How to make linguistics enjoyable?

English Linguistics ­Basic concepts

Chapter One

What is linguistics for me and linguistics approaches in everyday speech?

I studied linguistics before, or at least my college professor did all the efforts to teach me. I have

never been against it; however, it is rather hard to grab the essence of this wonderful discipline

sometimes. For all this, I would give it a try. In the first Unit we come across an interesting dialog

between two teenagers, actually presenting a joke of which punchline is perfectly collaborated and

understood by all of them. The principle task is to collect similar dialogs and analyze them from a

linguistic point of view. I do not want to repeat the linguistic analysis of the two kids exploring the

joke of the chicken that crossed the road, therefore I have tried to seek similar examples. In order to

work out a life-like situation, I have opted for two names; let us have Jessica and James talking to

each other in the first dialog.

Jess: Why is six afraid of seven?

Jam: have no clue can numbers be afraid of?

Jess: think of like you′d say it...

Jam: I ain′t no clue

Jess: because seven eight nine

Jam: (laughing), sure

I think I should not explain the punchline or the hit of this joke. Especially not for natives, since

they do not have to pay outstanding efforts to understand that "eight" is pronounced the same like

"ate", thus six has the very right reason to be scared of seven. (tacitness, equality). Moreover, they

do not even have any problems to figure out the differences in meaning, therefore the joke does

really take effect. On the contrary, being a non-native or native-like speaker we need to focus on the

dialog more precisely, and if being lucky enough we might manage to come out of the story with a

smiley on the face (equality, tacitness). The kids, however, do not have to focus on grammar rules,

or memorize all the irregular verb forms (at least the forms of "eat"), the effect comes

automatically. In addition, there is no logical explanation why we face homophones here, why the

past form of "ate" is consequently pronounced the same way like the number (arbitrariness). We do

not know. However, as for duality of patterning, hereby we might point out a fantastic dialectical

difference. Probably in cockney or Londoner dialect (I potentially avoided mentioning British

English) this joke will not take a glorious effect, therefore the duality of patterning might suffer

failure. It is only because "ate" is not pronounced like "eight", it is only pronounced like /et/,

obviously the joke does not operate here. The question might arise, however, that a British English

speaker might understand "ate" pronounced like eight or not, or at least he would need some time to

ponder about, consequently, a native might get on the same uptake capability like a non-native

speaker. In this coherence, linguistic experts might observe this phenomenon form another point of

view: the failure or sub-failure of duality of patterning. The speakers of any languages, however, do

not work as machines, so there is not a computer program-like machinery in real life conversations.

This could be the explanation why a British native speaker would adequately understand the joke

upon hearing /eit/, even though he does not use this dialect (creativity). In contrast, if he is supposed

to expose this joke, he really has to focus on the proper (we may ask, which is the proper one?)

pronunciation here. Otherwise, the whole conversation would never ever take effect. (or only side-

effects?). Furthermore, the joke above might have been abridged. I wittingly opted for the longer

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one. However, among natives or on a certain level of language acquisition behind, it should really

take effect without any problems, regardless of regional dialects. (explanatory adequacy, nobody

cares about which dialect is being used in this current dialog ­ the question on this level might not

be like which tool is better: Swiss army knife or an ax?)

The next example would not seem to be corroborative example for the first look. However, I was an

ear witness of this conversation among American youngsters, out of whom one is on the very edge

to get around a girl in a club:

Guy: Polar bear.

Girl: What?

Guy: I say polar bear.

Girl: What?

Guy: I don′ know but it hit the ice.

Girl: (smiling)

Guy: wanna drink something?

