An Introduction Course to Language - CTU.

CAN THO UNIVERSITY

SCHOOL OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES
Department of Linguistics & Culture

AN
INTRODUCTION COURSE
TO LANGUAGE

Bài Giảng
Dẫn Luận Ngôn Ngữ Tiếng Anh
(Anh Văn Bằng 2 ĐHCT)

Compiled and adapted by Nguyễn Hồng Quí, M.E.

Revised Edition-2022
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 1

PREFACE

This course is compiled from different sources of

materials including readings and exercises used in teaching the
introductory undergraduate course “An Introduction to
Language”.
The aim of this course is to help students majoring in
English have an overview about what language is, and then it
will help them be easier in studying all sub-fields of linguistics in
the final two years of their studying.
This course, which is mainly extracted from the book An
Introduction to Language by Victoria Fromkin, et al., (2003),
consists of two parts which are about The Nature of Human
Language and The Grammatical Aspects of Language. There are
six chapters in this course focusing on what language is, and the
major subfields of linguistics, namely Phonetics, Phonology,
Morphology, Syntax, Semantics, and Pragmatics.
We hope that this will be a useful and comprehensible
course to CTU students majoring in English so that they will be
successful in learning English linguistics.

Can Tho University, January 2022.

Compiler,

NH Quí
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 2

PART ONE
THE NATURE OF HUMAN LANGUAGE

Chapter 1
WHAT IS LANGUAGE?

1.1 Language
The possession of language distinguishes humans from other animals. To understand our
humanity, one must understand the nature of human language that makes us human and it
is considered as the source of human life and power.
1.1.1. The Definition of Language:

There are many definitions about language.

- Language is the method of human communication, either spoken or written,

consisting of the use of words in a structure and conventional way.

- Language is a system of words or signs that people use to express thoughts and
feelings to one another.

- Language is a system of communication, a medium for thought, and a social

interaction.

- Language is an arbitrary system of signals used to communicate in a community.

What is language?
Language is the system of human communication which consists of the structured
arrangement of sounds (or their written representation) into larger units, e.g. phonemes,
morphemes, words, sentences, and texts. In general, language is defined as an arbitrary
system of signals, which may be used of by a group of human as means of carrying out the
affairs in their society.
1.1.2. The Nature of Language

Nature is the basic constitution of a person or thing. The following nature can be seen in a
language.

- Language is a combination of sounds.

- Language consists of words having meanings.

 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 3

- Language follows grammatical structures.

- Language is based on aural and oral systems.

- Language can die (is still known and used in special contexts in written form) and
be extinct (a language that no longer has any speakers, or that is no longer in current
use.)

- Language can be diverse.

1.1.3. The Characteristics of Language

- Language is dynamic.

- Language has levels.

- Language is creative and unique.

- Language is a means of communication.

- Language identifies culture.

- Language is arbitrary. Language is said to be arbitrary because there is no necessary

or natural relationship between the words of a given language and the concepts that
they represent. Also, language is arbitrary because the rules for the combination of
signs in order to produce complete thoughts are different from one language to the
other, and no set of rules can claim to be the "right" one.
From the above definition, the following observations can be made:
a. Language is made up of signals which are signs having conventional meanings. The
signals of languages may be speech sounds, gestures, or other forms. However, among
them, speech sounds are greater in numbers and they are commonly used as the main
signals of human languages; and of course the speech sounds of one language may be
different from those of all the other languages. It should be noted here that the number of
speech sounds that can be produced and discriminated is unlimited, and that only a fraction
of these sounds is used in a certain language.
b. Each language has its own system of signals, and by system it means an orderly way in
which the signals of a language are selected and organized.
c. The system of signals of a language is arbitrary. The speakers of a language have no
choice in the selection and the organization of the signals they use. This has already been
done for them.
Arbitrary: this term refers to the fact that the meaning is not in a way predictable from the
form, nor is the form dictated by the meaning. In other words, form and meaning in
language are arbitrarily related. Thus, the meanings of a word must be learned.
The word fish, for example, does not sound like a fish or represent a fish in any logical
way. We know what the word fish refers to because we learn the word as English speakers.
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 4

Concept

fish [fi]

forms Reference
There is, however, some sound symbolism in a language. It means that the pronunciation
of some suggests the meaning. A few words in most languages are onomatopoeic-the
sounds of words supposedly imitate the sounds of nature. In other words, it is non-
arbitrary. This term refers to iconic forms which are directly representational of their
meaning.
d. Language is conventional. Indeed, the effectiveness of a language rests upon a kind of
unspoken public agreement that certain things will be done in definite ways. Language is
arbitrary, but you have to accept this arbitrariness or you will fail to communicate with
other members of your society.
e. Language must be learned. It is not something that is culturally transmitted, or
biologically inherited. Speech is a form of behavior that is social in origin and in
application.
With this kind of language, man is considered as the only talking creature on the earth. It is
true that some animals have their own signaling system or can use sounds to communicate,
but their cries can hardly be called articulation. And while certain birds can produce an
imitation of human speech, they communicate nothing by their parroting.

