INTRODUCTION TO LINGUISTICS Đinh Nhật Thanh

CHAPTER 1: THE ORIGINS OF LANGUAGE

I. The divine source
- “Whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the name thereof.”
- A Hindu tradition: language came from

II. The natural-ound source

Cuckoo, Splash, Bang, Hiss  Bow-wow theory
Ouch, Wow, Hey, Yuck  Natural cries of emotion (Yo-heave-ho theory)

III. The oral-gesture source

Goodbye
My car is broken so I took my wife’s car to get to work.

IV. Properties of human language:

- All creatures communicate in some way.
- Reflexivity: accounts for the fact that humans can use language to think and talk about itself.
- Displacement: Humans can refer to past and future time.
- Arbitrariness: there is no natural connection between linguistic form and its meaning.
- Productivity (open-endedness/creativity): The potential number of utterances in human language is indefinite.
- Cultural transmission: A lanuage is passed on from one generation to the next.
- Duality: Human language is organized at two levels simultaneously.
 Individual sounds: with no intrinsic meaning
 Sound combinations:
(Illustration) Chimpanzee and language:
The case of Washoe
Sign language: airplane, baby, banana, window, woman …
Make sentences: gimme tickle, more fruit, open food drink (open the fridge), water bird (swan)
The case of Sarah and Lana (kiểu đặt các kí tự cho con tinh tinh sắp xếp thành câu ấy mà)
(Illustration) The critical period
The story of Genie, a wild child

CHAPTER 2: THE SOUNDS OF LANGUAGE

I. Phonetics
The study of speech sounds:
- Articulatory phonetics: how speech sounds are articulated (analyzes how words are produced in the speech organ)
- Acoustic phonetics: The physical properties of speech sound (physically analyzes speech as vibrations of air.)
INTRODUCTION TO LINGUISTICS Đinh Nhật Thanh
- Perceptual phonetics: (analyzes how speech is perceived)

Vowels Consonants
1 No significant constriction of the oral cavities Significant constriction of the oral cavities
2 Open sounds Constricted sounds
3 Voiced Voiced/ unvoiced
4 Acoustically more intense Acoustically less intense

II. Consonants classification:

- Place of articulation:
a. Bilabial (both lips): âm do hai môi nhập lại rồi phát ra (như pat, bat, mat,…)
b. Labiodental (lower lip & upper teeth): âm do môi dưới chạm răng trên (như fat, vat, …)
c. Interdental (tip of the tongue & the teeth): âm do lưỡi chạm răng (như thick, this)
d. Alveolar (tip of the tongue & the tooth ridge): âm do lưỡi chạm vào họng trên răng (như tip, dip, nip, lip,
sip, zip,…)
e. Alveo-palatal (blade of the tongue & the hard palate): âm do :< không biết diễn tả, thử phát âm cái từ đi rồi
biết (như wish, beige, church, judge, phát âm mấy âm cuối mà nặng á)
f. Velar (back of the tongue & soft palate): âm do lưỡi sau gần cuống gà chạm lên trên, chặn bật hơi (như:
coat, goat, sing)
g. Glottals: những âm chưa kể đến (như house, have, who, whose,

- Manner of articulation:
a. Stops/Plosives (complete obstruction of the air stream): p, t, k, b, d, g
b. Fricatives (partial obstruction of the airstream): f, 0 (có gạch ngang ở giữa), s, sh, h, v, đ, z, 3
c. Affricates (complex consonants): ge, ch
d. Nasal sounds: mm, nn, ng
e. Approximants: glide or liquids
INTRODUCTION TO LINGUISTICS Đinh Nhật Thanh
III. The description of English vowels

1.
2. Frontness/ Backness
Classification of English vowels by height and frontness.

3. Tenseness/laxness
4. Lip roundingq
INTRODUCTION TO LINGUISTICS Đinh Nhật Thanh
CHAPTER 3: THE SOUND PATTERNS OF LANGUAGE
I. Phonology
 The study of patterns of sounds in a language.
[t]: tick, stick, writer, eighth
Tar, car, far, bar
Phonology is concerned with the abstract set of sounds in a language which allows us to distinguish meaning.

II. Phonemes
- Def: Phoneme is the smallest unit of sound that can distinguish one word from another in a language. (bat, cat:
differ only by one phoneme, the initial /b/ and /k/ sounds)
/t/  phonemic symbol fat vat
Fine vine
* Substituting one sound for another  a change in meaning  2 sounds represent different phonemes
[t]  phonetic symbol

III. Symbols & transcription

* Phonemic symbols = phonemes
BBC accent: 44 phonemes

Slant brackets: /ti:/ (Phonemic symbol)

h
Square bracket: [t i:] (Phonetic symbol)

IV. Features distinguishing phonemes

/p/: [-voice, + bilabio, + stop]
/k/: [-voice, + velar, + stop]

V. Phones & Allophones

* Phones are phonetic units [ ]
/t/: [th] [t..] [t] [D]
Tar eighth star writer
 Allophones of the phoneme [t]