Girl: sure, yeah

Rarely would this dialog take effect in the mind of a Granny (a woman ages between 60 and death,

secondary school Russian re-trained so-called English teacher in Hungary). She would only

understand the words separately, but would never ever know that this guy was extremely lucky that

evening. It is not enough to understand the words, or look for grammatical structure (the language

itself is extremely simple here ­ simplification). Even if there was any grammar in it to satisfy the

hunger of Grannies (Present Perfect preferably), without social as well as cultural integration, this

conversation would not take effect. Therefore, the arbitrariness and creativity of the language users

play a very significant role here. Not mentioning the fact that it would not even take effect on

different social levels in English speaking countries either. However, a native would much more

easily figure out the essence of this dialog than a non-native, since he is really living in that

surrounding and performing the language on a higher level (Chomsky′s explanatory adequacy?).

Why should we not use a more perfect and acceptable version of this dialogue? (it would be again a

question what is acceptable or not?). Probably because we like using idioms, or because this guy ­

even though he was eager to get around the girl ­ was too shy to propose directly with the

following:

I like you. (= it hit the ice).Do you want to drink anything?

At last, I should ask: would we have the same reaction (consent of the girl) if she had heard this

"normal" question? It is worth pondering about

The next example might be the top cream of our cake. It is a joke again, easily digestible, still very

smart.

A small boy is sent to bed by his father.

Five minutes later...

"Da-ad..."

"What?"

"I′m thirsty. Can you bring me a drink of water?"

"No. You had your chance. Lights out."

Five minutes later: "Da-aaaad..."

"WHAT?"

"I′m THIRSTY. Can I have a drink of water??"

"I told you NO! If you ask again, I′ll have to spank you!!"

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Five minutes later... "Daaaa-aaaad..."

"WHAT??!!"

"When you come in to spank me, can you bring me a drink of water?"

I hope I do not have to take any efforts to explain the punchline of the joke. What we actually can

see here from linguistic or semantic point of view is that how creatively a five year old kid could

use the language, how he could take advantage of a sudden situation. I have picked on this joke

because I wanted to present a joke that could take effect in Hungarian too. The punchline and the

meaning of this dialog could easily be converted into Hungarian language, and it would really take

effect without any discrepancy.

In this first Unit I have been dealing with basic linguistic approaches (if we can name them like

this), some features like duality of patterning, creativity, arbitrariness, equality, tacitness. We could

get a bit of taste from these via practical jokes, all taken from real life and real English ­ letting

behind deeper linguistic science.

Forms, words, morphemes

It is extremely interesting part of linguistics. Morphemes are the smallest units conveying meaning

in a language, or changing meaning if attached to each other (free or bound). The types of

morphemes and many examples are given for us, therefore explaining them again is really

inevitable now. My task was, however, to collect examples for cranberry morphemes and I cannot

apart from defining them. Cranberry morphemes are those of which one part is not conveying direct

meaning. It means if you divide the two or more parts, one of the parts has not automatically

understandable meaning: cran + berry, for instance, we know what berry is, but it is not

determinable what the word "cran" is derived from. Or at least, for the first look. So if you compare

this to "blackberry", for example, we all know that this will convey the meaning of a kind of berry

which is black, and consequently black has an easily recognizable meaning. For all these, after a

deeper research we might get to the origin of "cran", which is actually crane (like the bird), and due

to the fact that these berries were liked by those beautiful birds, hence the name. I have collected

some Hungarian cranberries, upon which we may lay our eyes for a while. Before I tried to

investigate the wonder of Hungarian cranberries, I turned to my colleagues for some help. They let

me know that there are no real cranberry morphemes in Hungarian, or not of those which properly

match the analogy. Therefore, I have decided on naming them semi-cranberries, and treating them

like real ones.

LEKVÁR (eng. marmalade)

I do think LEK- collaborates with CRAN, since it has no real meaning, whereas VÁR is a free

morpheme. However, semantically the compound of these two words ends up in a new word, which

has nothing to do with the original meaning of VÁR. The word LEK could be, analogically,

considered a bound morpheme. In addition VÁR can carry LOVAG-, FELLEG- in front, thus

forming a totally different but semantically perfect word. Here our analogy suffers a bit of failure,

but this does not make us frustrated to go on.

