LINGUIST 1A03 Study Guide - Fall 2018, Comprehensive Midterm Notes - Grammar, Vowel, Phonology
12 Oct 2018
School
Department
Course
Professor
LINGUIST 1A03
MIDTERM EXAM
STUDY GUIDE
Fall 2018
Tuesday 10th January 2017
Lecture 1
Linguistics
Introduction
• 10 quizzes every Wednesday.
• Wednesdays at noon to Thursdays at noon.
• 5 written assignments on Fridays.
• Clicker frequency is AA; this will help you get 4% off your exam.
• Participation in tutorial can also give you 3% off.
What is language?
• A method of communication used in the exchange of information.
• What is unique to human language?
• Maybe this is a different question.
• Is language unique to humans?
• We can all agree that animals communicate and exchange information.
• There are properties in human language that, make it different from animal
communication.
• Human language is a method of communication used in the exchange of information.
• Human language is symbolic, creative and systematic.
Animal means of communication
• Scent, light, electricity, color, posture, gesture, facial expressions and vocalizations.
• Scent, things like pheromones are identifiers.
• Animals and humans use this to communicate.
• Light can be a communication method.
• The most well know is the fire fly, it uses light patterns to signal identity sex and
location.
• Certain species of eels use electricity to communicate their presence.
• Color and color patterns are used to communicate like the octopus and the squid.
• Posture is a very common communication for dogs, when they are being playful the
wag.
• Gesture is a common form of communication.
• Facial expressions are used by humans and primates; they have similar facial
expressions.
• Vocalizations of course, several species use vocalization to communicate, birds, dolphins
and human and non-human primates.
• The method of communication that hums use in language composition is unique.
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Composition of signs
• Using something to stand for something else.
• Assign is composed of a token and a referent.
• A token stimulates a least one sense organ of the receiver.
• The referent is the concrete object or abstract feeling denoted by the token.
• In human speech, the token is often spoken.
• For example, the tree is the token, but the referent is what is being referred to when we
say tree.
• Not only does the image of the tree come to mind, but so do the characterizations of
the word.
Types of signs
• There are three categories.
• Iconic signs, always bare some kind of natural resemblance to their reference.
• The token resembles its referent.
• For instance, images and pictures are iconic signs.
• Indexical signs, they can be partial or representative samples of their reference.
• For example, animal track, it is left by the animal, it is a representative piece of the
animal but it is not the actual animal.
• The token is caused by the referent and is part of the referent so we can interpret it
appropriately.
• The token may be caused by the referent.
• Wincing in paint, the token is the wince, it was caused by the referent but it is caused by
the referent.
• It is a natural emotional response, it was not purposeful, this is not a deliberate form of
communication.
• It is tied to the referent but it is not deliberate communication.
• Symbolic signs bae no connection with the message that is being communicated.
• The colors red yellow or green in a stop sign bare no iconic natural relationship between
the token and referent.
• It was’t ause y aythig, it is syoli, it is delierate.
• When we are thinking about symbolic and indexical, we will think a lot about intention
to communicate.
• All three are used in human communication.
• In human language, iconic and symbolic are primarily used, indexical can be used a little.
• Humans use a lot of all three but primarily in language we use symbolic sings.
Linguistic competence
What is it that we know when we know a language?
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Document Summary
Is language unique to humans? communication: human language is a method of communication used in the exchange of information, human language is symbolic, creative and systematic. In human speech, the token is often spoken. say tree: not only does the image of the tree come to mind, but so do the characterizations of the word. It is a natural emotional response, it was not purposeful, this is not a deliberate form of communication. In human language, iconic and symbolic are primarily used, indexical can be used a little. Components of mental grammar: these five components are knowledge we have stored in memory about mental language. It highlights 3 attributes that makes our language unique. In terms of semantics, tree has no token or referent relationship: morphology s is assigned a meaning of plurality but there is no iconic relationship between iconic and plurality.
