第一章、语言与语言学

第一章、语言与语言学1. Which “language” is language?Each of the following sentences contains the word language. Read the sentences and identify whether the word, as used in the context, refers to language as activity or language as system. If it refers to language as system, does it refer to a system used by individual, a group of people, or all human beings?1) Compared with English, German is a difficult language.2) The professor keeps using obscure language.3) Aphasia means the loss of ability to use or to understand language.4) Do you know what that word really means? You should be more careful with your language.5) Psychologists use lots of big terms. Their language is difficult to understand.6) The article is full of archaic language.7) Your children are good at picking up a language.8) The boy was scolded by his mother for using bad language.2. Try to detect the fine differences of specific function of language in the following situation.1) Do you have a knife? 2) Ah, here you are.3) Close your book. 4) Road closed!5) What’s your idea? 6) Good heavens!7) If winter comes, can spring be far behind? 8) Long long ago, there was…3. A wolf is able to express subtle graduations of emotion by different positions of the ears, the lips, and the tail. There are eleven postures of the tail that express such emotion as self-confidence, confident threat, lack of tension, uncertain threat, depression, defensiveness, active submission, and complete submission. This system seems to be complex. Suppose there were a thousand different emotions that the wolf could express in this way. Would you then say a wolf had a language similar to man’s? If not, why not?第二章、语音学与音系学1. The principal means of such modification is the tongue; in fact, the word language derives from the Latin word lingua meaning “tongue”. Along with the tongue, our lips and teeth also make the wind from the lungs into speech sounds.2. Practice the pronunciation of the following phrases and point out all the instances of elision that you can find.Sandwich cupboard blackboard handsome waistcoat workshop wildcat shock-wave next stop a great deal a bad boy not tall a good job used to blood test big noise3. Hold your fingers lightly to your throats as you make a long, continuous [z] sound, as in[b zzzzzzz]. Do you feel the vibration? Move your fingers around until you do. That buzzing you feel is the process of voicing. Now try a long [s] sound as in [hissssssss]. You should notice that there is no buzzing. Keep your fingers in place in order to help you answer the following questions：1) Of the four words below, which begin with a voiced sound and which with a voiceless one?tin, bin, din, pin2) How about these four?fire, this, man, think3) Now try voiced sound and voiceless sounds at the end of a word. Which of the following have voicing?this, his, boss, lies4. The plural marker –s is pronounced /s/ sometimes but /z/ other times because of voice assimilation. Put the following nouns into two groups, one for those whose plural form will end in /s/ and the other in /z/：rock pencil plate cat tree knob dip dish workerWhat rules can you derive?5. Some students experience difficulty in learning to spell adjectives in –able or –ible. Given the following lists of words, what rule can you derive concerning the phonological functions of the –able or –ible spellings?applicable navigable invincible eligible despicable indefatigable forcible intangible(Hint：the letter c can be realized either as /k/ or as /s/. When it is followed by a suffix the spelling of the suffix may vary with such phonological realization.)Complete each of the following words by adding –able or –ible.defens- depress- admir- prov- produc- inflex- ostens- pay- divis- frang- plaus- wash- dispos- enclose- touch- mut- revis- patch- ador- read- bear- brib- chew- see-6. In terms of intonation, English is categorized as a stress-timed language. This means that in normal, uninterrupted speech, accented syllables occur at more or less regular intervals of time. In other words, the length of time between stressed syllables is similar however many other (relatively less accented) syllables occur in between. In contrast, Chinese is syllable-timed language, in which the timing of all syllables tends to be equal, regardless of their stress.7. In English, intonation may express either grammatical or attitudinal meaning. For one thing, it may modify the function of a sentence. Y ou said you put the sugar in the fridge is grammatically a declarative. But if the word fridge is pronounced with a falling tone instead of the rising-falling tone used in the statement, the sentence will function as the question：it has the same meaning as the interrogative Did you say you put the sugar in the fridge?Another grammatical function of intonation is to clarify the meaning of a grammatically ambiguous sentence. The following sentence may mean different depending on what intonation is used.︳︳∧She ︳didn’t marry him because she ︳loved him.︳︳(She did marry him, but did not love him. She might have married him for his money or because of family pressure.)︳︳∧She ︳didn’t ︳marry him ︳︳∧because she ︳loved him.