NOTES FOR STUDENTS IN OE-01/ SOCIOLINGUISTICS

UNIT – I: INTRODUCTION TO LINGUISTICS

BACKROUND OR GENESIS

The term Linguistics has been derived from the Latin term lingua meaning
tongue, and istics meaning knowledge or science. Therefore, linguistics is the
science or study of tongue or language/s.

Etymologically, therefore linguistics is the scientific study of language.

Linguistics is the science that studies the origin, development, nature, and
organization of language descriptively, historically, comparatively, and
explicitly and formulates the general rules related to language. Linguistics,
therefore, is the science that describes and classifies languages.

The linguist (a person who can read and write or communicate in many
languages is called a linguist) identifies and describes the units and pattern of
the sound system, the words and morphemes, and the phrases and sentences
that are the structure of language as completely, accurately, and economically
as possible.

There are 04 levels of linguistic analysis they are:

1. Related to SOUNDS – the study is called Phonetics and Phonology

2. Related to WORDS – the study is called Morphology
3. Related to SENTENCES – the study is called Syntax
4. Related to MEANINGS – the study is called Semantics

1. PHONETICS

Phonetics is the study of speech process including the anatomy, neurology and
pathology of speech sounds

Phonetics has many practical applications like phonetics transcriptions,

language teaching, speech therapy, communication engineering etc. Phonetics
can be divided into three basic types called---
 a. Articulatory Phonetics – It studies the movement of the speech organs
in speech articulation. It studies the articulation of sounds as to how
they are produced.
b. Acoustic Phonetics – It studies the physical properties of speech sounds
such as frequency and amplitude in their transmission. It studies how
sounds are produced and disturbed in the air
c. Auditory Phonetics – It studies the hearing and perception of speech
sounds

1. B. PHONOLOGY

Phonology is the study of speech sounds of a given language and their function
within the sound system of that language.

Therefore, phonology is the functional phonetics of a particular language

How sound system works in Language:

The word vibration is called frequency

The quick closure and opening of the vocal cord is called vibration

The more is the vibration the more is the frequency

The more is the frequency of vibration the higher is the speech frequency

The frequency of male is 80 to 120 while that of the female is 130 to 220

Sound System in English Language

In English, there are 26 letters or alphabets but there are 44 different sounds

VOWELS – In the production of vowels the air comes out freely through the
mouth. There is no closure of the air passage and no narrowing of the passage.
Though all of us have learned 05 basic vowels in English but there are actually,
20 different sounds of vowels in British Received Pronunciation. In BRP, vowels
are categorised into 02 types called pure vowels and diphthongs. Pure vowels
are 12 while diphthongs are 08
CONSONANTS—The word consonant has been derived from the Greek word
consonautem which means sounds produced with the help of other sounds

In the production of consonants, the air does not come out freely through the
mouth. There is closure and narrowing of the air passage which causes audible
friction. There are 21 consonants but there are 24 different consonant sounds

II. MORPHOLOGY

Morphology is the 2nd type or level of linguistic analysis. Morphology is

that part of the syntax or grammar that is concerned with the study and
classes of words. It includes not only morphemes studies but also the
history and development of word-forms.

Morphology is the grammar of words. Therefore in linguistics

morphology is the study of words including the principles by which they
are formed and how they relate to one another within a language

ORIGIN—The term Morphology is attributed to the German poet,

novelist, playwright and philosopher Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
( 1749-1832). He coined this term in early 19 th century. It basically deals
with words, their internal structure and how they are formed with
Morph means – forms or shape
Logy – study Therefore, morphology is the study of words and word
forms. Under words formation sometimes words are borrowed and
sometimes they are created. The strength of English lies in borrowing
from other languages than creating from its own language.

