Accent and dialect
Accent refers solely to the way words are pronounced, e.g. in the south of
England, it is normal to pronounce the word path as p-ar-th, but in the
Midlands and the North, the phoneme 'a' is articulated as a short vowel and
pronounced as in, 'cat'. The accent known as 'Received Pronunciation' is
considered as a prestige accent and is one frequently heard on television and
radio news bulletins, for example.
Dialect refers to choices of vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation made by
people in different geographical regions or social contexts. The dialect known as
'Standard English' is generally considered to be a prestige dialect and is the
choice of many teachers, business people, newsreaders, etc.
Active and passive
This is an important stylistic choice that concerns the way we use verbs. A
voice
typical English sentence will be cast in what is called the active voice, e.g.
'The teacher led the lesson'. In such a sentence, the subject (S) is also the
agent of the action told by the verb (V). This action is transferred to the
object of the sentence (O).
A different type of sentence construction is possible. In this, the subject
position can be filled not by the agent but by what, in the active sentence, was
the verb's object, e.g. 'The lesson was led by the teacher.' The grammatical
subject position is now filled by the noun phrase, 'the lesson' and the agent
becomes a part of a phrase that follows the verb, introduced with the
preposition 'by': 'by the teacher'. This is called a passive construction.
Importantly, passive constructions can even allow for the agent to be deleted
and the sense still retained, e.g. 'The lesson was led'. This makes passive
sentences potentially interesting as they can be made to carry a different
pragmatic force, one that leads to different inferred meanings being
created.
By fronting the object in place of the subject, the force of the sentence can be
changed and the role of the agent can be diminished. Passive constructions are
popular in newspaper headlines as it gives a concise, authoritative and
impressive style but one that does not risk 'pointing the finger' of blame, e.g.
'Woman murdered in gangland shooting'. Here the subject is not even
mentioned. See also voice.
Adjective
A word class which contains words that can add more detail (i.e. modify) to a
(adjectival)
noun or pronoun with which they often form a noun phrase, e.g. 'The busy
teacher' (pre-modification).
Adjectives can also post-modify a noun, as in: 'The dinner was awful'.
Adjectives are gradable depending on whether a comparison is made with one
other thing or many other things: big, bigger, biggest difficult, more difficult,
most difficult.
Agent
The grammatical agent is the participant in a clause or sentence that carries
out the action told by a verb. In the following sentence, the 'cat' is the
agent: 'The cat sat on the mat'. In the passive form of this sentence, 'The mat
was sat on by the cat', the 'cat' remains the agent, but the subject now
becomes 'mat'.
It is easy to confuse the two terms agent and subject: the word subject
refers syntactically to the word in a sentence or clause that is grammatically
linked to a verb and which makes the verb finite. For more, see
active/passive.
Agreement
In English grammar, it is necessary that certain linked words 'agree' with each
other, for example, a verb is given an inflexion (suffix) to allow it to 'agree
with' its subject when in the 'third person', e.g. he talks (not he talk).
Adverb
A class of words (many ending with the suffix -ly) that are often found helping
(adverbial)
to modify a verb in order to provide extra detail about the way the action told
by the verb occurred; however, adverbs are also used to modify other adverbs
or adjectives, e.g. 'The girl worked especially hard.' 'He was just too much!'
Adverbs can give detail concerning time (soon), place (there) and manner
(nearly). Adverbs tend to give extra detail about time, place or manner.
'Adverbial'
A phrase that acts like an adverb to provide extra information about time,
place or manner. A sentencecan contain several adverbials (which, unusually,
can be located in more than a single syntactical position without any change of
function). Adverbials are usually 'optional' elements in a clause - its central
meaning being unaffected if they are left out.
Ambiguity
Twice
during each day
ADVERBIAL
ADVERBIAL
manner
time
I exercise
SUBJECT+VERB
in the gym
in town
ADVERBIAL ADVERBIAL
place
place
This means 'more than one possible meaning'. The rules of grammar exist to
allow a structure of words to be created that has a single meaning, i.e. to be
unambiguous. Here is an ungrammatical sentence that was an actual warning
notice at the bottom of an escalator: 'Dogs must be carried on the escalator'.
What does this mean? Are you allowed to ride on the escalator without a dog in
your arms?
Archaic
If a word is described as archaic, it suggests its use is now old-fashioned.
(archaism)
Many words in poems are still used that seem archaic, and many formal words
may seem to be so, especially in a religious or legal register. Such words may
not be really archaic - it may simply be that you are unaware of these
particular registers. Take great care when writing about language in A2
change not to label a word archaic simply because you haven't heard of
it - better to say 'formal'.
Article
One of a class of words, akin to adjectives, called determiners. The definite
article is the and the indefinite article is a or an.
Audience
Audience means the kind of reader or listener the text was intended for. As this
is unlikely to be you, sadly you do need to attempt the near impossible and
'become' the intended reader. Always consider a text in this way or you will run
the risk of 'misreading' it. Also, avoid being overly specific or informal when
describing an audience’s likely characteristics: 'this writing is suitable for clever
so and so’s of about 23 and over' sounds rather less impressive than, 'the style
of this text seems geared towards an educated and sophisticated adult
audience'. For module 1 in your exam, audience is one way to categorise
similar texts.
Auxiliary verb
English verbs are limited as to what they can indicate alone, i.e. through their
own morphology. Morphological inflexions can be used, for example, to show
that an event occurred in the past (e.g. cooked) and in the present (e.g. cook);
they can also show third person agreement (e.g. she cooks) and continuous
action (e.g. cooking).
More often, the main verb needs to be linked with a secondary verb form which
accompanies it to create a verb phrase. These secondary verbs are called
auxiliaries. Auxiliary verbs are used, for example, to give a sense of time to
the main verb (e.g. 'He will be working soon.') or to create a question, 'Have
you won?', 'Do you believe it?', 'Could it be true?'.
Common auxiliary verbs are forms of to be (is/am/was/are/were/will), to have
(has/had/have) and to do (does/did).
Some auxiliary verbs are used to indicate that an action is not real but simply
an idea or possibility. These are called modal auxiliaries, e.g. may, might,
would, could, should.
Clause
A clause is a key grammatical structure and this means that clauses are things
(clausal)
that you need to have, at the very least, a basic grasp of. Thought of at its
simplest, a clause can be considered as a short 'sentence' - one that occurs
either on its own (e.g. "I ate the jelly") or together with other clauses to make
a longer sentence (e.g. "because I was hungry").

