Language+Terms



**This page is designed to help define some important linguistic terms. Want to study these terms? Check out these flashcards I created using Quizlet: [] **

**LANGUAGE TERMS **

** Affricate: ** //a sound produced by a stop closure followed immediately by a slow release (ch, j)//  ** Allomorph: ** //an alternative phonetic form of a morpheme ( /s/, /z/, /ez/) are forms of the plural morpheme in cats, dogs, and kisses. Knowledge of phonology determines how we pronounce morpheme in different contexts//  ** Alveolar: ** //a sound produced by raising the tongue to the alveolar ridge (s, t, n)//  ** Alveopalatal: ** //a sound whose place of articulation is the hard palate immediately behind the alveolar ridge//  ** Bilabial: ** //a sound articulated by bringing both lips together (m)//  ** Bound Morpheme: ** //a morpheme that must be attached to other morphemes such as -ly, -ed, pre-. Bound morphemes are affixes: prefixes, suffixes, infixes, circumfixes and some roots such as the morpheme (cran) in cranberry//  ** Code-switching: ** //the movement back and forth between two languages within the same sentence or conversation//  <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Complementary Distribution: ** //phonemes can never occur in the same phonetic environment// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Connotation: ** //the affective meaning associated with a word. (certain words reflect attitudes, emotions, value judgements, etc.)// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Continuants: ** //sounds in which there is no stoppage in the oral tract (s)// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Denotation: ** //the referential meaning of a word or expression// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Derivational Morpheme: ** //a morphemes added to a stem or root to form a new stem or word. Sometimes this changes the word's syntactic category (-er added to the verb, paint, makes it a noun, painter)// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Digraph: ** //two letter used to represent a single sound (gh represents [f] in enough)// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Dipthong: ** //vowel glides (bout, boy)// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Free Morpheme: ** //a single morpheme that constitutes a word. (boy, gentle, man)// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Fricatives: ** //in the production of some continuants, the airflow is so severely obstructed that it causes friction (f, v, s, z, th)// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Front vowel: ** //vowel sounds in which the tongue is positioned forward in the mouth (i)// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Function word: ** //a word that does not have a clear lexical meaning but has a grammatical function (conjunctions, prepositions, articles, auxiliaries--CLOSED class)// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Glides: ** //the sounds [j] and [w], the initial sounds of you [ju] and woo [wu] are produced with little or no obstruction of the air stream in the mouth. They are always preceded or followed directly by a vowel. The tongue moves rapidly in a gliding// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> //fasion either toward or away from the neighboring vowel// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Glottal stop: ** //a sound produced with constriction at the glottis, when the air is stopped completely at the glottis by tightly closed vocal cords (g)// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Glottis: ** //the opening between the vocal cords// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Grammatical Morpheme: ** //a function word or bound morpheme required by syntactic rules (he wantS TO go)// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Implosives: ** //sounds produced with an ingressive air stream that involves movement of the glottis// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Inflectional Morpheme: ** //a bound grammatical morpheme that is affixed to a word according to rules of syntax (-s suffix on third person singular)// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Labial: ** //a sound articulated at the lips (b, f)// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Labio-dental: ** //a sound produced by touching the bottom lip to the upper teeth (v)// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Labio-velar: ** //a sound articulated by simultaneously raising the back of the tongue toward the velum and rounding the lips (r, w)// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Lax vowel: ** //short vowel produced with little tension in the vocal cords (pUt)// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Lexicon: ** //the component of grammar containing speaker's knowledge about morphemes and words; a speaker's mental dictionary of words// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Minimal pair: ** //two or more words that are identical except for one phoneme that occurs in the same position (pet, bet)// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Morpheme: ** //the smallest unit of linguistic meaning or function// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Morphology: ** //the study of the structure of words; the component of the grammar that includes the rules of word formation// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Nasal sound: ** //speech sound produced with an open nasal passage (lowered velum) permitting air to pass through the nose as well as the mouth (m)// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Natural class: ** //a class of sounds characterized by a phonetic property or feature that pertains to all members of the set (class of stops)// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Neurolinguistics: ** //the branch of linguistics concerned with the brain mechanisms that underlie the acquisition and use of language// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Nomenclature: ** //a system of words used in a particular discipline// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Open class: ** //the class of lexical content words: a category of words that commonly add new words (nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs--constitute the major part of the vocabulary)// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Palatal: ** //a sound produced by raising the front part of the tongue to the palate (t, d)// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Phonology: ** //the sound system of a language; the component of a grammar that includes the inventory of sounds (phonetic and phonemic units) and rules for their combination and pronunciation// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Place of articulation: ** //the part of the vocal tract at which constriction occurs during the production of most consonants// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Plosives: ** //nonnasal or oral stops where the air that is blocked in the mouth explodes when the closure is released (p, b, d, t, g)// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Pragmatics: ** //the study of how context and situation affect meaning// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Psycholinguistics: ** //concerned with linguistic performance, language acquisition, and speech production and comprehension// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Semantics: ** //the study of the linguistic meaning of morphemes, words, and sentences// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Sociolinguistics: ** //concerned with linguistic performance within social contexts// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Stops: ** //the air stream may be completely stopped or just partially obstructed (t)// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Syntax: ** //the rules of sentence formation// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Uvular: ** //a sound produced by raising the back of the tongue to the uvula// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Velar: ** //a sound produced by raising the back part of the tongue to the soft palate of velum// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Voiced sound: ** //speech sound produced with vibrating vocal cords// <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">** Voiceless sound: ** //speech sound produced with open, nonvibrating vocal cords//

Anna Costa Graduate Assistant Middle Tennessee State University Certified Pre-K teacher, working on ESL endorsement aec2y@mtmail.mtsu.edu