ENG502 Midterm Solved Papers

Q. Allograph

1. a letter of an alphabet in a particular shape (such as A or a) A variant shape of a letter
2. any of the ways a unit of a writing system, as the letter of an alphabet, is formed or shaped
3. any of the units or combinations of unit that can represent one phoneme as /f/
4. Writing especially a signature, made by one person for another. So, we can see that allograph is the opposite of autograph.

Q. What is the functional morpheme?

A functional morpheme simply modifies the meaning of the word, rather than supplying the root meaning of the word. It encodes grammatical meaning e.g., the girls entered the classroom. In this sentence, ‘the’ is functional morpheme, which is specifying girl and classroom. Functional morphemes belong to the ‘closed’ class of words. Normally, new functional morphemes cannot be coined.

Q. discuss traditional grammar

Traditional Grammar The terms ‘article,’, ‘adjective’, and ‘noun’ that we use to label the grammatical categories of the words in the phrase the lucky boys come from traditional grammar, which has its origins in the description of languages such as Latin and Greek. Since there were well-established grammatical descriptions of these languages, it seemed appropriate to adopt the existing categories from these descriptions and apply them in the analysis of ‘newer’ languages such as English. The best-known terms from that tradition are those used in describing the parts of speech.

Q. types of stress

The stress placed on words within sentences is called sentence stress or prosodic stress. The stress tells the listener which words are important. Most unstressed words are ignored or discarded. it is difficult to define stress solely phonetically.

In English there are three types of stress:

syllable stress. when one syllable in a word is pronounced louder and more clearly than adjacent syllables. word stress. when one word is pronounced louder and more clearly than adjacent words in a sentence. phrase, clause or sentence stress.

Q. Language is a mean of control

Controlled languages (sometimes called controlled natural languages or CNLs) are subsets of human languages, such as English or Chinese. Controlled languages use restricted grammar rules and vocabularies (typically between 800 and 1,000 words) to reduce or eliminate ambiguity and complexity.

Q. Social interaction source Language is the foundation for most social interaction.

People use language to acquire goods, services, and information and to make public their thoughts and feelings. They use language in informal encounters with friends and family and in more task-oriented or highly scripted encounters, such as those occurring in school and the workplace. They also use language in face-to-face encounters as well as in encounters with partners who are not visible to them, such as when they speak on the telephone.

Q. Define monosyllable, disyllable, Bisyllable, Trisyllable and Polysyllable.

A word that consists of a single syllable (speech sound) (like English dog) is called a monosyllable (and is said to be monosyllabic). Similar terms include disyllable and disyllabic (also bisyllable and bisyllabic) for a word of two syllables; trisyllable (and trisyllabic) for a word of three syllables; and polysyllable (and polysyllabic), which may refer either to a word of more than three syllables or to any word of more than one syllable. An ideal syllable consists of CVC (Consonant Vowel Consonant), for example, cat/kæt/. However, there can be variety in the structure of the syllable.

Q. Interchangeability write examples

Interchangeability refers to the idea that humans can give and receive identical linguistic signals; humans are not limited in the types of messages they can say/hear. One can say "I am a boy" even if one is a girl. This is not to be confused with lying (prevarication). The importance is that a speaker can physically create any and all messages regardless of their truth or relation to the speaker. In other words, anything that one can hear, one can also say. Interchangeability refers to the speaker’s ability to both receive and broadcast the same signal. This is different to some communication systems where, for example, males produce one set of behaviours and females another and they are unable to interchange these messages so that males use the female signal and vice versa.

Q. WHAT IS GRAMMAR?

The word grammar is from Greek word which means "art of letters", (gramma), "letter". Grammar is the set of structural rules governing the composition of clauses, phrases, and words in any given natural language. The term refers also to the study of such rules, and this field includes phonology, morphology, and syntax, often complemented by phonetics, semantics, and pragmatics.

