胡壮麟语言学笔记1.docx

胡壮麟语言学笔记1.docx

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胡壮麟语言学笔记1

《语言学教程》重难点学习提示

第一章  语言的性质

语言的定义：

语言的基本特征（任意性、二重性、多产性、移位、文化传递和互换性）；语言的功能（寒暄、指令、提供信息、询问、表达主观感情、唤起对方的感情和言语行为）；语言的起源（神授说，人造说，进化说）等。

第二章    语言学

语言学定义；研究语言的四大原则（穷尽、一致、简洁、客观）；语言学的基本概念（口语与书面语、共时与历时、语言与言学、语言能力与言行运用、语言潜势与语言行为）；普通语言学的分支（语音、音位、语法、句法、语义）；；语言学的应用（语言学与语言教学、语言与社会、语言与文字、语言与心理学、人类语言学、神经语言学、数理语言学、计算语言学）等。

第三章    语音学

发音器官的英文名称；英语辅音的发音部位和发音方法；语音学的定义；发音语音学；听觉语音学；声学语音学；元音及辅音的分类；严式与宽式标音等。

第四章    音位学

音位理论；最小对立体；自由变异；互补分布；语音的相似性；区别性特征；超语段音位学；音节；重音（词重音、句子重音、音高和语调）等。

第五章  词法学

词法的定义；曲折词与派生词；构词法（合成与派生）；词素的定义；词素变体；自由词素；粘着词素（词根，词缀和词干）等。

第六章  词汇学

词的定义；语法词与词汇词；变词与不变词；封闭词与开放词；词的辨认；习语与搭配。

第七章  句法

句法的定义；句法关系；结构；成分；直接成分分析法；并列结构与从属结构；句子成分；范畴（性，数，格）；一致；短语，从句，句子扩展等。

第八章  语义学

语义的定义；语义的有关理论；意义种类（传统、功能、语用）；里奇的语义分类；词汇意义关系（同义、反义、下义）；句子语义关系。

第九章  语言变化

语言的发展变化（词汇变化、语音书写文字、语法变化、语义变化）；

第十章  语言、思维与文化

语言与文化的定义；萨丕尔-沃夫假说；语言与思维的关系；语言与文化的关系；中西文化的异同。

第十一章  语用学

语用学的定义；语义学与语用学的区别；语境与意义；言语行为理论（言内行为、言外行为和言后行为）；合作原则。

1.1.  Whatislanguage?

“Languageissystemofarbitraryvocalsymbolsusedforhumancommunication.Itisasystem,sincelinguisticelementsarearrangedsystematically,ratherthanrandomly.Arbitrary,inthesensethatthereisusuallynointrinsicconnectionbetweenawork（like“book”）andtheobjectitrefersto.Thisexplainsandisexplainedbythefactthatdifferentlanguageshavedifferent“books”:

“book”inEnglish,“livre”inFrench,inJapanese,inChinese,“check”inKorean.Itissymbolic,becausewordsareassociatedwithobjects,actions,ideasetc.bynothingbutconvention.Namely,peopleusethesoundsorvocalformstosymbolizewhattheywishtoreferto.Itisvocal,becausesoundorspeechistheprimarymediumforallhumanlanguages,developedor“new”.Writingsystemscamemuchlaterthanthespokenforms.Thefactthatsmallchildrenlearnandcanonlylearntospeak（andlisten）beforetheywrite（andread）alsoindicatesthatlanguageisprimarilyvocal,ratherthanwritten.Theterm“human”inthedefinitionismeanttospecifythatlanguageishumanspecific.

