- A collection of symbols governed by rules and used to convey messages between people is known as:
- Communication
- Transactions
- Language
- Jargon
- The rule that governs the structure of language, that is, the way symbols can be arranged, is:
- Phonological
- Pragmatic
- Semantic
- Syntactic
- _______ Rules are what make it possible for us to know that “bikes” are for riding and “books” are for reading.
- Phonological
- Pragmatic
- Semantic
- Syntactic
- The process of adapting their speech in a variety of ways to demonstrate affiliation with other communicators is known as:
- Linguistic relativism
- Convergence
- Divergence
- Linguistic intergroup bias
- A physician or attorney who wants to establish credibility with his or her client might use language to create a sense of distance. This linguistic strategy is known as:
- Linguistic relativism
- Convergence
- Divergence
- Linguistic intergroup bias
- Equivocal language refers to:
- Words that gain their meaning by comparison
- Language used by a members of a similar coculture or other group
- Language that vaguely refers to events or objects
- Words that have more than one correct dictionary definition
- Conclusions that arise from an interpretation of evidence are known as:
- Inferential statements
- Opinion statements
- Emotive language
- Evasive language
- Which communication style is typically clear and decisive, associated with traditionally powerful roles, and approaches speaking as a way to gain and maintain control?
- Affective
- Emotional
- Instrumental
- Equivocal
- In which of the following categories have there been no significant studies identifying a difference between male and female speech:
- Use of qualifiers [such as “This is just my opinion”]
- Type of questions asked
- Reason for communicating
- Interruptions
- Arbitrary constructions that represent a communicator’s thoughts are known as:
- Tag questions
- Disclaimers
- Symbols
- Slang
Answer: C
Page: 5
Bloom’s: Remembering
A-head: The Nature of Language
Answer: D
Page: 8
Bloom’s: Remembering
A-head: The Nature of Language
Answer: C
Page: 9
Bloom’s: Remembering
A-head: The Nature of Language
Answer: B
Page: 23
Bloom’s: Remembering
A-head: The Power of Language
Answer: C
Page: 24
Bloom’s: Remembering
A-head: The Power of Language
Answer: D
Page: 27
Bloom’s: Remembering
A-head: Troublesome Language
Answer: A
Page: 38
Bloom’s: Remembering
A-head: Troublesome Language
Answer: C
Page: 51
Bloom’s: Remembering
A-head: Gender and Language
Answer: A
Page: 48
Bloom’s: Remembering
A-head: Gender and Language
Answer: C
Page: 5
Bloom’s: Remembering
A-head: The Nature of Language
Back to Test
Last week I posted about the difference between speech and language. I wanted to go ahead and go into a little more detail about what language is.
What is Language?
While speech involves the physical motor ability to talk, language is a symbolic, rule governed system used to convey a message. In English, the symbols can be words, either spoken or written. We also have gestural symbols, like shrugging our shoulders to indicate “I don’t know” or waving to indicate “Bye Bye” or the raising of our eye brows to indicate that we are surprised by something.
ASHA, the American Speech Language Hearing Association defines language as being made up of socially shared rules. Some of these “rule” systems that govern a language include phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics, and pragmatics. Let’s talk about these rule systems.
Language in the written form in books
What is Phonology?
Phonology refers to the rules that govern a language’s sound system
[It’s individual speech sounds] and how those individual sounds, also known as phonemes, go together to convey meaning as well as how some phonemes will be pronounced differently depending on the location in a word and the other sounds that surround it.
What is Morphology?
Morphology refers to the rules that govern how a language’s units of meaning, called morphemes, are combined to form words [the study of word structure]. A morpheme is a combination of sounds that have meaning. Some morphemes are words, while others are not. Examples of morphemes that cannot stand alone to make a word include many affixes, presuffixes and suffixes.
For example let’s look at the wordboy. Boy is a morpheme [a unit of meaning] that can stand alone and be a word.Now let’s look at the suffix -s. This is a morpheme, but NOT a word. If you add the morpheme “-s” to the end of the word boy [meaning more than one] you now have the word boys which means there are more than one boy. Another example would be the word big. Alone, this is word and a morpheme that means large. However, you can add the morpheme -est to the end, biggest, to change the meaning to the MOST big. [Check out THIS LINK for more info]
What is Semantics?
Semantics refers to the rules that govern the meanings of words and word groups, as well as phrases, sentences, paragraphs, etc., within a language. Not only does semantics look at individual word meaning [like vocabulary words] but also how words relate to each other meaningfully like homonyms, antonyms, and synonyms.
Language in the written form
What is Syntax?
Syntax refers to the rules that govern how words are put together [especially word order] in a sentence to convey meaning. The order in which one puts words in a sentence can completely alter the meaning of the message. For example, let’s look at the words Dog, Likes, My and Baby, Eat, To, Food. Take a look at these two sences which use the SAME WORDS, but in different order:
- My dog likes to eat baby food.
- My baby likes to eat dog food
Notice how the word order determines the overall meaning of the message? This is syntax.
Braille: Language in a tactile representation
What is Pragmatics?
Pragmatics refers to the rules that govern the manner in which we use language. According to ASHA, pragmatics involves three major communication skills:
- Use language for different purposes such as: greeting [i.e. Hello], requesting [i.e. My I have milk?], protesting [i.e. No, I don’t want to], informing [i.e. I like ice cream], demanding [i.e. Give me milk], etc.
- Changing language according to the needs of a listener or situation, such as providing the listener with any relevant background information, speaking differently to friends/peers than to those in authority, speaking differently to a child than to an adult, etc.
- Following rules for conversations and storytelling, such as appropriately initiating a conversation topic, staying on topic, taking turns within a conversation, appropriate us of eye contact and facial expressions, using and understanding nonverbal communication, physical proximity, etc.
Receptive vs. Expressive Language
If you are a parent, you may have noticed that your toddler was able to understand many words, phrases and commands well before he was able to talk. Receptive language refers to what we understand. This can be spoken, written, or visual symbolic language [like sign language or the use of an AAC-augmentative or alternative communication system]. Expressive language, then, refers to our ability to communicate expressively to others. Again, this can be spoken, written or when using a visual symbolic system.
Sign Language: Language without speech
Remember: You can have language without speech!
I explained this in my last post, What is the Difference Between Speech and Language. You can have language without speech. The best example of this is American Sign Language [ASL] which has its own syntax, semantics, and pragmatic rules [remember, it is NOT just a gestural form of English]. It is language that does not require speech. Also, remember that you can communicate even if you don’t share a language with someone! Please check out that post to read more.
I hope that this post has explained what exactly language is! Did you find it little confusing? That’s ok…I have a Masters Degree in this stuff and found this post a little harder to write than I thought it would be, in a way that I felt the average person could understand!