دراسات لغوية

Deixis
Deixis is reference to a person, object, or event which relies on the situational context. First and second person pronouns such as my, mine, you, your, yours, we, ours and us are always deictic because their reference is entirely dependent on context. Demonstrative articles like this, that, these and those and expressions of time and place are always deictic as well. In order to understand what specific times or places such expressions refer to, we also need to know when or where the utterance was said. If someone says "I'm over here!" you would need to know who "I" referred to, as well as where "here" is. Deixis marks one of the boundaries of semantics and pragmatics.

Part Five: Neurolinguistics
The human brain consists of 10 billion nerve cells (neurons) and billions of fibers that connect them. These neurons or gray matter form the cortex, the surface of the brain, and the connecting fibers or white matter form the interior of the brain. The brain is divided into two hemispheres, the left and right cerebral hemispheres. These hemispheres are connected by the corpus callosum. In general, the left hemisphere of the brain controls the right side of the body and vice versa.

The auditory cortex receives and interprets auditory stimuli, while the visual cortex receives and interprets visual stimuli. The angular gyrus converts the auditory stimuli to visual stimuli and vice versa. The motor cortex signals the muscles to move when we want to talk and is directed by Broca's area. The nerve fiber connecting Wernicke's and Broca's area is called the arcuate fasciculus.
Lateralization refers to any cognitive functions that are localized to one side of the brain or the other. Language is said to be lateralized and processed in the left hemisphere of the brain. Paul Broca first related language to the left side of the brain when he noted that damage to the front part of the left hemisphere (now called Broca's area) resulted in a loss of speech, while damage to the right side did not. He determined this through autopsies of patients who had acquired language deficits following brain injuries. A language disorder that follows a brain lesion is called aphasia, and patients with damage to Broca's area have slow and labored speech, loss of function words, and poor word order, yet good comprehension.
Carl Wernicke also used studies of autopsies to describe another type of aphasia that resulted from lesions in the back portion of the left hemisphere (now called Wernicke's area.) Unlike Broca's patients, Wernicke's spoke fluently and with good pronunciation, but with many lexical errors and a difficulty in comprehension. Broca's and Wernicke's area are the two main regions of the cortex of the brain related to language processing.
Aphasics can suffer from anomia, jargon aphasia, and acquired dyslexia. Anomia is commonly referred to as "tip of the tongue" phenomenon and many aphasics experience word finding difficulty on a regular basis. Jargon aphasia results in the substitution of one word or sound for another. Some aphasics may substitute similar words for each other, such as table for chair, or they may substitute completely unrelated words, such as chair for engine. Others may pronounce table as sable, substituting an s sound for a t sound. Aphasics who became dyslexic after brain damage are called acquired dyslexics. When reading aloud words printed on cards, the patients produced the following substitutions:

StimuliResponse OneResponse Two

Act	Play	Play
South	East	West
Heal	Pain	Medicine

The substitution of phonologically similar words, such as pool and tool, also provides evidence that a human's mental lexicon is organized by both phonology and semantics.
Broca's aphasics and some acquired dyslexics are unable to read function words, and when presented with them on the cards, the patients say no, as shown in the following example:

Stimuli OneResponseStimuli TwoResponse

Witch	Witch	Which	no!
Hour	Time	Our	no!
Wood	Wood	Would	no!

The patient's errors suggest our mental dictionary is further organized into parts consisting of major content words (first stimuli) and grammatical words (second stimuli.)
In addition, split-brain patients (those who have had their corpus callosum severed) provide evidence for language lateralization. If an object is placed in the left hand of split-brain patient whose vision is cut off, the person cannot name the object, but will know how to use it. The information is sent to the right side of the brain, but cannot be relayed to the left side for linguistic naming. However, if the object is placed in the person's right hand, the person can immediately name it because the information is sent directly to the left hemisphere.
Dichotic listening is another experimental technique, using auditory signals. Subjects hear a different sound in each ear, such as boy in the left ear and girl in the right ear or water rushing in the left ear and a horn honking in the right ear. When asked to state what they heard in each ear, subjects are more frequently correct in reporting linguistic stimuli in the right ear (girl) and nonverbal stimuli in the left ear (water rushing.) This is because the left side of the brain is specialized for language and a word heard in the right ear will transfer directly to the left side of the body because of the contralateralization of the brain. Furthermore, the right side of the brain is specialized for nonverbal stimuli, such as music and environmental sounds, and a noise heard in the left ear will transfer directly to the right side of the brain.