︳︳(She loved him, but did not marry him. Perhaps she thought that she was not good enough for him or she had some other reason for which hit was better for him if they did not marry.) Besides these grammatical functions, intonation can also express attitudinal meaning. That is, it can serve to express the attitudes or emotions of the speaker towards the subject matter, the hearer and/or her or himself. By selecting the place of the tonic, the type of pitch movement andthe overall contour of the sentence, the speaker can communicate emphasis, doubt, surprise, determination, shock, sarcasm, incredulity and so on.8. Phonetics is the scientific study os speech sounds. It studies how speech sounds are articulated, transmitted, and received. It is a pure science and examines speech sounds in general; Phonology is the study of how speech sounds function in a language. It studies the way speech sounds are organized. It can be seen as the functional phonetics of a particular language. With some phonetic knowledge we can give a much more precise description to speech sounds; and with some phonological knowledge we can become more aware of the functions of sounds in different languages.The study of the speech sounds that occur in human languages is called phonetics. Human beings are capable of producing a wide range of sounds, but only a small set is used for speech. The task of phonetics is to identify what are speech sounds in a language, and then to study their characteristics. Phonology is the description of the systems and patterns of speech sounds in a language. It is, in fact, based on a theory of what every speaker of a language unconsciously knows about the sound patterns of that language.1. Take a careful observation on the elementary students’ or ten-year-old children’s memorization of complex English words like the following, trying to get the differences with college English major’s mode of memorizing them.sharpeners, legitimate, respectively, transcription, other-worldly, antidisestablishmentariansim 2. Which of the following forms are possible words of English?Mbood, coofp, sproke, worpz, frall, ktleem, fluke, bsarn3. With your acquired knowledge of vocabulary, please categorize the following eight morphemes into derivational and inflectional (there are four of each) and give an example of how each can be used.-ed (past) –ing –ate -ify -ize -ious –s (plural) –s (3rd person singular) Then with a partner, try to come up with as many more inflectional and derivational morphemes as you can, again give an example of how each is used. Which do there seem to be more of in English, inflectional morphemes or derivational ones?4. For those of us who’ve learned English through study, the word cupboard can be divided into cup and board, each a free morpheme. We may have been realized this when we first learned this word. For most native speakers, however, cupboard is a single morpheme; they have never thought about the idea that it comes from the notion of a board that can be used to store cups. This is reflected in the way the word is pronounced (a blending that does not retain the /p/ at the end of cup or original vowel sound of board).5. Morphemes do make up a word, but the meanings created by combinations of morphemes are not always predictable. Consider the following story：Bill was trying to tell his friends that his wife was physically unable to conceive and give birth to a child. He said：“The doctor said that she is impregnable.” But immediately she realized that the word “impregnable”means invulnerable or stubborn. “Oh,”he said, “I mean she is inconceivable…no…unbearable.”Children often notice the way in which morphemes have “illogical”meanings. One child named Katty asked her mother, “mommy, if a vegetarian is someone who eats vegetables, what does that make a humanitarian?”1. Place an asterisk next to any of these sentences that sound ungrammatical to you. Try an explanation what makes these sentences ungrammatical.1) The tutor told the students to study.2) The tutor suggested the students to study.3) The customer asked for a cold beer.4) The customer requested for a cold beer.5) He gave the Red Cross some money.6) He denoted the Red Cross some money.7) The pilot landed the jet.8) The jet landed.9) A journalist wrote the article.10) The article wrote very well.11) Julie is tired of her job.12) Julie is bored of her job.13) Myself bit John.14) I was surprised fro you to get married.15) Has the nurse slept the baby yet?2. Sentences below go against some rules of correct English. Do you know what they are?1) That’s the girl I gave my roller skates to.2) He wanted to simply borrow your car for an hour.3. Paraphrase each of the following sentences in two different ways.Example：Smoking grass can be nauseating.a. Putting grass in a pipe and smoking it can make you sick.b. Fumes from smoldering grass can make you sick.1) Terry loves his wife and so do I.2) They said she would go yesterday.3) The governor is a dirty street fighter.4) The design has big structures and circles.4. Try to detect the problems of the following sentences1) A student was upset when his classmates laughed at a sentence he had written：I passed by the hospital where my father died every day except the weekend.Why did his classmates laugh? How can you help him express his meaning more clearly? 2) A pharmacy put up a sign that read,We dispense with accuracy.What does this sign attract attention? How do you interpret it?(Hint：What is the verbal group here, dispense or dispense with?)3) Imagine that a hotel guest says, “Call me a taxi.” And the doorman says, “OK, you’re a taxi.”What can you tell about the relationship between these two people?4) What is the difference in structure between “She made him a cake.” And “She made him a student.”