PAPSAJT

This is an interesting case. I am not quiet sure that it is a cranberry morpheme. However, the two

words like PAP and SAJT (priest+cheese) has nothing in common with the combined word typed

above, since it is nor a dairy nor a cleric but a plant growing on the streets.

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CSOMAG (eng. parcel)

Just in accordance with the things considering LEKVÁR, this word could also carry a bound

cranberry morpheme CSO-, which surely has no real meaning. On the contrary, if you put TÖK- in

from for example, you may get another word conveying the original meaning of MAG (core), as the

core of pumpkin. I do think these examples lack two important things: first, the meaning of the

original free morpheme and the meaning of the compound word has nothing in common, while in

the case of cranberry, BERRY is always something of a round-shaped fruit. VÁR, however, in the

case of LEKVÁR means CASTLE if standing alone, while it ends up in MARMALDE. Second

important difference is that cranberry morphemes seem to be compound words, whereas LEKVÁR

is originally not a compound word in Hungarian grammar.

An interesting and funny word would be HULLAHOP in Hungarian, compounded by HULLA +

HOP. It is rather exciting. HULLA is actually a dead human body, while HOP has no meaning. It

probably had a meaning of JUMP, since in some nursery rhymes you might come across it.("hop

Juliska, hop Mariska" = "jump Julie, jump Mary") However, a jumping dead body has no adequate

meaning, yet HULLAHOP means a a spinning colored plastic hoop around children′s waist ­ it is a

beloved game by kids. Probably, the Hungarian HOP is a remaining of the English HOOP, but I am

not sure about this origin either.

Compound (endocentric, exocentric and so on

In this section we are supposed to analyze certain compounds from the aspects of certain aspect

such as compounding, endocentric, exocentric features and so on. I will finally draw tree structures

by hand and scan them.

BILLBOARD

Actually, in American English it is BULLETINBOARD and I do suppose that would make an

analogy here. It is, therefore, worth being analyzed too not just because of my being a devoted US

English speaker, but also for its being a very interesting phenomenon. But first let me glance at

BILLBOARD, which might stand for a BILL + BOARD; this would convey a direct message,

therefore I do consider it an endocentric compound. It is a board where people put or pin bills or

other small strips of paper. I am not quiet sure of its origin; however, as far as I know the unique

meaning of bill was a kind of written form of contract in which someone declares that he owes

money (he got it as a deposit or loan). There was a list in the lord′s court or king′s court on which

the name of these people who were not able to pay the money back was written. This was called

"BILL", and it was pinned on a wooden "BOARD" so that everyone could see the name of these

humiliated people. Today, if the parliament decides upon an important matter in Britain, the written

form of this decision is also called BILL as a token for the parliament′s reliability. The American

term, BULLETIN will definitely express this endocentricity, since the original as well as the

everyday meaning of bulletin is "notice", which is usually pinned on a board. Just in accordance

with its British synonym, a BULLETIN is also related to the decision of the congress. I am not

really sure that BLACKBOARD as a new example would be considered endocentric compound any

more, since BLACKBOARD is not really painted black any longer. Therefore, the only thing which

is true in this compound (not always, especially in the case of plastic interactive boards) that it has

something in common with a wooden board which teachers can write on if using a chalk.

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FAST FOOD

I would not really use a hyphen here to join the words. I assume this is again an endocentric

compound, since it inevitable suggest a food which is eaten in a fast way, probably because they

consumer has no time to ponder over some meal. On the contrary, this might refer to a kind of food

which is prepared in a fast way, and probably eaten slowly. Insert RESTAURANT in the compound:

FAST FOOD RESTAURANT. In this connotation we do not know whether the food is made in a

fast way (FAST-FOOD RESTAURANT) so it could hint at the method of cooking instead of the

method of consumption. or the service is fast (FAST FOOD-RESTAURANT). This or that, it would

not faint the original meaning of this compound. In order to verify this from another aspect, I would

try to look at JUNK FOOD, which might be worth a mass. If you divide the two words, JUNK

would not collaborate with food for the first not even for the second glance. The reason for this is

that JUNK was originally used for something absolutely unusable stuff, especially in automobile

market (see junk-yard). Consequently, everyone should think of inedible food, which is again not

true. When a native hears JUNK FOOD he will think of FAST FOOD, which can surely be eaten, so

it stands as a synonym of FAST FOOD, with one piece of small additive information: some people

think the fast food is not healthy.

SOFTWARE

Had I been asked this question 40 years ago, I would have answered that it was an endocentric

compound (if linguistic experts had already come up with these terms ­ I do not know) conveying

the meaning of light metal or other tools especially for kitchen. . However, today I would say that it

is an exocentric compound. If you were told to inquire the people on the streets right now, eleven

out of ten guys would say that this word refers to computer science. If you look it up in a dictionary,

the first meaning will definitely be computer program, or programme (in British English).

Therefore, the original meaning has all gone. I suppose it was like "keeping /waring soft metal

things". As an evidence, I am surely supposed to list HARDWARE here. I think the situation is the

same, probably HARDWARE as metal stuff for whatever (building, tooling, etc) would be

remembered by older British citizens, but youngsters or even middle-aged generations would

inevitably associate it with computer hardwares like hard disk driver, floppy disk driver, etc.

CITY CENTER

This nominal compound expresses the center of the city, therefore it does really convey the original

meaning. I would therefore call it endometric compound. In order to present an evidence I should

list SHOPPING CENTER here. What does CENTER represents here? Is this shopping mall in the

center of the city? Is SHOPPING a noun or and adjective (N+N or A+N)? Why do we have to shop

in the center of something? Can we apply the possessive relation here: CENTER OF SHOPPING?

Is that an adverbial phrase of location? Or is it a stable noun? Could we substitute this with one

single noun like STORE for instance? The answer might be yes, thus I do not consider it to be

endocentric compound On the contrary, CITY CENTER is an endocentric compound since it really

tells us about the center of the city whereas our other examples do not comprehend here.

AIR BAG

Unlike the previously discusses nominal compound, this one is an interesting case. Today it is

absolutely clear for everyone (expect for no-brain long-nailed blondies) that AIR BAG is in the car

saving our life in case of collision. However, being so skeptic I would easily bring up my questions

here: what does AIR refer to? Why is it not SACK just like its equivalents in Hungarian? We know

from our cars the practical meaning of this word and we would surely associate it with a bag or sack

which is filled up with air in no time in case of head-on-head crash. Therefore, nobody would think

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of a bag (school bag, for instance) which contains nothing but air. I should, eventually, place it

among the endocentric compounds. The counter example could be AIRPORT, which is obviously

neither situated in the air nor is it the port of airs or something. It should have been PLANE PORT

or FLIGHT PORT, therefore it is an exocentric compound in theory but it could be inevitably

handled as endocentric in practice. Nobody would think of a port in the air, or something. But I

wonder what we will call the ports really situated in the air in some hundred years′ time. It should

be worthing living ­ only for this ­ at that time as well.

FLOWER-POWER

It is an exocentric compound which travels a different meaning like we would first think of. If you

separated these two words they would carry a totally irrelevant meanings. Moreover, unlike in the

case of AIR BAG where an average English speaking person would inevitably know what if is

about, FLOWER-POWER comes into effect only if we get to know the historical background. In

addition, we can point at an interesting fact here. This compound would be clear only for those who

had any personal experience with the FLOWER-CHILDREN in the 1960s. Therefore, a longer

explanation of the words would as well be effective only if the listeners might have had personla

experience. If we were to categorize the exocentric compounds this would be the furthest in

meaning. Semantically, these compounds are rather of idioms. (see also CAMP FLOWER,