1.2.  Whataredesignfeaturesoflanguage?

“Designfeatures”hererefertothedefiningpropertiesofhumanlanguagethattellthedifferencebetweenhumanlanguageandanysystemofanimalcommunication.Theyarearbitrariness,duality,productivity,displacement,culturaltransmissionandinterchangeability

1.3.  Whatisarbitrariness?

By“arbitrariness”,wemeanthereisnologicalconnectionbetweenmeaningsandsounds（seeI.1）.Adogmightbeapigifonlythefirstpersonorgroupofpersonshaduseditforapig.Languageisthereforelargelyarbitrary.Butlanguageisnotabsolutelyseemtobesomesound-meaningassociation,ifwethinkofechowords,like“bang”,“crash”,“roar”,whicharemotivatedinacertainsense.Secondly,somecompounds（wordscompoundedtobeoneword）arenotentirelyarbitraryeither.“Type”and“write”areopaqueorunmotivatedwords,while“type-writer”islessso,ormoretransparentormotivatedthanthewordsthatmakeit.Sowecansay“arbitrariness”isamatterofdegree.

1.4.Whatisduality?

Linguistsrefer“duality”（ofstructure）tothefactthatinalllanguagessofarinvestigated,onefindstwolevelsofstructureorpatterning.Atthefirst,higherlevel,languageisanalyzedintermsofcombinationsofmeaningfulunits（suchasmorphemes,wordsetc.）;atthesecond,lowerlevel,itisseenasasequenceofsegmentswhichlackanymeaninginthemselves,butwhichcombinetoformunitsofmeaning.AccordingtoHuZhanglinetal.（p.6）,languageisasystemoftwosetsofstructures,oneofsoundsandtheotherofmeaning.Thisisimportantfortheworkingsoflanguage.Asmallnumberofsemanticunits（words）,andtheseunitsofmeaningcanbearrangedandrearrangedintoaninfinitenumberofsentences（notethatwehavedictionariesofwords,butnodictionaryofsentences!

）.Dualitymakesitpossibleforapersontotalkaboutanythingwithinhisknowledge.Noanimalcommunicationsystemenjoysthisduality,orevenapproachesthishonour.

1.5.Whatisproductivity?

Productivityreferstotheabilitytotheabilitytoconstructandunderstandanindefinitelylargenumberofsentencesinone’snativelanguage,includingthosethathasneverheardbefore,butthatareappropriatetothespeakingsituation.Noonehaseversaidorheard“Ared-eyedelephantisdancingonthesmallhotelbedwithanAfricangibbon”,buthecansayitwhennecessary,andhecanunderstanditinrightregister.Differentfromartisticcreativity,though,productivitynevergoesoutsidethelanguage,thusalsocalled“rule-boundcreativity”（byN.Chomsky）.

1.6.Whatisdisplacement?

“Displacement”,asoneofthedesignfeaturesofthehumanlanguage,referstothefactthatonecantalkaboutthingsthatarenotpresent,aseasilyashedoesthingspresent.Inotherwords,onecanrefertorealandunrealthings,thingsofthepast,ofthepresent,ofthefuture.Languageitselfcanbetalkedabouttoo.Whenaman,forexample,iscryingtoawoman,aboutsomething,itmightbesomethingthathadoccurred,orsomethingthatisoccurring,orsomethingthatistooccur.Whenadogisbarking,however,youcandecideitisbarkingforsomethingoratsomeonethatexistsnowandthere.Itcouldn’tbebow-wowingsorrowfullyfordomelostloveorabonetobelost.Thebee’ssystem,nonetheless,hasasmallshareof“displacement”,butitisanunspeakabletinyshare.

1.7.Whatisculturaltransmission?

Thismeansthatlanguageisnotbiologicallytransmittedfromgenerationtogeneration,butthatthedetailsofthelinguisticsystemmustbelearnedanewbyeachspeaker.Itistruethatthecapacityforlanguageinhumanbeings（N.Chomskycalledit“languageacquisitiondevice”,orLAD）hasageneticbasis,buttheparticularlanguageapersonlearnstospeakisaculturaloneotherthanageneticonelikethedog’sbarkingsystem.Ifahumanbeingisbroughtupinisolationhecannotacquirelanguage.TheWolfChildrearedbythepackofwolvesturnedouttospeakthewolf’sroaring“tongue”whenhewassaved.Helearnedthereafter,withnosmalldifficulty,theABCofacertainhumanlanguage.

