语言学教程复习题与答案

语言学复习题与答案(胡壮麟版第一章) Chapter I   1.    Linguistics is generally defined as the scientific study of language. 2.    Linguistics studies particular language, not languages in general. 3.    A scientific study of language is based on what the linguist thinks. 4.    In the study of linguistics, hypotheses formed should be based on language facts and checked against the observed facts. 5.    General linguistics is generally the study of language as a whole. 6.    General linguistics, which relates itself to the research of other areas, studies the basic concepts, theories, descriptions, models and methods applicable in any linguistic study. 7.    Phonetics is different from phonology in that the latter studies the combinations of the sounds to convey meaning in communication. 8.    Morphology studies how words can be formed to produce meaningful sentences. 9.    The study of the ways in which morphemes can be combined to form words is called morphology. 10.  Syntax is different from morphology in that the former not only studies the morphemes, but also the combination of morphemes into words and words into sentences. 11.  The study of meaning in language is known as semantics. 12.  Both semantics and pragmatics study meanings. 13.  Pragmatics is different from semantics in that pragmatics studies meaning not in isolation, but in context. 14.  Social changes can often bring about language changes. 15.  Sociolinguistics is the study of language in relation to society. 16.  Modern linguistics is mostly prescriptive, but sometimes descriptive. 17.  Modern linguistics is different from traditional grammar. 18.  A diachronic study of language is the description of language at some point in time. 19.  Modern linguistics regards the written language as primary, not the written language. 20.  The distinction between competence and performance was proposed by F.de Saussure. II. Fill in each of the following blanks with one word which begins with the letter given: 21. Chomsky defines “ competence” as the ideal user’s k__________ of the rules of his language. 22.Langue refers to the a__________ linguistic system shared by all the members of a speech community while the parole is the concrete use of the conventions and application of the rules. 23.D_________ is one of the design features of human language which refers to the pheno n that language consists of two levels: a lower level of meaningless individual sounds and a higher level of meaningful units. 24. Language is a system of a_________ vocal symbols used for human communication. 25. The discipline that studies the rules governing the formation of words into permissible sentences in languages is called s________. 26. Human capacity for language has a g ____ basis, but the details of language have to be taught and learned.   27. P ____ refers to the realization of langue in actual use. 28. Findings in linguistic studies can often be applied to the settlement of some practical problems. The study of such applications is generally known as a________ linguistics. 29. Language is p___________ in that it makes possible the construction and interpretation of new signals by its users. In other words, they can produce and understand an infinitely large number of sentences which they have never heard before. 30. Linguistics is generally defined as the s ____ study of language. III. There are four choices following each statement. Mark the choice that can best complete the statement. 31. If a linguistic study describes and analyzes the language people actually use, it is said to be ______________. A. prescriptive           B. analytic C. descriptive             D. linguistic 32.Which of the following is not a design feature of human language? A. Arbitrariness      B. Displacement C. Duality            D. Meaningfulness 33. Modern linguistics regards the written language as ____________. A. primary     B. correct    C. secondary    D. stable 34. In modern linguistics, speech is regarded as more basic than writing, because A. in linguistic evolution, speech is prior to writing B. speech plays a greater role than writing in terms of the amount of information conveyed. C. speech is always the way in which every native speaker acquires his mother tongue    D. All of the above 35. A historical study of language is a ____ study of language. A. synchronic                   B. diachronic C. prescriptive             D. comparative 36.Saussure took a (n) view of language, while Chomsky looks at language from a __point of view.  A. sociological…psychological    B. psychological…sociological  C. applied… pragmatic            D. semantic and linguistic 37. According to F. de Saussure, __ refers to the abstract linguistic system shared by all the members of a speech community. A. parole     B. performance     C. langue       D. Language 38. Language is said to be arbitrary because there is no logical connection between __ and meanings. A. sense         B. sounds    C. objects      D. ideas 39. Language can be used to refer to contexts removed from the immediate situations of the speaker. This feature is called__, A. displacement    B. duality    C. flexibility    D. cultural transmission 40. The details of any language system is passed on from one generation to the next through __, rather than by instinct. A. learning   B. teaching    C. books     D. both A and B IV. Define the following terms: 41. Linguistics   42. Phonology   43. Syntax    44. Pragmatics   45. Psycholinguistics   46. Language 47. Phonetics  48Morphology  49.Semantics     50.Sociolinguistics    51. Applied Linguistics 52.Arbitrariness   53 Productivity  54. Displacement      55.Duality    56. Design Features 57. Competence   58 Performance     59. Langue        60 Parole V. Answer the following questions as comprehensively as possible. Give examples for illustration if necessary: 61. Language is generally defined as a system of arbitrary vocal symbols used for   human communication. Explain it in detail. 62. What are the design features of human language? Illustrate them with examples. 63. How is modern linguistics different from traditional grammar? 64. How do you understand the distinction between a synchronic study and a diachronic study? 65. Why does modern linguistics regard the spoken form of language as primary, not the written? 66. What are the major distinctions between langue and parole? 67. How do you understand competence and performance ? 68. Saussure’s distinction between langue and parole seems similar to Chomsky’s distinction between competence and performance. What do you think are their major differences? 69. Do you think human language is entirely arbitrary? Why?   I l.T    2.F    3.F    4.T    5.T    6.F    7.T   8.F    9.T    10.F    11.T   12.T   13.T  14.T   15.T   16.F   17.T  18.F    19.F   20.F II. 21. knowledge  22. abstract   23. Duality   24. arbitrary 25. syntax    26.genetic   27. Parole    28. applied    29. productive   30. scientific (or systematic) III. 3l.C   32.D   33.C   34.D   35.B   36.A   37.C   38.B   39.A   40.D IV. 41.  Linguistics: Linguistics is generally defined as the scientific study of language. 42.  Phonology: The study of how sounds are put together and used in communication is called phonology. 43.  Syntax: The study of how morphemes and words are combined to form sentences is called syntax. 44.Pragmatics: The study of meaning in context of use is called pragmatics. 45.  Psycholinguistics: The study of language with reference to the workings of mind is called psycholinguistics. 46.  Language: Language is a system of arbitrary vocal symbols used for human communication. 47.  Phonetics: The study of sounds which are used in linguistic communication is called phonetics. 48.  Morphology: The study of the way in which morphemes are arranged to form words is called morphology. 49.  Semantics: The study of meaning in language is called semantics. 50.  Sociolinguistics: The study of language with reference to society is called sociolinguistics. 51.  Applied linguistics: In a narrow sense, applied linguistics refers to the application of linguistic principles and theories to language teaching and learning, especially the teaching of foreign and second languages. In a broad sense, it refers to the application of linguistic findings to the solution of practical problems such as the recovery of speech ability. 