In terms of the textbook, Midterm #3 will cover Chapters 9 and 11 on Latin and Greek word structure; Chapter 10 on Indo-European; and Chapter 8 on Language in Society. There will be a bit on the part of Ch. 3 on neologisms that formed part of the basis for doing your Word Journal assignment (the word formation types). You should now recognize these types easily when given clear examples of them.
Besides the book material, the exam will cover class discussions and web pages linked on the grid on the home page and on the Course Schedule. Parsing will be tested also, but via multiple choice questions on the parsing of words introduced or discussed in class and quizzes.
In terms of topics, the exam focuses on:
1. Latin and Greek word structure
2. genetic relationships of languages, the Indo-European language family,
Proto-Indo-European vocabulary and what it reveals about
Indo-European culture; a little on languages that are NOT
Indo-European
3. Language variation and varieties of
English, including slang, jargon, and varieties associated with
particular groups like gamers and college students.
Questions in the midterm will assume knowledge of concepts introduced in the previous chapters, but they will not be tested specifically.
Latin and Greek morphology
inflection verbs base or stem person: 1st, 2nd, 3rd inflectional categories verb conjugation classes (stem classes) nouns stem vowels grammatical gender infinitive masculine, feminine, neuter principal parts noun declension voice: active, passive (= noun class defined by set of endings) participles grammatical number past participle singular, plural ( = perfect participle in book) morpheme case present participle morpheme (stem vowel + nt) future participle morpheme (= gerundive in book) (stem vowel + nd)
Changes in late Latin; Latin vs. French
learned vocabulary spelling (spelling is the most conservative aspect of English words) classical diphthongs ae, oe pronunciation changes in late Latin approximimants /i/, /u/ --> affricates /d3/ as in justice, /v/ as in civil (L. iusticia --> Old Fr. d3ustice --> Engl. d3ustice) (L. civis 'citizen' /kiwis/--> Old Fr. sivi ) velar stops /k/, /g/ --> /s/, /d3/ as in judge. Great Vowel Shift affecting Latinate words Latin -ula --> Old Fr. -le (L. tabula --> O. Fr. table) Latin -fic- 'make' --> Old Fr. -fy Latin/French doublets: regal, royal; legal, loyal etc. Latin --> French syllable deletions Latin --> French coronalizations (usually called palatalizations): gaudiam --> joy, legalem -->loyal etc. diphthongizations (Lat. pictum --> Old Frn. paint, L. punctum --> O. Fr. point)
Genetic relationship, Indo-European language family, the Indo-Europeans
genetic relationship related languages VS. languages affected by culture contact (and therefore borrowing) language family family tree metaphor parent language, mother language, ancestor language sister language daughter language dialects language breakup (due to loss of contact + different changes in different places) Grimm's law sound change reasons for persistence of evidence of relationship: regularity of sound change resistance to change of basic vocabulary Indo-European Proto-Indo-European The Proto-Indo-Europeans: origin, time of migration to Europe, hypotheses Germanic North Germanic East Germanic West Germanic Celtic Welsh Scots Gaelic, Irish Gaelic Italic / Romance Hellenic (Greek) Baltic Slavic Armenian Albanian Indo-Iranian Tocharian Hittite language (Anatolian family) Sanskrit Hindi Finnish Hungarian Estonian Basque 4 language families of Africa 3 language families of the Americas The Indo-Europeans reconstruction of words reconstruction of aspects of culture (linguistic archaeology)
Language Variation and Language in Society
prescriptivism descriptivism standardization and education standard, nonstandard correctness; relativity (or context-dependence) of correctness standard forms as shibboleths; role of education prestige maintenance via linguistic shibboleths formality formal, informal varieties orthography; sound vs. spelling spoken vs. written language taboo euphemism jargon (words used by a professional or interest group) slang, characteristics of slang in-group vs. outgroup language as a marker of a group shibboleth language and power peevology: the study of people's pet peeves about language
Neologisms
neologism derivation zero-derivation affixation compounds, compounding: phrasal compounds, rhyming compounds blends, blending acronyms clipping, clippings folk etymology reanalysis analogy creative respelling novel creation sound symbolism/onomotopeia Other processes/types of origins/formation: malapropism eggcorn
Parsing
Review the Parsing page.
© 2010
Suzanne Kemmer
Last modified 2 Dec 10