/n/: beet bean

[i] [ĩ]
How to distinguish between phonemes and allophones?
INTRODUCTION TO LINGUISTICS Đinh Nhật Thanh
VI. Minimal pairs & minimal sets
Pat bat
Sheep ship
Boat coat
Tree three
Talk walk
 Be identical in form exept for a contrast in one phoneme, occurring at the same position  minimal pairs (âm
giống nhau là pairs)

feat fit fat fate fought foot

big pig rig fig dig wig
 A group of words can be differentiate by only one word changing  minimal sets (từ đầu giống nhau là sets)

VII. Phonotactics
big pig rig fig dig wig lig vig

Voiced vs Voiceless stops

Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers.
Fricatives
Fuzzy Wuzzy was a bear. Fuzzy Wuzzy had no hair. Fuzzy Wuzzy wasn’t very fuzzy, was he?

She sells seashells by the seashore

VIII. Syllables
Are /a:/ V(owels)
Go / ɡəʊ/ CV
Like / laɪk/ CVC

IX. Clusters
Stop /stop/  CC
Black bread trick twin flat throw
INTRODUCTION TO LINGUISTICS Đinh Nhật Thanh
*Initial:
V are /a:/
CV car /ka:/
CCV blue /blu:/
CCCV street /stri:t/

*Final:
V car /ka:/
VC man /maen/
VCC bank / bæŋk /
VCCC banks / bæŋks /
VCCCC prompts / prɒmpts /

X. Assimilation of Place
Quy tắc đổi: xác định chữ cái cuối là âm gì, plottal hay alvelar hay gì gì đó, rồi xem nó voiceless hay voiced thì
đổi đúng vị trí của nó, à nhớ xác định chữ cuối đổi phải đúng loại với chữ tiếp theo (ví dụ: rid buk, thấy chữ b
thuộc loại Bilabial, tiếp theo coi chữ d á, xác định voiced hay voiceless, trường hợp này d là voiced  đổi thành
b trong nhóm Bilabial, à nhớ không được đổi thành hàng Nasal nha)
pin [pĩn]
pan [paẽn]
I can go [aɪ kæn ɡə]
 When two phonoemes occur in sequence and some aspect of one phoneme is taken or ‘occupied’ by the
other.
Tea [thi:] eat [ĩt]
That person /ðæt ˈpɜːsᵊn/  [ðæp ˈpɜːsᵊn]
Light blue /laɪt bluː/  [[laɪp bluː]
tp
That thing /ðæt θɪŋ/  [ðæt.. θɪŋ]
Get those /ɡɛt ðəʊz/  [ɡɛt.. ðəʊz]
t  t..
This shoe /ðɪs ʃuː/  [ðɪʃ ʃuː]
Those years /ðəʊz jɪəz/  [ðəʊ3 jɪəz]
sʃ;z3
nine pens /nain penz  [naim penz] (vì n là voiced, thuộc hàng nasal, p thuộc cột bilibial 
đổi sang nhóm bilibial có voiced, nasal, bilibial thì là m)
INTRODUCTION TO LINGUISTICS Đinh Nhật Thanh
XI. Assimilation of Manner
1. Regressive assimilation
- Towards an easier consonant (less obstruction)
That side / ðæt saɪd /  [ðæs saɪd]
 Final plosive C  Fricatives or Nasal

XII. Assimilation of Voice

1. Regressive assimilation
2. Progressive assimilation:
Voiceless C + s  /s/
Voiced C + s  /z/
Cats /kaets/ dog /d…gz/

XIII. Elision
You and me [juenmi]
Friendship [frensip]
He must be [himesbi]

Ê hay là về nhà xong rồi tra mạng mấy phiên âm ra viết dưới footings, rồi dán cho lẹ 😊

Chapter 4: Word Formation

INTRODUCTION TO LINGUISTICS Đinh Nhật Thanh

Acronymy → acquired immunodeficiency syndrome

xerography → clipping
derivation → infixes
Conversion → noun to verb
skateboard compounding (verb-noun) kickass (verb-noun)
clipping → doc (doctor), vet (veterinarian)
sofa → borrowing, comfy → clipping (comfortable)
car-phone → compounding (noun-noun)
INTRODUCTION TO LINGUISTICS Đinh Nhật Thanh

làm bài tập này thử coi

INTRODUCTION TO LINGUISTICS Đinh Nhật Thanh
SYNTAX
I. DEFINITION
What is syntax?
- The rule that determines how words combine into phrases and sentences
- Same word choice, different structure
- Same structure, different word choice
‘A preposition phrase = a preposition + a NP’
‘An adjective phrase = an adj + Adv’
‘A verb phrase = verb + NP/PP/Adv’
Generative grammar: attempts to give a set of rules that will correctly predict which combinations of words will form
grammatical sentences.
Non-sense sentences with clear syntax
• Colorless green ideas sleep comfortably.
• A verb crumpled the milk.
• I gave the question an angry egg.