1.2 Linguistic Knowledge

When we know a language, we can speak and be understood by others who know that
language. This means we have the capacity to produce sounds that signify certain
meanings and to understand or interpret the sounds produced by others. This is the
knowledge about a language which is unconsciously present in the mind. This unconscious
knowledge of a language is also linguistic competence. It is considered as a person‟s
potential to speak a language, and that can be realized through linguistic performance.
Linguistic knowledge, for the most part, is not conscious knowledge. The linguistic system
- the sounds, structures, meanings, words, and rules for putting all together - is learned
subconsciously, with no awareness that rules are being learned.
As native speakers of English, people know a great deal about the English language.
However, suppose some people were asked to put all that knowledge down into a textbook
to be used to teach English to others, they would soon find out that they know perfectly
well how to speak English, but they are not consciously aware of most of that knowledge.
Linguists are interested in this hidden knowledge, which is called linguistic competence or
what native speakers know when they acquire a language. Linguistic knowledge consists
of different kinds of knowledge.
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 5

1.2.1. Knowledge of the Sound System

Knowing a language means knowing what sounds are in that language and what sounds
are not. This unconscious knowledge is revealed by the way speakers of one language
pronounce words from another language. Knowing the sound system of a language
includes more than knowing the inventory of sounds. It includes knowing which sounds
may start a word, end a word, and follow each other.
1.2.2. Knowledge of the Meaning of Words
Knowing a language means knowing that certain sound sequences signify certain concepts
or meanings. Speakers of English know what boy means and that it means something
different from toy and girl. Therefore, knowing a language means knowing how to relate
sounds and meanings.
1.2.3. Knowledge of Sentences and Non-sentences
When you know a language, your vocabulary is finite, and that can be stored. The
sentences in a language were not formed by putting one word after another in any random
order. When we read a sentence, our intuitive knowledge about what is or is not an allowed
sentence in the language suggests to us that the sentences are acceptable or not. It means
that we know where the words (with their formation) are in the sentence. This knowledge
also helps us form and understand an infinite set of new sentences. Thus, when we know a
language, we know the sounds, the words, and the rules of their combination.
1.2.4. The creativity of Linguistic Knowledge
Knowledge of a language enables us to combine words to form phrases, and phases to
form sentences. Thus, knowing a language means being able to produce new sentences
never spoken before and to understand sentences never heard before. With the linguistic
knowledge, we can make an infinite set of sentences.
i. You are right.

ii. I know that you are right.

iii. She knows that I know that you are right.

1.3 Linguistic Performance

Linguistic competence is what you know about the language. When we use this knowledge
in actual speech production and comprehension, this becomes our linguistic performance.
Linguistic competence isn‟t available to conscious thought. Thus, we can only find out
what it is like by observing speakers‟ linguistic performance and draw conclusions about
the knowledge that underlines it.
We can think of linguistic competence as being a person‟s potential to speak a language,
and his or her linguistic performance as the realization of that potential. The concepts as
linguistic knowledge or competence and linguistic performance can be compared with
something in our real life because we are unconscious of the physical rules that allow us to
stand, walk, or crawl on all fours, to jump, catch a ball, and ride a bicycle. We can have the
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 6

ability to ride a bike even when we are not using that ability and even though we aren‟t
fully aware of all the complex motor tasks and feats of balance and timing that are
involved. When we get on a bike and go, it is bicycling performance.
Suppose we are riding along, and you hit a bump and fall off. That does not mean we are
not a competent cyclist even though our competence is unfair. Maybe, we just haven‟t paid
attention to where we were going or it was dark and we couldn‟t see well. Linguistic
performance is quite similar. This is the ability to use linguistic competence in actual
speech production and comprehension. Speech usually contains lots of mistakes and
hesitations, but it doesn‟t mean that the competence underlying that speech is flawed.
Since competence can‟t be observed directly, linguists use linguistic performance as a
basis for drawing conclusion about what competence must be like.
When we speak, we usually have a certain message to convey. At some stages in the act of
producing speech, we must organize our thoughts into string of words. Errors occur,
though, and everyone produces speech errors or “the slip of the tongue”. This can be seen
in the following dialogue:

A: I‟d like the job.

B: We don’t hire dirt farmer.
A: Why not?
B: They soil the till. (They till the soil.)
Such errors are involuntary deviations from what we wish to say, and illustrate the
difference between linguistic knowledge and the way we use that knowledge in
performance.

1.4 Types of Grammar in Language

Grammar means a set of elements and rules that make up a language.
1.4.1 Mental Grammar
Mental grammar refers to the rules and principles that native speakers use in producing and
understanding their language. These rules and principles are almost all acquired in
childhood and are in the heads of native speakers. No one knows the precise form that
mental grammar takes because it cannot be directly observed. Because this is the native
linguistic competence, what can be observed is the output of a mental grammar – the
utterances that speakers use and recognize as sentences of their language.
1.4.2 Descriptive Grammar
This kind of grammar is created by linguists from a model of speaker‟s linguistic
competence. It describes how a language is actually spoken or written. This is the grammar
of an individual language written by linguists, which mirrors the mental grammar.
Descriptive grammar describes how people „actually‟ speak, whether or not they are
speaking „correctly‟. For examples, there are rules in descriptive grammar:
Adjectives precede the nouns they modify.; To form plural nouns, add –s.
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 7

1.4.3 Prescriptive Grammar

Prescriptive grammar states rules for what is considered the best or most correct usage.
This kind of grammar is often based not on description of actual usage but rather on the
grammarian‟s views of what is the best. These grammar rules are taught by so called
“language experts”. This kind of grammar tell people how they should speak to be well
educated. Some rules in prescriptive grammar:
Never end a sentence with a preposition.
Never split infinitive.
Never double negatives.
……
1.4.4 Teaching Grammar
Teaching grammar is the kind of grammar used to learn another language or dialect.
Teaching grammars are used in school to fulfill language requirement. They can be helpful
to people who do not speak the standard or prestige dialect. This kind of grammar states
explicitly the rules of language, lists the words and their pronunciations, and aids in
learning a new language or dialect. Teaching grammars assume that the students already
know one language and compare the grammar of the target language with the grammar of
the native language. Although teaching grammars might be considered prescriptive in the
sense that they attempt to teach the students what is or is not a grammar construction in the
new language, their aim is different from grammars that attempt to change the rules or
usage of a language already learned.