SURVIVING CAMP, etc)

BLUEPRINT

There is no doubt about its being an exocentric compound. It is a A+N nominal compound, since

BLUE is an adjective. We should associate anything with a color; however, this compound has

nothing in common with colors. It is a PLAN, DESIGN or COPY of something, usually used in

printing and architecture, but no other collaborations with BLUE. The counter example could be

FOOT-PRINT, FINGER-PRINT, which technically as well as theoretically represent endocentric

compounds. Unlike in the case of BILLLBOARD, for example, where we can trace the root back,

hereby it would be very hard to find the original roots of this word. An average English speaker

would never associate it with a kind of cyanotype (ferrocyanide is colored blue ­ hence the name)

printing method developed in 1842. For many decades it was the only available process for copying

drawings. On the contrary, when hearing this word, everybody would think of a printing method or

architecture designing, so the primer association and the original method do have something in

common. It would not, however, make this word an endocentric compound since no one would

associate it with a color or blue colored printings for the first look; it would rather be collaborated

with PLAN or COPY.

BRAIN DEAD

This coumpound might be considered both endocentric and exocentric ones. The reason for this

explanation is that on one hand biologically it has a meaning of a patient whose brain is not

functioning any more regardless of supported blood circulation. On the other hand, it could be an

abstract expression when some one is exhausted and tired. He could say, "Don′t disturb me, I′m

totally brain dead now". Still I would consider that this word is an endocentric compound. In order

to prove it I would suggest glancing at BRAIN STORM or BRAIN STORMING, which should

inevitably be regarded as exocentric ones.

BUST STOP

For the first look it seems to be an endocentric compund conveying the meaning of a place where

buses stop to accept and transport passengers. Phonologically I would raise your attention to the

following interesting thing: if you only pronounce this, you might get BUST UP instead of BUS

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STOP which is not the same, is it? I hope my readers would also agree. For all this, the answer

would obviously be that this word is an endocentric compound.

Chomsky makes me puzzle

I am still pondering about Chomsky′s theory of universal grammar, as I noted it in my previous

essay. I still believe that explanatory adequacy in itself includes grammatically as well as

semantically high performance of the speaker, thus I cannot apart from different dialects and

territorial divergences, cultures and subcultures where explanatory adequacy would mean a totally

different wave of universal grammar. What I previously stated is that universal grammar could be

different in certain circumstances, therefore it would mean different things on the above mentioned

social levels. To what extend is a sentence acceptable as grammatically correct one? Grammar is

also supposed to carry and transmit the speaker′s information, is it not? However, if we say there is

only one universal grammar, what could we consider the right one is? Which sentence might be

correct then? "I have a nice car" or "I have got a nice car" or "I′ve a nice car" or "I got a nice car"

or "I′ve got a nice car:" I wonder what universal grammar is in these sentences. And which sentence

would meet the criteria of explanatory adequacy?

Before categorizing certain words in here, let me recite these definitions.

Synonyms

are words or expressions that have the same meaning in some or all contexts.

Antonyms

are lexical items that are opposites with respect to some component of meaning.

Polysemy

occurs when a word has two or more related meanings(like

style

)

Homophony

is where a given form has two or more unrelated meanings (like

club, date, etc

)

Hyponym

is a word that names an entity belonging to the larger or more general category (like

cutlery
= fork, knife, spoon, etc

)

The next words are categorized according to the groups above. Following categorization, I make some

linguistic remarks on some of the examples.

Synonyms Antonyms Polysemy Homophony

Hyponym

Casual-informal aunt-uncle

relative flower-flour

father,mother

=

relative

melt-thawing

kill-resuscitate

grass

Ant-ant(aunt - US) Pen, pencil, ink =

writing tool

revive-resuscitate Frozen-thawing sort knight-night

Knight,

father,

(melt)

mother, uncle,

aunt, relative =

person

sort-kind

Reed-reed

(read)

Sporty,

white-tie,

kind = style

murder-kill

grass-grass

style-type

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As we can undoubtedly see it is possible to put a word into more categories. Just like in the case of

revive

or

resuscitate

, they can be synonyms of each other while they form antonyms with

kill

, destroy, etc.

