CMN105 QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS RATED A

CMN105 QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS RATED A What was the text written in response to? (Preface) "The original version of this book, Language in Action, was in many respects a response to the dangers of propaganda, especially as exemplified in Adolf Hitler's success in persuading millions to share his maniacal and destructive views" (xi). What is the definition of Semantics and what does it address and what does it NOT address? (Preface) "Those who approach the study of language and speech from a traditional point of view have seen their first as that of correcting the speaker's grammar, pronunciation, and diction...Teachers of semantics will concern themselves, and teach their students to concern themselves, first of all with the truth, the adequacy, and the degree of trustworthiness of statements...Semantics is the study of human interaction through communication." interspecific "Biologists distinguish between two kinds of struggle for survival. First, there is the interspecific struggle, warfare between different species of animals, as between wolves and deer, or men and bacteria. intraspecific Second, there is the intraspecific struggle, warfare among members of a single species, as when rats or human beings fight each other. A great deal of evidence in modern biology indicates that those species that have developed elaborate means of intraspecific competition often make themselves unfit for interspecific competition According to Hayakawa, what are the qualities important to human survival? "...If we don't hang together we shall all hang separately...Cooperation within a species (and sometimes with other species) is essential to the survival of most living creatures" (5). What does he refer to as "cooperative nervous systems?" Human societies (and animal) societies are for more cooperative then competitive "...the fundamental cooperative act by which most of the higher animals survive: namely, communication by the means of noises...We are drawing on the experiences of others in order to make up for what we ourselves have missed...In fact, gregariousness (friendliness/sociability) as an aid to self-defense and survival is forced upon animals as well as upon human beings by the necessity of uniting nervous systems even more than by the necessity of uniting physical strength. Societies, both animal and human, might almost be regarded as huge cooperative nervous systems" (5-6). What is the relationship between language and societal progress? They are inextricably linked. "These marks enable us to communicate with people who are beyond the reach of our voices, both in space and in time...Human beings, then, are never dependent for information on direct experience alone...They can go on from where others left off...Language, that is to say, makes progress possible" What is meant by cultural accomplishments as "free gifts from the dead?" "Language is the indispensible mechanism of human life - of life such as ours that is molded, guided, enriched, and made possible by the accumulation of the past experience of members of our species...The cultural accomplishments of the ages...come to us as free gifts from the dead. These gifts, which none of us have done anything to earn, offer us not only the opportunity for a richer life than any of our forebears enjoyed but also the opportunity to add to the sum total of human achievement by our own contributions, however small" What is the definition of "semantic environment?" "...Mits is affected every hour of his life not only by the words he hears and uses but also by his unconscious assumptions about language...Words - the way he uses them and the way he takes them when spoken by others - largely shape his beliefs, his prejudices, his ideals, his aspirations. They constitute the moral and intellectual atmosphere in which he lives - in short, his semantic environment" What are the basic assumptions behind the thesis of this book? Most societal problems are rooted in misunderstands and cooperation is essential for survival "It will be the basic assumption of this book that widespread intraspecific