Linguistic Context

1- What is a linguistics context?

A Linguistic Context is a context defined purely in terms of what follows or what precedes a
particular segment that is undergoing a sound change. In other words, a linguistic context will
not take into account the social, situational aspects, or the psychological aspects.
A linguistic change ( for e.g. a sound change ) is explained solely in linguistic terms, without
explaining why a sound change is taking place, or what prompts the change. But such kind of
changes do take place, irrespective of the speaker’s social standing, or educational status, or the
psychological state of mind.
In contrast, there are linguistic changes that require a social motivation, which means those
people that lack the necessary social motivation ( that which prompted the sound change ) will
not show that change in their speech.
As an example, let me quote the research by William Labov on the sound changes occurring in
the speech of people in Martha’s Vineyard, where the diphthongs in words like out, house, while,
night are pronounced differently from the standard English. In this island the people of the age
group 31–45 show this kind of sound change ( centralization of the diphthongs) more than the
others, because they identify themselves more closely with the island and set off themselves
from the Mainlanders.
On the other hand, there are sound changes that do not require any such social motivation ( at
least we are not aware of them) but take place because the immediate linguistic context ( which
sound comes before, or which sound follows ) alone prompts the change. As an example, let me
cite the changes that took place in Middle English : In words like half, palm, talk, the consonant l
was lost because it occurred after a low back vowel ( a ), and before labial or velar consonants
( i.e. m, k ), but this change did not take place in words like film, silk because the linguistic
context on both sides of the segment l is not satisfied in them. In the case of film, silk the vowel
preceding the consonant l is not a low back vowel. So the change did not take place. This change
is the effect of Linguistic Context.
This view is different from the view which states that meaning is considered in terms of sense
relations discussed before, but in terms of what is called SYNTAGMATIC (as opposed to
PARADIGMATIC) relations. Syntagmatic relation and paradigmatic relation are introduced by
Saussure (1974) to distinguish two kinds of signifiers: one concerns positioning (syntagmatic)
and the other concerns substitution (paradigmatic). Paradigmatic relations are widely used in
thesauri and other knowledge organization systems, while syntagmatic relations are generally
related to co‐occurrences in some context. Ex: The cat is on the mat. Thus, it is prominently clear
that it is distribution which deals with these two kinds of relations.
Statement of meaning in terms of distribution has the same kind of attraction like that of meaning
statement in terms of sense as both of them deal with observable features of language with intra-
linguistic relations, rather than the non-linguistic world of experience.
However, trying to state meaning in such way is not satisfactory for some reasons:
1- It does not deal with we usually mean by meaning, and is even less satisfactory than the
sense relations. It does not also meets what Lyons calls ‘material adequacy’

2- Linguistic context is how meaning is understood without relying on intent and

assumptions. In applied pragmatics, for example, meaning is formed through sensory
experiences, even though sensory stimulus cannot be easily articulated in language or
signs. Pragmatics, then, reveals that meaning is both something affected by and affecting
the world. Meaning is something contextual with respect to language and the world, and
is also something active toward other meanings and the world. Linguistic context
becomes important when looking at particular linguistic problems such as that of
pronouns.