A clause, then, is a group of words that is either a whole sentence or is
a part of a sentence.

Clauses are built up from individual words or from small clusters of
words called phrases.

Most clauses are built around a main verb which tells, often, of an
action, thought or state, e.g. "I ate the jelly because I was hungry".
A clause can be what is called independent. This mean it is acting as a simple
sentence, as in the example, "I ate the jelly". Independent clauses can also
exist as a part of a larger sentence when they are called not an "independent
clause" but a main clause.
Another common type of clause exists just to help out the meaning of a
main clause. This second kind of clause is, therefore, dependent on its main
clause for its meaning. An example would be the dependent clause,
"because I was hungry"; you'll see here that there is an extra word at the start
of the clause: "because". It is this extra word that stops the clause being able
to be independent or to be a main clause; the word "because" forces the clause
to be dependent on some other main clause, e.g. "I ate the jelly because I
was hungry". This words acts to subordinate its clause and so is called a
subordinator. Subordinators create dependent clauses - more often, these
days, called subordinate clauses (sometimes reduced to "sub-clauses").
There are many subordinators. Look at this example: "He hit him even though
he was a friend":
He hit him
even though he was his friend.
MAIN CLAUSE
DEPENDENT (subordinate) CLAUSE
An important kind of clause acts as if it were an adjective - it adds extra
information about a noun or noun phrase. These clauses are called relative or
adjectival clauses. They can seem confusing because they can be inserted
in between their main clause, e.g. "The girl who wore a red dress left
early." This sentence contains one main clause "The girl left early" and one
dependent or relative clause, "who wore a red dress".

The subordinator in this example, the word "who", is acting as a
pronoun (i.e. it is a word that takes the place of, and stands in for, a
noun). Here it is called, therefore, a relative pronoun because it
introduces a relative clause.

Other relative pronouns are "that" and "whom".

Sometimes the relative pronoun can be missed out to create an
elliptical relative clause, e.g. "The joke [that] he told was funny";
here the relative clause is "he told".
The structure of clauses is fairly fixed in English syntax (S = subject V
= verb O = object C = complement A = adverbial). In certain dialects and
in poetry the syntax can be varied and the sense still kept, e.g. "A ballad Alison
sang".

S+V: Alison / sang.

S+V+O: Alison / sang / a song.

S+V+C: Alison / is / a good singer.

S+V+A: Alison / sings / in the choir.

S+V+O+O: Alison / sang / her mum / a ballad.