For example the word Gangster was created it never existed in old
English
Phoneme- It has no meaning of its own
Morpheme – it has a meaning of its own. It is a smallest meaningful unit
in a language. A morpheme is identified by its meaning in morphology
For example the word Unfriendliness has 04 morphemes in it
Un—
Friend—
Ly—
Ness--
Here friend is the base or word that can stand by itself.
Word in English consists of 02 parts. Base and Affix
Affix is divided further into two called Prefix and Suffix
Suffix is further divided into Inflectional and Derivational suffix
1. Base is that word that can stand by itself or it can be used
independently. All noun and pronouns are base or base words

2. Affix can not stand by itself nor can it be used independently. It

needs to be attached to the base or base words for meaning

3. Prefix it is used before the base word. For example--- com- combine,
intra- intracollege, sub- suburban, super- superdancer, ultra-
ultrasound etc.

4. Suffix- it is used after the base. Example, acity- audacity, acy –

accuracy, al -refusal, ion – audition, nation , ism- heroism, ment-
movement, mony- matrimony, ness- goodness, tude- attitude etc. to
mention a few

5. Inflectional Suffix – It is the grammatical category called parts of

speech that never changes. Example—ing, ed, ‘s and s. Helping,
Helped, Household’s Help and Helpers etc. These four words have
been created from the base help using ing, ed, ‘s and s.

6. Derivational Suffix -In derivational suffix the grammatical category

may change rather it changes. For example— Boys- Noun, Boyish -
Adjective
Morphology describes 09 different ways or processes of word formation. They
are—

i. Derivation – It is the use of prefixes and suffixes to bring or coin new

words. Example – appear- disappear, justice- injustice, lighten-
enlighten, friend- friendship, happy-happiness etc.
ii. Back-formation – this process eliminates the derivational affix (prefix
and suffix) from main form to create a new word. Example—Insertion
– insert, Donation- donate, Procession- process, Resurrection-
resurrect
iii. Conversion – a word of one grammatical form converts into another
grammatical form without changing any spelling or pronunciation.
Example—

NOUN VERB

Access to access

Google to Google

[Link] to email

Name to name

Host to host

Hope To hope etc.

iv. Compounding- two words combine to create or make a new word.

Example--

Sun+ rise Sunrise

Note+book Notebook

Break+up Breakup

Father+in+ Father-in-law
law

Hight +light Highlight

 Lime+ light Limelight

Long+jump Longjump

v. Clipping – it reduces or shortens a word without changing its

meaning. It is further divided into 04 different types:
a. Back Clipping- it removes the end part. Example- Photograph to
photo
b. Fore clipping-- it removes the beginning part. Example—
Autorickshaw to auto, Telephone to phone etc.
c. Middle clipping—it reserves the middle position. Example-
Influenza to flue
d. Complex clipping—it removes multiple pieces from multiple
words. Example- Advertisement- Ad.

vi. Blending -- the parts of two or more words combine to form a new
word. Example- Angelina Jolly + Brad Pitt into Branjelina,
Breakfast+lunch into Brunch, Motor + Hotel into Motel,
Biographical+pictureinto Biopic

vii. Abbreviation- to shorten a word or phrase. Example— Junior- Jr.,

Senior- Sr., Mister- Mr. Doctor- Dr. , United Nations Organizations-
UNO etc.

viii. Acronyms – in this each letter or alphabet is pronounced as a word.

For example- PIN- Personal Identification Number; NASA- National
Aeronautics and Space Organization; ASAP- As soon as possible

ix. Borrowing – it is another formation process in which a word from

one language is directly borrowed into another. Example- Arabic;
Cherub- Hebrew; Murder- French; Pizza- Italian and Tamale- Spanish

III. SYNTAX OR STRUCTURE

Syntax is that part of Linguistics that studies the structure and formation of
sentences.

A sentence may make no sense yet it could be correct from the syntax point of
view as words are in their right place and sequence.

