What is Linguistics?

Linguistics is the scientific study of language. Human language, understood as a systematic use of speech sounds, signs, and written symbols for communicating among people, is a very complicated system, which can be analyzed on different levels and from various points of view.

Branches of Linguistics

• Anthropological Linguistics: It studies language variation and usage in relation to culture.
• Applied Linguistics: It is concerned with the application of linguistic theories and their findings in solving various language problems, mostly in the teaching of a foreign language, studying language disorders, translation, lexicography, and stylistics.
• Comparative Linguistics: It studies different languages looking for similar characteristics.
• Computational Linguistics: It uses computer techniques and applies them to automatic translation and speech analysis.
• Contrastive Linguistics: It concentrates upon the differences between languages.
• Development Linguistics: It is concerned with the study of the acquisition of language by children, describing the stages and patterns of development and explaining the typical features and variations.
• Historical Linguistics: It analyses the development of language in time.
• Psycholinguistics: It is a branch of linguistics which studies the relationship between linguistic behavior and mental processes.
• Sociolinguistics: It studies the relationship between language and society, taking into consideration standard and non-standard forms of language, regional and social varieties (ethnicity, social status, sex, age, etc.)
• Theoretical Linguistics: It tries to determine universal principles for studying languages and to describe the general features of language.

Language

Features Common to All Languages 

• all languages have vowels and consonants; 
• all languages have words; 
• all languages can create new words when required and modify their meanings; 
• all languages can form questions; 
• in all languages, we can use hypothetical, unreal, and fictional utterances; 
• all languages have grammatical rules.

Approaches to Language

Descriptive

• Linguistics attempts to describe the grammar of the language that exists in the minds of its speakers.
• It describes a person's basic linguistics knowledge. It explains how it is possible to speak and understand and it summarizes what speakers know about the sounds, words, phrases, and sentences of their language.
• It involves observing the language and trying to discover the main rules.
• Descriptive rules allow different dialects of a language and even variations within a dialect.

Prescriptive

• Prescriptivists tell you someone’s idea of what is “good” or “bad”.
• Prescriptive rules make a value judgment about the correctness of certain utterances and generally try to enforce a single standard.
• They attempt to impose the rules for speaking and writing on people without much regard for what the majority of educated speakers of a language actually say and write.
• So-called prescriptive grammar usually focuses only on a few issues and leaves the rest of a language undescribed.

Arbitrariness

The relation between form and meaning in language can be either:

• Arbitrary:
• the meaning is not deducible from the form.
• the form is not deducible from the meaning.
• the connection between the form and meaning must be learned via memorization. Examples: traffic lights, warning siren.
• Nonarbitrary:
• the meaning is derivable from the form and vice versa. Examples: a “no-smoking” sign (with a crossed-out cigarette), a deer-crossing sign (with a silhouette of a deer).

There are two very limited and partial exceptions to the arbitrariness of language: 

• Onomatopoeia: words whose sound imitates either the sound they denote or a sound associated with something they denote. These words are not entirely arbitrary. 
• Sound symbolism: it refers to the very vague, elusive way in which certain sounds “feel” more appropriate for describing certain objects or meanings than do other sounds.

Principles Of Modern Linguistics

Structuralism

It is the analysis of language that describes linguistic elements in terms of structures. Ferdinand de Saussure is considered the father of structuralism, who formulated the main ideas of structuralism and principles of linguistic analysis. These principles are:

1. Linguistics is descriptive, not prescriptive: It is descriptive because it focuses on describing the language as it is used, not saying how it should be used.
2. Priority of the spoken language: The spoken language is more basic since it has great differences between the written language, such as grammar and vocabulary.
3. Synchronic and diachronic description of language: They are important because they both study language. Diachronic from its historical development, while Synchronic, in a single point of time.
4. All languages are equal: Each existing natural language is a highly developed system and its structure does not correlate with the stage of social development.
5. Paradigmatic and Syntagmatic relations of linguistic units: It says that Paradigmatic is when all other elements of the same level (semantic groups) can be used in the same context; while Syntagmatic is when elements of different semantic groups are used in a situation and can change the sense of context.

Functionalism

This refers to the main function of language, which is communication and this, in turn, helps the speaker to convey their feelings and attitudes. Besides, phonological, grammatical and semantic structures have their own functions and thus be carried out correctly.

Generativism

Generativism refers to the theory of language developed by Noam Chomsky, where he exposes the difference between linguistic competence and performance. Linguistic competence is the part that a speaker uses to make infinite sentences by knowing their native language system. While, performance is the linguistic competence and the non-linguistic factors of the speaker, that is, social conventions, emotional attitudes, etc.