2- Collocations
The term collocation was coined by J.R. Firth in the 1950s to mean the common co-occurrence
of particular words. The British linguist famously said ‘You shall know a word by the company
it keeps (Firth, 1957). Firth considered that part of the meaning of a word derives from the
words with which is co-occurs:
Meaning by collocation is concerned
the syntagmatic level and is not directly concerned with the conceptual or idea approach to the
meaning of words. One of the meanings of night is its collocability with dark, and of dark, of
course, collocation with night.(Firth, 1957)
He says about the example of ass “One of the meanings of ass is its habitual collocation with an
immediately preceding you silly…”
 The meaning was also to be found In the context of situation. Nida, for instance, discussed the
use of chair in: Sat in a chair The baby’s high chair The chair of philosophy Has accepted a
university chair The chairman of the meeting Will chair the meeting The electric chair
Condemned to the chair
Collocation defines a sequence of words or terms that co-occur more often than would be
expected by chance.
 strong tea→ Correct Expression
 powerful tea →Incorrect Expression
*Kinds of Collocations
There are two kinds of collocation:
1- Lexical Collocation: (open class + open class)
2- Grammatical Collocation: (open class + closed class)
*Difficulties in the use of collocations:
1- Collocation is not only a matter of association of ideas.
 For example: white milk (seems not correct colocation) in compare to white paint.
"Collocations should not be confused with 'association of ideas.' The way lexemes work together
may have nothing to do with 'ideas.' We say in English green with jealousy (not blue or red),
though there is nothing literally 'green' about 'jealousy.'"
—From "How Language Works" by David Crystal
2- The words may have more specific meanings in particular collocation. For instance: the case
in the collocation abnormal or exceptional weather and abnormal and exceptional children.
An exceptional child is not an abnormal child. Exceptional being used for greater than usual
ability and abnormal to relate to some kind of defect.
3- It would be a mistake to create a distinguishing line between those collocations that are
predictable from the meanings of words that co-occur and those that are not.
Every lexeme has collocations, but some are much more predictable than others. Blond
collocates strongly with hair, flock with sheep, neigh with horse. Some collocations are totally
predictable, such as spick with span, or addled with brains . . .. Others are much less so: letter
collocates with a wide range of lexemes, such as alphabet and spelling, and (in another sense)
box, post, and write. . . .
 Pretty describes only a feminine kind of beauty
 Rancid is to be defined in terms of the very specific, unplanned, taste associated with butter
and bacon.
4- There is a difficulty in deciding whether a collocation is or is not semantically determined. Ex:
The German verb reiten (to ride) is restricted to riding a horse but the English verb ride is not
only used for riding on a horse but also for riding on bicycle.
5- We also find a difficulty in separating collocation and semantics. Ex: We shall say “The
thicket died.” but we shall not say “ The thicket passed away.”
*Kinds of collocation:3
1. Restricted collocation : e.g: blond with hair
2. Semi-restricted collocation : e.g: spick with span
3. Unrestricted collocation : e.g: letter with alphabet, spelling, box, post, and write.
**Restricted are of 3 kinds:
1- Some collocations are based wholly on the meaning of the item.
Ex: the use of the term “Green Cow”.
2- Some collocations are based on range – a word may used with those words that have some
semantic features in common.
For Example: the use of “died” for thicket instead of “passed away”.
"Two main factors can influence the collocational range of an item (Beekman and Callow,
1974). The first is its level of specificity: the more general a word is, the broader its collocational
range; the more specific it is, the more restricted its collocational range. The verb bury is likely
to have a much broader collocational range than any of its hyponyms, such as inter or entomb,
for example. Only people can be interred, but you can bury people, a treasure, your head, face,
feelings, and memories. The second factor which determines the collocational range of an item is
the number of senses it has. Most words have several senses and they tend to attract a different
set of collocates for each sense."
—From "In Other Words: A Coursebook on Translation" by Mona Baker
3- Some restrictions are collocational in the strictest sense, involving neither meanings nor range.
 For example: the use of “pretty” with only females

3- Idioms
An idiom is a set expression of two or more words that mean something other than the literal
meanings of its individual words. Adjective: idiomatic.
"Idioms are the idiosyncrasies of a language," says Christine Ammer. "Often defying the rules of
logic, they pose great difficulties for non-native speakers" (The American Heritage Dictionary of
Idioms, 2013).
Pronunciation: ID-ee-um
Etymology: From the Latin, "own, personal, private"
**Functions of Idioms
"People use idioms to make their language richer and more colorful and to convey subtle shades
of meaning or intention. Idioms are used often to replace a literal word or expression, and many
times the idiom better describes the full nuance of meaning. Idioms and idiomatic expressions
can be more precise than the literal words, often using fewer words but saying more. For
example, the expression it runs in the family is shorter and more succinct than saying that a
physical or personality trait 'is fairly common throughout one's extended family and over a
number of generations.'"
(Gail Brenner, Webster's New World American Idioms Handbook. Webster's New World,
2003)