Introduction to Linguistics Chapter 7: Language Change Instructor: LIU Hongyong Review: Pragmatics To fully understand the meaning of a sentence, we must understand the context in which it is used. Pragmatics is concerned with how people use language within a context. Review: Pragmatics vs. semantics Semantics: The meanings of words and sentences are studied independent of language use. Pragmatics: It would be impossible to give an adequate description of meaning if the context of language use is left unconsidered. Therefore, context is taken into consideration.  Both semantics and pragmatics study the meaning of a linguistic form. However, they are different. What essentially distinguishes them is whether the context is considered.  If it is not considered, the study is in the area of semantics; if it is considered, the study is in the area of pragmatics. Review: Four maxims     The maxim of quantity Make your contribution as informative as required. No more and no less. The maxim of quality Do not say what you believe to be false and do not say what you lack evidence for. The maxim of relation Be relevant The maxim of manner Avoid obscurity, ambiguity. Be brief and orderly. Introduction  All languages change through time, but how they change, what drives these changes, and what kinds of changes we can expect are not obvious.  By comparing different languages, different dialects of the same language, or different historical stages of a particular language, we can discover the history of languages. Introduction  Historical linguistics is concerned with language change. It is interested in what kinds of changes occur (and why), and equally important, what kinds of changes don’t occur (and why not).  Languages change in all aspects o the grammar: the phonology, morphology, syntax, and semantics. Sound change  Sound changes tend to be systematic; it is possible to see a regular pattern of pronunciation changes throughout the history of the English language. Example: knight [nait]  Modern English spelling contains many “silent letters,” which are actually just remnant indicators of earlier pronunciations. To anyone leaning English, the presence of such letters can be quite troublesome. (i) Word-initial velar stop consonants [k] and [g] were lost when they occurred before the nasal [n]: Middle English Modern English gnawn gnaw knixt knight (ii) Initial [w] was lost when it occurred before [r]: Middle English Modern English writan wrekken write wreck [rait] [rek] (iii) Word final [b] was lost when it occurred after [m]: Middle English Modern English dumb dumb [dAm] Morphological and syntactic change     1. Change in “agreement” rule 2. Change in negation rule 3. Process of simplification 4. Loss of inflection (Refer to the examples on P.96-97) Process of simplification  In Modern English, a noun phrase such as our father has the same form regardless of whether it is a subject or an object, as in (subject) (object) Our father drinks a lot of coffee. We love our father Old English: (subject) (object) fæder ure fæder urne Vocabulary Change: Addition of new words      1. Coinage 2. Clipped words 3. Blending 4. Acronyms 5. Initial letters      See P. 98-100 for examples 6. Back-formation 7. Functional shift 8. Borrowing 9. Derivation 10. Compounding Loss of words  Reason: One of the most common causes for the loss of lexical items is the discontinuation of the object they name.  soap flakes, wash board, rumble seat Changes in the meaning      1. Widening of meaning 2. Narrowing of meaning 3. Meaning shift a. elevate b. degrade Some recent trends 1. Moving towards greater informality 2. The influence of American English 3. The influence of science and technology a. space travel b. computer and internet language c. ecology Causes of language change 1. The rapid development of science and technology 2. Social and political changes and political needs 3. The way children acquire the language 4. Economy of memory 5. The desire to be intelligible