Language
A system of communication organized by rules that uses symbols such as words, sounds, and gestures to convey information.
Productivity
The linguistic ability to use known words to invent new word combinations
Displacement
The ability to use words to refer to objects not immediately present or events occurring in the past or future.
Descriptive linguistics
The study of the sounds, symbols, and gestures of a language, and their combination into forms that communicate meaning.
Phonemes
The smallest units of sound that can make a difference in meaning.
Phonology
The study of what sounds exist and which ones are important for a particular language.
Morphemes
The smallest units of sound that carry meaning on their own
Morphology
The study of patterns and rules of how sounds combine to make morphemes
Syntax
The specific patterns and rules for constructing phrases and sentences.
Kinesics
The study of the relationship between body movements and communication
Paralanguage
An extensive set of noises (such as cries) and tones of voice that convey significant information about the speaker.
Sapir-Whorf hypothesis
The idea that different languages create different ways of thinking.
lexicon
All the words for names, ideas, and events that make up a language's dictionary.
Focal vocabulary
The words and terminology that develop with particular sophistication to describe the unique cultural realities experienced by a group of people.
Sociolinguistics
The study of the ways culture shapes language and language shapes culture, particularly the intersection of language and systems of power such as race, gender, class, and age.
Dialect
A nonstandard variation of a language.
Prestige language
A particular way of speaking, or language variation, that is associated with wealth, success, education, and power.
Code switching
Switching back and forth between one linguistic variant and another depending on the cultural context.
Historical linguistics
The study of the development of language over time, including its changes and variations.
Language continuum
The idea that variation in languages appears gradually over distance so that groups of people who live near one another speak in a way that is mutually intelligible.
How many languages are currently in use in the world?
nearly 7,000
The Sapir-Whorf hypothesis
suggests that different languages create different ways of thinking.
Deidre studies how gender roles are revealed in the language used by recent Caribbean immigrants to New York City. Which type of linguistics best applies to her study?
sociolinguistics
Anthropologists refer to sounds that make a critical difference in meaning within a language as
phonemes
Ten of the most prominent languages are spoken by
half of the world's population.
Archaeological evidence that offers clues to the origins of human language includes:
the fossilized brain casts of Neandertals that show the anatomical features for speech.
Digital immigrants are:
the generation that uses technology, but in a process more akin to learning a new culture or language.
American women are far more likely than men to distinguish between colors like teal and turquoise, or magenta and purple. This is an example of:
a focal vocabulary that exists within American culture.
________ is the linguistic ability to refer to events or objects not present or to events that are happening in the future or past.
Displacement
The digital divide is:
the gap between those fully able to participate in the digital age and those without access to electricity, the Internet, and mobile phones.
Dialect is defined as:
a nonstandard variation of a language that is particular to a specific region.
Which of the following terms best describes the study of how gestures, postures, and facial expressions convey messages without words?
kinesics
In 1996, the Oakland School District proposed:
supporting Black English, or Ebonics, speakers as if they were learning Standard English as a second language in school.
Digital activism is
social struggles for worker rights and democracy that are aided by social media, mobile phones, and electronic communication.
According to the textbook, the ________ government has struggled to monitor and censor highly decentralized information that publicizes worker strikes, oppressive working conditions, and local government corruption.
chinese
Based on evidence from Benjamin Whorf's research with the Hopi, a Native American group in the southwestern United States, the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis suggests that:
thought is rooted in language.
According to the text, studying the patterns and importance of sounds as spoken by a group of people helps linguistic anthropologists:
understand the elements and rules of a particular language.
To investigate the focal vocabulary of a language in a particular community, a linguistic anthropologist might:
try to discover words that offer sophisticated ways to describe local cultural realities.
Compared to digital ________, people born before 1970 have more trouble navigating websites, wikis, blogs, and text messages.
natives
The fact that 85 percent, or 5.5 billion people, lack meaningful access to a digital communication network reflects:
the tendency of globalization to increase the effects of uneven development.
Deborah Tannen's research into the ways that boys and girls speak demonstrates that
they essentially grow up in different linguistic worlds.
In part because the Hopi language has verb tenses that differ from those of English, Benjamin Whorf's linguistic research suggested that the Hopi people of Arizona have:
a worldview where past and present represent lived reality and the future is hypothetical.
Some linguistic anthropologists find the work of the Summer Institute of Linguistics controversial because:
their Christian perspective may ignore some aspects of local culture, such as song and art.`
Anthropologist Laura Bohannan discovered in her attempt to translate a classic text from English literature that:
the meaning of the story became lost as the original meanings of the English words could not be easily translated.
The author suggests each of the following points to explain how men tend to dominate in mixed-gender conversations, EXCEPT:
male communication patterns are unrelated to social stratification in the culture at large.
Linguistic anthropologists have discovered that more than 90 percent of ________ information is communicated through body movements and paralanguage.
emotional
As new speech communities have been formed through the digital activism of the Arab Spring, a new ________ that includes events, names, and ideas pertaining to social protest has also emerged.
lexicon