S+V+O+A: Alison / sang / the song / from the song-book.
Cohesion
Many patterns of words exhibit a quality known as cohesion. This means that
(cohere / coherent
they form coherent units. Phrases are an important coherent grammatical
/ coherence)
unit. Words that cohere are cohesive: they appear to act not as individual
words but as a single unit, e.g. 'inside out', 'at three o'clock', 'the awful
creature', 'has been eating', 'in a traditional manner'. These examples of
coherent groups are all phrases, but clauses, sentences and discourses
are also, if they are to be effective in communicating ideas and facts,
coherent.
At the level of discourse, the reader or listener also needs to be able to link the
different sentences and paragraphs (or stanzas in a poem, etc) in a logical way.
This is achieved by many linguistic means including graphology, semantics,
pragmatics, narrative structure, tone, lists, pronouns, proper nouns,
repetition of either logical or similar ideas, use of synonyms, and so on. The
analysis of the cohesive qualities (i.e. the coherence) of a text is the analysis of
discourse structure.
Collocation
Many words are habitually put together - or collocated. A collocation is any
(collocates /
habitually linked group of words - a kind of lexical partnership, e.g. 'fish and
collocated)
chips', 'salt and pepper', 'don't mention it', 'it's nothing...', 'Oh well!', 'bangers
and mash'... and so on. Many idioms or idiomatic phrases exhibit
collocation, e.g. in a jiffy.
Colloquial / slang
A 'colloquy' is a formal word for 'conversation', so colloquial language means
(colloquialism)
the everyday language or register we adopt when chatting to friends, for
example, e.g. 'Hello Fred, how's the new mother-in-law these days?'.
Slang is a particular form of colloquial language used by certain social groups,
e.g. 'Hey-up Fred! How's the new battle-axe then?'; 'Hey that's some cool dude
there!'
Complement
A word, phrase or clause that follows a verb and which simply adds further
information concerning, usually, the verb's subject. Complements usually follow
stative verbs such as 'to be' to create a statement (i.e. a declarative
sentence), e.g. 'He is happy'. Here the adjective 'happy' is the subject
complement. However, in the sentence, 'He made me happy', the adjective
happy is called an object complement as it gives more information about the
verb's object, me.
Conjunction
A word used to link words, phrases and clauses. Common conjunctions are and,
but, or, either... or, neither...nor. These can link 'equal units' such as words,
phrases or main clauses. A special kind of conjunction that can link 'unequal'
independent and dependent clauses is called a subordinating conjunction.
There are many of these, e.g. if, when, where, unless, etc. Also see sentence
and clause.
Connotation /
The denotation of a word is its direct, literal or specific meaning (as can be
denotation
found in a dictionary). If a word also has implied or associated meanings when
(connote /
used in a certain way, these are called the word's connotations. The word
connotative denote
'bat' in this sentence is being used with its denotation: 'A bat is a flying
/ denotative)
mammal.' however, the word, 'bat' can also take on extra meanings, often
metaphorical, e.g. 'He went like a bat out of hell'.
Interestingly, the word 'bat' also happens to have several possible denotations:
'a cricket bat', 'a vampire bat', 'They bat next' (as well as other slang and
dialect meanings): words that have several denotations are called polysemic.
Polysemy is an area of semantics and pragmatics.
Context
Context is always an important aspect to consider whenever you analyse a
(contextual /
text. Context refers to those particular elements of the situation within which
contextualise)
the text is created and interpreted that in some way or another affect it (for
example, the effects of time, place, ideology, social hierarchies, relationships,
etc.).
Importantly, language has two potentially important contextual aspects: the
context in which it was created and that in which it was interpreted. For
example, a letter from a manager to one of his staff will be affected by context
such as the situation itself, the power relationship that exists between the
manager and the worker, the historical conditions and so on. Another example,
when you speak to your parents or when you speak to a friend on the phone
you will see that context naturally affects the linguistic choices - the style - of
the discourse in important ways. Also see register.
Copula / linking
Verbs that act to link a subject to a complement, for example, the verb 'is' in,
verb
'The rabbit is soft and furry', are called 'copulas' or 'linking verbs'.
Determiner
One of a small group of words - a word class - that precedes and premodifies a noun and creates a noun phrase, e.g. a, the, some, this, that,
those, each.

Determiners include the three 'articles' (i.e. a, an, the) and similar
words: e.g. some, those, many, their. Each of these are said to
determine the number or 'definiteness' of their noun, e.g. 'That man is
the one!'
Confusingly, determiners can themselves be pre-modified by 'pre-determiners',
e.g. 'Even the apples were rotten' 'All the books were lost.'
Discourse /
Whenever we use language for any purpose we create a discourse. What we
discourse analysis
are doing when we enter into a discourse is to try to express to someone else
/ discourse
some of our thoughts, ideas and (whether on the surface or implied) feelings.
structure /
These thoughts will have arisen as a reaction of our mind to the context in
discourse
which it finds itself. Texts - discourses - arise from an individual's context.
community /
Sometimes this context will involve communication with a known person,
discourse
sometimes with a group or audience, sometimes with an unknown individual or
communities
group. Conversation and letter writing are examples of the former, drama and
media texts of the latter.
We have evolved into very sophisticated communicators; and of course we
know how to use more than just language to create our discourse: we use
language and paralanguage (non verbal features) as well as kinesics (body
language). This all combines to make discourse a subtle, sophisticated and
complex area of study. But, even a basic understanding of discourse can help
push your marks up to the highest bands.
Aspects of communication that affect discourses include genre, context,
audience and purpose ('G-CAP'). All of these, and especially the first three,
will act to affect our language choices, often to 'constraint' what we can say or
write. 'Freedom' of speech is an illusion! Context is an especially important
aspect of discourse analysis as the social and hierarchical aspects of life often
bring all kinds of pragmatic meanings into the discourse.
A discourse occurs whenever we put thought into language. This could be for a
whole range of reasons - we might be in a conversation, writing a novel,
producing a piece of homework, holing someone to ransom, texting a friend...
all kinds of reasons. The result of this 'conversion' of thought and ideas into
language is the production of a discourse between the parties involved. And
these discourses can ne productively analysed as an analysis at the level of
discourse will reveal many interesting and subtle areas of language use.
Discourse, therefore, is no more than language - a kind of 'text' - but
considered as a part of the original context of its use. When considering
discourse, therefore, you need to consider all of the important aspects of
context that affected either its creation, its reception or its interpretation.
And remember that discourses or spoken - planned, spontaneous, to a known
audience, an unknown audience, historical, etc..
Thus, everyday language, technical language, business language, children's
language, cookery-book language, newspaper language... any and all kinds of
language, can all be considered at the level of discourse. All texts will contain
within them some discernible aspects of their user's personal, cultural, social
and historical situation. Discourse analysis comments on these contextual
aspects.