52.  Arbitrariness: It is one of the design features of language. It means that there is no logical connection between meanings and sounds 53.  Productivity: Language is productive or creative in that it makes possible the con-struction and interpretation of new signals by its users. 54.  Displacement: Displacement means that language can be used to refer to things which are present or not present, real or imagined matters in the past, present, or future, or in far-away places. In other words, language can be used to refer to contexts removed from the immediate situations of the speaker 55.  Duality: The duality nature of language means that language is a system, which consists of two sets of structure, or two levels, one of sounds and the other of meanings. 56.  Design features: Design features refer to the defining properties of human language that distinguish it from any animal system of communication 57.  Competence: Chomsky defines competence as the ideal user's knowledge of the rules of his language, 58.  Performance: performance is the actual realization of the knowl-edge of the rules in linguistic communication. 59.  langue : Langue refers to the abstract linguistic system shared by all the members of a speech community; Langue is the set of conventions and rules which language users all have to follow; Langue is relatively stable, it does not change frequently 60.   Parole: Parole refers to the realization of langue in actual use; parole is the concrete use of the conventions and the application of the rules; parole varies from person to person, and from situation to situation. V 61. Language is generally defined as a system of arbitrary vocal symbols used for human communication. Explain it in detail. First of all, language is a system, becauseelements of language are combined according to rules. Secondly, language is arbitrarybecause there is no intrinsic connection between form and meaning, or between the sign and what it stands for. Different languages have different words for the same object in the world. This fact is a good illustration of the arbitrary nature of language. This also explains the symbolic nature of language: words are just symbols; they areassociated with objects, actions, ideas, etc. by convention . Thirdly, language is vocalbecause the primary medium is sound for all languages, no matter how well - developed their writing systems are.     The term "human" in the definition indicates that language is possessed by human beings only and is very different from the communication systems of other living creatures. The term "communication" means that language makes it possible for its users to talk to each other and fulfill their communicative needs. 62.  What are the design features of human language? Illustrate them with examples1) Arbitrariness    As mentioned earlier, the arbitrary property of language means that there is no logical connection between meanings and sounds. For instance, there is no necessary relationship between the word elephant and the animal it symbolizes. In addition, different sounds are used to refer to the same object in different languages, and even within the same language, the same sound does not refer to the same thing. However, language is not entirelyarbitrary. There are words which are created in the imitation of sounds by sounds, such as crash, bang in English. Besides, some compound words are also not entirely arbitrary. But the non-arbitrary words are quite limited in number. The arbitrary nature of language makes it possible for languageto have an unlimited source of expressions. 2) Productivity     Language is productiveor creative in that it makes possible the construction and interpretation of new signals by its users. This is why they can produce and understand an infinitely large number of sentences, including sentences that they have never said or heard before. Theycan send messages which no one else has ever sent before. Productivity is unique to human language. Most animal communication systems appear to be highly restricted with respect to the number of different signals that their users can send and receive.3) Duality     The duality nature of language means that language is a system, whichconsists of two sets of structure, or two levels, one of sounds and the other of meanings. At the lower or the basic level, there is the structure of sounds, which are meaningless, discrete, individual sounds. But the sounds of language can be combined according to rules into units of meaning such as morphemes and words, which, at the higher level, can be arranged into sentences. This duality of structure or double articulation of language enables its users to talk about anything within their knowledge. No animal communication system has duality or even comes near to possessing it. 4) Displacement    Displacement means that language can be used to refer to things whichare present or not present, real or imagined matters in the past, present, or future, or in far-away places. In other words, language can be used to refer to contexts removed from the immediate situations of the speaker. Animal calls are mainly uttered in response to immediate changes of situation. 5) Cultural transmission     Human beings were born with the ability to acquire language, but the details of any language are not genetically transmitted or passed down by instinct. They have to be taught and learned, but animal call systems are genetically transmitted. 63.  How is modern linguistics different from traditional grammar? Traditional grammar is prescriptive; it is based on "high "(religious, literary) written language. It sets grammatical rules and imposes the rules on language users. But Modern linguistics isdescriptive; It collects authentic, and mainly spoken language data and then it studiesand describes the data in an objective and scientific way. 64. How do you understand the distinction between a synchronic study and a diachranic study? The description of a language at some point in time is a Synchronic study; the description of a language as it changes through time is a diachronic study. A synchronic study of language describes a language as it is at some particular point in time, while a diachronic study of language is the study of the historical development of language over a period of time. 65.    Why does modern linguistics regard the spoken form of language as primary, not the written?     First, the spoken form is prior to the writ-ten form and most writing systems are derived from the spoken form of language. Second, the spoken form plays a greater role than writing in terms of the amount of information conveyed and it serves a wider range of purposes Finally, the spoken form is the medium through which we acquire our mother tongue. 66.   What are the major distinctions between langue and parole?  The distinction between langue, and parole was made by the famous linguist Ferdinand de Saussure early this century. Langue refers to the abstract linguistic system shared by all the members of a speech community, and parole refers to the realization of langue in actual use. Langue is the set of conventions and rules which language users all have to follow while parole is the concrete use of the conventions and the application of the rules. Langue is abstract; it is not the language people actually use, but parole is concrete; it refers to the naturally occurring language events. Langue is relatively stable; it does not change frequently; while parole varies from person to person, and from situation to situation. 67.   How do you understand competence and performance?    American linguist N. Chomsky in the late 1950’s proposed the distinction between competence and performance. Chomsky defines competence as the ideal user’s knowledge of the rules of his language. This internalized set of rules enables the language user to produce and understand an infinitely large number of sentences and recognize sentences that are ungrammatical and ambiguous. According to Chomsky, performance is the actual realization of this knowledge in linguistic communication. Although the speaker’s knowledge of his mother tongue is perfect, his performances may have mistakes because of social and psychological factors such as stress, embarrassment, etc.. Chomsky believes that what linguists should study is the competence, which is systematic, not the performance, which is too haphazard. 