Part Six: Child Language Acquisition and Second Language Acquisition
Linguistic competence develops in stages, from babbling to one word to two word, then telegraphic speech. Babbling is now considered the earliest form of language acquisition because infants will produce sounds based on what language input they receive. One word sentences (holophrastic speech) are generally monosyllabic in consonant-vowel clusters. During two word stage, there are no syntactic or morphological markers, no inflections for plural or past tense, and pronouns are rare, but the intonation contour extends over the whole utterance. Telegraphic speech lacks function words and only carries the open class content words, so that the sentences sound like a telegram.
Three theories
The three theories of language acquisition: imitation, reinforcement and analogy, do not explain very well how children acquire language. Imitation does not work because children produce sentences never heard before, such as "cat stand up table." Even when they try to imitate adult speech, children cannot generate the same sentences because of their limited grammar. And children who are unable to speak still learn and understand the language, so that when they overcome their speech impairment they immediately begin speaking the language. Reinforcement also does not work because it actually seldomly occurs and when it does, the reinforcement is correcting pronunciation or truthfulness, and not grammar. A sentence such as "apples are purple" would be corrected more often because it is not true, as compared to a sentence such as "apples is red" regardless of the grammar. Analogy also cannot explain language acquisition. Analogy involves the formation of sentences or phrases by using other sentences as samples. If a child hears the sentence, "I painted a red barn," he can say, by analogy, "I painted a blue barn." Yet if he hears the sentence, "I painted a barn red," he cannot say "I saw a barn red." The analogy did not work this time, and this is not a sentence of English.
Acquisitions
Phonology: A child's error in pronunciation is not random, but rule-governed. Typical phonological rules include: consonant cluster simplification (spoon becomes poon), devoicing of final consonants (dog becomes dok), voicing of initial consonants (truck becomes druck), and consonant harmony (doggy becomes goggy, or big becomes gig.)
Morphology: An overgeneralization of constructed rules is shown when children treat irregular verbs and nouns as regular. Instead of went as the past tense of go, children use goed because the regular verbs add an -ed ending to form the past tense. Similarly, children use gooses as the plural of goose instead of geese, because regular nouns add an -s in the plural.
The "Innateness Hypothesis" of child language acquisition, proposed by Noam Chomsky, states that the human species is prewired to acquire language, and that the kind of language is also determined. Many factors have led to this hypothesis such as the ease and rapidity of language acquisition despite impoverished input as well as the uniformity of languages. All children will learn a language, and children will also learn more than one language if they are exposed to it. Children follow the same general stages when learning a language, although the linguistic input is widely varied.
The poverty of the stimulus states that children seem to learn or know the aspects of grammar for which they receive no information. In addition, children do not produce sentences that could not be sentences in some human language. The principles of Universal Grammar underlie the specific grammars of all languages and determine the class of languages that can be acquired unconsciously without instruction. It is the genetically determined faculty of the left hemisphere, and there is little doubt that the brain is specially equipped for acquisition of human language.
The "Critical Age Hypothesis" suggests that there is a critical age for language acquisition without the need for special teaching or learning. During this critical period, language learning proceeds quickly and easily. After this period, the acquisition of grammar is difficult, and for some people, never fully achieved. Cases of children reared in social isolation have been used for testing the critical age hypothesis. None of the children who had little human contact were able to speak any language once reintroduced into society. Even the children who received linguistic input after being reintroduced to society were unable to fully develop language skills. These cases of isolated children, and of deaf children, show that humans cannot fully acquire any language to which they are exposed unless they are within the critical age. Beyond this age, humans are unable to acquire much of syntax and inflectional morphology. At least for humans, this critical age does not pertain to all of language, but to specific parts of the grammar.
Second Language Acquisition Teaching Methods
Grammar-translation: the student memorizes words, inflected words, and syntactic rules and uses them to translate from native to target language and vice versa; most commonly used method in schools because it does not require teacher to be fluent; however, least effective method of teaching
Direct method: the native language is not used at all in the classroom, and the student must learn the new language without formal instruction; based on theories of first language acquisition
Audio-lingual: heavy use of dialogs and audio, based on the assumption that language learning is acquired mainly through imitation, repetition, and reinforcement; influenced by psychology
Natural Approach: emphasis on vocabulary and not grammar; focus on meaning, not form; use of authentic materials instead of textbook
Silent Way: teachers remain passive observers while students learn, which is a process of personal growth; no grammatical explanation or modeling by the teacher
Total Physical Response: students play active role as listener and performer, must respond to imperative drills with physical action
Suggestopedia: students always remain comfortable and relaxed and learn through memorization of meaningful texts, although the goal is understanding
Community Language Learning: materials are developed as course progresses and teacher understands what students need and want to learn; learning involves the whole person and language is seen as more than just communication
Community Language Teaching: incorporates all components of language and helps students with various learning styles; use of communication-based activities with authentic materials, needs of learner are taken into consideration when planning topics and objectives
Four skill areas
The four skill areas of learning a foreign language need to be addressed consistently and continually. Good lesson plans incorporate all four: Listening, Speaking, Reading (and Vocabulary), and Writing (and Grammar). Native speakers do not learn the skill areas separately, nor do they use them separately, so they shouldn’t be taught separately. However, it is easy to fall into the trap of teaching about the language, instead of actually teaching the language. Most textbooks resort to teaching grammar and vocabulary lists and nothing more.