Commenting on the situation in which a discourse arises means taking
account of aspects of both its local and ideological or cultural
context.
When analysing a text, it can be fascinating (and gain many extra marks
because of its subtlety) to dig deeper than the surface meaning of the words to
try to reveal interesting contextual aspects of the text's users. To make this
clearer, you can imagine that our own society is far more liberal-minded than,
say, the society of a century ago. This aspect will show up in the texts written
in these periods through a variety of aspects including word choice and
grammar. Similarly, aspects of social hierarchy and social power always
manifest themselves within texts. Imagine a conversation between a patient
and a doctor, for example - again, discourse analysis seeks to reveal this.
We can, somewhat artificially perhaps, but useful, 'lump together' certain
discourses and see that they contain broadly similar elements because of the
context, for example, in which they occur. Thus the idea of a 'discourse
community' or discourse communities can be used, similar to the idea of a
'register'. Young people, to take an example, tend to use language that shares
many similar features, and they can be called a 'discourse community'. In this
instance, this is similar to the idea of sociolect, also - but not all discourse
communities share a sociolect.
An important part of discourse analysis is to determine what are called the
orders of discourse. In any discourse, it is clear that speakers or readers are
rarely 'on equal terms'. Usually there is a hierarchy of power or a power
relationship involved, wherein one participant - through language choices can 'position' the other participant in a less powerful position. An analysis of
men and women in conversation has revealed many ways in which apparently
innocent uses of language create a power relationship between the participants.
'Frameworks' are recommended by most exam boards to help you to analyse
discourse. The basic aspects of a discourse are lexis and grammar; but
meaning can be signified directly ('semantically') or through implication
('pragmatically'); the form of language is also important (graphologically
and phonologically); and the discourse structure is crucial (see below).
Thus you can use frameworks to analyse discourse effectively.
Discourse structure can be a useful part of discourse analysis and is
generally rewarded highly in your exams. Analysing a text at the level of its
discourse structure sets out to reveal the various methods used, effects
created and purposes intended by the language user to create a coherent
and unified stretch of language. A text aimed at a child, for example, will have
a much more obvious structure with clear 'linguistic signposts' to guide the
child through it. If you compare such a text with, say, a broadsheet newspaper
article, you will immediately notice that the means of linking ideas in the latter
will be far more complex, sophisticated and subtle. Discourse structure,
therefore, is one of the elements of style: those choices a language user makes
to suit context, genre, audience and purpose.
Element
An element is a distinct grammatical unit - a 'building block' or segment of a
sentence there are three important grammatical elements: word, phrase and
clause. Some of the elements of a discourse or text are their sentences,
paragraphs, chapters and so on.
Elision
Elision is the omission of one or more sounds from a word, e.g. a vowel,
(to elide)
consonant or a whole syllable. It is used to create a word or phrase that is
easier or more casual to suit an informal context, for example, e.g. the word
'comfortable' is usually elided when spoken.
Ellipsis
Grammar allows some words to be missed from a grammatical construction
(elliptical)
(i.e. for sentences to be grammatically abbreviated) and yet for the sentence
still to be meaningful, e.g. 'I bought half a dozen eggs and [...I also bought...]
six rashers of bacon.' The reader or listener is able to 'add back in' the
elements that have been left out and thus understand what is meant.
Ephemeral
A term that means 'lasting for a short time', i.e. transitory. In the study of
language change, it refers to fashionable words that drift in and out of fashion.
Speech is often considered to be an ephemeral thing in contrast to the more
permanent nature of writing.
Finite / non finite
This word applies only to certain verbs. A verb in a sentence can exist on its
own as in these examples: 'It's good to exercise' or 'I enjoy exercising'. In each
of these sentences, the form of the verb is termed non-finite.
Alternatively - and every complete grammatical sentence has one at least by
definition - the verb can be made finite. This simply means that it is 'attached'
grammatically to a subject word. This subject is usually either a noun or
noun phrase. Look at this example: I exercise to keep fit'). In this latter case
the subject/verb combination work together to create a clause.
Form and content
Form means the sound, shape and appearance of something, e.g. two forms of
the word please, are pleases and pleased. The form of the sentence, e.g. 'He
pleased himself.' can be explained by referring to two kinds of structure: that
of its individual words (i.e. their morphology) and the way its words relate to
each other (i.e. their syntax). The study of both of these aspects of sentences
is called grammar the study of the form of a text is called discourse
analysis.
The content is the meaning contained by a word, phrase, clause or sentence
and this is involved with its function. The separation of form, function and
content is a theoretical way of discussing the effect of each even though all
three are inextricably linked.
Function
The function of a word is what it 'does' in its sentence, e.g. its function is to
act as a subject, object, verb, etc. The function of a sentence is what it is
intended to 'do', e.g. to make a statement, ask a question or give a command
or order.
Genre
Genre is a way of categorising texts according to similarities they share with
(generic)
those we already know. More generally, genre is a way of making the
unfamiliar seem more familiar and hence, be more easily and quickly
recognisable. New things might be unwanted, uncomfortable or even
threatening. For instance, if we see an insect that looks different from a wasp
but has black and yellow stripes and a pointy body – 'genre' allows us to
quickly label it and either run, squash or collect it. Genre is a kind of 'survival
instinct'. The world is naturally (sometimes worryingly and even threateningly)
chaotic things can and do happen at random – even dangerous things. To feel
safe, we force order upon as much of the world as we can: we build houses,
store food, name things and so on. We must feel secure. Your bedroom might
not seem to reflect your instinctive ordering mentality, but it most certainly
does: firstly, it is a defined space (it is a piece of the world that is more secure
because it is contained) and, although your belongings may look like pure
chaos to an untrained observer such as mum and dad, you know precisely what
is in that heap of clothes, CDs, magazines, English Language homework and
whatever else.
What has this to do with language study? Well, surprisingly, we impose order
and give labels even to things as unthreatening as language and media texts
(you wouldn’t want a romantic film to turn into 'The Chain Saw Massacre'). So,
texts that share content (e.g. chain saws, fondling couples), function (e.g. to
frighten, to arouse), and form (e.g. books, films) are categorised and 'made
safe'. But because, as they say, familiarity breeds contempt, genres can and do
change – but slowly (see Pulp Fiction or Reservoir Dogs for evidence).
Genre is an important idea because it affects the production as well as the
reception of texts. Writers know what we expect from a particular genre, and –
to keep us receptive and comfortable (and hence – importantly for language
study – more easily influenced or persuaded) – they will stay broadly within a
particular genre’s expectations. Typical genres of fiction are adventure,
detective and horror, and of non-fiction, reports (e.g. newspaper, school),
biographical writing, advertising, recipes, etc. Taking account of genre allows
you to comment on effective genre indicators ('signifiers') and stylistic devices
within a text. Of course, genre is an ideal way of categorising similar texts.
Grammar
Grammar is the set of rules that tells how words can be put into a sequence
(grammatical /
and a form that allows their meaning to become unambiguous in a sentence.
grammaticality)
The order of words in a phrase, clause or sentence is called its syntax and the
form of words is called morphology (for example, to show plural we add the
morpheme s, to show possession, we add the morpheme 's).
Graphology
Graphology is easily misunderstood and many teachers advise students to pay
(graphological)
it little attention as it can lead to analysing the images and diagrams in a text a habit that loses many marks in a language exam. But it needn't be that way
at all as, properly applied, a graphological analysis can be very useful and
subtle.
Originally, graphology applied only to the appearance of a person's
handwriting; for your course, however, it applies to any aspect of the form
and appearance of a text that modifies meaning in any way.