? The grammatical form of the two sentences looks the same, but is it?5) Consider the following sign：Wanted：A man to wash dishes and the two young waitresses.What unusual duties does this job for a man seem to include?5. Combine the following sentences：Aluminum is a metal. It is abundant. It has many uses.It comes from bauxite. Bauxite is an ore. Bauxite looks like clay.6. We can change “A guest turned down the radio.” into “The radio was turned down by a guest.”because it contains a transitive phrasal verb. However, can we do the same in the following sentence?A canoe floated down the river.Referent answer：5. These are in fact six single-clause sentences, each is with its X-word.1) A fourth-grade child combined the sentences in the following way：Aluminum is a metal and is abundant. It has many uses and it comes from bauxite. Bauxite is an ore and bauxite looks like clay.In this answer, the six sentences have been reduced to three, but there are still six X-words.2) An eighth-grade child produced the following version：Aluminum is an abundant metal, has many uses and comes from bauxite which is an ore that looks like clay.In this version, all of the ideas have been combined into a single sentence, but there are still five X-words, only one less than in the original.3) A student in the 12th-grade was able to do the job with only three X-words：Aluminum is an abundant metal with many uses. It comes from an ore called bauxite that looks like clay.4) And finally an educated adult who was an experienced writer managed to combine all of the ideas into a single complex sentence which had only one X-word.Aluminum, an abundant metal of many uses, comes from bauxite, a clay-like ore.6. No, we cannot. The reason this sentence cannot be made passive is that down is not part of its verbal group. Instead, down is acting as a true preposition; it is the head of a prepositional phrase, with the river as its object.第五章语义学1. To some Chinese students, a farmer is a peasant, and a peasant is a farmer. Look up these two words in a monolingual English dictionary and discuss the differences you find there.2. Have you ever heard the song “Love is blue”? It sounds romantic, but exactly what does blue mean? Chinese and English shares such color terns as red, blue, yellow, green, purple, orange, black, and white, but the connotations are not the same. Make a list of what each of them implies in Chinese; for instance, red may imply jealously or imply being politically active. Then, look up each of them in your dictionary and, in separate column, write down what each of them implies in English.Then answer the following questions. How do you translate 红眼病into English? What does red eyed mean? What do people mean when they say blue movie?3. In high school we learned that the word way means “road” or “method”. But the truth about this word is not actually that simple. Only by seeing it in multiple contexts can we come to see what way really “means”. With a partner, discuss the different meanings of the apparently simple word in each of the following sentences.Do you know your way to school?I’m on my way to lunch.Do it the right way.The chair is in my way.You’re heading the wrong way.That’s the way I like it.No way.4. There are certain Chinese English expressions we should definitely not use. For instance,I played with my friends over the weekend.I’m happy you look so fat and healthy.Now, we are intimate friends.Look up play, fat, and intimate in the dictionary and discuss why the phrases above are not generally appropriate in English.5. Explain the semantic ambiguity of the following sentences by providing two or more sentencesthat paraphrase the multiple meanings. Example：She can’t bear children can mean She can’t give birth to children or She can’t tolerate children.1) He waited by the bank.2) Is he really that kind?3) We bought her dog biscuits.4) He saw that gasoline can explore.5) Fifty soldiers shot three wild foxes.6) He saw her drawing pencils.6. Even advanced learners are sometimes unable to appreciate the shades of meaning involved in the use of X-words to express modality. With a partner, discuss the differences of meaning between the following sets of sentences.1) a) May I use your phone? a) Can I use your phone? c) Could I use your phone?2) a) You shouldn’t have to talk to him. b) You must not talk to him.3) a) I should go. b) I have to go. c) I’m supposed to go.c) I would rather go. e) I had better go7. Denotation and connotationA rough idea of differences of the two words can be summarized that denotation is a word’s primary, literal meaning and connotation refers to the more subtle flavor of associations that a word calls up.The denotation of a word, also known as a word’s “designative meaning” or “lexical meaning”, is whatever this word stands for outside itself, be that an object, a concept, or a state of affairs For instance, the word porch conjures up in the mind a picture of some kind of structure that is attached to the outside wall of a house, with a door opening to the inside and usually with a roof and enough room for some people to sit. This metal picture is the denotation of porch.What a word communicates to us includes all of the associations that have built up through our previous experience of what that word denotes in the real life. This part of meaning is called connotation or associative meaning. The connotation of a word is built out of the types of feelings that the word brings up, such as the attitude of language user and his or her emotional reaction to what the word stands for. Words of similar denotation may have very different connotations. For example, the words resolute, stubborn and pigheaded all