WHAT IS
GRAMMAR
Grammar is
The knowledge speakers have about the
units and rules of their language—rules.
Combining sounds into words:
Phonology
Rules of word formation: Morphology
Rules for combining words into phrases
and phrases into sentencex: Syntax
Rules for assigning meaning: Semantics
Descriptive Grammar
It explains how it is possible for you to
speak and understand and make judgments
about well-formedness, and it tells what you
know about the sounds, words, phrases, and
sentences of your language.
Prescriptive grammar a 2+ b 2 2
The goal is not to describe the rules people know. =c
The goal is to tell them what rules they should
follow.
Teaching grammar
Is used to learn another language or
dialect.
This kind of grammar gives the words and
their pronunciations, and explicitly states
the rules of the language,
Universal Grammar
There are parts that pertain to all languages; these components form what is
called the general grammar. In addition to these general (universal) parts,
there are those that belong only to one particular language; and these
constitute the particular grammars of each language.
Chomsky’s view that there is a Universal
Grammar (UG) that is part of the biologically
endowed human language faculty.
Sign "Sign languages are visual-
gestural systems that use
language hand, body and facial
gestures to represent words
and grammatical rules."
The ability of humans to learn
and use language is
biologically based in the
human brain and can be
expressed in different
modalities.
What it is not human language
Most animal species have a kind of
communication system, many use a
non-vocal system, but the difference is
that there are no variants inside these
systems, unlike the human language.
"Human language is different
of course. Our words and
sentences are not simply
responses to internal and
external stimuli."
Our capacity to talk about things that
don't relate to the here and now is
called displacement, and it is one of
the characteristics aside from
discreteness that distinguish human
language from the way animals
communicate.
Can animals learn human language?
Many attempts have been made to teach animals
how to use human language, but all results have
been disappointing so far
References:
Fromkin, V., Robert, R., & Hyams, N. (2014). An Introduction to Language.
Language and
thought Linguistic determinism:
our perception and
thinking about the world
is determined by the way
we use language. It acts
as "a filter of reality."
Linguistic relativism:
"different languages
encode different
categories and that
speakers of different
languages therefore
think about the world in
different ways".
Our language is not
something that limit us,
but it influences our
cognition somehow.
Examples: In Navaho language blue and
Examples: green are one color. This does
not mean they cannot
differentiate between the two
colors.
References
Fromkin, V., Robert, R., & Hyams, N. (2014). An Introduction to Language.