68.   Saussure’s distinction between langue and parole seems similar to Chomsky’s distinction between competence and performance. What do you think are their major differences?   Although Saussure’s distinction and Chomsky’s are very similar, they differ at least in that Saussure took a sociological view of language and his notion of langue is a mater of social conventions, and Chomsky looks at language from a psychological point of vies and to him, competence is a property of the mind of each individual. 69.   Do you think human language is entirely arbitrary? Why?     Language is arbitrary in nature, it is not entirely arbitrary, because there are a limited number of words whose connections between forms and meanings can be logically explained to a certain extent, for example, the onomatopoeia, words which are coined on the basis of imitation of sounds by sounds such as bang, crash,etc.. Take compounds for another example. The two elements  “photo” and “copy” in “photocopy” are non-motivated, but the compound is not arbitrary. 语言学教程复习题与答案(胡壮麟版第二章) Chapter 2：Phonology             I.   1.  Voicing is a phonological feature that distinguishes meaning in both Chinese andEnglish.  2.    If two phonetically similar sounds occur in the same environments and they distinguish meaning, they are said to be in complementary distribution.  3.     A phone is a phonetic unit that distinguishes meaning.  4.    English is a tone language while Chinese is not.   5.     In linguistic evolution, speech is prior to writing.   6.   In everyday communication, speech plays a greater role than writing in terms of the amount of information conveyed.   7.  Articulatory phonetics tries to describe the physical properties of the stream of sounds which a speaker issues with the help of a machine called spectrograph.  8.    The articulatory apparatus of a human being are contained in three important areas: the throat, the mouth and the chest.  9.    Vibration of the vocal cords results in a quality of speech sounds called voicing.10.  English consonants can be classified in terms of place of articulation and the part of the tongue that is raised the highest.   11.  According to the manner of articulation, some of the types into which the consonants can be classified are stops, fricatives, bilabial and alveolar.   12.  Vowel sounds can be differentiated by a number of factors: the position of tongue in the mouth, the openness of the mouth, the shape of the lips, and the length of the vowels.   13.  According to the shape of the lips, vowels can be classified into close vowels, semi-close vowels, semi-open vowels and open vowels.   14.  Any sound produced by a human being is a phoneme.   15.  Phones are the sounds that can distinguish meaning.   16.  Phonology is concerned with how the sounds can be classified into different categories.   17.  A basic way to determine the phonemes of a language is to see if substituting one sound for another results in a change of meaning.   18.  When two different forms are identical in every way except for one sound segment which occurs in the same place in the strings, the two words are said to form a phonemic contrast.   19.   The rules governing the phonological patterning are language specific.   20.    Distinctive features of sound segments can be found running over a sequence of two or more phonemic segments. II. Fill in each of the following blanks with one word which begins with the letter given: 21.  A ____ refers to a strong puff of air stream in the production of speech sounds.   22.  A ____ phonetics describes the way our speech organs work to produce the speech sounds and how they differ.   23.  The four sounds /p/,/b/,/m/ and /w/ have one feature in common, i.e, they are all b_______ sounds.   24.  Of all the speech organs, the t ____ is the most flexible, and is responsible for varieties of articulation than any other.   25.  English consonants can be classified in terms of manner of articulation or in terms of p____ of articulation.   26.  When the obstruction created by the speech organs is total or complete, the speech sound produced with the obstruction audibly released and the air passing out again is called a s________.  27.  S_________ features are the phonemic features that occur above the level of the segments. They include stress, tone, intonation, etc.   28.  The rules that govern the combination of sounds in a particular language are called s ____ rules.   29.  The transcription of speech sounds with letter-symbols only is called broad transcription while the transcription with letter-symbols together with the diacritics is called n_________ transcription.   30.  When pitch, stress and sound length are tied to the sentence rather than the word in isolation, they are collectively known as i_________.   31.  P______ is a discipline which studies the system of sounds of a particular language and how sounds are combined into meaningful units to effect linguistic communication.   32.  The articulatory apparatus of a human being are contained in three important cavities: the pharyngeal cavity, the o_______ cavity and the nasal cavity.   33.   T____ are pitch variations, which are caused by the differing rates of vibration of the vocal cords and which can distinguish meaning just like phonemes.  34.  Depending on the context in which stress is considered, there are two kinds of stress: word stress and s_________ stress III. There are four choices following each of the statements below. Mark the choice that can best complete the statement. 35.  Of all the speech organs, the _______ is/ are the most flexible. A. mouth   B. lips   C. tongue   D. vocal cords   36.  The sounds produced without the vocal cords vibrating are ____ sounds. A. voiceless    B. voiced    C. vowel     D. consonantal 37.  __________ is a voiced alveolar stop.  A. /z/        B. /d/      C. /k/    D./b/  38.  The assimilation rule assimilates one sound to another by “copying” a feature of a sequential phoneme, thus making the two phones ____________.  A. identical    B. same    C. exactly alike     D. similar   39.  Since /p/ and /b/ are phonetically similar, occur in the same environments and they can distinguish meaning, they are said to be ___________. A. in phonemic contrast        B. in complementary distribution C. the allophones             D. minimal pair   40.  The sound /f/ is _________________.  A. voiced palatal affricate             B. voiced alveolar stop  C. voiceless velar fricative            D. voiceless labiodental fricative    41.   A ____ vowel is one that is produced with the front part of the tongue maintaining the highest position.   A. back         B. central    C. front     D. middle   42.  Distinctive features can be found running over a sequence of two or more phonemic segments. The phonemic features that occur above the level of the segments are called ____________. A. phonetic components    B. immediate constituents C. suprasegmental features            D. semantic features   43.  A(n) ___________ is a unit that is of distinctive value.  It is an abstract unit, a collection of distinctive phonetic features. A. phone         B. sound    C. allophone     D. phoneme   44.  The different phones which can represent a phoneme in different phonetic environments are called the ____ of that phoneme. A. phones       B. sounds    C. phonemes     D. allophones  IV. Define the terms below: 45.  phonology       46. phoneme           47.allophone  48. international phonetic alphabet      49. intonation        50. phonetics       51. auditory phonetics52. acoustic phonetics    53. phone     54. phonemic contrast   55. tone             56. minimal pair V. Answer the following questions as comprehensively as possible. Give ex-amples for illustration if necessary: 57.    Of the two media of language, why do you think speech is more basic than writing? 58.    