Jon's Page O'
Linguistics - Questions
Some questions you
should ponder.
Here are some questions
that you 'otter' address. Many of these are things most people have not thought about --
have not even considered there to be a question about. Knowledge about the standard languages of Europe is more
widespread among the educated populace of European countries than it is in this country,
since such knowledge is part of the school curriculum there. Why should we be content to
be so ignorant about something so fundamental to our life as the English language?
- How many words are there in English?
- What kinds of words are there in English,
i.e. what are some ways they can be classified?
- Is there a system or structure to the
vocabulary?
- Why is there often more than one word in
English for what seems to be the same or almost the same concept?
- Are there any patterns we can discover when
we are faced with this situation?
- What is the difference between 'native' and
'borrowed' words?
- What kinds of word parts are there in
English?
- How do prefixes differ from suffixes? Roots
from affixes?
- Why do some meaningful word parts
(morphemes) occur in slightly different forms in different words? (a-morphous vs.
an-aerobic)
- How does sound change affect word elements?
- How does spelling relate to sounds, and to
sound change?
- How do we know which word parts can be
combined? And how are they put together?
- Where do words come from?
- How do new words get into the language?
- What kinds of changes do they undergo?
- What happens to words when they've been in
the language a long time?
- Where do morphemes come from?
- How has the English vocabulary evolved?
- What was it like in earlier times?
- What kinds of changes has it undergone?
- Have even the ways of building or forming
words in the language changed?
- What is the relation of particular English
words and morphemes to words and morphemes found in other languages?
- What does it mean for a language to be
'related' to another language?
- What are the languages most closely related
to English?
- How do people use words to create group
solidarity?
- What is 'standardization' of a language?
What is linguistic prescriptivism?
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constructed and maintained by Jonathan D. Pettus
Email: [email protected]