1.5 Language Universals (Universal Grammar)

The grammar of one language is different from that of the other languages. However, they
have a lot of things in common. This is called universal grammar which consists of a
number of facts pertaining to all languages (representing universal properties of language):
 Wherever humans exist, language exists.
 All languages are equally complex and equally capable of expressing any idea in
the universe.
 All languages change through time.
 The relationships between the sounds and meanings in spoken language and
between the gestures and sign meanings are arbitrary.
 All human languages utilize a finite set of discrete sounds (or gestures) that are
combined to form meaningful elements or words, which themselves form an
infinite set of possible sentences.
 All grammars contain rules for the formation of words and sentences in a similar
kind.
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 8

 Every spoken language includes discrete sound segments which belong to a class
of vowels or a class of consonants.
 Similar grammatical categories such as nouns, verbs… are found in every
language in the world.
 There are also semantic units that can be used to define the meaning of words.
 Every language has a way of referring to past time, negation …
 Language can be learned, and the speakers of that language can make an infinite
set of possible sentences.

1.6 Animal Language

Most animals possess some kinds of signaling communication system. Birds, bees, crabs,
and most other creatures communicate in some ways, but the information imparted is
limited and stimulus-bound, confined to a small set of messages.

1.7 Language and Linguistics

When using a language to communicate, we need three main factors: sounds, rules, and
meanings. They are essential factors because without one of them we can never
communicate. However, to be successful, we need to use language in a certain context.
This context factor helps us be successful in real communication. The relationship among
the language factors can be presented in the following chart:

Sounds Contexts Meanings

Rules
Linguistics is simply defined as the science of language. The word linguistics here means
descriptive linguistics because it proposes to describe scientifically the facts of language,
or what others call structural linguistics, thus emphasizing that language has structure and
that the description of language necessarily is a description of its structure.

Spoken language

Structure  Pragmatics  Use

Sounds Grammar Meaning

Phonetics Phonology Morphology Syntax Semantics

 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 9

(The structure of spoken language from Crystal 1997)

Phonetics (the sounds of language): is a branch of linguistics that studies how humans
make and perceive sounds. It studies human speech sounds in general with no particular
reference to any language.
Phonology (the sound patterns of language): is a branch of linguistics which studies the
system of sound patterns of a language.
Morphology (the word formation of language): is a branch of linguistics which studies
and analyzes the structure of words and parts of words in language.
Syntax (the sentence patterns of language): is a branch of linguistics which studies the
set of rules, principles, and processes that govern the structure of sentences.
Semantics (the literal meaning of language): is a branch of linguistics which deals with
the study of literal meaning of language.
Pragmatics (the contextual meaning of language): is a branch of linguistics that studies
the ways in which context contributes to meaning (language in use with non-literal
meaning).
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 10

QUESTIONS
1. What is language? Analyze its definition and its nature.
2. What does knowing a language mean?
3. What is linguistics? Who needs to study linguistics? Why?
4. Make clear the following opinion with examples:
Language is different from linguistics.
5. Explain the following opinion:
“Language is the means of communication; however, acquiring the native
language (mother tongue) is different from learning a foreign language.”
6. Consider the two sentences:
I learned a new word today.
I learned a new sentence today.
Do you think the two statements are equally probable, and if not, why not?
7. Describe the terms arbitrary and non-arbitrary with examples.
8. In what ways do compounds words like blackboard show a degree of non-
arbitrariness in their form-meaning connection? Is it true for all compound words?
9. What do you know about the nature of language through the following dialogue?
A: We need some more words for our language.
What are we going to call that big bird-thing with the leathery wings?
B: What about PTERODACTYL?
A: PTERODACTYL!
B: Well. What do you want to call it?
A: RON.
B: RON!
A: Well. At least people will be able to spell it.
10. Although sounds and meanings of most words in all languages are arbitrarily
related, there are some communication systems in which the “signs” unambiguously
reveal their “meanings”.
a. Describe (or draw) five different signs that directly show what they mean.
b. Describe any other communication system that, like language, consists of
arbitrary symbols.
11. Give examples to prove that native speakers unconsciously know what sounds in
their language and what sounds are not.
12. Describe the differences between linguistic competence and linguistic performance.
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 11

13. State whether the following rules are descriptive and /or prescriptive.
a. The possessive form for everyone is his and her. Do not say “Everyone
brought their lunch”, but rather “Everyone bought his or her lunch.”
b. Never end a sentence with a preposition.
c. The vowel sound in the word suit is produced with rounded lips.
d. Never use double negatives.
e. “It’s me.” is ungrammatical; “It’s I.” is the correct way to say this.
f. “Between you and me” is correct; “Between you and I” is ungrammatical.
14. What type of grammar is it when someone says: “I want to talk like a lady.”
15. State some rules of grammar that you have learned is the correct way to say
something, but that you do not generally use in speaking. For example, you may
have heard that „It’s me’ is incorrect and that the correct form is „It’s I’.
Nevertheless, you always use „me’ in such sentences and your friends do also, and
in fact, „It’s I’ sounds odd to you.
Write a short essay presenting arguments against someone who tells you that you
are wrong. Discuss how this disagreement demonstrates the difference between
descriptive and prescriptive grammar.
16. What do the barking of dogs, the meowing of cats and the singing of birds have in
common with human language? What are some of the basic differences?
17. Suppose you taught a dog to heel, sit up, beg, rollover, play dead, stay, jump, and
bark on command, using italicized words as cues. Would you be teaching a
language? Why or why not?
18. Comment on the opinion:
“A dog may bark eloquently, but he can not tell you that his parents were honest
though poor.”
19. What do you know about transfer in learning a new language? Is that a big problem
that we have to face when learning English as a new language? Why?
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 12