Phonetics

Phonetics is a branch of linguistics which studies speech sounds. Since in English and some other languages there is a considerable discrepancy between spelling and sound, phonetic alphabets have been created in which one letter corresponds to one sound. The best-known and most widely used one is the International Phonetics Alphabet (IPA).

Phonetics Subfield

Consonant Sounds

A consonant sound is a speech sound that is produced by a complete or partial obstruction of the airstream in the vocal tract. The consonant sounds of English are classified according to:

• Manners of Articulation: it is how the airstream is obstructed. It can be: stop, fricatives, affricates, nasals, liquids, and glides.
• Places of Articulation: it is where the obstruction of the airstream occurs. The places are: 

• Bilabial: both lips are together.
• Labiodental: upper teeth and lower lip come together.
• Dental: the tip of the tong is between the upper and lower teeth.
• Alveolar: the tip of the tongue toward the alveolar ridge.
• Alveopalatal: the front part of the tongue making firm contact with the alveolar ridge and the hard palate.
• Palatal: the front part of the tongue to the hard palate.
• Velar: raise the back part of the tongue to the soft palate (velum).
• Glottal: it occurs when the glottis acquires a closed position.

• Voicing: it is the state of the vocal cords. If the vocal cords are together is Voiced, but if they are separated is Voiceless.

In the following table, you can see the consonants sounds according to their classification:

Vowel Sounds

A vowel sound is a little or no modification of the airstream coming from the lungs. The vowel sounds of English are classified according to:

1. Backness or Frontness: it is the part of the tongue (front, central, and back).
2. Highness: it is the position of the tongue in the mouth (high, mid, and low).
3. Tenseness: it indicates if the sound of a vowel is short or long (lax and tense respectively).
4. Roundness: it is the form of the mouth (round or unround).

The vowel sounds are also classified into Simple vowels (monophthongs) and diphthongs.

Phonology

Phonology is the branch of linguistics that studies the patterning of speech sounds in language. To a large extent, it is related to Phonetics but has a different focus. Whereas Phonetics concentrates on the physical articulatory and auditory aspects of speech sounds, Phonology investigates sound types that subsume all the variations of speech sounds which we actually produce while speaking. For example, it gives explanations why [p] is aspirated in the words like put, pity, and rump; but is non-aspirated in spite, splash, and spirit.

In Phonology, the central term is phoneme, which is defined as the smallest meaning distinguishing sound unit. In other words, phonemes can distinguish words with different meanings. For example, /p/ and /b/ are two separate phonemes because they can distinguish words such as pit and bit; pull and bull, etc.  

Another important word in Phonology is allophone which is any of the speech sounds that represent a single phoneme, such as the aspirated k in kit and the unaspirated k in skit, which are allophones of the phoneme /k/. 

Also, we have the concept of distinctive features, which are the distinguishing characteristics of phonemes. For instance, comparing the same phonemes /p/ and /b/, we may notice that they are very similar in their articulation, only /b/ is voiced and /p/ is voiceless. If the feature is present in a phoneme, it is marked with a plus sign and if it is absent, it is marked with a minus sign. Thus /b/ is presented as [+VOICE] and /p/ as [-VOICE]. 


One more field of study in phonology is the possible patterning of sounds and the constraints on the sequence, ordering or position of phonemes in various languages. These possible sequential arrangements of phonological units in a language are called phonotactics. In English, for example, /spm-/ or /nb-/ are not possible initial phonotactic sequences. 

On the other hand, it is important to set the differences between phonetic transcription and phonological transcription. 

-Phonetic transcription is given in square brackets [ ]. It is used in allophones.

-Phonological transcription is given in slashes / /. It is used in phonemes.

Morphology

Morphology is the branch of linguistics that studies the structure of words, how they are formed, and their relationship to other words in the same language. 

It is generally divided into:

- Inflectional morphology which studies inflections of a language.

- Derivational morphology which studies the types of word-formation. 

At the basic level, words are made of "morphemes." It is defined as a minimal unit of meaning or grammatical function. For example, the word unlocked in the sentence “He unlocked the door” has three morphemes: 

• un- is used to show an opposite; 
• lock  means to fasten with a key, and 
• –ed indicates past tense. 

Types Of Morphemes

Free Morphemes: Some morphemes can be used as single words (e.g. book, run, nice, one)

Bound Morphemes: Others cannot stand alone and have to be attached to another morpheme (e. g. un-, -ment, -ed, -s).

