英语语言学练习题

英语语言学练习题

Supplementary exercises

Chapter 1 Introduction

Ⅰ. Decide whether each of the following statements is True or False:

1. Linguistics is generally defined as the scientific study of language.

2. Linguistics studies particular language, not languages in general.

3. A scientific study of language is based on what the linguist thinks.

4. In the study of linguistics, hypotheses formed should be based on language facts and checked against the observed facts.

5. General linguistics is generally the study of language as a whole.

6. General linguistics, which relates itself to the research of other areas, studies the basic concepts, theories, descriptions, models and methods applicable in any linguistic study.

7. Phonetics is different from phonology in that the latter studies the

combinations of the sounds to convey meaning in communication.

8. Morphology studies how words can be formed to produce meaningful sentences.

9. The study of the ways in which morphemes can be combined to form words is called morphology.

10. Syntax is different from morphology in that the former not only studies the morphemes, but also the combination of morphemes into words and words into sentences.

11. The study of meaning in language is known as semantics.

12. Both semantics and pragmatics study meanings.

13. Pragmatics is different from semantics in that pragmatics studies meaning not in isolation, but in context.

14. Social changes can often bring about language changes.

15. Sociolinguistics is the study of language in relation to society.

16. Modern linguistics is mostly prescriptive, but sometimes descriptive.

17. Modern linguistics is different from traditional grammar.

18. A diachronic study of language is the description of language at some point in time.

19. Modern linguistics regards the written language as primary, not the written language.

20. The distinction between competence and performance was proposed by F. de Saussure.

Ⅱ. Fill in each of the following blanks with one word which begins with the letter given:

21. Chomsky defines “competence” as the ideal user’s k__________ of the rules of his language.

22. Langue refers to the a__________ linguistic system shared by all the members of a speech community while the parole is the concrete use of the conventions and application of the rules.