第一章导论练习题

I. Decide whether each of the following statements is TRUE or FALSE:

1. Linguistics is the scientific study of language.

2. Competence and performance is distinguished by Saussure.

3. A synchronic linguistics is the study of a language through the course of its history.

4. Linguistics is generally defined as the scientific study of language.

5. Linguistics studies particular language, not languages in general.

6. A scientific study of language is based on what the linguist thinks.

7. In the study of linguistics, hypotheses formed should be based on

language facts and checked against the observed facts.

8. General linguistics is generally the study of language as a whole.

9. General linguistics, which relates itself to the research of other areas,

studies the basic concepts, theories, descriptions, models and methods applicable in any linguistic study.

10. Phonetics is different from phonology in that the latter studies the combinations of the sounds to convey meaning in communication. 11. Morphology studies how words can be formed to produce meaningful sentences.

12. The study of the ways in which morphemes can be combined to form words is called morphology.

13. Syntax is different from morphology in that the former not only

studies the morphemes, but also the combination of morphemes into words and words into sentences.

14. The study of meaning in language is known as semantics.

15. Both semantics and pragmatics study meanings.

16. Pragmatics is different from semantics in that pragmatics studies

meaning not in isolation, but in context.

17. Social changes can often bring about language changes.

18. Sociolinguistics is the study of language in relation to society.

19. The arbitrary nature of language makes it possible for language to have an unlimited source of expressions.

20. Synchronic linguistic is the study of a language through the course of

its history.

21. Modern linguistics is mostly prescriptive, but sometimes descriptive.

22. Modern linguistics is different from traditional grammar.

23. A diachronic study of language is the description of language at some

point in time.

24. Modern linguistics regards the written language as primary, not the

written language.

25. The distinction between competence and performance was proposed

by F. de Saussure.

26. Features that contrast words in meaning are called design features are said to be in complementary distribution.

27. Linguistic symbols are arbitrary.

28. By arbitrariness Saussure means that the forms of linguistic signs bear

some natural relationship to their meaning.

II. Fill in each of the following blanks with one word which begins with the letter given:

1. If a linguistic study describes and analyzes the language people actually use, it is said to be d_______.

2. Chomsky defines “competence”as the ideal user’s k__________ of the rules of his language.