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Parole/Performance
the concrete act of speaking
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Langue
language system shared by a community of speakers-same pronounciation/grammar/vocab/context
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Language/Dialect
If 2 or more varieties are mutually unintelligible, then they are different languages
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Dialect
subdivision of languages and are mutually intelligible. regionally/socially distinctive variety of a language.
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Idiolect
linguistic system that underlies a person's use of language in a given time or place, specific to that person.
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Facts of All Languages
- a.language is an integral part of human existence
- b.languages are equally complex/capable of expressing ideas
- c.languages capable of expanding
- d.languages change over time
- e. relationship b/n sound and meaning is arbitrary
- f.grammars contain rules of a similar kind
- g. all have vowels, consonants, prosodies
- h. nouns and verbs
- i. semantic properties: male/female, mother/father
- j.syntactic properties: negating, questions, tenses
- k.infinite set of sentences
- l.any normal child can learn any language he/she is exposed to
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Arbitrariness
No connection between form and meaning in majority of words.
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Duality
property of having two levels of structure: units of primary level are composed of elements of the secondary level
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Productivity
ability to construct/interpret new sentences
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Discreteness
occurrence of one sound may reduce the possibility of the occurrence of the other
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Learnability
Human language can be learned. Children can acquire it with no external instruction.
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Semantics
Study of the meaning of language
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Philosophical Semantics
examines relations between linguistic expressions and the phenomena in the world to which they refer.
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Meaning
refers to what language is about, the concepts that words and linguistic patterns refer to.
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Information Content
communicate or reveal information about the world around us (relationships between objects situated in the world)
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Dictionary Definition
more to the meaning of the word than it's dictionary definition
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Mental representations or mental images
meaning of expression is not just mental image, since mental images vary from person to person more than meaning does
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Meaning and reference
thing a word refers to. meaning involves a relation between language and the world
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Meaning, truth conditions, and truth value
knowing the meaning of a sentence involves knowing conditions under which it would be true so explaining the meaning of a sentence can be done by explaining its truth conditions.
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Meaning and Language Use
knowing the meaning of an utterance involves knowing how to use it, so conditions on language use also form an important aspect of meaning.
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Sense
refers to the literal meaning of an expression independent of situational context
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Semantic Extension
extending the meaning of the word (xerox as a noun and verb)
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Pragmatics
study of language from the point of view of the users: what choices speakers make
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Quantity
don't say too much-get to the point
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Quality
tell the truth, don't say things without evidence
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Relevance
don't say irrelevant things, don't get off topic
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Conversational Implicature
inferences generated from an utterance, inferences tend to be beyond the semantic content of the sentence
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Flouting a Maxim
interactional participants not cooperating with other discourse participants
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Locutionary
just the act of saying something
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Illocutionary
doing something by saying it-"you're fired"/ "you're under arrest"
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Felicity Conditions
conditions that must be obtained for the valid performance of an illocutionary act. must be qualified to say it.
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Presupposition
implicit asuumptions about the world required making an utterance appropriate/meaningful
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Implication
presuppositions may be described in terms of implication, implying information that was not said
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Direct Illocutionary Act
- synctatic form matches the illocutionary force
- shut the door.
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