Linguistics 3: the study of language: summary
George Yule: 7 t h edition
Chapter 1: The Origin (p. 1 – 11)
Spoken language developed between 100,000 and 50,000 years ago, written language originated
about 5000 years ago.
o Onomatopeia: words that are similar to the noises they describe → splash, bang, buzz, etc.
o Pooh-pooh theory: words/sounds developed from the instinctive sounds people make in
emotional circumstances. These sounds are usually produced with sudden intakes of breath
→ Ouch! Ah! Phew!
o Bow-wow theory: early human speech developed from imitations of natural sounds in the
environment.
o Vocal folds / vocal cords: thin strips of muscle in the larynx
which can be open, in voiceless sounds, or close together,
creating vibration in voiced sounds.
o Larynx: the part of the throat that contains the vocal folds,
also called the voice box.
o Pharynx: area inside the throat above the larynx. Created,
mostly in humans, to act as resonator of increased range and
clarity of the sounds produced via the larynx.
o Voiceless sounds: speech sounds produced without vibration of the vocal folds.
o Voiced sounds: speech sounds produced with vibration of the vocal folds.
o Lateralized / lateralisation: the human brain has specialized functions in each of the two
hemispheres.
o Innateness Hypothesis: the idea that humans are genetically equipped to acquire language.
,Chapter 2: Animal & human language (p. 13 – 26)
o Communicative signals: behaviour used intentionally to provide information.
o Informative signals: behaviour that provides information, usually unintentionally. E.g.: you’ve
sneezed multiple times, so someone knows you’ve got a cold.
o Glossolalia: speaking in tongues: production of sounds and syllables in a stream of speech
that seems to have no communicative purpose. Meaningless speech.
o Reflexivity: only humans are capable of reflexivity: we can use language to think and talk
about language itself.
o Displacement: being able to refer to things/events that are not present in their immediate
environment: past and future time → Yesterday I did…
o Arbitrariness: the absence of any natural connection between a word and the object → duck
is arbitrary, quack is non-arbitrary (because quack is the literal sound and the word to
describe the sound).
o Cultural transmission: the process whereby a language is passed on from one generation to
the next.
o Productivity/creativity/open-endedness: creating new expressions by manipulating their
linguistic resources to describe new objects and situations. It shows that the potential
number of utterances in any human language is infinite.
o Fixed reference: the lack of productivity in animal communication. Each signal is fixed as
relating to one particular object or occasion.
o Duality/double articulation: human language is organized at two levels simultaneously when
looking at sound production: 1. The physical level at which we can produce individual sounds
such as /n/ and /b/. All 44 sounds belong to this category. These do not have any individual
meaning. 2. When we combine these meaningless sounds in a specific manner, they give us
meaning such as /nib/ and /bin/. Same sounds, different combination and therefore meaning.
,Chapter 16: Written language (p. 247 – 260)
Pictographic → ideographic → logographic /morphographic → syllabic → consonantal → alphabetic
o Writing: the symbolic representation of language through the use of graphic signs.
o Pictogram / pictographic writing: drawings that mean a word → = sun. The picture of the
object is used to represent said object.
o Ideograms / ideographic writing: the drawing becomes simple and has more meanings →
= sun, warmth, daylight, etc. The picture represents a concept.
o Logogram / logographic writing: one symbol to represent the meaning of a word, the
o relationship between the symbol and word is now arbitrary. The way the word is portrayed
isn’t related to the word itself. → = sun
o Phonographic writing: the symbols are adapted to represent sounds.
o Rebus principle: a process used in writing in which a pictorial representation of an object is
used to indicate the sound of the word for that object.
o Syllabic writing: each symbol represents the pronunciation of a syllable.
o Syllabary: having a (partially) syllabic writing system.
o Alphabet / alphabetic writing: a set of written symbols, each one representing a single type
of sound or phoneme. Single symbol for a single sound.
o Consonantal alphabet: symbols representing consonant sounds and the reader filling in the
vowel sounds (Hebrew and Arabic).
, Chapter 5: Word formation (p. 58 – 73)
o Neologism: a new word
Not creativity/productivity: creativity is creating new expressions with already
existing words while a neologism is an entirely new word.
o Etymology: the study of the origin and history of a word.
Process name Meaning Example
(True) Coinage Invention/thinking up a completely Aspirin, Kleenex (from clean)
new word/name
Eponyms Create words from proper names Jumbo olives (from name for
elephant)
Latin/Greek roots Combining Latin or Greek words Thermometer (Thermos + metron)
Borrowings Taking over a word from another Croissant (from French)
language
Loan Translations/Calques Direct translation into the Superman (from German
borrowing language Übermensch)
Compounds Joining two or more words Sleepwalk (from sleep and walk)
together
Blends Joining parts of words together Smog (from smoke and fog)
Clippings Reducing a word of more than one Fax (from facsimile)
syllable to a shorter form
Hypocorisms Reducing words to one syllable, Telly (from television)
then adding -y or -ie
Backformations Changing a word’s function by To televise (from television (noun))
removing a morpheme
(real/perceived)
Conversion Changing a word’s function To bottle (from ‘a bottle’ (noun))
without any reduction
Derivational processes Adding affixes (like prefixes, Unhappily (from happy)
suffixes and infixes)
Acronyms Taking the initial letters of a set of CD (from compact disk)
words
Affixes:
Small ‘bits’ that normally aren’t given separate listings in dictionaries. On their own, they don’t mean
something specific. They are used to add to another word. It will change the meaning of that word,
once added. These are bound morphemes.
o Prefixes: added at the beginning of a word. → un-, mis-, etc.
o Suffixes: added at the end of a word. → -less, -ish, etc.
o Infixes: added inside of the word. → -damn-, -bloody-, etc.