have essentially the same denotation,referring to someone who sticks firmly to an idea and is unwilling to change his opinion. Resolute, however, has very positive connotations, implying that the person is brave and has integrity. S tubborn, on the other hand, is slightly negative, implying that someone is strong of character, but perhaps not adequately sensitive to the ideas or needs of others. And pigheaded, is simply an insult, comparing someone to a very undesirable animal (the connotation of the word pig include very dirty, fat, and greedy).8. Componential analysis is a method that looks at each word as a bundle of different features or components. The focus of componential analysis is on finding those features that are necessary and sufficient for a given item to be an example of a given words. For example, the word man could be seen as the sum of the features [+human], [+adult], [+male]. Anyone who has all of these features qualifies as a man.Componential analysis can be particularly useful in helping to understand the subtle differences in meaning between a group of related words. It can be particularly benefit when you are required to translate to or from English. The word heir in English, for instance, means a person who has received, or will receive, something of value after someone else died or dies. But in many other cultures, the use of the term clearly implies that the other person has died already (What about in Chinese?). Another strength of this method lies in its handling of figurative language. Figures of speech tend to be highly culture-bound. If an English speaker says the phrase “He is the dog”, they are probably commenting on the person’s greed or selfishness, as this is the feature associated with dogs. But if the same comparison is made in Chinese, the speaker probably means to call the person a snob or bootlicker since dogs are seen as submissive and servile.In spite of the strengths, componential analysis is not completely satisfactory for the analysis of meaning in all situations. The following are its three major limitations：1) It tends to focus exclusively on denotation and leave out the connotation. For example, shou t usually implies a degree of urgency, growl carries with it a sense of anger and disapproval, whisper one of secrecy; and babble is associated with babies. None of these important shades of meaning are captured by the componential analysis.2) Componential analysis focuses exclusively on typical cases. The word run, when distinguished from walk, jump and hop, may be defined as moving quickly on two feet, with no foot on the ground for an instant for each step. The analysis, however, leaves out the meaning ofrun as it is used in sentences such asThe crabs are running around. The snake ran across the lawn.Then, the cases are also detected in which there is no physical movement：He runs the office. He is running for president.The car is running. The road runs across the mountain.3) It is often difficult, if not impossible, to define exactly what the necessary and sufficient features for a given word are. In man y cases, people seem to know how words differ from each other without being able to definitely identify their components. For example, what are the defining features of more abstract words such as freedom, democracy, socialism and communism? Also an attempt to classify different plants will quickly fall into highly technical biological terminology.9. Predicational AnalysisPredicational analysis is based on grammatical meaning. That is, it looks at the syntagmatic axis and seeks to uncover the aspects of meaning that words get from their syntactic relationships with the words they are used alongside.For example, inThe cat was chasing the mouse.The word cat, in addition to the lexical meaning of the word “cat”, takes on the meaningful role of “doer” or “agent” because of its relationship to the verb chase. In other words, “cat” is the one who carries out the action of “chasing”. However, inThe dog was chasing the cat.The word cat, while retaining the same lexical meaning, now has a different grammatical meaning. Here, it is the “bearer” or “patient” because it receives (i.e., “bears”) the action of being chased. In other words, “cat” is the one to or against whom the action is directed. In both cases, we would classify chase as a two-place argument; that is, as a verb whose use must involve an agent and a patient.A clause is usually a predicational process. There are three major types of process：action processes, mental processes, and relational processes.1) Action processesAn action process may comprise the following elements：ACTION, DOER, BEARER,BENEFICIARY, RANGE, TIME/PLACE, INSTRUMENT/MEANS/MANNER.Each of these is a grammatical meaning that a word takes on when it is used in a sentence. For instance,Joe opened the door with another key five minutes ago.She ran the race superbly.George built his mother a house near the village.Jack bought a book.In analyzing these sentences, we have：Action：open, run, build, buy;Doer：Joe, the person she refers to, George, Jack;Bearer：door, house, bookInstrument/means/manner：key, superbly;Beneficiary：George’s mother, Mary;Range：race;Time/place：five minutes ago, near the village.2) Mental processesA mental process may comprise the following elements：EXPRIENCE, EXPRIENCER, PHENOMENON, TIME/PLACE.For instance,Sally saw the dawn.He also heard the barking.Jack likes that sculpture.The movie amused her.Jerry understands the question and knows the answer.In analyzing these sentences, we