What are the criteria that a linguist uses in classifying vowels? 59.     What are the major differences between phonology and phonetics? 60.     Illustrate with examples how suprasegmental features can affect meaning. 61.     In what way can we determine whether a phone is a phoneme or not? I.   l.T    2.F    3.F    4.F    5.T    6.T    7.F   8.F    9.T    10.F 11.F  12.T   13.F   14.F   15.F   16. F   17. T   18. F  19. T  20. T II.     21. Aspiration  22.Articulatory  23.  bilabial   24. tongue   25. place 26. stop    27. Suprasegmental  28. sequential 29. narrow 30. intonation 31. Phonology   32. oral   33. Tone   34. sentence III.           There are four choices following each of the statements below. Mark the choice that can best complete the statement: 35.C    36.A    37.B    38.D    39.A    40.D    41.C    42.C    43.D 44.D IV.       45.phonology: Phonology studies the system of sounds of a particular language; it aims to discover how speech sounds in a language form patterns and how these sounds are used to convey meaning in linguistic communication. 46.  phoneme: The basic unit in phonology is called phoneme; it is a unit of distinctive value. But it is an abstract unit. To be exact, a phoneme is not a sound; it is a collection of distinctive phonetic features. 47.  allophone: The different phones which can represent a phoneme in different phonetic environments are called the allophones of that phoneme. 48.  international phonetic alphabet: It is a standardized and internationally accepted system of phonetic transcription.  49.  intonation: When pitch, stress and sound length are tied to the sentence rather than the word in isolation, they are collectively known as intonation. 51.  phonetics: Phonetics is defined as the study of the phonic medium of language; it is concerned with all the sounds that occur in the world' s languages 52.  auditory phonetics: It studies the speech sounds from the hearer's point of view. It studies how the sounds are perceived by the hear-er. 53.  acoustic phonetics: It studies the speech sounds by looking at the sound waves. It studies the physical means by which speech sounds are transmitted through the air from one person to another. 54.  phone : Phones can be simply defined as the speech sounds we use when speaking a language. A phone is a phonetic unit or segment. It does not necessarily distinguish meaning. 55.  phonemic contrast: Phonemic contrast refers to the relation between two phonemes. If two phonemes can occur in the same environment and distinguish meaning, they are in phonemic contrast. 56.  tone: Tones are pitch variations, which are caused by the differing rates of vibration of the vocal cords. 57.  minimal pair: When two different forms are identical in every way except for one sound segment which occurs in the same place in the strings, the two words are said to form a minimal pair. V. 58.  Of the two media of language, why do you think speech is more basic than writing? 1)  In linguistic evolution, speech is prior to writing. 2)  In everyday communication, speech plays a greater role than writing in terms of the amount of information conveyed. 3)  Speech is always the way in which every native speaker acquires his mother tongue, and writing is learned and taught later at school. 59.   What are the criteria that a linguist uses in classifying vowels? 1)    Vowels may be distinguished as front, central and back in terms of the position of the tongue in the mouth. 2) According to how wide our mouth is opened, we classify the vowels into four groups: close vowels, semi-close vowels, semi-open vowels, and open vowels. 3) According to the shape of the lips, vowels are divided into rounded vowels and unrounded vowels. 4) The English vowels can also be classified into long vowels and short vowels according to the length of the sound. 60.  What are the major differences between phonology and phonetics?     They differ in their approach and focus. Phonetics is of a general nature; it is interested in all the speech sounds used in all human languages: how they are produced, how they differ from each other, what phonetic features they possess, how they can be classified. Phonology, on the other hand, is interested in the system of sounds of a particular language; it aims to discover how speech sounds in a language form patterns and how these sounds are used to convey meaning in linguistic communication. 61.   Illustrate with examples how suprasegmental features can affect meaning. 1)   The location of stress in English distinguishes meaning, such as `import and import. The similar alternation of stress also occurs between a compound noun and a phrase consisting of the same elements. A phonological feature of the English compounds is that the stress of the word always falls on the first element and the second element receives secondary stress, for example: `blackbird is a particular kind of bird, which is not necessarily black, but a black `bird is a bird that is black. 2)  The more important words such as nouns, verbs adjectives , adverbs,etc are pronounced with greater force and made more prominent. But to give special emphasis to a certain notion, a word in sentence that is usually unstressed can be stressed to achieve different effect. Take the sentence “He is driving my car.”  for example. To emphasize the fact that the car he is driving is not his, or yours, but mine, the speaker can stress the possessive pronoun my, which under normal circumstances is not stressed. 3)  English has four basic types of intonation, known as the four tones: When spoken in different tones, the same sequence of words may have different meanings. Generally speaking, the falling tone indicates that what is said is a straight-forward, matter-of-fact statement, the rising tone often makes a question of what is said, and the fall-rise tone often indicates that there is an implied message in what is said. 62.  In what way can we determine whether a phone is a phoneme or not? A basic way to determine the phonemes of a language is to see if substituting one sound for other results in a change of meaning. If it does, the two sounds then represent different phonemes. 语言学教程复习题与答案(胡壮麟版第三章) I.   1.  Morphology studies the internal structure of words and the rules by which words are formed. 2.    Words are the smallest meaningful units of language. 3.    Just as a phoneme is the basic unit in the study of phonology, so is a morpheme the basic unit in the study of morphology. 4.    The smallest meaningful units that can be used freely all by themselves are free morphemes. 5.    Bound morphemes include two types: roots and affixes. 6.    Inflectional morphemes manifest various grammatical relations or grammatical categories such as number, tense, degree, and case. 7.    The existing form to which a derivational affix can be added is called a stem, which can be a bound root, a free morpheme, or a derived form itself. 8.    Prefixes usually modify the part of speech of the original word, not the meaning of it. 9.    There are rules that govern which affix can be added to what type of stem to form a new word. Therefore, words formed according to the morphological rules are acceptable words. 10.  Phonetically, the stress of a compound always falls on the first element, while the second element receives secondary stress. II. 11.  M ____ is the smallest meaningful unit of language. 12.  The affix “-ish” in the word boyish conveys a g____ meaning. 13.  B______ morphemes are those that cannot be used independently but have to be combined with other morphemes, either free or bound, to form a word. 14.  Affixes are of two types: inflectional affixes and d____ affixes. 15.  D______ affixes are added to an existing form to create words. 16.  A s______ is added to the end of stems to modify the meaning of the original word and it may case change its part of speech. 17.  C______ is the combination of two or sometimes more than two words to create new words. 18.  The rules that govern which affix can be added to what type of stem to form a new word are called m____ rules. 19.  In terms of morphemic analysis, d____ can be viewed as the addition of affixes to stems to form new words. 20.  