W. C.

MAN WOMAN

( NAM) ( VỢ NAM )

ARBITRARY NON_ARBITRARY
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 13

PART TWO
THE GRAMMATICAL ASPECTS OF LANGUAGE

Chapter 4
MORPHOLOGY: The Words of Language

Words are an important part of linguistic knowledge and constitute a component of our
mental grammar. Without words, we would be unable to convey our thought through
language.
4.1 Words in Language
4.1.1 Definition of Words
There are different definitions of what a word is. However, it is generally believed that
A word is the smallest meaningful linguistic units which can occur on its own in speech
and writing. Words are meaningful units that can be combined to form phrases and
sentences. When a speaker hears a word in his language, he has an immediate association
with a particular meaning. In fact, when people master the words of a language, they know
a lot of things that relate to words.
First of all, they know how to produce speech sounds though they may have never had to
really think about the mechanism of doing so.
Besides the ability in producing and perceiving the sounds of their language, native
speakers of a language know how those sounds work together as a system. Thus, it means
that they know which sounds may start a word, end a word, and follow each other.
Thirdly, they know how words are structured, and have ability to distinguish between
acceptable or unacceptable forms.
Fourthly, their competence also allows them to determine when a sentence has one
meaning or more than one meaning.
Fifthly, knowledge of a language enables them to combine words to form phrases and
phrases to form sentences and even larger units as texts. They are able to form and produce
sentences they have never spoken before, and to understand sentences never heard before.
This is part of creative aspect of language use.
Finally, their understanding of the meaning of sentences and larger utterances also involves
an understanding of how the content of those utterances influences their meaning.
4.1.2 Classes of Words in Language
In a language there are two main classes of words: content words and function words.
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 14

a. The content words in English are nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs which make up
the largest part of the vocabulary. The content words of a language are sometimes called
the open class of lexical items because we can and regularly do add new words to them.
For example, new verbs like to decriminalize, to jackpot, to breathalyse have been added
to the English language in the last few years.
b. Other categories are called grammatical words or function words. Conjunctions,
prepositions, articles, and pronouns have been referred to as closed classes. These words
belong to the closed classes because the number is limited and we can never invent or form
new words.

4.2 Morphemes: The minimal units of meaning

4.2.1 Definition of Morphemes
Although many people think of words as the basic meaningful elements of a language,
many words can be broken down into smaller meaningful units which are called
morphemes.
Morpheme is the smallest meaningful units of language. By smallest we mean that a
morpheme cannot be divided any further into smaller recognizable or meaningful parts.
Morphemes are designated in { } braces.
The word untrue has two morphemes because both {un} and {true} have meanings. In
contrast, in the word under, there is only one morpheme. This is a mono-morphemic word.
If you try to cut up under further, you are left with two meaningless elements.
The word walked is bi-morphemic because there are two morphemes in this word: {walk}
and {-ed}. We call {-ed} in this word a morpheme because it has a grammatical function
(It is used to express the past tense).
A single word may be composed of one or more morphemes:
one morpheme: boy
desire
two morphemes: boy+ish
desire+able
three morphemes: boy+ish+ness
desire+able+ity
four morphemes: gentle+man+li+ness
un+desire+abe+ity
There are some problems with the definition of morphemes although it is right for most
morphemes in a language. Some morphemes are not meaningful in isolation but acquire
meaning only in combination with other specific morphemes. For example, in the words
like cranberry, huckleberry, the berry part has no problems, but {cran} and {huckle} occur
only with {berry}. The morpheme {cran} when joined with {berry} has the meaning of a
special kind of berry which is small, red and acidic.
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 15

In the words audible, audition and auditorium, the bound root morpheme {audi-} never
occurs alone.
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 16

4.2.2 Classification of Morphemes

Morphemes

Free Morphemes Bound Morphemes

Content words Function words Affixes Bound roots Contracted forms

Position Function
Pre. Inf. Suf. Deri. Inflec.
book but undo … doer useful works audible I‟ll, you‟re

a. Free and bound morphemes

Morphemes are commonly classified into free and bound ones. Morphemes such as {boy},
{desire}, {gentle}, and {man} can constitute words by themselves. They are called free
morphemes. Other morphemes like {–ish},{-ness},{dis-},and {un} are called bound
morphemes because they cannot occur unattached. They always have to be bound to other
morphemes.
An affix is a type of bound morphemes. All affixes can only exist when attached to some
other morpheme(s). Affixes can be classified differently according to their positions or
their functions.
According to the positions, in English there are two types of affixes: prefixes and suffixes.
rewrite, undo, amoral
teacher, beautiful, walked
According to the functions, in English there are two types of affixes: derivational and
inflectional affixes. Derivational affixes are used to form new words. They can be both
prefixes and suffixes. For example, they are {un-} in untie, {-er} in worker, {-ly} in
quickly. Inflectional morphemes, which are bound morphemes, do not create new lexeme.
They are only used to make a word to fit into its context (phrase or clause). For example, it
is the morpheme {–s} in the sentence “Bill walks to school everyday”.
b. Lexical and grammatical morphemes
Lexical morphemes are used for the construction of new words, such as {black} and {bird}
in blackbird, and affixes such as {un-}, {-ise}, {-dom}, {-less}. Lexical morphemes carry
the semantic content.
Grammatical morphemes express grammatical relationships between a word and its
contexts such as plurality and past tense (i.e. the inflections of words). Grammatical
morphemes which are separate words are called function words (articles, pronouns, and
conjunctions).
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 17

