal mammal native to Africa For most people, there about 15 meaningful items Meaningful Less obvious meanings other examples The = a definite thing aardvark is singular, third person, present tense it/he/she eats ants a = one of the type the lion is a cat etc. medium size + -ed = noun > adjective (pointed stick, left handed etc. ) burrow + -ing = verb > adjective (running water, sleeping cat etc. ) nocturne + al = noun > adjective (cranial, basal etc. ) mammal native to Africa

Deeper analysis The actual number of meaningful items present can also depend on the depth of your analysis, the knowledge you have of a borrowed word’s origins etc. For example, in the sentence above aardvark = aarde ‘earth’ + vark ‘pig’ (Afrikaans) native = nat- + -ive nat- = ‘birth / life’ (nation, natal, nature etc. ) Should I panic because I was unaware of some /any of this stuff today? In short, NO! The depth of analysis we undertook in the exercises above is specialised knowledge for most people. By the end of LING 103, you will have the knowledge of language structure to readily perform this kind of task.