LING 101: Introduction

Communication

• Language is a means of communication-- transferring thoughts from one mind to another.
• But we can't use direct mind-to-mind communication (mental telepathy).
• So we have to use indirect means (language) to encode our thoughts.
• Speakers encode meanings into sounds.
• Listeners decode sounds into meanings.
• Meaning ⇔ Sound

Science

• Linguistics is the scientific study of human language.
• Linguistics asks the question: "What do we KNOW when we know a language?"
• Some of the things we know are:
  • Sounds: [b] is a sound of English.
    [x] and [y] are not sounds of English (but they are sounds of German).
  • Sound Patterns: English words can begin with [tr] but not with *[rt]
    (compare Russian "ртуть" = "rtut'" = 'mercury')
  • Words: The English word for "cat" is [kæt]
    "read" is to "read-er" as "reside" is to "resid-ent" ('someone who Xs')
  • Word Patterns: "a big ball" is an English phrase; *"ball big a" is not
  • Social Conventions
  • etc.

Creativity

• Language use demonstrates the creative capacity of the human mind
• We can understand and produce totally new sentences
• Language provides infinite variety through
  • a finite set of elements and
  • rules
• How can it do that? Through COMBINATIONS of elements by rule.
• Especially through "recursion" -- putting sentences inside sentences!
• This is the dog [that chased the cat [that killed the rat [...]]]
• What's the longest sentence of English? There is no longest sentence! How can we prove this?
  1. Let's say we have a sentence, S, that we believe to be the longest.
  2. But then we can make a longer sentence--
     "The longest sentence of English is not S"
• Recursion allows for an infinite number of sentences by allowing sentences inside other sentences.
• Human language in not limited to the here and now. We can talk about yesterday, tomorrow, or worlds that are entirely fictional.
  "There is not a giraffe standing next to me."
• Negative, conditional, and counterfactual statements are all possible.
• Recursion and displacement are features of human language which are not observed in animal "languages".

Knowledge versus Perfomance

• Linguistics studies what people KNOW when they know a language.
• Most of the time we learn what people KNOW by what they DO.
• But sometimes what people actually DO does not reliably indicate what they KNOW.
• Someone with laryngitis still KNOWS their language, they just have a medical, physical problem performing (DOING) speech.
• Many external factors can affect performance.
• Linguistics abstracts away from such complicating factors to study the true system of knowledge.
• But we must use what people DO to discover and test our theories about what people KNOW about language.
• Much linguistic knowledge is "implicit", that is, people are not conscious of what they know.

Grammars

• What's in a Grammar?
• Fundamental elements (sounds, words, meanings, ...)
• Rules of combination

Description

• Linguists DESCRIBE what people know about language.
• They do NOT tell people how to speak, they study how people DO speak.
• Physicists do not tell planets how to move.
• Chemists do not tell atoms how to combine.
• Anthropologists do not tell people how to live.

Difference between Languages

• Languages can differ in:
  • the fundamental elements
  • the rules of combination
• The units and rules can be different for all of the modules of language:
  • sounds
  • words
  • sentences
• But all languages are equally complex, they all have units and rules.
• Dialects differ in the same way -- units and rules.
• Languages change in the same way -- units and rules.
• Children learn languages in the same way -- units and rules.
• Any child can learn any human language if exposed to it.