Introduction to Linguistics

Area: ENGLISH

Focus: Introduction to Linguistics

Competencies:

1. demonstrate familiarity with the theories of language and language learning and
their influence on language teaching
2. revisit the knowledge of linguistic theories and concepts and apply it to the
teaching of communication skills – listening, speaking, reading, writing, and
grammar
3. show understanding of how language rules are used in real conversations

A. Linguistics and English Language Teaching

Teachers’ knowledge on the workings of language and language teaching are

essentially intertwined with each other. The teachers’ competence on how a
language behaves will certainly help teachers explain to the students how the
language works, as well as anticipate and respond appropriately to possible
learning difficulties.
1. Knowledge of linguistics, specifically phonology, may be useful for explaining
interference problems that may be experienced by English language learners with
the English sound system. To illustrate, in the absence of the following sounds
such as /f/ and /v/ in Philippine languages, except in Ivatan and Ibanag, Filipino
English learners are likely to use /p/ and /v/ as substitute sounds, e.g., /pæn/ for
/fæn/ ‘ fan’ and /bæn/ for /væn/ ‘van’. Language teachers are advised to remember
that each language has its own inventory of phonemes that may differ from that of
another language. Such differences may result in using sounds that only
approximate the target sounds, as shown in the aforecited examples.

2. Language teachers need to realize that grammatical units such as morphemes,

words, phrases and clauses behave quite differently across languages. For example,
plurality, and tense in English are expressed through inflections as is {-s/ -es} and
{-ed}. However, Tagalog plurality is expressed as separate words as in mga bata
‘children’. Linguistically speaking, Tagalog verbs have no tense, only aspects –
perfective “kumain’ and imperfective ‘kumakain’, which may explain the
Filipinos’ problems in dealing with English tenses.

3. Helping students to discover the meaning of words by parsing them into small
parts depends heavily on the teacher’s knowledge of morphology or word
formation rules. To exemplify, students may parse or segment the following words,
taking note of the morpheme {-ment} that recurs in embarrassment, government,
disillusionment, enhancement. As students discover the meaning of {-ment} as
‘state or condition’, they may be able to give the meaning of the cited examples as:
‘state of being embarrassed’, ‘state of governing’, ‘state of being disillusioned’,
and ‘state of enhancing’. Hence, the process of word formation such as derivation
may help learners interpret and remember meaning of words that follow certain
patterns in forming short words into longer words.
4. Teachers’ knowledge about larger units of language use – discourse structure –
may be relevant when teaching exchanges or conversations. The use of language
for social functions such as asking permission involves familiarity with modals that
 express formality and a higher degree of politeness when speaking with someone
who is older, who occupies a higher position, or is an authority than the speaker. In
this context appropriacy has to be observed in selecting modals. For example, it is
appropriate to use may, not can when asking permission from someone who is
older, higher in position than the speaker. e.g. May I use the office computer?

B. Views about Language

1. The structuralists believe that language can be described in terms of observable

and verifiable data as it is being used. They also describe language in terms of its
structure and according to the regularities and patterns or rules in language
structure. To them, language is a system of speech sounds, arbitrarily assigned to
the objects, states, and concepts to which they refer, used for human
communication.
 Language is primarily vocal. Language is speech, primarily made up of vocal
sounds produced by the speech apparatus in the human body. The primary medium
of language is speech; the written record is but a secondary representation of the
language. Writing is only the graphic representation of the sounds of the language.
While most languages have writing systems, a number of languages continue to
exist, even today, in the spoken form only, without any written form. Linguists
claim that speech is primary, writing secondary. Therefore, it is assumed that
speech has a priority in language teaching.

 Language is a system of systems. Language is not a disorganized or a chaotic

combination of sounds. Sounds are arranged in certain fixed or established,
systematic order to form meaningful units or words. For example, no word in
English starts with bz-, lr- or zl- combination, but there are those that begin with
spr- and str- (as in spring and string). In like manner, words are also arranged in a
particular system to generate acceptable meaningful sentences. The sentence
“Shen bought a new novel” is acceptable but the group of words “Shen bought
new novel a” is unacceptable, since the word order of the latter violates the
established convention in English grammar, the Subject-Verb-Object or S-V-O
word order.

Language is a system of structurally related elements or ‘building blocks’ for the

encoding of meaning, the elements being phonemes (sounds), morphemes (words),
tagmemes (phrases and sentences/clauses). Language learning, it is assumed,
entails mastering the elements or building blocks of the language and learning the
rules by which these elements are combined, from phoneme to morpheme to word
to phrase to sentence.

