P.

Schlenker - Ling 1 - Introduction to the Study of Language

UCLA, Winter 2004

Introduction to the Study of Language - Lecture Notes 0

Rules of Language: Description vs. Prescription

+ Goal: To know a language is to have in principle the ability to utter and understand infinitely many new sentences. How is this possible? The key is that speakers know (a finite number of) rules, which can be applied repeatedly to produce an infinite number of sentences. All spoken language is in this sense governed by rules; in this respect there is no difference between what is considered 'good English' and what is considered 'bad English' - they each follow rules, though they may be different ones. We will distinguish two uses of the notion of rule: for prescriptive and for descriptive purposes. Prescriptive rules are intended to teach people how they should speak or write according to some pre-determined (arbitrary) standard. They are of dubious origin, have no linguistic justification, and have no relevance for the linguist, who is solely interested in describing and understanding the rules that speakers do in fact follow.

1
1.1

The Miracle of Language: 'Infinite Use of Finite Means'

Any speaker can in principle construct an infinite number of sentences.

-There is no limit to the complexity of the sentences that we may in principle utter or understand: (1) a. John is asleep b. The President is asleep c. The chairman of the Linguistics Department is asleep a. The rightmost person in the first row is asleep. b. The person immediately to the left of the rightmost person in the first row is asleep c. The person behind the person immediately to the left of the rightmost person in the first row is asleep a. John is asleep b. Mary noticed that John is asleep c. Nobody cares that Mary noticed that John is asleep d. Sam knows that nobody cares that Mary noticed that John is asleep

(2)

(3)

-Note that if we modify the order of words in any of these sentences, or omit some of the words, we typically obtain sentences that are 'odd' or 'sound weird'. For this reason they will henceforth be preceded by a star: * As we will see, the fact that a sentence is 'odd' or 'sounds weird' indicates that a rule of the language has been violated. (4) (5) a. *asleep is John b. *President the is asleep a. *Rightmost person the in the first row is asleep. b. *The to the left of the rightmost person in the first row is asleep

P. Schlenker - Ling 1 - Introduction to the Study of Language

UCLA, Winter 2004

1.2

Speakers know (a finite number of) rules

-The puzzle, then, is this: how can human beings, who are finite creatures, have knowledge of an infinite number of sentences? The answer is: because they know rules, which they may apply repeatedly to form any number of new sentences. In this respect our knowledge of language is similar to our knowledge of integers. In principle there is no limit to the number of even integers that you may enumerate: 2, 4, 6, 8, etc. In this sense you know an infinite number of even integers. But of course you did not memorize them all! You know a rule that allows you to produce 'new' even integers from old ones. In this case the rule is: for any even integer E, E+2 is another even integer. -What is the longest sentence of English? Answer: there is none! For any sentence that you care to choose, you may construct a longer sentence by embedding it under 'Nobody cares that __'. Examples: (6) a. John is asleep Nobody cares that John is asleep b. Mary noticed that John is asleep Nobody cares that Mary noticed that John is asleep

This is our first example of a rule of English: A simple rule: If S is a sentence of English, Nobody cares that S is a sentence of English. Of course as stated this rule is very crude, but it does give us an idea of how we may have knowledge of a potentially infinite number of sentences. Notice that this rule can be iterated any number of times to produce an arbitrary number of new sentences: (7) a. John is asleep b. Nobody cares that John is asleep c. Nobody cares that nobody cares that John is asleep d. Nobody cares that nobody cares that nobody cares that John is asleep e. etc.

[Note that if all you have memorized is (a) the sentence 'John is asleep', and (b) the simple rule described above, you will still be able to produce a potentially infinite number of sentences, simply by repeating the procedure whose results are illustrated in (7)]

P. Schlenker - Ling 1 - Introduction to the Study of Language

UCLA, Winter 2004

Prescription vs. Description

When we speak of rules of grammar, we often mean prescriptive rules, i.e. rules that are intended to tell people how they should speak or write according to some pre-established (arbitrary) standard. Prescriptive rules are of dubious origin and have no linguistic justification. The linguist is solely interested in understanding descriptive rules, i.e. rules that govern the way in which people actually do speak. Every spoken language is governed by rules in this sense. This does not mean that every speaker of English follows exactly the same rules: English has a number different dialects, which are equally valuable but are nonetheless distinct. 2.1 Some Prescriptive Rules of English
[C. Phillips, University of Maryland]

Examples (8) Dont split infinitives! a. Do not say: I wanted to carefully explain to her why the decision was made. b. Say: I wanted to explain to her carefully why the decision was made. Dont use double negation! a. Do not say: I didn't do nothing b. Say: I didn't do anything

(9)

(10) Dont end a sentence with a preposition! a. Do not say: A preposition is not a good word to end a sentence with b. Say: A preposition is not a good word with which to end a sentence. (11) Dont use who in place of whom! a. Do not say: Who did you talk to? b. Say: Whom did you talk to? Some of these rules stem from an attempt to make English look like Latin. Thus in Latin an infinitive, being a single word, could never be split. But of course from this it does not follow that the same should hold of English, where 'to explain' is made of two words, not one. In any event, the linguist as a scientist has nothing to say about prescription. We will attempt to describe and understand the rules that speakers do in fact follow; we are interested in how people speak, not in how they should speak. Accordingly we distinguish between descriptive grammar and prescriptive grammar: Descriptive grammar has as its goal to describe what the native speakers of a language do (verbally) when they speak their language (the meaning of the word grammar as used in this course). Prescriptive grammar categorizes certain language uses as acceptable or unacceptable according to a standard form of the language (the meaning of grammar normally intended in English classes). An example: Use of slow vs. slowly and similar pairs of adjectives vs. adverbs (adjective form here refers to the word without -ly, adverb form refers to the word with -ly):