Grammar refers to cognitive information underlying language use. Speakers of a language have a set of internalized rules for using that language. These rules constitute grammar, and the vast majority of the information in the grammar is—at least in the case of one's native language—acquired not by conscious study or instruction, but by observing other speakers.

Q. Zero Onset:

If the first syllable of a word begins with a vowel, it can be any vowel except /ʊ/ which is rare. Initial consonant of a word may be any except /ŋ/.

Q. DIFFERENCE BETWEEN PRESCRIPTIVE LINGUISTICS and DESCRIPTIVE LINGUISTICS

Prescriptive grammar describes when people focus on talking about how a language should or ought to be used. One way to remember this association is to think of going to a doctor’s office. When a doctor gives you a prescription for medication, it often includes directions about how you should take your medication as well as what you should not do when taking your medication. In a similar way, a prescriptive grammar tells you how you should speak, and what type of language to avoid. This is commonly found in English classes as well as other language classes, where the aim is to teach people how to use language in a very particular (typically described as ‘proper’ or ‘correct’) way. Descriptive grammar, on the other hand, focuses on describing the language as it is used, not saying how it should be used. For example, think about a prescriptive rule like Don’t split infinitives. A descriptive grammarian would see a sentence like “To boldly go where no man has gone before” and would try to describe how the mental grammar can cause that ordering of words, rather than saying that the surface form is faulty due to prescriptive rules (which would require the sentence “To go boldly where no man has gone before”). Linguistics takes this approach to language.

Q. GENERAL RULES OF STRESS

1. When nouns and adjectives possess two syllables the stress is on the first syllable. Examples: PRO-gress
2. Verbs possess two syllables the stress is on the last syllable. Examples: pre-SENT
3. Words ending in ‘Shen’ sound like –TION, -SION, -CIAN are usually stressed on the second last syllable. Example: e-du-CA-tion
4. Words ending on –IC are usually stressed on second last syllable. Examples: e-co-NO-mic
5. Words ending in –EE and –OO are usually stressed on last syllable. Example: em-poly-EE

Q. Derivational Morphemes

Derivational morphemes change the grammatical categories of words.

Word Part of speech Affix New word Changed class Bake Verb -er Baker Noun Quick Adjective -ly Quickly Adverb Happy Adjective -ness Happiness Noun Derivational morphemes can be added to free morphemes or to other derivational morphemes.

Transform (v) Form (root word) Prefix trans-, a derivational morpheme. -ation. Transformation (N) -al to -ation, the transformational (adj.)

Q. Linguistics:

Non-Speculative Nature Linguistics is non-speculative. So the main difference between scientific and non-scientific study of language is that linguistics is empirical rather than speculative or intuitive. It operates with publically verifiable data obtained by means of observation and experiment. Speculative mood (abbreviated spec) is an epistemic grammatical mood found in some languages, which indicates that the utterance is based on speculation of the speaker, and not necessarily known to be the case. For example, " The butler could have been the killer."

Q. SAPIR’S DEIFINITION OF LANGUAGE:

According to Sapir (1921: 8), "language is a purely human and non-instinctive method of communicating ideas, emotions and desires by means of voluntarily produced symbols." This definition suffers from several defects. However, broadly, we interpret the terms 'idea', 'emotion' and 'desire , it seems clear that there is much that is communicated by language which is not covered by any of them and 'idea' in particular is inherently imprecise. On the other hand, there are many systems of voluntarily produced symbols that we only count as languages in what we feel to be an extended or metaphoric sense of the word ‘language’. For example, what is now popularly referred to by means of expression ‘body language’ which make use of gestures, postures, eye-gaze etc. would seem to satisfy this part of Sapir’s definition. Whether it is purely human or non-instinctive is open to doubt. This is the main point to be noted in Sapir's definition.

Q. Language: A Symbol System

A language is a system of arbitrary vocal symbols by means of which a social group co-operates. Language is a system of symbols and rules that enable us to communicate. The symbols used in language can include speech