 Language is arbitrary. There is no inherent relation between the words of a

language and their meanings or the ideas conveyed by them. Put another way, there
is no one to one correspondence between the structure of a word and the thing it
stands for. There is no ‘sacred’ reason why an animal that flies is called ibon in
Filipino, pajaro in Spanish, bird in English. Selection of these words in the
languages mentioned here is purely an accident of history that native speakers of
the languages have agreed on. Through the years reference to such animal has
become an established convention that cannot be easily changed.

That language is arbitrary means that the relationship between the words and the
‘things’ they denote is merely conventional, i.e. native speakers of English, in
 some sense, agreed to use the sounds / kæt / ‘cat’ in English because native
speakers of English ‘want’ it to be.

 Language is a means of communication. Language is an important means of

communicating between humans of their ideas, beliefs, or feelings. Language gives
shape to people’s thoughts, as well as guides and controls their activity.
2. The transformationalists/ cognitivists believe that language is a system of
knowledge made manifest in linguistic forms but innate and, in its most abstract
form, universal.

 Language is innate. The presence of the language acquisition device (LAD) in the
human brain predisposes all normal children to acquire their first language in an
amazingly short time, around five years since birth.

 Language is creative. It enables native speakers to produce and understand

sentences they have not heard nor used before.

 Language is a mental phenomenon. It is not mechanical.

 Language is universal. It is universal in the sense that all normal children the world
over acquire a mother tongue but it is also universal in the sense that, at a highly
abstract level, all languages must share key features of human languages, such as
all languages have sounds; all languages have rules that form sounds into words,
words into phrases and clauses; and all languages have transformation rules that
enable speakers to ask questions, negate sentences, issue orders, defocus the doer
of the action, etc.
2. The functionalists believe that language is a dynamic system through which
members of speech community exchange information. It is a vehicle for the
expression of functional meaning such as expressing one’s emotions, persuading
people, asking and giving information, making people do things for others.

This view of language emphasizes the meaning and functions rather than the
grammatical characteristics of language, and leads to a language teaching content
consisting of categories of meaning/notions and functions rather than of elements
of structure and grammar.

3. The interactionists believe that language is a vehicle for establishing interpersonal

relations and for performing social transactions between individuals. It is a tool for
creating and maintaining social relations through conversations. Language teaching
content, according to this view, may be specified and organized by patterns of
exchange and interaction.

B. Acquisition of Language

1. Behaviorist learning theory. Derived from a general theory of learning, the

behaviorist view states that the language behavior of the individual is conditioned
by sequences of differential rewards in his/her environment.

It regards language learning as a behavior like other forms of human behavior, not
a mental phenomenon, learned by a process of habit formation. Since language is
viewed as mechanistic and as a human activity, it is believed that learning a
language is achieved by building up habits on the basis of stimulus-response
chains. Behaviorism emphasizes the consequences of the response and argues that
 it is the behavior that follows a response which reinforces it and thus helps to
strengthen the association.

According to Littlewood (1984), the process of habit formation includes the

following:

a. The child imitates the sounds and patterns which s/he hears around her/him.
b. People recognize the child’s attempts as being similar to the adult models and
reinforce (reward) the sounds by approval or some other desirable reaction.
c. In order to obtain more of these rewards, the child repeats the sounds and patterns
so that these become habits.
d. In this way the child’s verbal behavior is conditioned (‘shaped’) until the habits
coincide with the adult models.

The behaviorists claim that the three crucial elements of learning are: a stimulus,
which serves to elicit behavior; a response triggered by the stimulus, and
reinforcement, which serves to mark the response as being appropriate (or
inappropriate) and encourages the repetition (or suppression) of the response.

2. Cognitive learning theory. Chomsky argues that language is not acquired by

children by sheer imitation and through a form of conditioning on reinforcement
and reward. He believes that all normal human beings have an inborn biological
internal mechanism that makes language learning possible. Cognitivists/ innatists
claim that the child is born with an ‘initial’ state’ about language which
predisposes him/her to acquire a grammar of that language. They maintain that the
language acquisition device (LAD) is what the child brings to the task of language
acquisition, giving him/her an active role in language learning.

One important feature of the mentalist account of second language acquisition is

hypothesis testing, a process of formulating rules and testing the same with
competent speakers of the target language.

3. Krashen’s Monitor Model (1981). Probably this is the most often cited among
theories of second language acquisition; considered the most comprehensive, if not
the most ambitious, consisting of five central hypotheses:

The five hypotheses are:

a. The acquisition/ learning hypothesis. It claims that there are two ways of
developing competence in L2:
Acquisition - the subconscious process that results from informal, natural
communication between people where language is a means, not a focus nor an end,
in itself.