A s____ can be a bound root, a free morpheme, or a derived form itself to which a derivational affix can be added.III. There are four choices following each statement. Mark the choice that can best complete the statement: 21.  The morpheme “vision” in the common word “television” is a(n) ______.     A. bound morpheme   B. bound form      C. inflectional morpheme   D. free morpheme 22.  The compound word “bookstore” is the place where books are sold. This indicates that the meaning of a compound  ______. A.    is the sum total of the meaning of its components B.     can always be worked out by looking at the meanings of morphemes C.    is the same as the meaning of a free phrase. D.    None of the above. 23.  The part of speech of the compounds is generally determined by the part of speech of _______.  A. the first element           B. the second element   C. either the first or the second element D. both the first and the second elements. 24.  _______ are those that cannot be used independently but have to be combined with other morphemes, either free or bound, to form a word. A. Free  morphemes           B. Bound morphemes    C. Bound words        D. Words 25.  _____ is a branch of grammar which studies the internal structure of words and the rules by which words are formed. A. Syntax               B.Grammar      C. Morphology             D. Morpheme 26.   The meaning carried by the inflectional morpheme is _______. A. lexical             B. morphemic      C. grammatical                 D. semantic 27.    Bound morphemes are those that ___________. A.   have to be used independently B.   can not be combined with other morphemes C.  can either be free or bound D. have to be combined with other morphemes. 28.  ____ modify the meaning of the stem, but usually do not change the part of speech of the original word.  A. Prefixes          B. Suffixes     C. Roots               D. Affixes 29.    _____ are often thought to be the smallest meaningful units of language by the linguists. A. Words        B. Morphemes     C. Phonemes       D. Sentences 30.  “-s” in the word “books” is  _______. A. a derivative affix            B. a stem   C. an inflectional affix        D. a root IV.  31.  morphology          32. inflectional morphology  33. derivational morphology   34. morpheme     35. free morpheme     36. bound morpheme    37. root     38. affix 39. prefix        40. suffix      41. derivation         42. Compounding V. Answer the following questions:43.  What are the main features of the English compounds? 44.  Discuss the types of morphemes with examples. I.          l.T  2.F    3.T   4.T   5.T   6.T   7.T   8.F   9.F   10.T II. 11. Morpheme  12. grammatical  13. Bound  14. derivative  15.Derivative 16. suffix    17. Compounding   18. morphological   19. derivation  20. stem III.2l.D   22.D   23.B   24.B   25.C   26. C   27. D   28. A   29. B   30. C IV. Define the following terms: 31.  Morphology: Morphology is a branch of grammar which studies the internal structure of words and the rules by which words are formed. 32.  inflectional morphology: The inflectional morphology studies the inflections 33. derivational morphology: Derivational morphology is the study of word- formation. 34.  Morpheme: It is the smallest meaningful unit of language. 35.  free morpheme: Free morphemes are the morphemes which are independent units of meaning and can be used freely all by themselves or in combination with oth-er morphemes. 36.    bound morpheme: Bound morphemes are the morphemes which cannot be used indepen-dently but have to be combined with other morphemes, either free or bound, to form a word. 37.  Root: A root is often seen as part of a word; it can never stand by itself al-though it bears clear, definite meaning; it must be combined with another root or an affix to form a word. 38.  Affix: Affixes are of two types: inflectional and derivational. Inflectional affixes manifest various grammatical relations or grammatical categories, while derivational affixes are added to an existing form to create a word. 39.  Prefix: Prefixes occur at the beginning of a word . Prefixes modify the meaning of the stem, but they usually do not change the part of speech of the original word.     40.  Suffix: Suffixes are added to the end of the stems; they modify the meaning of the original word and in many cases change its part of speech. 41.  Derivation: Derivation is a process of word formation by which derivative affixes are added to an existing form to create a word. 42.  Compounding: Compounding can be viewed as the combination of two or sometimes more than two words to create new words. V.    Anwser the following questions: 43.   What are the main features of the English compounds?   Orthographically a compound can be written as one word, two separate words with or without a hyphen in between. Syntactically, the part of speech of a compound is determined by the last element. Semantically, the meaning of a compound is idiomatic, not calcu-lable from the meanings of all its components. Phonetically, the word stress of a compound usually falls on the first element. 44.   Discuss the types of morphemes with examples.     Free morphemes: They are the independent units of meaning and can be used freely all by themselves, for example, “book-” in the word “bookish”.     Bound morphemes: They are those that cannot be used independently but have to be combined with other morphemes, either free or bound, to form a word such as “-ish” in “bookish”. Bound morphemes can be subdivided into roots and affixes. A root is seen as part of a word; it can never stand by itself although it has a clear and definite meaning, such as “gene-” in the word “generate”. Affixes are of two types: inflectional and derivational. Inflectional morphemes manifest various grammatical relations or grammatical categories such as “-s” in the word “books” to indicate plurality of nouns. Derivational affixes are added to an existing form to create a word such as “mis-” in the word “misinform”. Derivational affixes can also be divided into prefixes and suffixes. Prefixes occur at the beginning of a word such as “dis- ” in the word “dislike”, while suffixes occur at the end of a word such as “-less” in the word “friend less”. 语言学教程复习题与答案(胡壮麟版第四章) I. Decide whether each of the following statements is True or False: 1. Syntax is a subfied of linguistics that studies the sentence structure of language, including the combination of morphemes into words. 2.Grammatical sentences are formed following a set of syntactic rules. 3. Sentences are composed of sequence of words arranged in a simple linear order, with one adding onto another following a simple arithmetic logic. 4.Universally found in the grammars of all human languages, syntactic rules that comprise the system of internalized linguistic knowledge of a language speak-er are known as linguistic competence. 5. The syntactic rules of any language are finite in number, but there is no limit to the number of sentences native speakers of that language are able to produce and comprehend. 6. In a complex sentence, the two clauses hold unequal status, one subordinating the other. 7. Constituents that can be substituted for one another without loss of grammaticality belong to the same syntactic category. 8. Minor lexical categories are open because these categories are not fixed and new members are allowed for. 9. In English syntactic analysis, four phrasal categories are commonly recognized and discussed, namely, noun phrase, verb phrase, infinitive phrase, and auxiliary phrase. 10. In English the subject usually precedes the verb and the direct object usually follows the verb. 11.What is actually internalized in the mind of a native speaker is a complete list of words and phrases rather than grammatical knowledge. 12. A noun phrase must contain a noun, but other elements are optional. 13. It is believed that phrase structure rules, with the insertion of the lexicon, generate sentences at the level of D-structure. 14. WH-movement is obligatory in English which changes a sentence from affirmative to interrogative. II. Fill in each of the following blanks with one word which begins with the letter given: 15. A s________ sentence consists of a single clause which contains a sub-ject and a predicate and stands alone as its own sentence. 