Part Seven: Sociolinguistics
A dialect is a variety of language that is systematically different from other varieties of the same language. The dialects of a single language are mutually intelligible, but when the speakers can no longer understand each other, the dialects become languages. Geographical regions are also considered when dialects become languages. Swedish, Norwegian, and Danish are all considered separate languages because of regular differences in grammar and the countries in which they are spoken, yet Swedes, Norwegians, and Danes can all understand one another. Hindi and Urdu are considered mutually intelligible languages when spoken, yet the writing systems are different. On the other hand, Mandarin and Cantonese are mutually unintelligible languages when spoken, yet the writing systems are the same.
A dialect is considered standard if it is used by the upper class, political leaders, in literature and is taught in schools as the correct form of the language. Overt prestige refers to this dominant dialect. A non-standard dialect is associated with covert prestige and is an ethnic or regional dialect of a language. These non-standard dialects are just as linguistically sophisticated as the standard dialect, and judgments to the inferiority of them are based on social or racist judgments.
African-American English contains many regular differences of the standard dialect. These differences are the same as the differences among many of the world's dialects. Phonological differences include r and l deletion of words like poor (pa) and all (awe.) Consonant cluster simplification also occurs (passed pronounced like pass), as well as a loss of interdental fricatives. Syntactic differences include the double negative and the loss of and habitual use of the verb "be." He late means he is late now, but he be late means he is always late.
A lingua franca is a major language used in an area where speakers of more than one language live that permits communication and commerce among them. English is called the lingua franca of the whole world, while French used to be the lingua franca of diplomacy.
A pidgin is a rudimentary language of few lexical items and less complex grammatical rules based on another language. No one learns a pidgin as a native language, but children do learn creoles as a first language. Creoles are defined as pidgins that are adopted by a community as its native tongue.
Besides dialects, speakers may use different styles or registers (such as contractions) depending on the context. Slang may also be used in speech, but is not often used in formal situations or writing. Jargon refers to the unique vocabulary pertaining to a certain area, such as computers or medicine. Words or expressions referring to certain acts that are forbidden or frowned upon are considered taboo. These taboo words produce euphemisms, words or phrases that replace the expressions that are being avoided.
The use of words may indicate a society's attitude toward sex, bodily functions or religious beliefs, and they may also reflect racism or sexism in a society. Language itself is not racist or sexist, but the society may be. Such insulting words may reinforce biased views, and changes in society may be reflected in the changes in language.