Learning - the conscious process of knowing about language and being able to talk
about it, that occurs in a more formal situation where the properties or rules of a
language are taught. Language learning has traditionally involved grammar and
vocabulary learning.

Acquisition parallels first language development in children while learning

approximates the formal teaching of grammar in classrooms. Conscious thinking
about the rules is said to occur in second language learning while unconscious
feeling about what is correct and appropriate occurs in language acquisition.
b. The natural order hypothesis. It suggests that grammatical structures are acquired
in a predictable order for both children and adults, that is, certain grammatical
structures are acquired before others, irrespective of the language being learned.
When a learner engages in natural communication, then the standard order below
will occur.

Group 1: present progressive -ing (She is reading)

plural -s (bags)
copula ‘to be’ (The girl is at the library.)
Group 2: auxiliary ‘to be’ (She is reading.)
articles the and an (That’s a book.)
Group 3: irregular past forms (She drank milk.)
Group 4: regular past -ed (She prayed last night.)
third-person-singular -s (She prays every day.)
possessive -s (The girl’s bag is new.)

b. The monitor hypothesis. It claims that conscious learning of grammatical rules

has an extremely limited function in language performance: as a monitor or editor
that checks output. The monitor is an editing device that may normally operate
before language performance. Such editing may occur before the natural output or
after the ouput.

Krashen suggests that monitoring occurs when there is sufficient time, where there
is pressure to communicate correctly and not just convey meaning, and when the
appropriate rules are known.
d. The input hypothesis. Krashen proposes that when learners are exposed to
grammatical features a little beyond their current level (i.e., i + 1), those features
are ‘acquired’. Acquisition results from comprehensible input, which is made
understandable with the help provided by the context. If learners receive
understandable input, language structures will be naturally acquired. Ability to
communicate in a second language ‘emerges’ rather than indirectly put in place by
teaching.
c. The affective filter hypothesis. Filter consists of attitude to language, motivation,
self-confidence and anxiety. Thus learners with favorable attitude and self-
confidence may have a ‘low filter’ which promotes language learning. Learners
with a low affective filter seek and receive more input, interact with confidence,
and are more receptive to the input they are exposed to. On the other hand, anxious
learners have a high affective filter which prevents acquisition from taking place.

d. Implications for teaching:

1. Teachers must continuously deliver at a level understandable by learners.
2. Teaching must prepare the learners for real life communication situations.
Classrooms must provide conversational confidence so that when in the outside
world, the student can cope with and continue learning.
3. Teachers must ensure that learners do not become anxious or defensive in
language learning. The confidence of a language learner must be encouraged in a
language acquisition process. Teachers should not insist on learners conversing
before they feel comfortable in doing so; neither should they correct errors nor
make negative remarks that inhibit learners from learning. They should devise
specific techniques to relax learners and protect their egos.
4. Teachers must create an atmosphere where learners are not embarrassed by their
errors. Errors should not be corrected when acquisition is occurring. Error
correction is valuable when learning simple rules but may have negative effects in
terms of anxiety and inhibitions.
5. Formal grammar teaching is of limited value because it contributes to learning
rather than acquisition. Only simple rules should be learned.
6. Teachers should not expect learners to learn ‘late structures’ such as third person
singular early.

C. Influences of Theories on Language Teaching

1. Applied linguists claim that theories of language learning as well as theories of

language may provide the basis for a particular teaching approach/method. To
illustrate, the linking of structuralism and behaviorism has produced the
audiolingual method (ALM), oral approach/situational language teaching, operant
conditioning approach, bottom-up text processing, controlled-to-free writing, to
cite a few. These methods underscore the necessity of overlearning, a principle that
leads to endless and mindless mimicry and memorization (‘mim-mem’). They are
also characterized by mechanical habit-formation teaching, done through
unremitting practice: sentence patterns are repeated and drilled until they become
habitual and automatic to minimize occurrences of mistakes. Grammar is taught
through analogy, hence, explanations of rules are not given until the students have
practiced a pattern in a variety of contexts.
2. The cognitive learning theory has given birth to the cognitive approach to learning
that puts language analysis before language use and instruction by the teacher,
before the students practice forms. It is compatible with the view that learning is a
thinking process, a belief that underpins cognitive-based and schema-enhancing
strategies such as Directed Reading Thinking Activity, Story Grammar, Think-
Aloud, to name a few.
3. The functional view of language has resulted in communication-based methods
such as Communicative Language Teaching/Communicative Approach, Notional-
Functional Approach, Natural Approach, Task-Based Language Teaching. These
methods are learner-centered, allowing learners to work in pairs or groups in
information gap tasks and problem-solving activities where such communication
strategies as information sharing, negotiation of meaning, and interaction are used.
4. The view that is both cognitive and affective has given rise to a holistic approach
to language learning or whole-person learning which has spawned humanistic
techniques in language learning and Community Language Learning. In these
methods, the whole person including emotions and feelings as well as language
knowledge and behavior skills become central to teaching. The humanistic
approach equips learners “vocabulary for expressing one’s feelings, for sharing
one’s values and viewpoints with others, and for developing a better understanding
of their feelings and needs.”
D. Linguistic Concepts:

Scope of Linguistic Studies:

1. Phonology. It studies the combination of sounds into organized units of speech,

the combination of syllables and larger units. It describes the sound system of a
particular language and distribution of sounds which occur in that language.
Classification is made on the basis of the concept of the phoneme.
 Phonology is the study of the sound system of language: the rules that govern
pronunciation. It comprises the elements and principles that determine sound
patterns in a language.

2. Phonetics. It studies language at the level of sounds: how sounds are articulated by
the human speech mechanism and received by the auditory mechanism, as well as
how sounds can be distinguished and characterized by the manner in which they
are produced.

3. Morphology. It studies the patterns of forming words by combining sounds into

minimal distinctive units of meaning called morphemes. It deals with the rules of
attaching suffixes or prefixes to single morphemes to form words.

Morphology is the study of word formation; it deals with the internal structure of
words. It also studies the changes that take place in the structure of words, e.g. the
morpheme ‘go’ changes to ‘went’ and ‘gone’ to signify changes in tense and
aspect.

4. Syntax. It deals with how words combine to form phrases, phrases combine to
form clauses, and clauses conjoin to make sentences. Syntax is the study of the
way phrases, clauses and sentences are constructed. It is the system of rules and
categories that underlies sentence formation. It also involves the description of
rules, of positioning of elements in the sentence such as noun phrases, verb
phrases, adverbial phrases, etc.

Syntax also attempts to describe how these elements function in the sentence, i.e.,
the function that they perform in the sentence. For example, the noun phrase “the
student” has different functions in the following sentences:

a) The student is writing a new play.

b) The teacher gave the student a new play.

In sentence a), the student functions as the subject of the sentence while in
sentence b), it functions as indirect object.

5. Semantics. It deals with the level of meaning in language. It attempts to analyze

the structure of meaning in a language, e.g., how words are related in meaning; it
attempts to show these inter-relationships through forming ‘categories’. Semantics
accounts for both word and sentence meaning.

6. Pragmatics. It deals with the contextual aspects of meaning in particular

situations. Pragmatics is the study of how language is used in real communication.
As distinct from the study of sentences, pragmatics considers utterances – those
sentences which are actually uttered or said by speakers of a language.

7. Discourse. It is the study of chunks of language which are bigger than a single
sentence. At this level, inter-sentential links that form a connected or cohesive text
are analyzed. The unit of language studied in discourse and pragmatics may be an
utterance in an exchange or a text in written form.
Phonology:

1. Phoneme is a distinctive, contrasted sound unit, e.g. / m /, / æ /, / n /. These

distinct sounds enter into combination with other sounds to form words, e.g.,
/mæn/ ‘man’.
 Phoneme is the smallest unit of sound of any language that causes a difference in
meaning. It is a phone segment that has a contrastive status. The basic test for a
sound’s distinctiveness is called a minimal pair test. A minimal pair consists of two
forms with distinct meaning that differ by only one segment found in the same
position in each form. For example, [sɪp] ‘sip’ and [zɪp] ‘zip’ form a minimal pair
and show that the sounds [s] and [z] contrast in English because they cause the
difference in meaning between the words ‘sip’ and ‘zip’; hence, they are separate
phonemes - /s/ and /z/.

2. Allophones are variants or other ways of producing a phoneme. They are

phonetically similar and are frequently found in complementary distribution. For
example, the systematic variations of /t/ are:

The /t/ in top is aspirated [th]; the /t/ in stop is released [t]; the /t/ in pot is
unreleased [t7].

3. Sounds are categorized into two major classes: vowels and consonants.

4. Consonant sounds are produced with some restriction or closure in the vocal tract
as the air from the lungs is pushed through the glottis out the mouth. The airflow
is either blocked momentarily or restricted so much that noise is produced as air
flows past the constriction. Consonants are described in terms of physical
dimensions: place of articulation, manner of articulation, voicing, as shown in
Figure 1.
Labiodental
Interdental
Alveolar
Bilabial

Palatal

Glottal
Velar

Stops voiceless p t k
voiced b d g
Fricatives voiceless f θ s š h
voiced v ð z ž
Affricates voiceless č
voiced ǰ
Nasals voiceless
voiced m n ŋ
Liquids voiceless
voiced l r
Glides voiceless
voiced w y
Source: Parker, F. & K. Riley. (1994). Linguistics for Non-Linguists.Boston: Allyn and
Bacon.
FIGURE 1. Consonant Phonemes of English

Place of Articulation. For any articulation corresponding to one of these

consonant phonemes, the vocal tract is constricted at one of the following points.