have：Experience：see, hear, like, amuse, understand, know;Experiencer：Sally, the person he refers to, Jack, the person her refers to, Jerry,;Phenomenon：dawn, barking, sculpture, movie, question, answer3) Relational processes.A relation process may comprise an ITEM and an ATTRIBUTE, often connected with thehelp of a RELATOR, usually verb “to be”. For instance,The movie is interesting.Joe is a soloist.The artist is George.The brother will be in London.Mary has three kids.Here, whatever precedes “to be” or “to have” is the ITEM, and whatever following it is the ATTRIBUTE.In English, a predicational process is usually a two-place predication. That is, it requires either a DOER and a BEARER, and EXPRIENCER and a PHONOMENON, or an ITEM and an ATTRIBUTE. It may be three-place predication is the action word is, for instance, give or put. Such asThe door opened. A boy walked in.English also has a few zero-place predications：It is raining. Here is the man.There are many people.A predicational process does not have to be realized in a sentence or clause. It can also occur within a nominal group. The following nominal groups can be seen as sharing the same predication：The fact that a man was wearing a wigA man who is wearing a wigA man wearing a wigA man with a wig onA bewigged man10. Linguistic Relativity /The Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis.The semantic structure of a given language --- the way in which it organizes and classifies reality---has a strong effect on how people who speak that language experience the world. That is, the language we speak determines how we see things. This idea is called the linguistic relativity or, because of the two scholars who argued strongly for it early in the 20th century, the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis.Referent answer：6. 1) All three sentences express polite requests, but sentence (a) and (b) are formal (with (a) being perhaps a bit more formal that (a)) while sentence c is informal. In an office where you do not know anyone well, sentence (a) or (b) would be appropriate. Among friends, only (c) would be appropriate; the others would put your friends at too much of a distance.2) While have to and must express almost exactly the same meaning in the positive, their negative meanings are quite different. Sentence a) expresses freedom from obligation; the person being addressed may choose whether to talk him or not.3) These sentences express a range of attitudes towards the idea of leaving.a) This means that there is some reason to go, but this reason is perhaps not very strong. In fact, the speaker may well stay.b) Some other party expects the speaker to go.c) This implies that there will be some negative consequences if the speaker does not go (had better always implies that there is some negative consequence, and it is often used with the phrase or else --- which introduces whatever will occur if the action is not done).d) The speaker is saying that he is required to go. In this situation, the meaning of have to is identical to must.e) The speaker is saying that she wants to go and she would prefer leaving to staying.第六章语用学1. The following exchanges all take place between an American teacher in her early fifties (A) anda Chinese college student (B). In each case, B uses English in a way that may confuse or even anger A. Edit these dialogues so that B expresses the intended meaning in a more appropriate way.1) B has just introduced himself to A after the first class of the fall semester.A：Your English is excellent.B：No, no. My English is very poor. I still have a long way to go.2) A has been ill, but now is released from the hospital.A：I’m glad to be able to go home.B：I’m glad, too. You look so healthy, and you have put on a lot of weight.3) A is having a dinner in B’s home.A：That was a lovely dinner. But now I’m full.B：oh, don’t be so polite. There’s indeed little food, but you should eat more. Eat more. 4) A is about to get on her bicycle. .A：See, I can ride my bike as well as a Chinese..B：Be careful. An old woman like you should not take any risks.5) A and B are riding on a bus.A：Hey, B, there’s a seat for you.B：Oh, no. you’d better take it because you are old.6) A and B are complaining about Karaoke.A：I can’t stand karaoke.B：Yes, I can’t too. I don’t know why so many people like it.7) B is sitting in A’s apartment when A wants to go out for a while.A：do you mind if I leave you alone for a few minutes?B：Yes, of course.2. Someone stands between you and the TV set you were watching, so you decide to say one of the following. Identify the delicate distinction of these expressions (direct or indirect?).1) Move!2) You’re in my way.3) Could you sit down?4) I can’t see anything.5) Please get out of the way.3. What exactly are the aspects of the context that have the influence on language use?Linguists have identified three key aspects of context,1) Field. It refers to the topic being discussed. It can be thought of as the “what” of a piece of discourse.2) Tenor. It relates to “who” or the interpersonal relationship between the two or more people involved in a discourse.3) Mode. It refers to the type of medium that the discourse is being communicated through. These include speaking in person, speaking over the phone, writing and so on.For example, Dick Jameson calls to invite you for a job interview. The field is an invitation for a job interview. The tenor is somewhat formal, between two people who do not know each other but may be starting a business relationship. The mode is talk by phone.。