Morphemes

grammatical M lexical M

function words inflectional affixes content words derivational affixes

c. Derivational and inflectional morphemes

Derivational morphemes are bound morphemes that add new meanings to an existing
word. They are called derivational morphemes because when they are conjoined to other
morphemes (or word), a new word is derived, or formed. This derived word may even be
in a different grammatical word class from the un-derived word.
In general, derivational morphemes help to change the part of speech of the words they
attach to.
Noun to adjective: boy +{ish} = boyish, health +{ful} = healthful
Verb to noun: sing + {er} = singer, predict + {ion} = prediction
Adjective to adverb: exact + {ly} = exactly, quite +{ly} = quietly
Noun to verb: moral + {ise} = moralise, vaccin(e) +{ate} = vaccinate
Some derivational morphemes do not cause a change in grammatical class. Many prefixes
and suffixes fall into this category.
{a} + moral = amoral, {ex} + wife = ex-wife,{re} + print = reprint, {un} + do = undo
green + {ish} = greenish, commun + {ist} = communist, music + {ian} = musician
Inflectional morphemes are bound morphemes that serve a purely grammatical function.
They never create a new word but only a different form of the same word. Inflectional
morphemes never change the syntactic category of the words or morphemes to which they
are attached.
Noun inflectional suffixes:
1) Plural marker {–s }: (The girls are here.)
2) Possessive marker {‘s } (Mary’s books.)
Verb inflectional suffixes
3) Third personal present singular marker {–s } (He bakes well.)
4) Past tense marker {–ed } (They wanted beer.)
5) Progressive marker {–ing } (They are singing.)
6) Past participle marker {–en } or {–ed } (She has eaten dinner.)
Adjective inflectional affixes
7) Comparative marker {–er } (She is faster than you.)
8) Superlative marker {–est } (She is the fastest.)
An interesting thing about inflectional morphemes in English is that they typically follow
derivational morphemes. However, with compounds the situation is complicated. For many
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 18

speakers, the plural of mother-in-law is mothers-in-law. Whereas, the possessive form of

mother-in-law is mother-in-law’s.
In English, some grammatical relations can be expressed either inflectionally
(morphologically) or syntactically. We can see the option in the following sentences:
The girl’s book is blue. The book of the girl is blue.
He loves books. He is a lover of books.
He is hungrier than Tom. He is more hungry than Tom.
4.2.3 Morphological Analysis (ways to identify morphemes)
There are three kinds of morphemes: roots, prefixes, and suffixes of which words are
composed. They can be put together to build the structure that we call a word.
The word blaze has only one morpheme.
The word cheerful is composed of two morphemes with the division between them.
The word with three or more morphemes is not made up by a string of individual
morphemes. It is built with a hierarchy of twosomes. Each twosome is the layer of
structure by which a word has been composed. We can make successive division into two
parts, each of which is called immediate constituent. This division is called Immediate
Constituent (I.C.) division.
Morphemes are added in fixed order, which reflects the hierarchical structure of the
word. For example, the word ungentlemanly consists of four morphemes and can be
formed as follows:
un gentle man ly

un gentle man ly
Words have a special type of structure characterized as hierarchical since they are formed
by steps. This hierarchical structure can be schematically represented by means of a tree
that indicates the steps involved in the formation of the word, i.e., which morphemes are
joined together first and so on.
Some words are ambiguous in that they have more than one meaning. When we examine
their internal structure, we find an explanation for this: their structure may be analyzed in
more than one way as in unlockable, nonsmoker…
The word unlockable could mean either able to be unlocked or not able to be locked. Thus,
there are two prefixes that sound like {un-} in English. The first {un-} combines with an
adjective to form a new adjective which means not. The second prefix {un-} combines
with a verb to form a new verb which means do the reverse of. The way of forming
unlockable is schematized in the following trees:
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 19

---1---
----2---
---3---
un lock able un lock able

4.3 Basic Concepts in Morphology

4.3.1 Roots
The root is that part of a word which carries the main meaning and which is left after all
affixes have been removed. In the word meaningfulness, for instance, removing {–ing},
{-ful}, and {–ness} leaves the root mean.
Most of the roots in the English language are free. It means that they can stand by
themselves in isolation. For example, they are the free roots {work} in worker, {beauty} in
beautiful.
Some English roots are bound because we can never find them in isolation.
{audi-} audio, audience, auditorium (hear)
{-vert}: convert, revert, subvert, intravert, pervert (turn)
{-mit}: transmit, commit, remit, admit, omit, submit (send)
{-ceive}: conceive, perceive, receive, deceive (seize)
4.3.2 Bases
There is a problem when there are more than two morphemes in a word. For example, the
word depolarization can be divided in to the root pole and the affixes {de-}, {-ar}, {-ize},
{-tion}. However, with a basic analysis like this, the morphemes appear to be simply
linked together into a chain forming the whole word. It might give us the false impression
that {de-} can be combined with pole or polar to yield the word depole or depolar, which
is ungrammatical. In fact, this word is formed by specific hierarchical structures.
polar + ize = polarize
polarize + ation = polarization
de + polarization = depolarization
In this situation, we should distinguish a unit which may be neither root nor word. It is just
a unit that a particular affix is attached to which is called a base.
A base is a part of a word to which affixes can be added. A root like boy can be a base
since it takes the inflectional affix {–s} (boys), or a derivational suffix like {-ish} turning
the noun boy into the adjective boyish. In the word educational, educate is the root, but
education is the base.
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 20