(a) Bilabial (from bi ‘two’ + labial ‘lips’). The primary constriction is at the
lips (/p,b,m,w/).
(b) Labiodental (from labio ‘lip’ + dental ‘teeth’). The primary constriction
 is between the lower lip and the upper teeth (/f,v/).
(c) Interdental (from inter ‘between’ + dental ‘teeth’). The primary
constriction is between the tongue and the upper teeth (/θ,ð/).
(d) Alveolar (from alveolar ridge). The primary constriction is between the
tongue and the alveolar ridge (/t,d,s,z,n,l/).
(e) Palatal (from palate). The primary constricton is between the tongue and the palate
(/š,ž,č,ǰ,r,y/).
(f) Velar (from velum). The primary constriction is between the tongue and
the velum (/k,g,ŋ/).
(g) Glottal (from glottis, which refers to the space between the vocal cords). The primary
constriction is at the glottis (/h/).

Manner of Articulation. For any articulation corresponding to one of these

consonant phonemes, the vocal tract is constricted in one of the following ways.

(a) Stops. Two articulators (lips, tongue, teeth, etc.) are brought together such that the
flow of air through the vocal tract is completely blocked (/p,b,t,d,k,g/).
(b) Fricatives. Two articulators are brought near each other such that the flow of air is
impeded but not completely blocked. The air flow through the narrow opening
creates friction, hence the term fricative (/f,v,θ,ð,s,z,š,ž,h/).
(c) Affricates. Articulations corresponding to affricates are those that begin like stops
(with a complete closure in the vocal tract) and end like fricatives (with a narrow
opening in the vocal tract) (/č,ǰ/). Because affricates can be described as a stop plus
a fricative, some phonemic alphabets transcribe / č/ as /tš/ and /ǰ/ as /dž/.
(d) Nasals. A nasal articulation is one in which the airflow through the mouth is
completely blocked but the velum is lowered, forcing the air through the nose
(/m,n,ŋ/).
(e) Liquids and Glides. Both of these terms describe articulations that are mid-way
between true consonants (i.e., stops, fricatives, affricates, and nasals) and vowels,
although they are both generally classified as consonants. Liquid is a cover term
for all l-like and r-like articulations (/l,r/).

Voicing. For any articulation corresponding to one of these consonant

phonemes, the vocal cords are either vibrating (/b,d,g,v,ð,z,ž,ǰ,m,n,ŋ,l,r,w,y/) or not
(p,t,k,f,θ,s,š,č,h/). Stops, fricatives, and affricates come in voiced and voiceless
pairs (except for /h/); nasals, liquids, and glides are all voiced, as are vowels.

Each consonant phoneme is not really an indivisible unit, but rather a

composite of values along these three dimensions. Each such dimension constitutes
a distinctive feature. For example, from one perspective /p/ and /b/ are not really
units in themselves, but rather each is bundle of feature values, as follows.

+bilabial +bilabial
/p/ = +stop /b/ = +stop
−voice +voice
5. Vowels are produced with little obstruction in the vocal tract and are generally
voiced. They are described in terms of the following physical dimensions: tongue
height, frontness, lip rounding, tenseness. Different parts of the tongue may be
raised or lowered. The lips may be spread or pursed. The passage through which
the air travels, however, is never narrow as to obstruct the free flow of the
airstream.

Vowel sounds carry pitch and loudness; one can sing vowels. They may be long or
short.

Front Back

i u

ɪ ℧
Hig
h Tense
e o
Lax
ε Λ (ә)

Mid
Ɔ
æ a

Low Spread Round

Source: Parker, F. & K. Riley. (1994). Linguistics for Non-Linguists.Boston: Allyn and
Bacon.

Figure 2. Vowel Phonemes of English

6. Suprasegmentals are prosodic properties that form part of the makeup of sounds
no matter what their place or manner of articulation is. These properties are pitch,
intonation, stress, and juncture. They are variations in intensity, pitch, and
timing.

