2017م - 1444هـ
The Neat Summary of Linguistics

Table of Contents Page

I Language in perspective 3

1 Introduction 3

2 On the origins of language 4

3 Characterising language 4

4 Structural notions in linguistics 4

4.1 Talking about language and linguistic data 6

5 The grammatical core 6

6 Linguistic levels 6

7 Areas of linguistics 7

II The levels of linguistics 8

1 Phonetics and phonology 8

1.1 Syllable structure 10

1.2 American phonetic transcription 10

1.3 Alphabets and sound systems 12

2 Morphology 13

3 Lexicology 13

4 Syntax 14

4.1 Phrase structure grammar 15

4.2 Deep and surface structure 15

4.3 Transformations 16

4.4 The standard theory 16

5 Semantics 17

6 Pragmatics 18

III Areas and applications 20

1 Sociolinguistics 20

2 Variety studies 20

3 Corpus linguistics 21

4 Language and gender 21

5 Language acquisition 22

6 Language and the brain 23

7 Contrastive linguistics 23

8 Anthropological linguistics 24

IV Language change 25

1 Linguistic schools and language change 26

2 Language contact and language change 26

3 Language typology 27

V Linguistic theory 28

VI Review of linguistics 28

1 Basic distinctions and definitions 28

2 Linguistic levels 29

3 Areas of linguistics 31

VII A brief chronology of English 33

1 External history 33

1.1 The Germanic languages 33

1.2 The settlement of Britain 34

1.3 Chronological summary 36

2 Internal history 37

2.1 Periods in the development of English 37

2.2 Old English 37

2.3 Middle English 38

2.4 Early Modern English









1 Introduction



The goalof linguistics is to provide valid analyses of language structure. Linguistic theory isconcerned with establishing a coherent set of independent principles to explain phenomena inlanguage.There are no primitivelanguages. Each language is adapted for the community which speaks it,be this industrialised or not.Onomatopoeiais not a major principle in language although symbols (icons) may be present on amore abstract level.There is no such thing as correctlanguage in any absolute sense. Language is neutraland shouldnot be the object of value judgements. Lay people tend to confuse language and attitudes to thosewho use language.Writtenlanguage is secondaryand derived from spoken language. Despite its status in westernsocieties, written language is only of marginal interest to the linguist.Linguistics is a sciencealthough the evidence for assumptions about the structure of language isnever direct. Linguists are more concerned with designing valid and general models of linguisticstructure rather with than searching for proof in any strictly empirical sense.Language consists largely of ruleswhich determine its use. There are, however, manyexceptions. Native speakers can deal with a large amount of irregularitywhich is stored in thementallexicon.