16.A s______ is a structurally independent unit that usually comprises a number of words to form a complete statement, question or command. 17.A s______ may be a noun or a noun phrase in a sentence that usually precedes the predicate. 18. The part of a sentence which comprises a finite verb or a verb phrase and which says something about the subject is grammatically called p_________. 19. A c___ sentence contains two, or more, clauses, one of which is incorporated into the other .20. In the complex sentence, the incorporated or subordinate clause is normally called an e___clause. 21. Major lexical categories are o___ categories in the sense that new words are constantly added. 22. A ___Condition on case assignment states that a case assignor and a case recipient should stay adjacent to each other. 23. P_______ are syntactic options of UG that allow general principles to operate in one way or another and contribute to significant linguistic variations between and among natural languages. 24. The theory of C____ condition explains the fact that noun phrases appear only in subject and object positions.III. There are four given choices for each statement below. Mark the choice that can best complete the statement: 25.  A sentence is considered ____ when it does not conform to the grammatical-cal knowledge in the mind of native speakers. A. right       B. wrong    C. grammatical     D. ungrammatical 26.  A __ in the embedded clause refers to the introductory word that introduces the embedded clause. A. coordinator   B. particle     C. preposition  D. subordinator 27. Phrase structure rules have ____ properties. A. recursive       B. grammatical   C. social      D. functional 28. Phrase structure rules allow us to better understand  _ A.  how words and phrases form sentences. B.  what constitutes the grammaticality of strings of words C.  how people produce and recognize possible sentences D.  All of the above. 29. Syntactic movement is dictated by rules traditionally called __. A. transformational rules B. generative rules C. phrase structure rules D. x-bar theory 30. The theory of case condition accounts for the fact that ___. A. noun phrases appear only in subject and object positions. B. noun phrases can be used to modify another noun phrase C. noun phrase can be used in adverbial positions D. noun phrase can be moved to any place if necessary. 31. The sentence structure is ________ . A. only linear B. Only hierarchical  C. complex D. both linear and hierarchical   32.  The syntactic rules of any language are ____ in number. A. large       B. small     C. finite        D. infinite   33. The ________ rules are the rules that group words and phrases to form grammatical sentences  A. lexical       B. morphological  C. linguistic     D. combinational 34._______ rules may change the syntactic representation of a sentence.   A. Generative   B. Transformational    C. X-bar    D. Phrase structure   IV. Define the following terms: 35. syntax  36. Sentence  37. coordinate sentence   38. syntactic categories 39. grammatical relations   40. linguistic competence 41. transformational rules 42. D-structure V. Answer the following questions: 43.  What are the basic components of a sentence? 44.  What are the major types of sentences? Illustrate them with examples. 45.  Are the elements in a sentence linearly structured? Why? 46.  What are the advantages of using tree diagrams in the analysis of sentence structures? 47.  What is NP movement. Illustrate it with examples. I.  l.F   2.T   3.F   4.T   5.T   6.T   7.T   8.F   9.F   10.T   11.F   12.T 13.T  14.T II.15. simple, 16. sentence  17. subject  18. predicate  19. complex  20.embedded  21. open  22.adjacency  23.Parameters  24.Case III. There are four given choices for each statement below. Mark the choice that can best complete the statement: 25. D 26. D  27. A  28. D  29. A  30. A 31. D  32. C  33. D  34. B IV. 35.  syntax: Syntax is a subfield of linguistics. It studies the sentence structure of language. It consists of a set of abstract rules that allow words to be combined with other words to form grammatical sentences. 36.  Sentence: A sentence is a structurally independent unit that usually comprises a number of words to form a complete statement, question or command. Normally, a sentence consists of at least a subject and a predicate which contains a finite verb or a verb phrase. 37.  coordinate sentence: A coordinate sentence contains two clauses joined by a linking word called coordinating conjunction, such as "and", "but", "or". 38.  syntactic categories: Apart from sentences and clauses, a syntactic category usually refers to a word (called a lexical category) or a phrase ( called a phrasal category) that performs a particular grammatical function. 39. grammatical relations: The structural and logical functional relations of constituents are called grammatical relations. The grammatical relations of a sentence concern the way each noun phrase in the sentence relates to the verb. In many cases, grammatical relations in fact refer to who does what to whom .40. linguistic competence: Universally found in the grammars of all human languages, syntactic rules comprise the system of internalized linguistic knowledge of a language speaker known as linguistic competence.41. Transformational rules: Transformational rules are the rules that transform one sentence type into another type.42. D-structure: D- structure is the level of syntactic representation that exists before movement takes place. Phrase structure rules, with the insertion of the lexicon, generate sentences at the level of D-structure V. 43.  What are the basic components of a sentence? Normally, a sentence consists of at least a subject and its predicate which contains a finite verb or a verb phrase. 44.  What are the major types of sentences? Illustrate them with examples.     Traditionally, there are three major types of sentences. They are simple sentence, coordinate( compound) sentence, and complex sentence. A simple sentence consists of a single clause which contains a subject and a predicate and stands alone as its own sentence, for example: John reads extensively.     A coordinate sentence contains two clauses joined by a linking word that is called coordinating conjunction, such as "and", "but", "or". For example: John is reading a linguistic book, and Mary is preparing        for her history exam.     A complex sentence contains two, or more, clauses, one of which is incorporated into the other. The two clauses in a complex sentence do not have equal status, one is subordinate to the other. For exam-ple: Before John gave her a lecture, Mary showed no interest in lin-guistics. 45.  Are the elements in a sentence linearly structured? Why?     No. Language is both linearly and hierarchically structured. When a sentence is uttered or written down, the words of the sentence are produced one after another in a sequence. A closer examination of a sentence shows that a sentence is not composed of sequence of words arranged in a simple linear order with one adding onto another following a simple arithmetic logic. In fact, sen-tences are also hierarchically structured. They are orga-nized by grouping together words of the same syntactic category, such as noun phrase (NP) or verb phrase (VP), as can be seen from the following tree diagram:                            S               NP                        VP          Det          N            Vt          NP                                           Det          N         The         boy          likes     the         music. 46. What are the advantages of using tree diagrams in the analysis of sentence structures?     The tree diagram can not only reveal a linear order, but also a hierarchical structure that groups words into structural constituents. It can, in addition, show the syntactic category of each structural constituent, thus it is believed to most truthfully illustrate the constituent relationship among linguistic elements. 47. What is NP movement. Illustrate it with examples. NP movement in-volves the movement of a noun phrase. NP-movement occurs when, for example, a sentence changes from the active voice to the passive voice: (A)  The man beat the child. (B).  