Example: 

Word: peaceful

Free morpheme: peace

Bound morpheme: -ful

Types Of Words

Simple Words: They are words that consist only of one morpheme.

Example: Success, Kind.

Complex Words: They are words consisting of two or more morphemes.

Example: Successful (success + -ful), Unkindness (un- + kind + -ness).

Complex words have a root and one or more affixes (prefixes or suffixes).
Root: is a word or word part that can form the basis of new words through the addition of affixes.
Affix: is one or more than one syllable or letter added at the beginning or at the end of a root word, to change its meaning. It can be:
-Prefix: it is a group of letters placed before the root of a word.
-Suffix: it is a group of letters placed after the root of a word.
Another important concept is base or stem, which is the form that an affix is added. Example: in the word assertiveness, assert is the root and the base for –ive and assertive is the base for –ness. 

In the next table, you can see somes of the most common affixes.

Ways To Form New Words

• Compounding: combination of two or more roots to form a new word. Examples: raincoat, brother-in-law, bathrooms, etc.
• Conversion: it is when the function of a word changes. Examples: walk (Verb) - walk (Noun).
• Clipping: new words are formed by shortening other words by eliminating the initial part, the last part, or both parts of the words. Examples: phone from telephone, plane from airplane, exam from examination.
• Blending: it is when we say in pronunciation two words into one. Example: I get it (the words get and it are pronounced together as if they were a single word).
• Backformation:  new words are formed by the deletion of a supposed affix from an already existing word. For example, the nouns such as revision, creation, formation, transmission, to name a few, which are derivatives from the verbs revise, create, form, transmit.
• Initialism (abbreviations and acronyms):
• An acronym is formed from the initial letters of some longer name and is pronounced differently than the expanded form. Examples of acronyms as the term is commonly used: FBI, which stands for Federal Bureau of Investigation, but is pronounced ef-bee-I
• An abbreviation is typically a shortened form of words used to represent the whole. is pronounced the same. Examples: Mr., which stands for mister and is pronounced mister.
• Borrowings: words that are borrowed from other languages. Examples:  the noun chef- “a skilled cook, especially the main cook in a restaurant” - has been borrowed from French.
• Coinages: new words are created outright, either deliberately or accidentally, to fit some purpose. Usually, words are coined to express new ideas, processes, products, etc. in the language. For example, xerox, teflon or aspirin.

Syntax

Syntax is the branch of linguistics that studies sentence structure.  In this section, it is important to remember the parts of speech in order to classify sentences and identify their parts.

Parts of Speech

• Nouns: a noun is a word that names a person, place, thing, or idea. Example: chair, dog, Anna.
• Verbs: they are the action words in a sentence that describe what the subject is doing. Example: walk, eat, write.
• Adjectives: it is a word that describes or modifies a noun or pronoun. Example: beautiful, smart, old, little.
• Adverbs: it is a word that modifies or describes a verb, adjective or another adverb. Examples: slowly, tomorrow, happy.
• Prepositions: it is a word used to link nouns, pronouns, or phrases to other words within a sentence. Examples: of, with, by, in, above.
• Pronouns: it is a word that takes the place of a noun. Examples: me, they, whom, us, her.
• Articles:  they define whether something is specific or unspecific. The articles are the words a, an, and the.
• Conjunctions: it is used to connect words, phrases, clauses, or sentences. Examples: and, yet, until, although.
• Interjections: it is a word that demonstrates the emotion or feeling of the author. Examples: wow! ouch! oh, dear!

English has fixed Subject-Verb-Object (SVO) word order. Therefore, the sentence The children took all the apples. is correct (grammatical) but the sentence *Took all the apples the children. is ungrammatical.

Using the rules of syntax, we combine words into phrases and phrases into sentences. A phrase may consist of one word or a group of words. The main types of phrases are the noun phrase, the verb phrase, the adjective phrase, the adverb phrase, and the prepositional phrase.

Types of Sentences

The majority of linguistics makes a distinction between functional and formal sentences:

• Functional: it is from the point of view of their function. This type of sentence is divided into statements, questions, commands, and exclamations.
• Formal: they are declarative, interrogative, imperative, and exclamative sentences.

Another classification is simple, compound, and complex sentences.

• Simple: it is a complete thought or idea. Example: She reads a book.
• Compound: two independent clauses joined by coordinating conjunctions (for, and, yet...). Example: She is reading a book and her brother is dancing.
• Complex: one independent clause and one or more dependent clauses. joined by subordinating conjunctions (after, before, until...). Example: While she is reading, her brother is dancing in the living room.

