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2018年三峡大学外国语学院894外国语言学及应用语言学之语言学教程考研核心题库

  摘要

一、Explain-the-fllowing-terms

1. Semantic field

【答案】 It is the organization of related words and expressions into a system which shows their relationship to one another. For example, kinship terms such as father, mother, brother, sister, uncle, aunt belong to a semantic field whose relevant features include generation , sex , membership of the father's or mother's side of the family.

2. Categorization

Categorization is the process of classifying our experiences into different categories based 【答案】

on commonalities and differences. There are three levels in categories: the basic level,the superordinate level ,and the subordinate level.

3. Contrastive analysis

【答案】 Contrastive analysis is an approach to analysis of second language acquisition, based on a belief that a more effective teaching pedagogy would come out when the similarities and differences between native language and target language are taken into consideration. By such an analysis , it is supposed that some leaning difficulties could be predicted in terms of language transfer.

4. Locutionary Act, Illocutinary Act and Perlocutionary Act

【答案】 According to Austin , a speaker might be performing three acts simultaneously when speaking.

A locutionary act is the uttering of words, phrases, and clauses, which conveys meaning by giving out meaningful sounds. Therefore, when somebody says „„Morning‟‟,we can ask a question like “What did he do?‟‟,and the answer could be “He offered a greeting.”

An illocutionary act is the act of expressing the speaker‟s intention; it is the act performed in saying something. Therefore, for the same example,we can say “He meant it as a greeting”.

A perlocutionary act is the effect of the utterance. Thus,by saying “Morning!” the speaker has made it clear that he wants to keep friendly relations with the hearer.

5. Register

【答案】 It is a speech variety used by a particular group of people , usually sharing the same occupation (e.g. doctors, lawyers) or the same interests. A particular register often distinguishes itself from others by having a number of distinctive words, by using words or phrases in a particular way, and sometimes by special grammatical constructions (e.g. legal language).

6. Contextual meaning

【答案】 It is also called speaker‟s meaning, or utterance meaning, which is more closely related to the context. For example, when a person says “My bag is heavy”,what he actually means may be asking the hearer to help him carry the bag.

7. Sapir-Whorf hypothesis

【答案】 Sapir-Whorf hypothesis consists of two parts : linguistic determinism and linguistic relativity. Linguistic determinism refers to the notion that a language determines certain nonlinguistic cognitive processes. Different languages offer people different ways of expressing around , they think and speak differently. Linguistic relativity refers to the claim that the cognitive processes that are determined are different for different languages. Thus, speakers of different languages are said to think in different ways. The hypothesis is now interpreted mainly in two different ways: a strong version and a weak one. The strong version believes that the language patterns determine peopled thinking and behavior ; the weak one holds that the former influence the later. So far , many researches and experiments conducted provide support to the weak version.

8. Componential analysis

【答案】 It refers to a semantic approach which defines the meaning of a lexical element in terms of semantic components , or semantic features. For example , the meaning of the word boy may be analyzed into three components: HUMAN, YOUNG and MALE.

9. Embedding

【答案】 It refers to the inclusion of a clause within a phrase or another clause, or of a phrase into another phrase. An example of embedded clauses is: What I do is none of your business. (Nominal clause embedded as subject of another clause)

10.Applied linguistics

【答案】 It is a branch of linguistics which studies the application of linguistics in reality. For example , there are studies on multilingualism, language acquisition, first and second language teaching and learning.

二、Short-answer-questions

11.Why is Saussure hailed as the father of modem linguistics?

【答案】 Saussure occupies such an important place in the history of linguistics that he is often described as ''father of modem linguistics”:

A. The book Course in General Linguistics (1916),which is the most important source of Saussure‟s ideas, marked the beginning of modem linguistics.

B.Saussure was the first to notice the complexities of language. He believed that language is a system of signs, called conventions. He held that the sign is the union of the signifier and the signified.

C.By providing answers to questions concerning many aspects of language, Saussure made clear the object of study for linguistics as a science. His ideas on the arbitrary nature of sign, on the relational nature of linguistic units , on the distinction of langue and parole and of synchronic and diachronic

linguistics , etc. pushed linguistics into a brand new stage.

12.Produce surface structures from the following deep structures without going through the process of transformations.

(1)Neg she past work last week

(2)Tag you past meet him

(3)the students I pres be+ing help the students I

(4)policemen past be+en beat John

(5)Q the professor pres be angry SOME REASON

(6)SOMEONE past be+ing be+en beat Joseph hard

(7)Q he past do SOMETHING

(8)Imp you pres will wash you

(9)[ Neg Mary past go to the bookstore] [Neg Lisa past go to the bookstore]

(10)the girl [the girl pres be beautiful]pres be from China

【答案】(1) She didn't work last week.

(2)You met him, didn't you?

(3)The students are helping themselves.

(4)The policemen were beaten by John.

(5)Why is the professor angry?

(6)He / She was being beaten hard by Joseph.

(7 ) What did he do?

(8)Wash yourself.

(9)Mary didn‟t go to the bookstore. Lisa didn‟t go to the bookstore either.

(10)The girl who is beautiful is from China.

13.What makes language unique to human beings?

The design features of language which refer to the defining properties of human language 【答案】

tell the difference between human language and any system of animal communication.Arbitrariness is a core feature of language, which means that there is no logical connection between meanings and sounds. Duality , which means the property of having two levels of structures, such that units of the primary level are composed of elements of the secondary level and each of the two levels has its own principles of organization. Creativity means language is resourceful because of its duality and its recursiveness. Because of duality the speaker is able to combine the basic linguistic unites to form an infinite set of sentences , most of which are never heard before. 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. So all these features make language unique to human beings.

14.What is the cognitive interpretation of image schema?

【答案】 Image schema is a recurring, dynamic pattern of our perceptual interactions and motor