1.8.Whatisinterchangeability?

Interchangeabilitymeansthatanyhumanbeingcanbebothaproducerandareceiverofmessages.Wecansay,andonotheroccasionscanreceiveandunderstand,forexample,“Pleasedosomethingtomakemehappy.”Thoughsomepeople（includingme）suggestthatthereissexdifferentiationintheactuallanguageuse,inotherwords,menandwomenmaysaydifferentthings,yetinprinciplethereisnosound,orwordorsentencethatamancanutterandawomancannot,orviceversa.Ontheotherhand,apersoncanbethespeakerwhiletheotherpersonisthelistenerandastheturnmovesontothelistener,hecanbethespeakerandthefirstspeakeristolisten.Itisturn-takingthatmakessocialcommunicationpossibleandacceptable.

Somemalebirds,however,uttersomecallswhichfemalesdonot（orcannot?

）,andcertainkindsoffishhavesimilarhapsmentionable.Whenadogbarks,alltheneighbouringdogsbark.Thenpeoplearoundcanhardlytellwhichdog（dogs）is（are0“speaking”andwhichlistening.

1.9.Whydolinguistssaylanguageishumanspecific?

Firstofall,humanlanguagehassix“designfeatures”whichanimalcommunicationsystemsdonothave,atleastnotinthetruesenseofthem（seeI.2-8）.Let’sborrowC.F.Hocket’sChartthatcompareshumanlanguagewithsomeanimals’systems,fromWangGang（1998,p.8）.

Secondly,linguistshavedonealottryingtoteachanimalssuchaschimpanzeestospeakahumanlanguagebuthaveachievednothinginspiring.Washoe,afemalechimpanzee,wasbroughtuplikeahumanchildbyBeatniceandAlanGardner.Shewastaught“AmericansignLanguage”,andlearnedalittlethatmadetheteachershappybutdidmotmakethelinguisticscirclehappy,forfewbelievedinteachingchimpanzees.

Thirdly,ahumanchildrearedamonganimalscannotspeakahumanlanguage,notevenwhenheistakenbackandtaughttolotoso（seethe“WolfChild”inI.7）

1.10.Whatfunctionsdoeslanguagehave?

Languagehasatleastsevenfunctions:

phatic,directive,Informative,interrogative,expressive,evocativeandperformative.AccordingtoWangGang（1988,p.11）,languagehasthreemainfunctions:

atoolofcommunication,atoolwherebypeoplelearnabouttheworld,andatoolbywhichpeoplelearnabouttheworld,andatoolbywhichpeoplecreateart.M.A.K.Halliday,representativeoftheLondonschool,recognizesthree“Macro-Functions”:

ideational,interpersonalandtextual（see!

.11-17;seeHUZhuanglinetal.,pp10-13,pp394-396）.1.  11Whatisthephaticfunction?

The“phaticfunction”referstolanguagebeingusedforsettingupacertainatmosphereormaintainingsocialcontacts（ratherthanforexchanginginformationorideas）.Greetings,farewells,andcommentsontheweatherinEnglishandonclothinginChineseallservethisfunction.Muchofthephaticlanguage（e.g.“Howareyou?

”“Fine,thanks.”）isinsincereiftakenliterally,butitisimportant.Ifyoudon'tsay“Hello”toafriendyoumeet,orifyoudon’tanswerhis“Hi”,youruinyourfriendship.

1.12.    Whatisthedirectivefunction?

The“directivefunction”meansthatlanguagemaybeusedtogetthehearertodosomething.Mostimperativesentencesperformthisfunction,e.g.,“Tellmetheresultwhenyoufinish.”Othersyntacticstructuresorsentencesofothersortscan,accordingtoJ.AustinandJ.Searle’s“indrectspeechacttheory”（seeHuZhuanglinetal.,pp271-278）atleast,servethepurposeofdirectiontoo,e.g.,“IfIwereyou,Iwouldhaveblushedtothebottomofmyears!

”

1.13.Whatistheinformativefunction?

Languageservesan“informationalfunction”whenusedt