Semantics

Semantics is the branch of linguistics that studies meaning in language. It is generally accepted that words, phrases, and sentences have meaning. Semantics is divided into:

-Lexical semantics that studies the meanings of words and sense relations (such as synonymy, antonymy, and hyponymy). 

-Sentence semantics (or sentential semantics) that is concerned with the meaning of sentences. 

It is possible to analyze meanings of words decomposing them into more basic semantic features. Thus the noun man can be described as having the features [+HUMAN], [+MALE], and [+ADULT]. Componential analysis helps to clarify how words relate to other words. Comparing man and boy, it can be noted that the two words are differentiated only by one semantic feature: boy is characterized as [- ADULT]. 

Linguists acknowledge that it is difficult both to define and to analyze the meaning of a word. One of the reasons is that word meaning is not homogeneous. A distinction is drawn between denotation, which is understood as the relationship between words and the entities in the world to which they refer, and connotation, which is understood as the additional (often emotional or evaluative) associations suggested by words. Denotations of words are more stable and established, while connotations are less determinate.  

Within the vocabulary, words are semantically related to one another in different ways. Sense relations are paradigmatic, i.e. they reflect the choice and the substitution of one word for another in a particular context. They are:

• Synonymy, or sameness of meaning. However, there are no strict or perfect synonyms, i.e. two words usually do not have exactly the same meaning. Compare the adjectives beautiful and pretty. Both mean someone or something that is attractive to look at. Beautiful describes someone who is good-looking in a very special and even exceptional way, whereas pretty refers to someone or something that is pleasant to look at but not impressive. 
• Antonyms are words that are opposite with respect to some element of their meaning; for example, big and small both describe size but opposite in regard to the extent of the size. A large number of antonymic pairs are adjectives, but this sense relation is also found among other word classes.  Three different types of oppositeness of meaning can be distinguished: 
• Gradable antonyms represent a more or less relation, i.e. more of one is less of the other. For example, rich-poor, fast-slow, tall-short. 
• Complementaries represent an either/or relation, which means that the negation of one is the meaning of the other. For example, dead–alive, married–single. 
• Converses, one describes a relation between two objects and the other describes the same relation when the two objects are reversed. For example, teacher–pupil, parent-child, buy–sell. 

Let's see some exercises to understand better these issues.

Exercise 1. Determine whether the given pairs of words represent synonymy or antonymy.

1. long - short -> antonymy
2. casual - informal -> synonymy
3. instantly - immediately -> synonymy
4. rebellious - obedient -> antonymy
5. give - take -> antonymy
6. lucky - fortunate -> synonymy
7. free - independent -> synonymy
8. promote - downgrade -> antonymy
9. above - below -> antonymy
10. private - public -> antonymy

Exercise 2. Linguists say that synonyms are never completely equivalent in their meaning. Check the definitions of the given synonyms in a dictionary and determine their meaning differences. 

1. clever: quick to understand, learn, and devise or apply ideas
2. intelligent: having or showing intelligence, especially of a high-level.
3. intellectual: possessing a highly developed intellect. 
4. brainy: having or showing intelligence. 
5. smart: having or showing a quick-witted intelligence
6. bright: (of a person, idea, or remark) intelligent and quick-witted.

Exercise 3. There are several kinds of oppositeness of meaning. Indicate whether the pairs of words are gradables, complementaries or converses. 

1. husband - wife -> complementary
2. soft - hard -> gradable
3. false - true -> complementary
4. father - son -> converse
5. buy - sell -> converse

Semantic relations among sentences 

• Paraphrases: If two sentences have the same meaning, they are called paraphrases of each other. For example, the sentence The cat chased the mouse. is a paraphrase of the sentence The mouse was chased by the cat. 
• Entailment: it is a semantic relation between two sentences when the truth of one sentence implies the truth of another but not vice versa. For example, the sentence Peter saw a fox. entails Peter saw an animal. However, to say that Peter saw an animal does not mean that he saw a fox – he might have seen a wolf, a lion, etc. 
• Contradiction: two sentences are contradictory when they both cannot be true at the same time. In other words, if one sentence is true, the other has to be false. For example, Miranda is alive. is a contradiction to Miranda is dead.

Let's see another exercise for this part.

Exercise 4. Which of the three semantic relations (paraphrase, entailment, and contradiction) is represented in the given pairs of sentences? 

     1) My brother studies at Vilnius University. 

         My brother is a student.                                                    }Entailment

     2) My uncle built this house twenty years ago. 

         This house was built by my uncle twenty years ago.   }Paraphrase

     3) Susan is the only child. 

         William is Susan’s brother.                                              }Contradiction