It is the graphological qualities of any written or printed text
that we first notice.
This means you would do well to consider analysing a text at the level of
its graphology before looking at other methods of analysis such as
lexis or grammar. The graphological features of a text determine subtle and
important aspects such as genre and ideology: how we react to the text itself.
Graphological features, therefore, carry pragmatic force and are an important
part of our society's discourse.
For example, a text's layout, presentation, use of paragraphs, lists, 'bullets',
font choices, underlining, italics, white space, colour, etc. can all create
different kinds of impact, some of which will cause the reader to react
differently for example, graphological aspects can create important pragmatic
perceptions of power and influence.
Head / head word
All phrases have what is called a head or head word. This is the word within
the phrase that determines its grammatical function (and which acts to provide
its most general meaning); other words within the phrase act in a modifying
capacity. For example, in the noun phrase 'the old-fashioned door', the head
word is the noun, door - the remaining words within the phrase act to modify
this head word; in a verb phrase such as 'might be hit', the head word is the
finite verb hit and in a prepositional phrase such as 'on the table', the head
word is on.
Ideology
Ideology refers to the values and attitudes we all share towards such things
(ideological)
as ourselves, others and institutions. Ideologies are general or cultural
ways of thinking that form the foundation of the many important 'belief
systems' that are adhered to by groups or whole societies. They form a
society's and individual's 'world view' or 'mind set' concerning how things are
and ought to be. A society is a group of people who share certain key values
and ideas; these values and ideas are called that society's ideologies.
Texts are created by speakers and writers who share society's beliefs
concerning 'what is right' and 'what is wrong' or about 'the way things should
be for the best' in society. These ideologies mw be 'hidden' because they seem
'natural' or 'common sense', as the result of 'progress' in our 'advanced'
society, and so on.
If we closely examine and consider some important ideologies, it can be seen
that those ideas act to reinforce the structure of our society. Some
thinkers - called Marxists - conclude that this might not be a healthy thing for
a society as it helps maintain what they call society's status quo - ideas that
maintain the existing social hierarchies and power structures (with, for
example, the wealthy holding the reigns of power, and the poor being attached
in important ways to those reigns, perhaps?).
This 'political' way of considering the effect of ideologies arose in the theories of
the key nineteenth century philosopher, Karl Marx. Marx recognised that those
with power naturally enough wish to hold on to their status (those who 'own
the means of production', i.e. the powerful, he called the bourgeoisie lesser
mortals are the proletariat or the masses). Marx thought that the bourgeoisie
were able to create and reinforce particular 'ways of thinking' that would act to
reinforce and maintain a society’s status quo and hence, existing hierarchies of
status and power.
Ideas that 'maintain the status quo' are referred to as a society’s dominant or
prevailing ideologies. An example of such an idea might be, 'He deserves to
be rich because he’s worked hard for all he has' but this ignores the plight of
millions who work even harder but stay poor. The point of ideological thinking
is just that – it ignores, hides, sidelines, and 'disappears' those groups whose
ideas it does not support.
Marx felt that such ways of thinking act not only to keep the powerful in power
but also to create the conditions necessary for the masses to justify their own
lower position in society. The means by which ideas can support the status quo
is called hegemony. Prevailing ideologies become a part of us as we grow up
we become 'conditioned' into thinking that the way our society operates is for
the best. This 'social conditioning' is created through the family, school,
religion, law and – very importantly for language study – the mass media
indeed, the media receive much of the focus of Marxist criticism because it is
considered a major means through which powerful elite groups can increase
their hegemony over others. It is hegemony that causes us to view our
capitalist, consumerist 'social-democracy', with its hierarchies of status and
power, its elitism, its individualistic self-centredness, its poverties and its
suffering… as 'the best of all possible worlds'.
In studying a text for its hegemonic or ideological power, you must learn to
look for what is termed 'ideologically loaded' language. Such language is that
which has judgemental value as well as meaning. Look out for such language
and consider its seductively persuasive effect as it subtly 'ideologically
positions' you as reader. Many ideologically loaded words have their judgmental
value because their meaning is relational: they exist as 'binary pairs', e.g.
'master/mistress', 'housewife/working mother', 'middle class/working class',
'freedom fighter/terrorist', 'hero/coward', 'normal/abnormal', 'gay/hetero',
'feminine/feminist, 'The West/the East', etc. Some linguists maintain that all
language – all meaning – is an 'ideological construct'.
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Idiomatic language
Idiomatic language refers to many words or phrases that are a familiar and
(idiom / idiomatic
everyday feature of our language. Idioms are a part of the comfortable,