Syntax is of 04 types:

i. Simple syntax or sentence:

It is a sentence that has only one verb. It consists of single main
clause or independent clause.
Example- Subject+ Verb = Ram+eats
Subject+object+verb = Ram+ eats+ apple
Subject=verb+complement= Ram= is+ intelligent OR at least one
subject+one predicate like—
My father is a doctor
I am ten years old
That is a beautiful dress
He cannot do two things at a time

ii. Compound sentence :

A compound sentence has two independent clauses joined by
comma, semicolon or conjunction.
An independent clause is a clause that has a subject+verb and forms
complete thought.
Example- I have a pet and his name is Fluffy
In this kind of sentences one can alternatively use comma (,) or
semicolon (;) or conjunction and the sentence will be still correct.

Two independent clauses, joined by a comma and co-ordinating

conjunction or a semicolon.
Examples- Lisa likes milk but Evelyn does not
Can you come by after work, or you will be too busy
I did not want to come, yet here I am!
Lets go to the gym; I don’t feel like studying right now

How to create a compound sentence:

 a. Use a comma (,) and co-ordinating conjunction. Co-ordinating
conjunctions are of 07 types—For, And, Nor, But, Or, Yet, So

iii. Complex sentence

A complex sentence is a sentence that contains at least one main
clause and one subordinate clause. To separate main clause from
subordinate clause use a comma or conjunction.

Example – We will leave as soon as they come

As soon as they come, we will leave
In case you find Ram’s number let me know

IV. SEMANTICS

It is a branch of Linguistics that deals with the study of meaning

It studies what meaning is as an element of language and how it is constructed

by language, interpreted and negotiated

It examines the relationship between words and how different people draw
different meanings from those words.

Example: The word crash has a different meaning.

Crash- It means an accident, it means a drop in the share market and it also
means uninvited guests or attending parties without an invitation.

Types of semantics:There are 03 types of semantics. They are:

1) Formal semantics – It is the study of grammatical meaning in natural

languages using formal concepts. It uses the formal tools from logic and
mathematics to understand its meaning and interpretation. It is
interdisciplinary and connects to different disciplines.
Formal semantics studies the denotation of natural language expression.
Depending on the subject or discipline, even the word's meaning may
change. For example:
Cell-Mobile phone
Cell-Police custody
 Cell-Tissue
Cell-Battery

2) Lexical semantics - Lexical semantics is the study of word meaning as

recorded in the dictionary. It studies how words structure their meaning,
how they act in grammar, and compositionality and the relationship
between distinct senses and uses of words. It includes a catalogue of
words in a language.
Types of Lexical words and their meanings:
Hyponymy and hypernymy – Hyponymy refers to general meaning and
hypernymy refers to specific meanings.

Example : Colour-- Orange, Green, White, etc

Synonym – Words with the same meaning and spelled and pronounced
differently. Examples- joy, happiness, delight, gladness etc.

Antonyms – words that are related to each other by having opposite

meanings. Example- Sleep-Awake, Bold- Timid, Long- Short, etc.

Homonymy- words spelled and pronounced the same way but hold
different meanings. Bank stands for river bank as well as for financial
institution

Polysemy – A word having two or different meanings. Example- bright

means shining and bright also means intelligent

Therefore, Lexical semantics is the branch of semantics that deconstructs or

interprets the meaning of words within a passage or a line of text as per the
context.

3) Conceptual Semantics : It is the literal or core sense of a word. It is the

plain and straight reading of a word meaning without its hidden or under
the surface meaning. It is also called denotation. Conceptual semantics is
used in the context of :
i. Affective meaning- same words with real world experience.
Example- charity for CEO of a company and a nun hold different
feeling and experience
ii. Collacative Meaning – As has been accepted and used by society.
Example – Man- handsome
Woman- beautiful
iii. Conceptual meaning – Cell in physics means battery while cell in
legal studies means police custody
iv. Connotative – Same word but meaning changes according to
mood and emotion. Example, the word conservative
v. Reflective meaning – Multiple conceptual meanings as society
perceives with the changing time. Example – gay means happy
and bright but today gay has a different meaning.
vi. Social meaning-- meaning given to words based on social context.
Eg.- Soda, Cold drinks, beverages etc.
vii. Thematic meaning – the order of words used for emphasis.
viii. Eg.- My studies are important to me

What is important to me are my studies etc.

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