4.3.3 Morphs
We know that a morpheme is the smallest unit of a word which is meaningful or has
grammatical function. Morphemes are abstract units. They exist only in our minds, and in
speech we use sounds to pronounce them. Put differently, morphemes are realized in
speech by sounds. For example, the group of sounds representing the morpheme {leave} in
speech as [liv], and the sounds of the two morphemes {leave} and {s} appear in speech as
[liv] + [z]. We call the sound or group of sounds that represents one morpheme the morph
of that morpheme. In this way the morph of the morpheme {leave} is [liv], and in leaves
the morph of the plural morpheme {–s} is [z].
4.3.4 Allomorphs
Most morphemes are realized by only one possible kind of morph, but some morphemes
may have different pronunciations (that is, different phonetic realizations). We call the
various possible morphs of a morpheme its allomorphs (allo- is a prefix meaning various,
different). Allomorphs are variant phonological representations of the same morpheme.
When we wish to refer to a minimal meaningful form merely as a form, we use the term
morph. In the words incorrect, illegal, irregular, impossible, in-, ir-, il-, ir- are the
allomorphs of the negation morpheme {iN-}.
4.3.5 The Pronunciation of Morphemes
A single sound may have different pronunciations (phonetic forms) in different contexts.
Different pronunciations of vowels occur in English, depending on whether they are
stressed or unstressed.
The particular phonetic forms of some morphemes are determined by regular phonetic
rules that refer only to the phonemic context.
[ ] melody harmony symphony
[ ] melodious harmonious symphonious
[ ] melodic harmonic symphonic

Another example of morphemes in English with different phonetic forms is the plural
morpheme. The plural morpheme {-s} may be pronounced as [s], [z], or [z] in different
contexts depending on the preceding sound. The regular past tense morpheme in English
may be pronounced as [t], [d], or [d] depending on the preceding sound.

4.3.6 Morphophonemes
Morphophonemes are variations in the form of morphemes because of phonetic factors.
The morphophoneme { -S} may be pronounced as [s], [z], [z] in books, pens, boxes.

The morphophoneme {leaF} may be pronounced as [lif] or [liv] in leaf, leaves.

 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 21

4.4 Word Formation Processes

Most new words are formed in a productive way, but some of them belong to the non-
productive one. The two most common English word formation processes are derivational
process and coining process. Other word formation processes include arbitrary process and
loaning process.
4.4.1 Non-Productive Means
Some words are formed by adding prefixes or suffixes but they are non-productive. It
means that they can be applied only to certain words in the language.
cranberry, huckleberry.
4.4.2 Productive Means
4.4.2.1 Derivational Process (by using affixes)
Words formed by the combination of bound affixes and free morphemes are the result of
the process of affixation. The form that results from the addition of a derivational
morpheme is called a derived word. Although English uses only prefixes and suffixes,
many other languages use infixes which are inserted within the root morpheme as well.
These derivational morphemes are added in a fixed order. This reflects the hierarchical
structure of the word.
In English, suffixation usually change the class of words to which they attach:
work + {er} = worker (verb  noun)
beauty + {ful} = beautiful (noun adjective)
slow + {ly} = slowly (adjective  adverb)
modern + {ize} = modernize (adjective  verb)
Most English prefixes maintain the class of words to which they attach:
{im} + polite = impolite (adjective)
{re} + do = redo (verb).
Lexicon Gaps in English
Lexicon is the mental system which contains all information a person knows about words.
People‟s knowledge of a word includes:
a. The ways to pronounce words.
b. The grammatical patterns with which a word is used.
c. The meaning(s) of the word.
The total sets of words a speaker knows forms his mental lexicon.
New words may enter the dictionary by adding derivational morphemes. They can be
created by the application of morphological rules.
Some of the morphological rules are productive. They can be used freely to form new
words from the list of free and bound morphemes
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 22

Verb+{able} (able to be VERB-ed) acceptable = able to be accepted

{In}+Adj (not Adjective) incorrect = not correct
There is a phenomenon called lexicon gap when we form new words based on our
linguistic knowledge. Those “new words” haven‟t existed in the language because there is
no union between form and meaning.
First of all, they can be words with possible sound sequence but have no meaning. For
example, the group “blaft” is a possible word because the order of sounds in the word
satisfies the phonological constraint of English sounds.
a stop + liquid + vowel + fricative + stop
However, words in languages are for the most part arbitrary. Each form has its
conventional meaning. The group “blaft” does not exist in the English language. Thus, the
form is possible but there is no meaning.
Secondly, there may be possible combination of morphemes which has not been made.
They may have meaning and can be understood by listeners; however, that word has not
existed in the language. These forms may be merely accidental gaps in the lexicon.
uglify, unsad
No dictionary can list all the possible words in a language, so there are always gaps in the
lexicon – words that are not in the dictionary but that can be added. Accidental gaps are
well-formed but non-meaning words.
No speakers of a language know all the words. With the knowledge of morphemes of the
language and the morphological rules, we can often guess the meaning of a word we do not
know. Sometimes, we have wrong guesses as in the case of stalemate, which can be
interpreted as husband or wife no longer interested.

4.4.2.2 Word Coinage (by using existing words)

Words may be added to the vocabulary of the language by the derivational process. New
words also enter a language in a variety of other ways from existing words.
1. Compoundings
Compounding is a process that forms new words not from bound affixes but from two or
more independent words. The words that are parts of the compound can be free
morphemes, words derived by affixation, or even words formed by compounding
themselves.
There is almost no limit on the kinds of combinations that occur in English, as the
following list of compounds:
- adjective - noun - verb
Adjective bittersweet poorhouse highborn
Noun headstrong rainbow spoon-feed
Verb carryall pickpocket sleepwalk
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 23