George Yule: 7 t h edition
Chapter 1: The Origin (p. 1 – 11)
Spoken language developed between 100,000 and 50,000 years ago, written language originated
about 5000 years ago.
o Onomatopeia: words that are similar to the noises they describe → splash, bang, buzz, etc.
o Pooh-pooh theory: words/sounds developed from the instinctive sounds people make in
emotional circumstances. These sounds are usually produced with sudden intakes of breath
→ Ouch! Ah! Phew!
o Bow-wow theory: early human speech developed from imitations of natural sounds in the
environment.
o Vocal folds / vocal cords: thin strips of muscle in the larynx
which can be open, in voiceless sounds, or close together,
creating vibration in voiced sounds.
o Larynx: the part of the throat that contains the vocal folds,
also called the voice box.
o Pharynx: area inside the throat above the larynx. Created,
mostly in humans, to act as resonator of increased range and
clarity of the sounds produced via the larynx.
o Voiceless sounds: speech sounds produced without vibration of the vocal folds.
o Voiced sounds: speech sounds produced with vibration of the vocal folds.
o Lateralized / lateralisation: the human brain has specialized functions in each of the two
hemispheres.
o Innateness Hypothesis: the idea that humans are genetically equipped to acquire language.
,Chapter 2: Animal & human language (p. 13 – 26)
o Communicative signals: behaviour used intentionally to provide information.
o Informative signals: behaviour that provides information, usually unintentionally. E.g.: you’ve
sneezed multiple times, so someone knows you’ve got a cold.
o Glossolalia: speaking in tongues: production of sounds and syllables in a stream of speech
that seems to have no communicative purpose. Meaningless speech.
o Reflexivity: only humans are capable of reflexivity: we can use language to think and talk
about language itself.
o Displacement: being able to refer to things/events that are not present in their immediate
environment: past and future time → Yesterday I did…
o Arbitrariness: the absence of any natural connection between a word and the object → duck
is arbitrary, quack is non-arbitrary (because quack is the literal sound and the word to
describe the sound).
o Cultural transmission: the process whereby a language is passed on from one generation to
the next.
o Productivity/creativity/open-endedness: creating new expressions by manipulating their
linguistic resources to describe new objects and situations. It shows that the potential
number of utterances in any human language is infinite.
o Fixed reference: the lack of productivity in animal communication. Each signal is fixed as
relating to one particular object or occasion.
o Duality/double articulation: human language is organized at two levels simultaneously when
looking at sound production: 1. The physical level at which we can produce individual sounds
such as /n/ and /b/. All 44 sounds belong to this category. These do not have any individual
meaning. 2. When we combine these meaningless sounds in a specific manner, they give us
meaning such as /nib/ and /bin/. Same sounds, different combination and therefore meaning.
,Chapter 16: Written language (p. 247 – 260)
Pictographic → ideographic → logographic /morphographic → syllabic → consonantal → alphabetic
o Writing: the symbolic representation of language through the use of graphic signs.
o Pictogram / pictographic writing: drawings that mean a word → = sun. The picture of the
object is used to represent said object.
o Ideograms / ideographic writing: the drawing becomes simple and has more meanings →
= sun, warmth, daylight, etc. The picture represents a concept.
o Logogram / logographic writing: one symbol to represent the meaning of a word, the
o relationship between the symbol and word is now arbitrary. The way the word is portrayed
isn’t related to the word itself. → = sun
o Phonographic writing: the symbols are adapted to represent sounds.
o Rebus principle: a process used in writing in which a pictorial representation of an object is
used to indicate the sound of the word for that object.
o Syllabic writing: each symbol represents the pronunciation of a syllable.
o Syllabary: having a (partially) syllabic writing system.
o Alphabet / alphabetic writing: a set of written symbols, each one representing a single type
of sound or phoneme. Single symbol for a single sound.
o Consonantal alphabet: symbols representing consonant sounds and the reader filling in the
vowel sounds (Hebrew and Arabic).
, Chapter 5: Word formation (p. 58 – 73)
o Neologism: a new word
Not creativity/productivity: creativity is creating new expressions with already
existing words while a neologism is an entirely new word.
o Etymology: the study of the origin and history of a word.
Process name Meaning Example
(True) Coinage Invention/thinking up a completely Aspirin, Kleenex (from clean)
new word/name
Eponyms Create words from proper names Jumbo olives (from name for
elephant)
Latin/Greek roots Combining Latin or Greek words Thermometer (Thermos + metron)
Borrowings Taking over a word from another Croissant (from French)
language
Loan Translations/Calques Direct translation into the Superman (from German
borrowing language Übermensch)
Compounds Joining two or more words Sleepwalk (from sleep and walk)
together
Blends Joining parts of words together Smog (from smoke and fog)
Clippings Reducing a word of more than one Fax (from facsimile)
syllable to a shorter form
Hypocorisms Reducing words to one syllable, Telly (from television)
then adding -y or -ie
Backformations Changing a word’s function by To televise (from television (noun))
removing a morpheme
(real/perceived)
Conversion Changing a word’s function To bottle (from ‘a bottle’ (noun))
without any reduction
Derivational processes Adding affixes (like prefixes, Unhappily (from happy)
suffixes and infixes)
Acronyms Taking the initial letters of a set of CD (from compact disk)
words
Affixes:
Small ‘bits’ that normally aren’t given separate listings in dictionaries. On their own, they don’t mean
something specific. They are used to add to another word. It will change the meaning of that word,
once added. These are bound morphemes.
o Prefixes: added at the beginning of a word. → un-, mis-, etc.
o Suffixes: added at the end of a word. → -less, -ish, etc.
o Infixes: added inside of the word. → -damn-, -bloody-, etc.