phrase)
conversational style of language we use daily - but to a foreigner, idioms are
difficult to understand because their meaning is very different from the literal
meaning of the words that make them up, e.g. 'He wants his pound of flesh.'
'You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours' 'That's real cool' 'No way, José', 'He's a
pain in the neck!', etc. Each of these are idioms - or idiomatic phrases. You will
notice that idioms always exist as fixed collocations which do not work if the
phrase order is altered at all. For example, we cannot really say, 'He scratched
my back and I scratched his...'.
Imagery
Words can be chosen to create more than just meaning: they create feeling,
too. Some words or phrases are able to create a particularly vivid mental sense
of a picture, person, sound, taste, etc. This effect is called imagery. Imagery is
a very important feature of all descriptive writing and, especially, of poetry. The
most common way by which a writer can create imagery is through the use of
figurative or metaphorical language, typically through the use of
metaphor, simile and personification. Truly effective imagery acts almost to
etch itself onto the reader's mind. This can be a very emotional and persuasive
device as it acts to engage the reader intensely in the subject matter of the
writing.
Imperative
A command sentence which uses the second person plural form of a verb but
misses out the subject pronoun 'you'. It gives orders, e.g. Leave now! Sit
down.
Infinitive
A form of a verb without tense and often introduced by 'to' infinitive forms can
replace noun phrases as subject or object of a verb, e.g. Object: He likes to
eat subject: To fish is a very relaxing way to spend the morning.
Inflection
The way words can change their form to show, for example, that they are
(inflexion / inflect
singular or plural (e.g. table becomes tables) and to indicate tense (e.g. change
/ inflects /
becomes changes/ changed/ changing) or possession (The cat's whiskers).
inflected)
Intensifier
Intensifiers are a special kind of adverb. An intensifier is used when the
semantic value of another adverb or adjective needs to be altered. Examples of
intensifiers are: very, quite, absolutely and extremely but there are many
more.
Intensifiers act to pre-modify their adverb or adjective. Can you identify the
intensifier in this sentence: 'It's a terrifically bad accident.'?
Interjection
A word class that is used to show emotion, e.g. 'Ouch!', 'Hey!'
Intransitive
A verb is called intransitive when no action transfers from their subject to an
object, e.g. we swam like a fish they sang beautifully he died. A transitive
verb always takes an object - the thing that takes its action, e.g. He hit his
thumb with the hammer.
Irony
Irony is the name given to the effect of meaning created when one thing is
said or written but another - sometimes opposite - thing is meant. In speech
this effect is created by tone of voice in writing by carefully chosen lexis. The
study of such meaning falls within the area known as pragmatics.
Latinate
This term refers to those many rather formal words in English that derive from
either Latin or French. These words entered the language most notably during
the period following the Norman Conquest (1066). King William I spoke a
northern French dialect that itself was heavily influenced by the classical Latin
language of ancient Rome; he insisted that the nobility of newly conquered
England learn to speak French and, from this, many French/Latin words
entered the language. The Latinate equivalent now sits alongside the original
Old English/Anglo-Saxon term and tends to be used in more formal occasions.
Examples are motherly (Anglo-Saxon)/maternal (Latinate); inn (AngloSaxon)/hotel (Latinate). As a rule of thumb, if you can pronounce the word in a
French accent it is Latinate! A text that relies heavily on Latinate words will be
aimed at a more educated audience.
Lexeme
A lexeme or lexical item is a word - or occasionally phrase - in its most basic
(lexical item /
form, like the head words found in a dictionary that are listed each as
lexemic / lexicon)
separate entries. An example is the word 'spell'; from this lexeme there can be
several derivations, e.g. spelled, spelt, spelling, etc. These inflected forms of
the root word are not counted as lexemes. The word 'crane', as an example, is
two lexemes, one meaning a large bird and the other a machine for lifting.
Also included under the heading of lexemes are the so-called phrasal verbs;
these are short phrases whose meanings are different from their constituent
lexemes, e.g. 'see to', 'break down', 'put up with', 'wind up'.
Idiomatic phrases that carry meaning as a unit are also counted as lexemes,
e.g. 'give over, 'rain cats and dogs', etc.
The collection of lexemes that forms a person's vocabulary is called his or her
lexicon. A dictionary is another kind of lexicon.
Lexical (dynamic)
Lexical or dynamic verbs tell of an action (to hit, to call, to sing); stative
and stative verbs
verbs tell of a state of being (to be - am, is, was, were - to think, hope, seem,
appear, feel, etc.).
Lexis
Lexis means the vocabulary of a language as opposed to other aspects such
(lexical)
as the grammar of the text. Lexis is clearly an important aspect of creating a
suitable style or register (i.e. when choosing language and language features
to suit a particular genre, context, audience and purpose).
Lexis and semantics are very close and often used interchangeably.
Lexical cohesion occurs when words have an affinity for each other as in
collocations.
Linguistic
Referring to the study or ways of language and the use of words to create
meaning.
Modifier /