2. Back-formations
New words may be formed from existing words by subtracting an affix thought to be part
of the old word; that is, ignorance sometimes can be creative. Thus, peddle was derived
from peddler on the mistaken assumption that the {er} was the agentive suffix. Such words
are called back-formation because they were morphologically interpreted incorrectly. The
majority of back-formations in English are verbs.
hawker  hawk stoker  stoke,
swindler  swindle editor  edit
transcription  transcript escalator  escalate
3. Clippings
In informal language polysyllabic words are often shorten into one single syllable. This
shortening is known as clipping or abbreviation. Abbreviation of longer words may
become lexicalized and used as the whole word. In this way of forming new words,
different parts of words can be clipped.
The first part is clipped: telephone phone.
The last part is clipped: demonstration  demo.
The beginning and the end are clipped: refrigerator  fridge
condo < condominium
rehab < rehabilitation
fax < facsimile
burger < hamburger
venture < adventure
car < motorcar
flu < influenza
Clipping is different from back-formation in that clipped words are made without
regarding to derivational analogy.
4. Blends
A blend is a new word made out of the shorten forms of two words. The process can be
viewed as a combination of clipping and compounding. However, blends are less than
compounds.
smoke + fog = smog, motor +hotel = motel, breakfast + lunch = brunch
5. Acronyms
Acronyms are words derived from the initials of several words. They are pronounced as
the spelling indicates. Many words of this kind begin by being their lives written with
uniform capitals and a dot. Some acronyms are written with uniform lower-case letters
from the beginning. They only gradually attain the status and shape of ordinary words after
constant use.
World Health Organization  W.H.O.  WHO.
radio detection and ranging  radar.
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 24

6. Words from names

The creativity of words in English is also revealed by the number of words in the English
vocabulary that derive from proper names of individuals or places.
sandwich, jumbo, jeans.
4.4.2.3 Other Ways to Form New Words
1. Reduplication
Reduplication is a process of forming new words either by doubling the entire free
morpheme (total free duplication) or pat of it (partial duplication). English makes use of
reduplication very sporadically. The most commonly use of reduplication are:
(i) to imitate sounds, e.g. tick-tock
(ii) to suggest alternating movements, e.g. seesaw
(iii) to disparage by suggesting instability, nonsense, insincerity, etc. e.g. wishy-washy
(iv) to intensify, e.g. tip-top

2. Conversion
Conversion is the process by which a word belongs to one word class gets used as part of
another word class without the addition of an affix. Words produced by conversions are
mainly nouns, verbs, and adjectives.
- Verb  noun: swim, cheat, bore, bounce.
- Noun  verb: fingerprint, highlight, holiday.
- Adjective  verb: dirty, empty, dry.
- Adjective  noun: bitter, regular, wet.
- Noun  adjective: cotton, average, chief.
Usually the newly-created word does not keep all the different original senses of the input
word. The noun paper, for instance, has various senses such as newspaper, wallpaper, and
academic articles, yet the verb to paper relates only to wallpaper (to paper the walls of the
room).
Conversion includes cases where the base undergoes some slight phonological or
orthographic change.
Shelf (n)  shelve (v), mouth /mau/ (n)  mouth /mau/ (v)

Permit /pmit/ (v)  permit /p:mit/ (n)

Naturally, if you don‟t know the history of a word, it is difficult to decide which word was
the input and which one was the output.
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 25

3. Borrowing
One of the most common sources of new words in English is the process simply called
borrowing, that is, the taking over of words from other languages. Through history, the
English language has adopted a vast numbers of words from other languages.
Croissant (French), dope (Dutch), piano (Italian), sofa (Arabic), yogurt (Turkish)…
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 26

QUESTIONS
1. What is morphology? What do we study in morphology?
Why do we need to study morphology?
2. What do we base on to recognize morphemes in English words?
3. Split the following words up into morphemes:
a. retroactive b. befriended
c. televise d. margin
e. endearment f. psychology
g. unpalatable h. holiday
i. grandmother j. morphemic
k. cursive k. Wollongong
4. Below are some data from Samoan:
manao (he wishes.) mananao (they wish.)
matua (he is old.) matutua (they are old.)
malosi (he is strong.) malolosi (they are strong.)
punou (he bends.) punonou (they bend.)
atamaki (he is wise.) atamamaki (they are wise.)
savali (he travels.) pepese (they sing.)
laga (he weaves.)
a. Give the Samoan for:
i. They weave. ii. They travel. iii. He sings.
b. Formulate a general statement (a morphological rule) that states how to form the
plural form from the singular verb form.
5. Consider the following data from Ewe:
Ewe English
uwa ye xa amu The chief look at a child.
uwa ye xa ufi The chief looked at a tree.
uwa xa ina ye A chief looked at the picture.
amu xa ina A child looked at a picture.
amu ye vo ele ye The child wanted the chair.
amu xa ele ye A child looked at the chair.
ika vo ina ye A woman wanted the picture.
a. Which morpheme means the?
b. Which morpheme means a? (xa, amu, ye, none of these)
c. List all the morphemes occurring in the Ewe sentences above.
d. How would you say The woman looked at the tree?
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 27

e. If Oge de abo means A man drank wine, what would the Ewe sentence
meaning A man wanted the wine be?
6. Consider the following data from the Bantu language:
[ enato] a canoe [ akaato] little canoe
[ enapo] a house [ akaapo] little house
[ enobi] [ akaoobi]
an animal little animal
[ akapipi]
[ empipi] a kidney little kidney
[ akakoosa]
[ ekoosa] a feather little feather
[ akabaammo]
[ emmaammo] a peg little peg
[ akagoomme]
[ eoomme] a horn little horn
a garden [ akadimiro] little garden
[ ennimiro]
a stranger [ akatabi] little branch
[ enugeni]
 Hint: The phonemic representation of the morpheme meaning little is aka.

b. Are the nasal vowels in Luganda phonemic? Are they predictable? Why?
c. Is the phonemic representation of the morpheme meaning garden /dimiro/?Why?
d. What is the phonemic representation of the morpheme meaning canoe?
e. If /am/ represents a bound prefix morpheme in Luganda, can you conclude that
[amdano] is a possible phonetic form of a word in this language starting with this
prefix? Why (not)?
f. If the phonemic representation of the word meaning little boy is [akapoobe], give
the phonemic and phonetic representations for a boy.
7. What can you say about the kind of language that Russian belongs to through the
following data?
Maksim zasisajet Viktora.
Zasisajet Maksim Viktora.
Zasisajet Viktora Maksim.
Viktora zasisajet Maksim.
Maksim Viktora zasisajet.
Viktora Maksim zasisajet.
*(Hints: all the above Russian sentences mean Maxim defends Victor.)