P. Schlenker - Ling 1 - Introduction to the Study of Language

UCLA, Winter 2004

Descriptive rule

Prescriptive rule

There is a certain overlap between the adjective and Use as an adjective a word which qualifies a noun. Use as an adverb a adverb classes, e.g. the adjective form slow may be word which qualifies as a verb. (Greever & Jones, The Century used as either adjective or adverb. However, when Collegiate Handbook, 1924) the adjective form is used as an adverb, it must follow the verb; only the adverb form is allowed preceding a verb. (Adapted from Quirk, et al., A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language, 1985)

You drive too slow! (conforms to descriptive account but violates prescriptive rule) You drive too slowly! (conforms to both descriptive and prescriptive accounts) He slowly negotiated the curves. (conforms to both descriptive and prescriptive accounts) *He slow negotiated the curves. (violates to both descriptive and prescriptive accounts) Relativity of Prescriptive Rules What is considered grammatically proper depends on historical circumstances that have nothing to do with purely linguistic or logical considerations. For instance, in contemporary French double negation is considered to be 'proper', while single negation is considered 'sloppy' - the opposite pattern from the one we find in English: (12) Contemporary French a. Il ne mange rien He NOT eats nothing 'He doesn't eat anything' b. Il mange rien He eats nothing 'He doesn't eat anything'

Prestige Dialect Spoken Language

'Double negation', or 'negative agreement' [also called 'negative concord] is a feature of African-American Vernacular English, as well as other varieties of English. 2.2 All spoken language is governed by rules!

What is considered 'sloppy' speech turns out to be governed by systematic rules. Here is one extreme example - a highly improper term which, in slang, can be inserted inside words, apparently in an arbitrary fashion: Example 1: fuckin-insertion (13) a. fan-fuckin-tastic b. abso-fucking-lutely c. Phila-fuckin-delphia d. Kalama-fuckin-zoo e. Pennsyl-fuckin-vania

P. Schlenker - Ling 1 - Introduction to the Study of Language

UCLA, Winter 2004

As it turns out, the process is systematic, as witnessed by the fact that an odd result is obtained when the term in question is inserted in different positions: (14) a. *fanta-fuckin-stic b. *absolute-fuckin-ly c. *Kala-fuckin-mazoo d. *Penn-fuckin-sylvania In fact, there is a systematic rule underlying the insertion of this term: as a first approximation, it may only be inserted right before a stressed syllable, represented in bold below: (15) a. fanTAstic fan-fuckin-tastic b. absoLUTEly abso-fucking-lutely c. PhilaDELphia Phila-fuckin-delphia Descriptive Rule: 'fuckin' can be inserted only before a stressed syllable.

Example 2: missing 'be' in African-American Vernacular English (AAVE, also called Black English Vernacular)
[W. Labov, 'The Case of the Missing Copula', in Gleitman & Liberman (eds), Language, 1995]

Note: The examples described below are by no means illustrative of the speech of all African-Americans, just of one dialect among others (these examples are reproduces because they were the object of an influential study by the sociolinguist Willian Labov]. (16) a. She the first one started us off (Dolly R., 35) b. He fast in everything he do (M, 16) c. Michael Washington out here selli' his rocks (F, 14, East Palo Alto) (17) a. Boot always comin' over my house to eat, to ax for food. (M, 10, South Harlem) b. He just feel like he gettin' cripple up from arthritis (F, 48, North Carolina) c. Y'all got her started now, she fixin' to give y'all a lecture! (F, 14, East Palo Alto) Hypothesis 1. 'Be' can be freely omitted in African-American English Hypothesis 2. 'Be' is not omitted in African-American English, but it is phonologically reduced - a more extreme form of the phenomenon found in standard varieties of English: John is nice John's nice Argument against Hypothesis 1: In some contexts, be cannot be omitted in AAVE

P. Schlenker - Ling 1 - Introduction to the Study of Language

UCLA, Winter 2004

(18) Imperative a. Be cool, brothers! [M, 15, South Harlem] b. Don't be messin' with my old lady! [M, 16, South Harlem] (19) Emphasis a. Allah is god [M, 16, South Harlem] b. He is a expert [M, 12, South Harlem] (20) Yes-no questions Is he dead? is he dead? Count the bullet holds in his motherfucking head. [M, 16, South Harlem] Argument in favor of Hypothesis 2: Be can 'disappear' in AAVE in exactly those contexts that permit elision of is to 's, am to 'm and are to 're in English. Other English dialects a. *He's as nice as he says he's b. *How beautiful you're! c. Are you going? *I'm d. *Here I'm. African American Vernacular English *He's as nice as he says he *How beautiful you! Are you going? *I. *Here I.

Although we have not explained what the precise rules are, it is clear that omission of be in AAVE is governed by strict rules. Conclusion: (i) Any spoken language is governed by rules. (ii) By knowing a finite number of rules, speakers can in principle utter or understand an infinite number of new sentences. (iii) The linguist is interested in descriptive rule, not in prescriptive rules.