It does not seem to be complicated to break these words down into groups. Sometimes some words

could be polisemys and homophonys, just as in the case of

reed

or

grass.

(reed is actually could be the

homophone of

read

, and meaning a plant and musical instrument, just like in the case of

grass

, where it

could be either a plant, a kind of drug and a person who always betrays his/her friends) However, let

me once show a kind of differences in dialects: in some part of the States "

aunt

" is pronounced like

"

ant"

, hence the joke:

"Why was the American kid scared when he was at the zoo? Because he saw an aunt (ant) eater."

I could but list more of the jokes and witty anecdotes here; however I lack the time and opportunity.

Closing up this section, however, I cannot regard from the following joke stretching its punchline when

being spoken:

"Why were the middle ages so dark? Because there were so many nights (knights).

Hereby I am supposed to categorize the following words something like semantically, name whether

they are central in meaning (close to the original ones just like when you say "animal" and not "dog"),

or peripheral in meaning, when we consider "blood cell" being placed far behind the original meaning

of "cell". It is, however, not always simple to decide. There could be graded memberships (like in the

case of certain auxiliaries or future times in English, not mentioning different adjectives /eg. Big, large,

huge, giant, enormous, etc/); moreover, the concept might be fuzzy or non-fuzzy. Let me point at some

of the features I have been talking about.

(I have opted for both British and American meanings, since I have been dealing with American

English for more than 15 years now; consequently, I am really interested in the semantical, grammatical

as well as structural differences in these two "dialects" (I know they are more than that); I do hope to

write my thesis upon this phenomenon later.)

film star, hound, vehicle, blood cell, pencil, kitchen utensil, book, notebook, housewife, insulator

film start

= a well-known cinema actor or actress1

movie star

= an actor or actress who is famous in movies2

Well, for the first look we might consider these a little bit peripheral, since this compound word has

nothing to the with the central meaning of "star".Why do we call them stars? However, they do not

concept fuzzily. We all know who these people are, "well-known" or "famous" (does this mean the

same semantically?) actors or actresses. Why on Earth then do we not call them "well-known actors or

famous actors?" What is the original concept of calling them "stars"? If it refers to the hight of the

planets above, why do we compare them to those of celestial bodies? In addition, you may know that

the word "star" functions as a verb as well, eg. "act in a movie", where we are absolutely in despair to

trace down the origins. (NB, some consider it a fuzzy concept, graded membership? Why graded? Does

it have stages like junior or senior film star?However, if you consider that it is the highest among other

actor and actresses, it might be graded; in contrast, we might question what makes a "star" star, if not

only his/her being well-known /see examples above/.)

hound

= a type of dog used in hunting3

hound

= a dog (animal) that people often keep as pets and use for hunting or guarding4

As we obviously see, this word refers to a type of dog that hunts, especially used by hunters in oder

that it could chase and fetch the bird or other poor creatures being shot by the hunter. It is a

1

Oxford Advanced Learners Dictionary,

OUP, Oxford, 1989, 453

2

Longman Study Dictionary of American English,

Pearson Education Ltd, Essex, UK, 2006, 443

3 Ibid1,

604

4 Ibid2,

190

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subcategory of dogs, however, I cannot state that it is peripheral in meaning, since it is not very far

from the original central word "dog". (fuzzy concept, graded membership) Just imagine that sentence

like "When I hunt I usually take my hound with me to chase and get the prey." Nobody would think of

other animal, would they not? We all would understand a "hunting dog". (Originally, the basic meaning

comes from German language, probably because German breeds of dogs were first initiated for

hunting in Britain as well around the 16th century; notably, HUND is equivalent to DOG in German.)

vehicle

= conveyance such as cars, lorries, buses, etc used for transporting goods or passengers5

vehicle

= something such as cars, bus, etc that carries people or things6

This is a central category, that must be sure. It cannot be considered subcategory for the first look.