The child was beaten by the man.    B is the result of the movement of the noun phrases "the man" and "the child" from their original positions in (A) to new positions. That is, "the man" is postposed to the right and "the child" is preposed to the left.     Not all instances of NP-movement, however, are related to changing a sentence from the active voice to the passive voice. For example:     (C) It seems they are quite fit for the job.     (D) They seem quite fit for the job. These sentences are identical in meaning, but different in their superfi-cial syntactic representations. It is believed that they have the same underly-ing structure, but (27b) is the result of an NP movement. 语言学教程复习题与答案(胡壮麟版第五章) I.  1. Dialectal synonyms can often be found in different regional dialects such as British English and American English but cannot be found within the variety itself, for example, within British English or American English.   2. Sense is concerned with the relationship between the linguistic element and the non-linguistic world of experience, while the reference deals with the inherent meaning of the linguistic form.     3. Linguistic forms having the same sense may have different references in different situations.  4. In semantics, meaning of language is considered as the intrinsic and inherent relation to the physical world of experience.     5. Contextualism is based on the presumption that one can derive meaning from or reduce meaning to observable contexts.     6. Behaviourists attempted to define the meaning of a language form as the situation in which the speaker utters it and the response it calls forth in the hearer.     7. The meaning of a sentence is the sum total of the meanings of all its components.     8. Most languages have sets of lexical items similar in meaning but ranked differently according to their degree of formality.     9. “it is hot.” is a no-place predication because it contains no argument.   10. In grammatical analysis, the sentence is taken to be the basic unit, but in semantic analysis of a sentence, the basic unit is predication, which is the abstraction of the meaning of a sentence.   II. 11. S________  can be defined as the study of meaning. 12. The conceptualist view holds that there is no d______ link between a linguistic form and what it refers to. 13. R______ means what a linguistic form refers to in the real, physical world; it deals with the relationship between the linguistic element and the non-linguistic world of experience. 14. Words that are close in meaning are called s________. 15. When two words are identical in sound, but different in spelling and meaning, they are called h__________. 16.R_________ opposites are pairs of words that exhibit the reversal of a relationship between the two items. 17. C ____ analysis is based upon the belief that the meaning of a word can be divided into meaning components. 18. Whether a sentence is semantically meaningful is governed by rules called s________ restrictions, which are constraints on what lexical items can go with what others. 19. An a________ is a logical participant in a predication, largely identical with the nominal element(s) in a sentence. 20. According to the n ____ theory of meaning, the words in a lan-guage are taken to be labels of the objects they stand for. III. 21. The naming theory is advanced by ________.       A. Plato                    B. Bloomfield       C. Geoffrey Leech            D. Firth 22. “We shall know a word by the company it keeps.” This statement represents _______.     A. the conceptualist view   B. contexutalism   C. the naming theory     D.behaviourism   23. Which of the following is not true? A.   Sense is concerned with the inherent meaning of the linguistic form. B.   Sense is the collection of all the features of the linguistic form. C.   Sense is abstract and de-contextualized. D.  Sense is the aspect of meaning dictionary compilers are not interested in.   24. “Can I borrow your bike?” _______ “ You have a bike.”                A. is synonymous with    B. is inconsistent with C. entails   D. presupposes   25. ___________ is a way in which the meaning of a word can be dissected into meaning components, called semantic features.    A. Predication analysis   B. Componential analysis  C. Phonemic analysis  D. Grammatical analysis   26. “alive” and “dead” are ______________.    A. gradable antonyms   B. relational opposites   C. complementary antonyms         D. None of the above   27. _________ deals with the relationship between the linguistic element and the non-linguistic world of experience. A. Reference              B. Concept C. Semantics                D. Sense   28. _refers to the pheno n that words having different meanings have the same form. A. Polysemy     B. Synonymy C. Homonymy      D. Hyponymy   29. Words that are close in meaning are called ______________.     A. homonyms   B. polysemy   C. hyponyms         D. synonyms   30.  The grammaticality of a sentence is governed by _______ A. grammatical rules B. selectional restrictions C. semantic rules D. semantic features IV. 31. semantics    32. sense 33.reference    34. synonymy 35. polysemy    36. homonymy  37. homophones  38. Homographs 39. complete homonyms  40. hyponymy 41.antonymy    42 componential analysis   43.grammatical meaning44. predication 45. Argument    46. predicate   47. Two-place predication V. 48.   Why do we say that a meaning of a sentence is not the sum total of the meanings of all its components? 49.   What is componential analysis? Illustrate it with examples. 50.   How do you distinguish between entailment and presupposition in terms of truth values? 51.   How do you account for such sense relations between sentences as synonymous relation, inconsistent relation in terms of truth values? 52.   According to the way synonyms differ, how many groups can we classify synonyms into? Illustrate them with examples. 53.   What are the major views concerning the study of meaning? How they differ? I. l.F   2.F   3.T   4.F   5.T   6.T   7.F   8.T   9.T   10.T II.11. Semantics 12. direct 13.Reference 14. synonyms 15.homophones 16.Relational 17. Componential 18. selectional 19. argument  20. naming III. l.A 22.B 23.D 24.D 25.B 26.C 27.A 28.C 29.D 30.A IV. 31. Semantics: Semantics can be simply defined as the study of meaning in language. 32. Sense: Sense is concerned with the inherent meaning of the linguistic form. It is the collection of all the features of the linguistic form; it is abstract and de -contextualised. 33. Reference: Reference means what a linguistic form refers to in the real, physical world; it deals with the relationship between the linguistic element and the non-linguistic world of experience 34. Synonymy :Synonymy refers to the sameness or close similarity of meaning. 35. Polysemy :Polysemy refers to the fact that the same one word may have more than one meaning. 36. Homonymy :Homonymy refers to the pheno n that words having different mean-ings have the same form, i.e. , different words are identical in sound or spelling, or in both. 37. homophones :When two words are identical in sound, they are called homophones 38. homographs :When two words are identical in spelling, they are homographs. 39. complete homonyms.:When two words are identical in both sound and spelling, they are called complete homonyms. 40.Hyponymy :Hyponymy refers to the sense relation between a more general, more inclusive word and a more specific word. 41. Antonymy :Antonymy refers to the relation of oppositeness of meaning. 42. Componential analysis : Componential analysis is a way to analyze word meaning. It was pro-posed by structural semanticists. The approach is based on the belief that the meaning of a -word can be divided into meaning components, which are called semantic features. 43.The grammatical meaning : The grammatical meaning of a sentence refers to its grammaticality, i.e. , its grammatical well-formedness . The grammaticality of a sentence is governed by the grammatical rules of the language 44. predica-tion :The predica-tion is the abstraction of the meaning of a sentence. 