Modification describes the grammatical process through which the meaning of
Modification /
a head word within a phrase can be altered, refined or modified. This is done
Pre-modification /
by the addition of one or more words. The result of the modification of a word
Post-modification
is the creation of a phrase e.g. in the noun phrase, 'A criminal act', the head
word (the noun 'act') is modified by the noun 'criminal'.
Nouns can be both pre-modified (by linking with one or more adjectives, e.g.
A tall dark stranger' or with other nouns, e.g. 'oven glove') as well as postmodified, e.g. 'The man with an ice-cream. Prepositional phrases can also act
as modifiers when they act as the complement of a verb, as in, 'He's in a
mess'.
Mode
'Mode' refers to the channel of communication of a text. A text might be
spoken or written, for example, or it might show features of being 'mixed
mode' is the sense that it contains features of both speech and writing, as in
text messages and email.
Mood
'Mood' is an aspect of English verbs. Verb phrases can be categorised
(modal / modality)
according to whether they express an actual or a potential action or state. The
moods are: indicative mood: 'He plays well'; 'She is happy' (indicating an
actual event or state); imperative mood: 'Sit down!' (issuing a command);
interrogative mood: 'Will you please sit down?' (asking a question);
subjunctive mood: 'If she were alive, then...' (pointing to a possibility or
wish).
Mood is often created in a verb phrase through the use of a modal auxiliary.
This kind of auxiliary verb usually creates the effect of suggesting that the
action told of by the verb is not real but is potential.
Morphology /
The suffix "morph-" is to do with shape, and morphology concerns the form and
morpheme
shape of words. It is an important aspect of grammar (along with syntax);
(morphological)
morphology is the study of the way words are formed. The smallest part of a
word that can exist alone or which can change a word's meaning or function is
called a morpheme (e.g. un-, happy, -ness).
A bound morpheme is an affix, i.e. usually a prefix or a suffix, e.g. un-, tion. These are 'bound' called because they must be attached to another
morpheme to create a word. Morphemes that can exist alone as a complete
word are called free morphemes, e.g. happy.
Narrative & Myth
Whilst it's true to say that a narrative is no more than a story, the important
realisation from an analytical viewpoint is that when we tell or write a story,
we all tend to use a very similar form and structure, no matter what the
story and whether it is imaginary or not. Narrative is easily one of the most
common varieties of social discourse and a day will not pass without you
reading or hearing a story - or constructing one of your own.
In a narrative, events (whether they be real or fictional) are told in certain
ways: they are told ('narrated') from a certain point of view (e.g. 'first
person', 'third person', 'multiple viewpoint', etc.), they are carefully selected
for their value in creating a sense of involvement, interest and tension; the
events are unified and coherent, they have an apparently logical 'cause and
effect' structure. The events typically involve a main character (called, 'the
protagonist' or 'hero'); the life of the protagonist is usually disturbed from an
initial - or presumed - state of 'normality' or equilibrium; this disturbance is
created by a conflict that is introduced by a second character (called the
'antagonist' or 'villain' - also sometimes a social institution); the conflict is
tackled by the 'hero' during the development or rising action of the
narrative; this leads to a climax of action followed by a winding down and
tying up of loose ends called the d�nouement; during this final part of the
story, there is the formation of a new equilibrium and a final resolution.
Typically, by the end of the narrative, the protagonist's life will have changed
in some way and he or she will have learned something useful about life.
From early childhood, we become accustomed to making sense of the complex
events of the world through the simplifying and satisfying means of narrative,
not noticing the way the form and structure of narrative orders and simplifies
reality, most particularly the way it positions people as either wholly 'good' (=
heroes and helpers) or wholly 'bad' (= villains and accomplices). The fact that
this is merely a point of view and a massive over-simplification of the realities
of life passes us by as we become absorbed by and relate to the characters
and events of the narrative. It has been suggested that we might even be
born with such basic structures and forms embedded within our subconscious;
they certainly have an enduring and unshakeable impact upon our psychology.
Certainly, it is clear that as human beings we do have a need for security,
control and order within our lives and narrative, along with genre, are two
very important means by which order and security can be created in what is,
in reality, a disordered and even potentially dangerous universe.
Many narratives are so ancient and enduring that they are called myths.
Examples are the romance myth, the family myth, the hero myth and so on.
Narratives usually have a relatively fixed structure: a 'beginning' (where a
setting creates mood or atmosphere and characters are introduced), linked to
a 'middle' (where the hero meets a problem and works to overcome the
problem and where the plot becomes interesting and reaches a climax) linked
to an 'end' (where a satisfying sense of closure is introduced - the plot draws
to a conclusion).
Nonce word
'Nonce' is an archaic word meaning, 'for the one time'. A 'nonce word' is a
word that is coined for a particular occasion. Nonce words sometimes catch on
