胡壮麟第四版语言学教程第一章大题总结

Chapter1 Invitation to Linguistics1.Why study language?2.What is language? Explain it in details.3.What makes language unique to human beings?4.What are the design features of language? List out at least three of them.5.In what sense we say linguistic is a science?6.Explain the different levels of the arbitrariness.7.What is the function of language?8.Do you understand the distinction between the langue and paroleintroduced by Saussure?9.Descriptive vs. Prescriptive10.Synchronic vs. Diachronicpetence vs. Performance1.Why study language?First, language is such an integral part of our life and humanity that too muchabout it has been taken for granted. For some people, language may not even be considered a worthy job for academic study. They take it as a tool for access to other fields of knowledge rather than as a subject in and of itself. However, it is indeed necessary to reconsider how much we really the nature of language and its role in our life. And you may be surprised to realize that some of our most damaging racial, ethnic, and socio-economic prejudices are based on our linguistic ignorance and wrong ideas about language.Second, for a student learning language, some knowledge of language is of both interest and important. To know the general properties of language can help the student have an overview of its. No necessary question to ask for human language, they can understand the details of its different features thereof.Third, let us mention the broader educational concerns. We can note that language plans a central role in our lives as individuals and social beings. If we are not fully aware of the nature and mechanism of our language, we will be ignorant of what constitutes our essential humanity. The understanding of language should not be confined to linguistics, as language is a vital human resource that of us share.2.What is language? Explain it in details.Language is a means of verbal communication. It is a system of arbitrary vocal symbols used for human nguage is a system of arbitrary vocal symbols used for human communication.This definition has captured the main features of language, i.e. systematic, arbitrary, vocal, symbolic, human-specific.It is system, since linguistic elements are arranged systematically, rather than randomly. Arbitrary, in the sense(从某种意义上说) that there is usually no intrinsic connection between a word and the object it refers to. This explains and explained by the fact that different language have different “books”: “book”in English, 书in Chinese, “check”in Korean.It is symbolic,because words are associated with objects, actions, ideas etc. Namely, people use the sounds or vocal forms to symbolize what they wish to refer to.It is vocal, because sound or speech is the primary medium for all human language, developed or “new”.The term” human” in the definition is meant to specify that language is human specific.6.Explain the different levels of the arbitrarinessArbitrarinessis the core feature of language. Saussure holds the idea that the forms of linguistics signs bear no natural relationship to their meaning.There seems to be different levels of arbitrariness:1)Arbitrary relationship between the sound of a morpheme and its means. You may object to this when you think of words with different degrees of onomatopoeia, namely, words that sound like the sounds they describe. e. g. in Chinese 叮咚,轰隆,叽里咕噜. These linguisticforms seem to have a natural basis. But in English, totally different words are used to be describe the sound. For example, the dog barks bowwow in English but汪汪in Chinese. But there are some misunderstandings about the onomatopoeia effect. As a matter of fact, arbitrariness and onomatopoeia effect may work at the same time.2)Arbitrariness at the syntactic levelBy syntax we refer to the ways that sentences areconstructedaccording to the grammar of arrangement. As we know, the order of elements in a sentence follows certain rules, and there is a certain degree of correspondence between the sequence clauses and the rule happenings. In other words, syntax is less arbitrary than words, especially in so far as in this kind of order is concerned. Compared:a)He came in and set down.b)He set down and came in.c)He set down after he came in.Sentence (a) means the man came in first and then set down, but (b) means the opposite perhaps he got into his wheelchair and propelled(推进去) himself into the room. In (c), with the word “after” help, we can reverse the order of the clauses.3)Arbitrariness and conventionIn fact, the link between a linguistic sign and its meaning is a matter of convention. Here we have to look at the other side of arbitrariness, namely, conventionality. Arbitrariness of language makes it potentially creative, and conventionality of language makes learning a language laborious. For learners of foreign language, it is conventionality of language that is more worth noticing than its arbitrariness. That may be why when we are burying ourselves memorizing idioms, we feel nothing of the arbitrariness of the language but are somewhat tortured (折磨) by its conventionality.8-12important distinctions in linguistics8.Descriptive vs. prescriptiveTo say that linguistics is a descriptive science is to say thatthe linguist tries to discover and record the rules to whichthe members of a language-community actually conform and does not seek to impose upon them other rules, or norms, of correctness.Prescriptive linguistics aims to lay down rules forthe correct use of language and settle the disputes over usage once andfor all.For example, “Don’t say X.”is a prescriptive command; “People don’t say X.”is a descriptive statement. The distinction lies in prescribing how things ought to be and describing how things are. In the 18th century, all the main European languages were studied prescriptively. However, modern linguistics is mostly descriptive becausethe nature of linguistics as a science determines its preoccupation with description instead of prescription.9.Synchronic vs. diachronicA synchronic study takes a fixed instant (usually at