7. Stress is a property of a syllable rather than a segment. It is a cover term for a

combined effect of pitch, loudness and length --- the result of which is vowel
prominence; hence, it refers to the relative prominence of syllables. The syllable
that receives the most prominent stress is referred to as primary stress. To
produce a stressed syllable, one may change the pitch (usually by raising it), make
the syllable louder, or make it longer.

e.g.
2 1 2 1 1 2
fundamental introductory secondary

8. Pitch is the auditory property of a sound that enables us to place it on a scale that
ranges from low to high.
9. Intonation is the rise and fall of pitch which may contrast meanings of sentences.
The pitch movement in spoken utterances is not only related to differences in the
word meaning, but serves to convey information of a broadly meaningful nature
such as completeness or incompleteness of an utterance. Intonation refers to the
pitch contours as they occur in phrases and sentences.

In English, the statement ‘Marian is a linguist’ ends with a fall in pitch while as a
question, ‘Marian is a linguist?’ the pitch goes up.

10. Juncture refers to the pauses or breaks between syllables. It refers to the
transition between sounds. The lack of any real break between syllables of words is
referred to as close juncture; plus juncture or open juncture is used to describe a
break or pause between syllables in the same word or adjacent word; e.g. nitrate
vs. night rate; why try vs. white rye; black bird vs. blackbird

Morphology:

1. Morpheme is a short segment of language that meets three criteria:

a. It is a word or part of a word that has meaning.

b. It cannot be divided into smaller meaningful parts without violation of its meaning
or without meaningless remainders.
c. It recurs in different words with a relatively stable meaning.

The word unhappiness has 3 morphemes: {un-}, {happy}, {-ness} while the
word salamander is a single morpheme.

2. Allomorphs are morphs which belong to the same morpheme. For example, /s/, /z/
and /əz/ in /kæts/ ‘cats’, /bægz/ ‘bags’ and / bΛsəz/ ‘buses’ are allomorphs of the
plural morphemes {(e)s}. Allomorphs are variants of a morpheme that may be
phonologically or morphologically conditioned; e.g. {-en} as in oxen and children
are allomorphs of {plural} morpheme.

3. Free morphemes are those that can stand on their own as independent words, e.g.
{happy} in unhappily, {like} in dislike, {boy} in boyhood. They can also occur in
isolation; e.g. {happy}, {like}

4. Bound morphemes are those that cannot stand on their own as independent
words. They are always attached to a free morpheme or a free form, e.g. {un-}, {-
ly}, {dis-} {-hood}. Such morphemes are also called affixes.

Bound morphemes are those that cannot stand alone as words; they need to be
attached to another morpheme; e.g. {con-}; {de-}, {per-} to be attached to {-ceive}
as in conceive, deceive, perceive.

5. Inflectional morphemes are those that never change the form class of the words
or morphemes to which they are attached. They are always attached to complete
words. They cap the word; they are a closed-ended set of morphemes - English has
only 8 inflectional morphemes.

-s third person sing. pres. She stay-s at home.

-ed past tense She stay-ed at home.
-ing progressive She is stay-ing at home.
-en past participle She has eat-en at home.
 -s plural She wrote novel-s.
-‘s possessive Marie’s car is new.
-er comparative This road is long-er than that.
-est superlative This is the long-est road.

6. Derivational morphemes are those that are added to root morphemes or stems to
derive new words. They usually change the form class of the words to which they
are attached; they are open-ended, that is, there are potentially infinite number of
them; e.g. actual + {-ize}  actualize; help + {-ful}  helpful; {un-} + lucky 
unlucky.

7. Word – Formation processes

Derivation. This involves the addition of a derivational affix, changing the syntactic
category of the item to which it is attached (e.g., discern (V) discernment (N);
woman (N)  womanly (Adj)).

Category Extension. This involves the extension of a morpheme from one syntactic
category to another (e.g., house (N)  house (V); fast (Adj) fast (Adv))

Compounding. This involves creating a new word by combining two free

morphemes (e.g., sunset; drugstore).

Root Creation. It is a brand new word based on no pre-existing morphemes (e.g.,

Colgate; Xerox).

Clipped Form. It is a shortened form of a pre-existing forms (e.g., gym <

gymnasium; mike < microphone).

Blend. It is a combination of parts of two pre-existing forms (e.g., smog < smoke +
fog; motel < motor + hotel).

Acronym. It is a word formed from the first letter(s) of each word in a phrase (e.g.,
NASA < National Aeronautics and Space Administration; SARS < Severe Acute
Respiratory Syndrome).

Abbreviation. It is a word formed from the names of the first letters of the
prominent syllables of a word (e.g., TV < television) or of words in a phrase (e.g.,
FBI < Federal Bureau of Investigation).

Proper Name. This process forms a word from a proper name (e.g., hamburger <
Hamburg (Germany); sandwich < Earl of Sandwich).