However, neither of the definitions sates the vehicle is "a means of transportation" or something like

that. I know this question is hypothetical a bit, however, let me be picking on it. Could "means of

transportation" be a higher category than "vehicle"? If you think that vehicle is just some

transportation on wheels (I do not suppose anyone would think of airplanes or space shuttles upon

hearing this word first), you might have the chance of considering "means of transportation" a higher

category. Therefore, even if "vehicle" is a central category for the fist look, I do not state that is is the

subcategory of "means of transportation". Nevertheless, "means of transportation"

(prototype

) might

embrace chairlifts, funicular trains, hotair balloons, space shuttles, ferries, liners and whatever cargo

carriages including horse-pulled carts as well.

Blood cell

= a round shaped part of blood (the red liquid flowing through bodies of humans and

animals7

Blood cell

= part of the red liquid our heart pumps through our body. 8

The first component is very clear. The second one, however, hunches far from the original meaning of

cell (eg. a very small room especially for a monk in a monastery or for a prisoner in jail). Therefore, it

might be considered peripheral; on the contrary, when hearing "blood cell" noone would think of a

place to live in, but of something really associated with human as well as animal body.

The use of the words "pencil" and "kitchen utensil" is very tricky here. "Pencil" is of "writing

utensils", whereas "kitchen utensil" is a general category of different kitchen tools. As a consequence,

one is of a subcategory and the other is of central concept. (basic level terms,

On one hand "notebook" could be handled as a subcategory of book, where obviously "book" is a

prototype. However, in our life "notebook" has recently been added a new meaning like "laptop

computer". It is now fashionable to use this term instead of computer, therefore it might ans isolated

category.

housewife

= a woman whose occupation is looking after the family and the house...9

(Something like the same is noted in my other sources)

We surely cannot consider this a prototype or basic level concepts. However, place her is not as easy as

it looks at first sight. She could be either a family member (fuzzy concept, graded membership) or one

kind of job (eg. it is a job to stay at home ant take care of the family members).That might be the

5 Ibid1,

1414

6 Ibid2,

743

7 Ibid1,

116

8 Ibid2,

64

9 Ibid1,

605

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reason I now let my readers decide.

insulator

= a substance or device for insulating, especially used in electricity10

It seems to be a basic level term in a way, due to its forming a main category; the central members

could be wood, porcelain, nylon, or other stuff. Other subcategories might be imagined, since this word

is not only used for electrical insulation, but also for heat or other separations. Therefore, other

peripheral categories could be attached. Just like in the case of heat insulator, central members could be

wall, panels, glass, fixing foam, wooden doors, bricks, prefabricated bricks, concrete...so I could make a

list of a library here.

Hereby I am supposed to list some examples of paraphrases, contradictions and entailment.

I would but cannot make a long account on each, so let me list some of the examples I have collected;

afterwards I would comment upon some of them.

PARAPHRASES

1 We saw him yesterday. = We met yesterday.

2 His wife died a week ago. = He has become a widower.

3 I gave a one million dollar bill to Jack. = Jack was granted a one million dollar bill.

4 Sheila is our neighbor. = Sheila is the next door lodger.

5 All his hair is gone. = He went bald.

6 Monica comforted William. = William and Monica had a good time.

Let me stop here for a while. Based on the definitions we had in our course kit, I would say that

different usage of different dialects might act as paraphrases. For instance, some say that the

sentences like "I live in a flat" and "I live in an apartment." correlate as paraphrases. If it is true,

anyway, I could say the US English might form paraphrases with its UK brother. On the

contrary, that would not be always effective. The reason for its inadequacy is that paraphrases

have to take effect in the same listener or user: hence the sentence above is not a real

paraphrase. The sentences like "She lost her husband" = "She is widowed." do associate with

paraphrases, since they convey the same information in the same listener or user. Just compare

these.