Part Eight: Historical Linguistics
Languages that evolve from a common source are genetically related. These languages were once dialects of the same language. Earlier forms of Germanic languages, such as German, English, and Swedish were dialects of Proto-Germanic, while earlier forms of Romance languages, such as Spanish, French, and Italian were dialects of Latin. Furthermore, earlier forms of Proto-Germanic and Latin were once dialects of Indo-European.
Linguistic changes like sound shift is found in the history of all languages, as evidenced by the regular sound correspondences that exist between different stages of the same language, different dialects, and different languages. Words, morphemes, and phonemes may be altered, added or lost. The meaning of words may broaden, narrow or shift. New words may be introduced into a language by borrowing, or by coinage, blends and acronyms. The lexicon may also shrink as older words become obsolete.
Change comes about as a result of the restructuring of grammar by children learning the language. Grammars seem to become simple and regular, but these simplifications may be compensated for by more complexities. Sound changes can occur because of assimilation, a process of ease of articulation. Some grammatical changes are analogic changes, generalizations that lead to more regularity, such as sweeped instead of swept.
The study of linguistic change is called historical and comparative linguistics. Linguists identify regular sound correspondences using the comparative method among the cognates (words that developed from the same ancestral language) of related languages. They can restructure an earlier protolanguage and this allows linguists to determine the history of a language family.
Old English, Middle English, Modern English

Old English	499-1066 CE	Beowulf
Middle English	1066-1500 CE	Canterbury Tales
Modern English	1500-present	Shakespeare

Phonological change: Between 1400 and 1600 CE, the Great Vowel Shift took place. The seven long vowels of Middle English underwent changes. The high vowels and [u] became the diphthongs [aj] and [aw]. The long vowels increased tongue height and shifted upward, and [a] was fronted. Many of the spelling inconsistencies of English are because of the Great Vowel Shift. Our spelling system still reflects the way words were pronounced before the shift took place.
[i]Morphological change: Many Indo-European languages had extensive case endings that governed word order, but these are no longer found in Romance languages or English. Although pronouns still show a trace of the case system (he vs. him), English uses prepositions to show the case. Instead of the dative case (indirect objects), English usually the words to or for. Instead of the genitive case, English uses the word of or 's after a noun to show possession. Other cases include the nominative (subject pronouns), accusative (direct objects), and vocative.
Syntactic change: Because of the lack of the case system, word order has become more rigid and strict in Modern English. Now it is strictly Subject - Verb - Object order.
Orthographic change: Consonant clusters have become simplified, such as hlaf becoming loaf and hnecca becoming neck. However, some of these clusters are still written, but are no longer pronounced, such as gnaw, write, and dumb.
Lexical change: Old English borrowed place names from Celtic, army, religious and educational words from Latin, and everyday words from Scandinavian. Angle and Saxon (German dialects) form the basis of Old English phonology, morphology, syntax and lexicon. Middle English borrowed many words from French in the areas of government, law, religion, literature and education because of the Norman Conquest in 1066 CE. Modern English borrowed words from Latin and Greek because of the influence of the classics, with much scientific terminology.
For more information, read the [ندعوك للتسجيل في المنتدى أو التعريف بنفسك لمعاينة هذا الرابط] page.

Part Nine: Classification of Languages
Indo-European family of languages

• Italic (Latin)
  
  
  
  • Romance
    
    
    
    • Catalan
      
    • French
      
    • Italian
      
    • Occitan (Provençal)
      
    • Portuguese
      
    • Rhaeto-Romansch
      
    • Romanian
      
    • Spanish
      
  
  
  
  
• Germanic
  
  
  
  • North Germanic
    
    
    
    • Danish
      
    • Faroese
      
    • Icelandic
      
    • Norwegian
      
    • Swedish
      
    
    
  • East Germanic
    
    
    
    • Gothic (extinct)
      
    
    
  • West Germanic
    
    
    
