Language Structure
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What are the key ideas of language?
Language is categorical Language has hidden structures and rules Language is biological as well as cultural
What is language as biology?
Language is a small genetic innovation that was not very long ago
What is the faculty of language in the broad sense?
It has to do with sensory, conceptual beliefs shared with other species
What is the faculty of language in the narrow sense?
Unique that it enables use for language
What is form/sound?
A perceptual abstraction of experience
What is meaning?
A conceptual abstraction
What are phonemes?
a category or abstraction of speech sounds unit of sound that can distinguish one word from another in a particular language Abstractions since different languages have different phoneme inventories
What is a vowel?
When there is no air flow constriction
What are consonants?
They are produced by some kind of air flow constriction during articulation
What is stops?
When saying a consonant the air flow is entirely obstructed
What is voicing?
When a person’s vocal chords vibrate when saying the consonant
BA vs PA
Ba is voiced Pa is voiceless Ba vocal cord vibrates earlier than Pa
What is voice onset time?
The time between vocal cords vibrating after a stop consonant is released
What is categorical perception?
Despite lots of variability in the acoustic signal (continuous), we perceive speech sounds as examples of categories Perception changes very quickly from PA to BA when you cross the (sharp) boundary
Categorical Perception at Birth
Babies will be exposed to a stimulus over and over (the sound pa), but if you change the stimulus (the sound ba), they will notice it by sucking their pacifier harder and faster.
The idea that infants go from universalists to specialists when it comes to language
Infants at birth can distinguish virtually all consonant pairs, such as ba~pa, even though they lose the ability to do so with language exposure Especially if it is not needed for the language they are learn
When do we lose the ability to distinguish all consonant pairs?
Surprisingly early; around 10-12 months do we lose the ability to distinguish consonants of other languages Since being exposed to your language, you hone in on your own language and start to ignore other things that are not relevant to the language you are exposed to
What is flapping?
a consonant sound made by a quick, single tap of the tongue against the alveolar ridge, located behind the upper front teeth. Ex. Patting, padding
What is the flapping rule?
If between two vowels and the second vowel is not stressed then t/d flaps This rule is specific to a variety of English and is learned
What is syntax?
Grammar Parts of speech/word classes
What are some syntax rules (syntactic trees)?
• Sentence -> Noun Phrase + Verb Phrase • Noun phrase -> (Determiner) + Noun + (Prepositional phrase) • Verb phrase -> Verb + (Noun phrase) • Prepositional phrase -> Preposition + Noun phrase
What is structural ambiguity?
One grammar may have various ways of generating a sentence, leading to ambiguity Like the sentence: Sherlock saw the man with binoculars
What is recursion?
The ability to embed a linguistic structure within another of the same type, which allows for the creation of an infinite number of complex sentences Ex. Using PP in NP infinitely
What is productivity?
Rules in language that can be applied to new instances, thereby giving the power of infinity to language Ex. Adding -ed to make a word past tense