ACS 106 Study Guide - Quiz Guide: Front Vowel, Vocal Tract, Voicelessness

• School: Ryerson University
• Department: Arts and Contemporary Studies
• Course: ACS 106
• Professor: Dana Osborne

Document Summary

Semantics: having to do with meaning of words (not necessarily the literal meaning) The function of language in social life. The ways that language and social factors intermingle to make new things. Eg. prey react to stimulus of the predator. Experiment: testing to see how capuchin monkeys react to predators. Create new reactions based on the stimulus - limited amount of reactions though. It is open ended and combinatorial, meaning that we can use the same systems of signs to make whole new meanings. This differs from forms of animal communication in which signs often have direct meaning and systems are not adaptable over time. Some scientists have argued that humans have an inborn language faculty that is woven into the structure of our brains, unique among animals, and is the product of evolutionary forces. Evidence of this is often cited in the fact that speakers of linguistically diverse languages have similar components structurally.