Folk Etymology. This process forms a word by substituting a common native form
for an exotic (often foreign) form (e.g., cockroach < Spanish cucuracha ‘wood
louse’).

Back Formation. This process forms a word by removing what is mistaken for an
affix (e.g. edit < editor; beg < beggar).

8. Morphophonemic Processes

There are processes that produce a great deal of linguistic variability: assimilation,
dissimilation, deletion, epenthesis, metathesis.
 Assimilation is a process that results from a sound becoming more like another
nearby sound in terms of one or more of its phonetic characteristics; a process in
which segments take on the characteristics of neighboring sounds; e.g. probable –
improbable; potent -impotent; separable – inseparable; sensitive – insensitive

Dissimilation is a process that results in two sounds becoming less alike in

articulatory or acoustic terms; a process in which units which occur in some
contexts are ‘lost’ in others; e.g. ‘libary’ instead of ‘library,’ ‘ govenor’ for
‘governor’

Deletion is a process that removes a segment from certain phonetic contexts. It

occurs in everyday rapid speech; e.g. [blaɪn mæn] ‘blind man ’

Epenthesis is a process that inserts a syllable or a nonsyllabic segment within an

existing string of segment; e.g. [plæntɪd] ‘planted’

Metathesis is a process that reorders or reverses a sequence of segments; it occurs

when two segments in a series switch places, e.g. ask  aks; ruler  lurer; violet
 viloyet

Syntactic Structures

1. Structure of Predication has two components: a subject and a predicate; e.g. the
seagull flies, the water level rose abruptly, the trial has begun

2. Structure of Complementation has two basic components: a verbal element and

a complement; e.g. disturbed the class, rendered service, be conscientious

3. Structure of Modification has two components: a head word and a modifier,

whose meaning serves to broaden, qualify, select, change, or describe, or in some
way affect the meaning of the head word; e.g. responsible officers, trusted friend,
impartially conducted

4. Structure of Coordination has two basic components: equivalent grammatical units

and joined often but not always by a coordinating conjunction; e.g. bread and
butter, peace not war, neither extrovert nor introvert

Semantics

1. Lexical ambiguity refers to a characteristic of a word that has more than one
sense, e. g. the English word fly is ambiguous because it has more than one
meaning: ‘an insect,’ ‘a zipper on a pair of pants,’ or ‘a baseball hit into the air
with a bat.’

2. Syntactic ambiguity refers to the characteristic of a phrase that has more than one
meaning, e.g. English literature teacher can mean ‘a teacher of English literature’
or ‘a literature teacher who is from England.’

3. Synonymy refers to words having the same sense; that is, they have the same
values for all of their semantic features. happy and glad; reply and respond; hastily
and hurriedly are synonymous words in English.

4. Hyponymy is a characteristic of a word that contains the meaning of another word;

the contained word is known as the superordinate. For example, sampaguita
contains the meaning of flower; therefore, sampaguita is a hyponym of the
 superordinate flower. Put another way, a hyponym is a word whose meaning
contains all the same feature values of another word, plus some additional feature
values.

5. Antonymy refers to the characteristic of two words which are different both in form
as well as meaning. An antonym conveys the opposite sense (binary antonyms),
e.g. rich - poor; good – bad. They are also words whose meanings differ only in
the value for a single semantic feature; e.g. rich – poor; rich is marked [+wealth]
and poor is marked [- wealth]; dead – alive; dead is marked [-life] and alive is
marked [+life]. Gradable antonyms are words that describe opposite ends of a
continuous dimension, e.g. hot and cold. Not everything that can be hot or cold is,
in fact, either hot or cold. Liquid, for example, may be warm or cool.

6. Homonymy refers to sense relation in words with the same phonetic form but
different in meaning, e.g. bat meaning ‘a nocturnal animal’ and bat meaning ‘an
equipment used in baseball or softball.’

7. Coreference refers to the sense relation of two expressions that have the same
extralinguistic referent. In the sentence “Mercury is the nearest planet from the
sun,” Mercury and the nearest planet from the sun are coreferential because they
both refer to the same extralinguistic object – the planet Mercury in the solar
system.

8. Anaphora is a linguistic expression that refers to another linguistic expression; e.g.

“The tsunami killed thousands of people. It was devastating.” It in the second
sentence is used anaphorically (to point backwards) to refer to ‘the tsunami’.

9. Deixis refers to the characteristic of an expression that has one meaning but can
refer to different entities within the same context of utterance. Deictic expressions
have a ‘pointing function.’ Examples of deixis are you, I, she (personal pronouns);
here, there, right, left, (expressions of place); this, that, those, these
(demonstratives); now, yesterday, today, last year (time expressions).