present) as its point of observation. Saussure’s diachronic description is the study of a language through the course of its history.E.g. a study ofthe features oftheEnglish used in Shakespeare’s time would be synchronic, and a study ofthe changes English has undergone since then would be a diachronic study. In modern linguistics, synchronic study seems to enjoy priority over diachronic study. The reason is thatunlessthe various state of a language is successfully studied it would be difficult to describe the changes that have taken place in its historical development.ngue & paroleSaussure distinguished the linguistic competence ofthe speaker andthe actual phenomena or data of linguistics as langue and parole. Langue is relative stable and systematic, parole is subject to personal and situational constraints; langue is not spoken by an individual, parole is always a naturally occurring event. What a linguist should do, according to Saussure, is to draw rules from a mass ofconfused facts, i.e. to discover theregularities governing all instances of parole and make themthe subject of linguistics.petence and performanceAccording to Chomsky, a language user’s underlying knowledge about the system of rules is called the linguistic competence, andthe actual use of language in concrete situations is called performance. Competence enables a speaker to produce and understand and indefinite number of sentences and to recognize grammatical mistakes and ambiguities.A speaker’s competence is stable while his performance is often influenced by psychologicaland social factors. So a speaker’s performance does not always match his supposed competence. Chomskybelievesthat linguists ought to study competence, rather than performance. Chomsky’s competence-performance distinction is not exactly the same as, though similar to, Saussure’s langue-parole distinction. Langue is a social product and a set of conventions of a community, while competence is deemed as a property of mind of each individual. Saussure looks at language more from a sociological or sociolinguistic point of view than Chomsky since the latter deals with his issues psychologically or psycholinguistically.12.Etic vs. emicBeing etic means researchers’ making far too many, as well as behaviorally and inconsequential, differentiations, just as often the case with phonetics vs. phonemics analysis in linguistics proper.An emic set of speech acts and events must be one that is validated as meaningful via final resource to the native members of a speech community rather than via appeal to the investigator’s ingenuity or intuition alone.Following the suffix formations of (phon)eticsvs (phon)emics, these terms were introduced into the social sciences by Kenneth Pike (1967) to denote the distinction betweenthe material and functional study of language: phonetics studies the acoustically measurable andarticulatorily definable immediate sound utterances, whereas phonemics analyzes the specific selection each language makes from that universal catalogue from a functional aspect.13.Traditional grammar vs. modern linguistics14.What are the differences between traditional grammar and modernlinguistics? Illustrate with your own understanding.As we all know, linguistic is concerned with observing facts about language, setting up hypotheses, testing their validity and accepting or rejecting them accordingly. To avoid biases of the kinds mentioned above, modern linguists differ from traditional grammarians in adopting empirical rather than speculative or intuitive approaches in their study. Here are some differences I can find according the text books and my understanding.The first difference: modern linguistics is descriptive rather than prescriptive. That is linguists try to make statements which are testable, and take language as it is rather than say how it should be.The second difference: modern linguistics regards spoken rather than written language as primary. Traditional grammar tends to emphasize the importance of written language and the writings.The third difference: modern linguistics does not force languages into a Latin-based framework. In the past, Latin was considered the language that provided a universal grammar for all languages.Here is a form I found from the internet and it can show the differences betweenAt last, we should know when criticizing traditional grammar for being unscientific, modern linguistics do not deny altogether the contributions of traditional grammar to the development of modern linguistics. A balance view on traditional grammar is needed in order to track down the continuity of Western linguistic theories from the earliest times to the present day.15.Illustrate the difference between langue and parole with examples you canfind.F. De Saussure refers “langue” to the abstract linguistic system shar ed by all the members of a speech community and refers “parole” to the actual or actualized language, or the realization of langue.Langue is abstract while parole is concrete. In fact, langue is not spoken by any individual; parole is always a really happening event. Langue is systematic; on the contrary, parole is a pile of complicated speech. Langue exists in our brain, not the words we say. Parole is the words we human beings use to communicate with each other. In a word, langue is the totality of a language or the abstract language system shared by all the members of a speech of a speech community, while parole is the realization of langue in actual use, that is, the concrete act of speaking at a particular time and in a specific situation.Example1: wh en we Chinese says “do you have dinner?” to an American. The sentence uttered by the Chinese is parole, and how the American understands the sentence is langue.Example2: when Jack said I love you to Rose in the street, the sentences itself is the parole. And how Rose understands this sentence is all about the langue.To sum up, langue is our potential ability to speak while parole is the actual use of language in concrete situation. Langue is social, but parole is individual.End of Chapter 1。