 These rules explain how speaker

II. STRUCTURAL AMBIGUITY

Active vs passive -> surface structure
NP + V + NP -> deep structure
Ex: The lion chased the zebra
The zebra was chased by the lion

She observed the man with the binoculars => ambiguous

2 ways of interpretation
- Different in their surface structure = different in syntactic forms = different arrangement or ordering
INTRODUCTION TO LINGUISTICS Đinh Nhật Thanh

Recursion: Kathy knew that Henry believes that Mary helped Alex.  The sentence can be prolonged: I hope that
Kathy …
Tree diagram:
E.g.: The baby sat on the floor.

[[[The]art[baby]N]NP [[sat]V[[on]prep[[the]art[floor]N]NP]PP]VP]S
Symbols used in syntactic description:
- S: sentence
- NP: Noun phrase
- N: Noun
- Art: article
- : consist of
- (): an optional constituent
- {}: only one of the elements enclosed within the curly brackets must be selected.
Phrase structure rules:
NP  {Art (Adj) N, Pro, PN cái này là proper noun}
S  {NP, VP}
INTRODUCTION TO LINGUISTICS Đinh Nhật Thanh
VP  {V (NP) (PP) (AdvP)}
PP  {prep, NP}
AP  {Adj, Adv, (prep)}
AdvP  {(adv) adv}
Lexical rules: (Ex) Draw the tree diagrams for these sentences

Complement phrases:
Katy believes that Henry knew that Mary helped Alex.
That Mary helped Alex = complement phrase
= complementizer(if/whether/that/…)(dùng để mở ra mệnh đề) + S
INTRODUCTION TO LINGUISTICS Đinh Nhật Thanh
***Bức ảnh trên gọi là tree diagram (à cái này là vẽ từ dưới lên)
Phân tích câu đó nha: (Phrase structure rules/ Lexical rules)
CP  C S
VP  V CP
S  NP VP
VP  V CP
CP  C S
Câu mới nè: They believe that John said that he would quit his job.
(câu này cô vẽ từ trên xuống nha)

DET: determiner
NOM: nominal
S1 [They believe S2 [ John said S3 [he would quit his job]s3]s2]s1 (cái này là square bracket nha)

1. Subject – extraposed subject

Whether he should be promoted was worrying them (boldened is a SUBJECT of a sentence)
That we are not prepared for the future concerns us. (also this one)
It concerns us that we are not prepared for the future (cái này mới là extraposed subject nha)

Relation to syntax  unambiguous which have the parantheses????

(a+b)/c instead of a+ b/c
INTRODUCTION TO LINGUISTICS Đinh Nhật Thanh
PRAGMATICS
I. Definition
- Pragmatics is the study of what speakers mean.
- Linguistic context & physical context
- Deixis: referring expressions (it, that, this, those, here, there, now, then, yesterday, today, tomorrow, me, she,
him , it, them, etc.)  can be classified into 3 categories: spatial deixis, temporal deixis, person deixis.
II. Two ways of talking about the meaning of words & other expressions
- Sense: is the relationship inside the language (tùy theo người nghe hiểu, ví dụ giáo viên kêu mọi người mang
trái táo, tất nhiên các táo sẽ khác nhau, hoặc khác xuất xứ,…)  everyone understands the word, however, actual
meaning may be different. (sense: có nghĩa đơn, nhưng không chỉ về cái gì hết, ví dụ: but, also, when,…)
- Reference: is the relationship between the language and the world “indication”. (ví dụ cô hỏi, what is the
phone,  technical device: sense, nhưng cô cầm điện thoại và nói, this is a phone  reference, kiểu giống có obvious
evidence)
* Referents: the enitity or the object (là thực thể, như cái bàn, cái ghế, cô ấy, vv)
* Reference: (kiểu khi được đề cập đến, thì nó là reference, tôi có một cây bút reference)

- Inference:
* Anteccedents: từ được đề cập đến lần đầu (I want a table)
* Anaphoric expressions: từ lặp lại (The table should be green.)
 Anaphora: từ được sử dụng như là một bộ phận của cái được nhắc đến
The house is for rent. But the kitchen is badly-maintained. (chưa từng nhắc the kitchen,
nhưng nó là a part of a house)
Look at the sun. It’s going down quickly.
 Cataphora: từ ẩn chỉ xuất hiện trước, rồi mới đến từ cụ thể (someone/ something,…)
Nobody seemed to know where they came from, but they are there: Job and Anny.
 Exophora: Outward from text.
Leave it on the table. (cần phải dùng ngữ cảnh để biết nó là cái gì)
The government are to blame for unemployment.(tương tự)
III. Presupposition
My aunty has a puppy.
Why didn’t you do the homework?
 What a speaker/ wrieer assumes is true or known by a listener/reader.
My aunty has a puppy
My aunty doesn’t have a puppy
 Constancy under negation test
IV. Speech acts
Structures Functions
INTRODUCTION TO LINGUISTICS Đinh Nhật Thanh
Interrogative Questions
Imperative Command/Request
Declarative Statement
 Direct vs Indirect speech acts

V. Implicature
INTRODUCTION TO LINGUISTICS Đinh Nhật Thanh
DISCOURSE ANALYSIS