8. Write the one proper description from B for the italicized part of each word in A.
a. terrorized 1. free root
b. uncivilized 2. bound root
c. terrorize 3. inflectional suffix
d. lukewarm 4. derivational suffix
e. impossible 5. inflectional prefix
6. derivational prefix
7. inflectional infix
8. derivational infix
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 28

9. What kind of language does English belong to - word order or inflectional one?
Why?
10. Explain the opinion: “The knowledge about English morphemes according to
functions helps us a lot in forming English grammatical sentences.”
11. What does mastering the words in a language mean?
Give examples to prove that native speakers master the words in their language.
12. What are the ways to form new words from the existing ones?
13. Below are listed some words followed by incorrect definitions. For each of these
incorrect definitions, give some possible reasons for the students‟ wrong
guesses.
a. longevity being very tall
b. polyglot more than one glot
c. homogeneous devoted to home life
d. deciduous able to make up one’s mind
e. stalemate husband or wife no longer interested
f. tenet a group of ten people
g. ingenious not very smart
14. State the way from which the following words are formed.
a. Pasteurize c. V.C.R. e. I.Q. g. O.K.
b. monokini d. televise f. bike h. S.R.V.
15. Draw the immediate constituent (IC) tress diagrams of the following words:
a. uncontrollably
b. unaffordable
c. irreplaceability
d. international
e. victimization
f. educationally
g. morphological
h. unluckily
i. palatalized
j. antiprovincialisms
16. Prove that the following words have different meanings: unchattable, unzippable
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 29

BIBLIOGRAPHY

 Brain Partridge, (2008) Discourse Analysis - An Introduction. Continuum, London.

 Crystal, David. (1997) A dictionary of linguistics and phonetics. 4th edition.
Cambridge, MA: Blackwell.
 Delahunty, Gerald P. Language, Grammar, and Communication. McGraw-Hill, Inc.
 Francis, W. Nelson, The structure of American English. New York: Ronald Press,
1958.
 Fromkin, V. et al (2003) An Introduction to Language. Habourt Brace, Australia.
 Fromkin, V. et al (2002) Linguistics - An Introduction to Linguistic Theory.
Blackwell Publishing. U.K.
 Huynh, Trung Tin, (2001) An Introduction Course To Language. Can Tho
University, VN.
 Jacobs, R. A. (1995) English Syntax. Oxford University Press.
 Jackson, H. Analyzing English. Second Edition, Pergamon Institute of English.
 Jannedy, S. et al (1994) Language Files. Ohio State University Press.
 Yule, George. (2010) The Study of Language. Cambridge University Press.
 Laurel J. Brinton, (200) The Structure of Modern English A Linguistic.
 Nguyen, Thu Huong (2000) English Syntax. Can Tho University, Can Tho City.
 Nguyen, Van Huy. An Introduction to English Syntax. University of Hue.
 Nguyen, Van Huy. An Introduction to English Morphology. University of Hue.
 Richards, J. C. (1992) Language Teaching and Applied Linguistics. Longman, UK.
 Trask, R. L. (1999) Key Concepts in Language and Linguistics. Routledge, London
and New York.
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 30

CONTENTS
Preface
Part one: The Nature of Human Language
Chapter 1 - What is Language?
1.1 Language
1.2 Linguistic Knowledge
1.3 Linguistic Performance
1.4 Types of Grammar in Language
1.5 Language Universals
1.6 Animal Language
1.7 Language and Linguistics
Part two: The Grammatical Aspects of Language
Chapter 2 - PHONETICS: The Sounds of Language
2.1 What is Phonetics?
2.2 The Sounds of Speech
2.3 Components of Human Speech Production
2.4 Articulation and Description of Consonants
2.5 Articulation and Description of Vowels
2.6 The Phonetic Alphabets
Chapter 3 - PHONOLOGY: The Sound Patterns of Language
3.1 Phonemes
3.2 How to Solve Phonological Problems
3.3 Sequences of Phonemes
3.4 Natural Classes
3.5 Phonological Rules
3.6 Prosodic Phonology
Chapter 4 - MORPHOLOGY: The Words of Language
4.1 Words in the Language
4.2 Morphemes
4.3 Basic Concepts in Morphology
4.4 Word Formation Processes
 An Introduction Course to Language - CTU. 31

Chapter 5 - SYNTAX: The Sentence Patterns of Language

5.1 Grammatical Sentences
5.2 Sentence Properties
5.3 Syntactic Analysis
5.4 Phrase Internal Structures
5.5 English Phrases
5.6 English Clauses
5.7 Constituent Structure Trees of Phrases in Generative Grammar
5.8 Constituent Structure Trees of Sentences in Generative Grammar
Chapter 6 – SEMANTICS & PRAGMATICS: The Meaning of Language
6.1 Semantics
6.2 Phrase and Sentence Meaning
6.3 Pragmatics
Bibliography
Contents