45. ar-gument : An ar-gument is a logical participant in a predication. It is generally identical with the nominal element (s) in a sentence.46. predicate : A predicate is something that is said about an argument or it states the logical relation linking the arguments in a sentence. 47. two-place predication :  A two-place predication is one which con-tains two arguments. V. Answer the following questions: 48. Why do we say that a meaning of a sentence is not the sum total of the meanings of all its components? The meaning of a sentence is not the sum total of the meanings of all its components because it cannot be worked out by adding up all the meanings of its constituent words. For example; (A) The dog bit the man (B) The man bit the dog. If the meaning of a sentence were the sum total of the meanings of all its components, then the above two sentences would have the same meaning. In fact they are different in meanings. As we know, there are two aspects to sentence meaning: grammatical mean-ing and semantic meaning. The grammatical meanings of “the dog” and “the man” in (A) are different from the grammatical meanings of “the dog” and “the man” in (B). The meaning of a sentence is the product of both lexical and grammatical meaning. It is the product of the meaning of the constituent words and of the grammatical constructions that relate one word syntagmatically to another. 49.   What is componential analysis? Illustrate it with examples.     Componential analysis, pro-posed by structural semanticists, is a way to analyze word meaning. The approach is based on the belief that the meaning of a word can be divided into meaning components, which are called semantic features. Plus and minus signs are used to indicate whether a certain semantic feature is present or absent in the meaning of a word, and these feature symbols are usually written in capitalized letters. For example, the word “man” is ana-lyzed as consisting of the semantic features of [+ HUMAN, + ADULT, + ANIMATE, +MALE] 50.   How do you distinguish between entailment and presupposition in terms of truth values? Entailment is a relation of inclusion. Suppose there are two sentences X and Y:     X: He has been to France.     Y: He has been to Europe. In terms of truth values, if X is true, Y is necessarily true, e.g. If he has been to France, he must have been to Europe.   If X is false, Y may be true or false, e. g. If he has not been to France, he may still have been to Europe or he has not been to Europe. If Y is true, X may be true or false, e.g. If he has been to Europe, he may or may not have been to France. If Y is false, X is false, e.g. If he has not been to Europe, he cannot have been to France. Therefore we conclude that X entails Y or Y is an entailment of X. The truth conditions that we use to judge presupposition is as follows: Suppose there are two sentences X and Y           X: John' s bike needs repairing.           Y: John has a bike. If X is true, Y must be true, e.g. If John' s bike needs repairing, John must have a bike. If X is false, Y is still true, e. g. If John' s bike does not need repairing, John still has a bike. If Y is true, X is either true or false, e.g. If John has a bike, it may or may not need repairing. If Y is false, no truth value can be said about X, e.g. If John does not have a bike, nothing can be said about whether his bike needs repairing or not. Therefore, X presupposes Y, or Y is a presupposition of X. 51.   How do you account for such sense relations between sentences as synonymous relation, inconsistent relation in terms of truth values?    In terms of truth condition, of the two sentences X and Y, if X is true, Y is true; if X is false, Y is false, therefore X is synonymous with Y e.g. X; He was a bachelor all his life. Y: He never married all his life. Of the two sentences X and Y, if X is true, Y is false; if X is false, Y is true, then we can say A is inconsistent with Y e.g.  X: John is married.       Y: John is a bachelor. 52.   According to the ways synonyms differ, how many groups can we classify synonyms into? Illustrate them with examples.     According to the ways synonyms differ, synonyms can be divided into the following groups. i.   Dialectal synonyms They are synonyms which are used in different regional dialects. British English and American English are the two major geographical varieties of the English language. For examples: British English  American English   autumn     fall,  lift   elevator Then dialectal synonyms can also be found within British, or American English itself. For example, "girl" is called "lass" or "lassie" in Scottish dialect, and "liquor" is called "whisky" in Irish dialect. ii. Stylistic synonyms They are synonyms which differ in style or degree of formality. Some of the stylistic synonyms tend to be more formal, others tend to be casual, and still oth-ers are neutral in style. For example: old man, daddy, dad, father, male parent chap, pal, friend, companion iii. Synonyms that differ in their emotive or evaluative meaning They are the words that have the same meaning but express different emotions of the user. The emotions of the user indicate the attitude or bias of the user toward what he is talking about . For exam-ple, “collaborator”  and  “accomplice”  are synonymous, sharing the meaning of "a person who helps another", but they are different in their evaluative meaning. The former means that a person who helps another in do-ing something good, while the latter refers to a person who helps another in a criminal act. iv. Collocational synonyms They are synonyms which differ in their collocation. For example, we can use accuse, charge, rebuke to say that someone has done something wrong or even criminal, but they are used with different preposi-tions accuse. . . of, charge. . . with, rebuke. . .for. v. V. Semantically different synonyms Semantically different synonyms refer to the synonyms that differ slight-ly in what they mean. For example, "amaze" and "astound" are very close in meaning to the word "surprise," but they have very subtle differences in meaning. While amaze suggests confusion and   bewilderment, " astound" implies difficulty in believing. " 53.  What are the major views concerning the study of meaning? How do they differ?   One of the oldest was the naming theory, proposed by the ancient Greek scholar Plato, who believed that the words used in a language are taken to be la-bels of the objects they stand for. The conceptualist view holds that there is no direct link between a lin-guistic form and what it refers to. The form and the meaning are linked through the mediation of concepts in the mind. Contextualism is based on the presumption that one can derive meaning from or reduce meaning to observable contexts. Two kinds of context are recognized; the situational context and the linguistic context. For example, the meaning of the word "seal" in the sentence "The seal could not be found" can only be determined ac-cording to the context in which the sentence occurs: The seal could not be found. The zoo keeper became worried. (seal meaning an aquatic mammal) The seal could not be found. The king became worried. (seal meaning the king's stamp)     Behaviorism drew on behaviorist psychology when he tried to define the meaning of linguistic forms. Behaviorists attempted to de-fine the meaning of a language form as " the situation in which the speaker utters it and the response it calls forth in the hearer". Saussure's 'theory of the sign' defined a sign as being made up of the matched pair of signifier and signified. Signifier The signifier is the pointing finger, the word, the sound-image. A word is simply a jumble of letters. The pointing finger is not the star. It is in the interpretation of the signifier that meaning is created. Signified The signified is the concept, the meaning, the thing indicated by the signifier. It need not be a 'real object' but is some referent to which the signifier refers. The thing signified is created in the perceiver and is internal to them. Whilst we share concepts, we do so via signifiers. Whilst the signifier is more stable, the signified varies between people and contexts. The signified does stabilize with habit, as the signifier cues thoughts and images. PAGE 26