The first writing system emerged about six thousand years ago in the ancient Middle East for the purpose of
accounting
Kanzi, an 8-year-old bonobo ape similar to a chimpanzee but genetically and behaviorally closer to humans, was able to communicate with symbols when he was very young with a grammatical complexity similar to that of
a 2-year-old child
The island of Papua New Guinea once had at least 841 spoken languages, many of which are now
endangered, and some have no living speakers
Which of the following statements concerning human language is not true?
It rarely reflects social differences.
Recent research on the origins of language suggests that a key mutation might have something to do with it. Comparing chimp and human genomes, it appears that
the speech-friendly form of FOXP2 took hold in humans around 150,000 years ago, thus conferring selective advantages (linguistic and cultural abilities) that allowed those who had it to spread it at the expense of those who did not
The study of communication through body movements, stances, gestures, and expressions is
kinesics
Which of the following is commonly used to communicate status differences in Madagascar?
lowering one's head
Words that have different meanings but differ in just one sound, such as "cat" and "bat," are known as
minimal pairs
The study of speech sounds in general, what people actually say in various languages, is known as
phonetics
The study of the significant sound contrasts of a given language is known as
phonemics
Pit" and "bit" are two English words that are differentiated by a single sound contrast: /p/ versus /b/. This means that /p/ and /b/ are
phonemes in English
Who argued that the human brain contains a limited set of rules for organizing language, known as universal grammar?
Noam Chomsky
The Sapir-Whorf hypothesis states that
the grammatical categories of particular languages lead their speakers to think about things in different ways.
Semantics refers to
a language's meaning system.
In their cross-cultural study of color terms, Berlin and Kay found that
basic color terms evolved in a more or less set order
All people style shift�that is, they
vary their speech in different social contexts
Which of the following statements concerning Black English Vernacular is not true?
It is inferior to SE in terms of its ability to communicate complex ideas.
Bourdieu refers to the widespread acceptance of the authority and correctness of the prestige dialect�even by people who do not use it�as
symbolic domination
Languages that have descended from the same language are called
daughter languages.
Language is based on arbitrary, learned associations between words and the things they stand for
true
Although only humans can speak, other primates have the same complex capacity as humans to make vocal sounds.
false
Black English Vernacular (BEV) is a separate language.
false
A close relationship between two languages indicates that their speakers are closely related biologically
false
The world's linguistic diversity has been cut in half in the past 500 years, and half of the remaining languages are predicted to disappear during this century.
true
studies of communication among nonhuman primates reveal that:
like humans, though to a lesser degree, apes possess the linguistic ability of productivity
washoe and lucy's effort to teach sign language to other chimpanzees is an example of
cultural transmission
recent research on the origin of language suggests that
a mutation in humans that occurred around 150,000 years ago may have conferred selective advantages (linguistic and cultural abilities) to those who had it
The study of communication through body movements, stances, gestures, and facial expressions is called:
kinesics
the area of analysis of a spoken language that refers to all of a language's morphemes and their meanings is
lexicon
the sapir-whorf hypothesis states that:
different languages produce different ways of thinking
studies of the differences in the use of color terms between female and male Americans suggest that:
changes in culture produce changes in language and thought
which of the following statements about sociolinguistics is false:
it has found that speakers retain their speech patterns even as the social context changes
which of the following statements about Black English Vernacular (BEV) is true?
upwardly mobile BEC-speaking students typically consider standard english to be society's prestige dialect and learn it
historical linguistics studies all of the following except:
short term language change