I came here by streetcar. (tram?)

I just stuck the notice on the bulletin board. (bill?)

Where is your coach? (in US its a person; a British guy would be looking for a bus.)

What pants do you have on? (a British guy would be astonished at me having an X-ray eye and peeping

her/his underwear? eg. in the US its simple trousers)

So you see, "dialect paraphrases" do not often take effect, that is for sure.

10 Ibid1, 650

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CONTRADICTION

1 I live in a ranch house. ­ I live in an apartment.

2 I am a medical doctor. ­ I never attended a medical university.

3 I just kissed her. ­ She is expecting a baby now.

4 Mary is on the dole. ­ Mary makes a good deal of money.

5 I don′t have a family. ­ I′m married with two kids.

6 My son doesn′t speak yet. - My son said hello to me this morning.

7 Fish have gills. - Fish use their mouth to take a breath.

8 I was fired yesterday. - My job is fascinating.

Surely we could list many of these examples. As my being really engaged with dialect research, I

would intend to show you contradictions in a funny way: we do not change anything in the

sentence, however, they will mean a totally different (contradicting) things in the two dialects.

1. (telephone conversation) "I′ll put you through" = I′ll connect you. (UK)

= I′ll disconnect you. (US).

2. "Peter is so clever." = "Peter is really intelligent and educated." (UK)

= "Peter is a freak and he is just showing off" (US)

3. He is so intimate to me. = He is too insinuative to me. (UK)

= He is very close to me. (US)

Of course the list is endless, but this time it was just a bit of taste for you.

ENTAILMENT

1 Dairy products in bulk are not produced in Hungary. = Butter and cheese in bulk are not

produced in Hungary

2 She loves mammals. ­ She reads a lot about tigers.

3 We have a pet. ­ We are dog owners.

4 Jake is my lover. = Jake is not my wife. (Okay, I′m just kidding )

5 I sell gums, lolly-pops and chocolate to kids in front of the school. = I′m a candy man.

6 I′m a meat eater. = I only eat pork and chicken.

You see, entailment is not always as clear as soup. We cannot get any further information about the

marital statuses for instance in example 4. It is not sure if I have a wife or not, and it is not sure

whether Jane will be my wife or not (still could be). So it is rather like paraphrasing things. Obviously,

my examples were tricky, since "granny sentences" like "I like the fruit of the sea" and "I like eating

salmon and shrimps" would have been simple as ABC.

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Signs, symbols, signals and so on.

I carried out the following research in this field. I am aware of the fact that not the most perfect ones,

but I hope they will do.

Graded signs Discreet signs

Iconic signs: scream,smile map (or smile here?), grin
laughter, giggle "no smoking" or"wet paint" sign

Indexes: singing of birds indicator lights, flashes
barking railway crossing lights
animal′s murmuring, growling

Symbolic signs: watch announcements (whatever)
clock "Szolnok" road sign
thermometer, ECG sings? all road signs in Highway Code

Signals: cop instructing traffic "WC" light
ECG alarm signals for ticket collector
cardiac arrests railway crossing lights (flashes up
repeatedly for free trespassing)

I could have placed "grin" or "smile" into other categories, however, it depends on the circumstance

how graded or discreet these signs would be. On one hand, ECG signs might be symbolic, when we

take the ECG of a patients. The lines of the ECG could correlate to different cardiac syndromes and

happenings. If there is a change in cardiac status of a transported patient, the ECG signals therefore

helps me (the paramedic) to interfere if necessary. In this case, the ECG could be put into the

category of "signals". All figure-like characters in the Highway Code must be considered symbolic

signs. However, definitions of the Code might not be considered signals.

I hope this essay would meet the minimum requirements.

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