    • Afrikaans
      
    • Dutch
      
    • English
      
    • Flemish
      
    • Frisian
      
    • German
      
    • Yiddish
      
  
  
  
  
• Slavic
  
  
  
  • Western
    
    
    
    • Czech
      
    • Polish
      
    • Slovak
      
    • Sorbian
      
    
    
  • Eastern
    
    
    
    • Belarusian
      
    • Russian
      
    • Ukrainian
      
    
    
  • Southern
    
    
    
    • Bulgarian
      
    • Croatian
      
    • Macedonian
      
    • Old Church Slavonic
      
    • Serbian
      
    • Slovene
      
  
  
  
  
• Baltic
  
  
  
  • Latvian
    
  • Lithuanian
    
  • Old Prussian (extinct)
    
  
  
• Celtic
  
  
  
  • Brythonic
    
    
    
    • Breton
      
    • Cornish (extinct)
      
    • Gaulish (extinct)
      
    • Welsh
      
    
    
  • Goidelic
    
    
    
    • Irish
      
    • Manx Gaelic (extinct)
      
    • Scots Gaelic
      
  
  
  
  
• Hellenic (Greek)
  
• Albanian
  
• Armenian
  
• Anatolian (extinct)
  
• Tocharian (extinct)
  
• Indo-Iranian
  
  
  
  • Indo-Aryan (Indic)
    
    
    
    • Assamese
      
    • Bengali
      
    • Bihari
      
    • Gujarati
      
    • Hindi-Urdu
      
    • Marathi
      
    • Punjabi
      
    • Romani
      
    • Sanskrit
      
    • Sindhi
      
    • Singhalese
      
  
  
  
  
  
  
  • Iranian
    
    
    
    • Avestan
      
    • Balochi
      
    • Farsi (Persian)
      
    • Kurdish
      
    • Pashtu (Afghan)
      
    • Sogdian
      
  
  

Uralic (or Finno-Ugric) is the other major family of languages spoken on the European continent. Finnish, Estonian and Hungarian are examples.
Afro-Asiatic languages are spoken in Northern Africa and the Middle East. They include Berber, Egyptian, Omotic and Cushitic languages (Somali, Iraqw) as well as the modern Semitic languages of Hebrew, Arabic and Amharic, in addition to languages spoken in biblical times, such as Aramaic, Akkadian, Babylonian, Canaanite, and Phoenician.
The Altaic languages are classified as Japanese and Korean, though some linguists separate these languages into their own groups.
Sino-Tibetan languages include Mandarin, Hakka, Wu, Burmese, Tibetan, and all of the Chinese "dialects."
Austro-tai languages include Indonesian, Javanese and Thai; while the Asiatic group includes Vietnamese.
The Dravidian languages of Tamil and Telugu are spoken in southeastern India and Sri Lanka.
The Caucasian language family consists of 40 different languages, and is divided into Cartvelian (south Caucasian), North-West Caucasian and North-East Caucasian language groups. Some languages are Georgian, Megrelian, Chechen, Ingush Avarian, Lezgian and Dargin. These languages are mostly spoken in Georgia, Turkey, Syria, Iran, Jordan and parts of the Russian federation.
The Niger-Congo family includes most of the African languages. About 1,500 languages belong to this group, including the Bantu languages of Swahili, Tswana, Xhosa, Zulu, Kikuyu, and Shona. Other languages are Ewe, Mina, Yoruba, Igbo, Wolof, Kordofanian and Fulfulde.
Other African language groups are Nilo-Saharan, which includes 200 languages spoken in Central and Eastern Africa; and Khoisan, the click languages of southern Africa. The Khoisan group only contains about 30 languages, most of which are spoken in Namibia and Botswana.
The Austronesian family also contains about 900 languages, spoken all over the globe. Hawaiian, Maori, Tagalog, and Malay are all representatives of this language family.
Many languages are, or were, spoken in North and South America by the native peoples before the European conquests. Knowledge of these languages is limited, and because many of the languages are approaching extinction, linguists have little hope of achieving a complete understanding of the Amerindian language families.