10. Entailment is a proposition (expressed in a sentence) that follows necessarily from

another sentence. A sentence entails another if the meaning of the first includes the
meaning of the second; it is also called paraphrase. For example, the sentence,
‘Raul had a fatal accident’ entails that ‘Raul died’ since it is impossible to figure
in a fatal accident without loss of life. Semantically speaking, fatal means [-life]
while died also means [-life].

11. Presupposition refers to a proposition (expressed in a sentence) that is assumed to

be true in order to judge the truth or falsity of another sentence. It also refers to the
truth relation between two sentences; one sentence presupposes another if the
falsity of the second renders the first without a truth value; e.g. The sentence ‘The
King of Canada is dead.’ presupposes that ‘There exists (is) a King of Canada.’
The first sentence presupposes the second sentence because if the second sentence
is false, then the first sentence has no truth value.

Pragmatics

1. Speech act theory. Every utterance of speech constitutes some sort of act
(promising, apologizing, threatening, warning, etc.). Every speech act consists of
three separate acts:
 Locutionary force an act of saying something; it is a description of what a speaker
says, e.g., I promise to return your book tomorrow.

Illocutionary act/force is the act of doing something; it is what the speaker intends
to do by uttering a sentence, e.g., by saying “I promise to return your book
tomorrow,” the speaker has made an act of promising.

Perlocutionary act is an act of affecting someone (i.e., the listener); it is the effect
on the hearer of what a speaker says, e.g., by saying “I will return your book
tomorrow,” the hearer may feel happy or relieved that s/he will get the book back

2. Categories of Illocutionary Acts. These are categories proposed by John Searle to

group together closely related intentions for saying something.

Declaration. A declaration is an utterance used to change the status of some entity

– for example, Foul! uttered by a referee at a basketball game. This class includes
acts of appointing, naming, resigning, baptizing, surrendering, excommunicating,
arresting, and so on.

Representative. A representative is an utterance used to describe some state of

affairs – for example, Recession will worsen in Europe in the next five years. This
class includes acts of stating, asserting, denying, confessing, admitting, notifying,
concluding, predicting, and so on.

Commissive. A commissive is an utterance used to commit the speaker to do

something – for example, I’ll meet you at the library at 10:00 a.m. This class
includes acts of promising, vowing, volunteering, offering, guaranteeing, pledging,
betting, and so on.

Directive. A directive is an utterance used to try to get the hearer to do something –

for example, Review thoroughly for the exams. This class includes acts of
requesting, ordering, forbidding, warning, advising, suggesting, insisting,
recommending, and so on.

Expressive. An expressive is an utterance used to express the emotional state of the

speaker – for example, Congratulations for topping the bar exam!. This class
includes acts of apologizing, thanking, congratulating, condoling, welcoming,
deploring, objecting, and so on.

Question. A question is an utterance used to get the hearer to provide information

– for example, Who won the presidential election? This class includes acts of
asking, inquiring, and so on. (Note: Searle treated questions as a subcategory of
directives; however, it is more useful to treat them as a separate category.)

3. Conversational Maxims are rules that are observed when communication takes
place in a situation where people are co-operative. When people communicate,
they assume that the other person will be cooperative and they themselves wish to
cooperate.

In the “Cooperative Principle,” the following maxims or rules govern oral

interactions:
 Maxim of quantity – a participant’s contribution should be as informative as
possible – “Give the right amount of information, neither less nor more than what
is required.”
e.g. A: Are you attending the seminar?
B: Yes, I am.

Maxim of quality – a participant should not say that which is false or that which
the participant lacks evidence - “Make your contribution such that it is true; do not
say what you know is false or for which you do not have adequate evidence.”
e.g. A: Who did you see enter the room last?
B: The janitor

Maxim of relation – a participant’s contribution should be related to the subject

of the conversation – “Be relevant.”
e.g. A: Why did you come late?
B: I had to take my son to school.

Maxim of manner – a participant’s contribution should be direct, not obscure,

ambiguous, or wordy – “Avoid obscurity and ambiguity; be brief and orderly.”

A: Are you accepting the position?

B: Yes, I am. Thank you for your trust in me.

4. Implicatures refer to statements that imply a proposition that is not part of the
utterance and does not follow as a necessary consequence of the utterance.

For example: Dan says to his wife Nitz,“Uncle Ernie is driving us to Tagaytay”
to which Nitz responds, “I guess I’d better take tranquilizers.” Nitz’s utterance
raises the implicature that Uncle Ernie must be a fast, reckless driver.