and enter everyday usage, initially as neologisms or new words - they are
especially common in pop culture, e.g. 'poptastic'; Linguist David Crystal
mentions the word 'floodle' someone once used to mean a stretch of water
bigger than a puddle but smaller than s flood.
Noun
A noun is any word that can form the head word in a noun phrase or be the
(nominative)
subject or object of a verb. Semantically speaking, a noun is any word that
'labels' or 'names' a person, thing or idea.
There are several types of noun: common noun (e.g. computer, sandwich,
cats), proper noun (proper nouns are names for individual nouns, e.g. Coke,
London, Simon), abstract noun (abstract nouns are 'ideas', e.g. death,
hunger, beauty), concrete nouns (concrete nouns are solid objects in the
real or imaginary world, e.g. bread, butter, clock) collective nouns
(collective nouns name groups of individual or things, e.g. parliament,
audience collective nouns are often treated as if they were singular, e.g. 'The
choir is singing well.'), mass (or non-count) nouns (mass nouns exist as an
undifferentiated mass, e.g. card, beer, milk, cake), and count nouns (count
nouns exits as countable items, e.g. bottle, pencil).
Orthography
Orthography is the term used in linguistics used to refer to the way that words
(orthographic)
are spelled.
Participle
Words made from verbs that are used either with an auxiliary to create a verb
(participial)
tense (e.g. was eaten) or as an adjective to describe a noun (e.g. an eating
apple) or as a noun to label a thing (e.g. the singing was loud). Notice that
because the participles all derive from verbs, they always retain the idea of
action in their meaning.
Person
This term is used to describe pronouns. A pronoun always has a referent
(i.e. a noun to which it refers). The referent of 'I' is always the writer or
speaker of a sentence and is referred to as the first person singular
pronoun 'we' is called the first person plural pronoun the person or people
spoken to is referred to as the second person pronoun, i.e. 'you' (both
singular and plural) the person or people spoken about is referred to as the
third person pronoun, i.e. he / she / it (third person singular) or they
(third person plural).
Phonetics
Phonetics is the study of the way people physical produce and perceive the
Phonology
different sounds we use to create speech. These sounds are called phonemes
Prosody
and are created by the various 'organs of speech' in the body, including the
Phoneme
tongue, the soft and hard palate, lips, pharynx, etc. Phonetics, unlike
(phonemic)Diphtho
phonology, is not concerned in any way with the meaning connected to these
ng
sounds.
Glide
Phonology is the study of the way speech sounds are structured and
how these are combined to create meaning in words, phrases and
sentences. Phonology can be considered an aspect of grammar and, just as
there are grammar 'rules' that apply to the syntax of a sentence and the
morphology of words, there are phonological rules, too.
Even in very early childhood, children are said to be able to produce (i.e. they
can articulate) the full range of sounds needed to create all of the words used
in any world language, yet as language acquisition progresses, those
phonemes that do not apply to their mother tongue become forgotten. This is
so much so that in later life, if a second language is then attempted, the
pronunciation of non-English phonemes needs to be re-learned - this time at a
wholly conscious level, as opposed to the ability to pronounce each English
phoneme without any conscious thought. Even 'non-words' such as 'erm',
'uh?', etc. use English phonemes.
An important part of phonology is the study of those sounds that form distinct
units within a language. The smallest unit of sound that can, in itself, alter the
meaning of a word is called a phoneme. Although there are 26 letters in the
English alphabet, it's interesting to note that there are around 44 phonemes in
the dialect called Standard English. This means that letters cannot represent
phonemes as such and so other symbols are used. Each phoneme is given a
symbol so that the accurate pronunciation of any English word can be
represented in writing. Here is the (American) English phonetic alphabet version of the International Phonetic Alphabet or IPA:
The extra sounds we have above the number of letters we have available in
part explains the complexities of English spelling (see orthography). Consider
the word might, in which there are three phonemes m-ight-t (represented as
m/ai/t using the Phonetic Alphabet), changing just a single phoneme can
completely change the meaning of this word, e.g. mate, m-a-te (represented
as m/ei/t phonetically).
Some of the extra sounds are there because we use phonemes that are called
diphthongs. If the tongue has to move significantly to make a vowel sound,
the result is a diphthong; it sounds like a rapid blend of two vowel sounds.
The letter 'i' in the word 'kite' is a diphthong - it is a rapidly made blend of an
'a' and an 'i' sound. The movement of sound from the 'a' to the 'i' is called a
glide.
Phonology also covers the study of important sound features such as
rhythm, pitch, tone, melody, stress and intonation. These phonological
features of language are aspects of prosody - they are referred to as the
prosodic or suprasegmental features of language.
Phrase
A phrase is a key grammatical unit. In terms of its meaning, a phrase
(phrasal)
expresses one complete element of a proposition. It will be made up of
one or more words and occupy a particular syntactic slot within its clause or
sentence, e.g. as subject, predicate or object. A useful rough and ready 'test'
for a phrase is that it can be 'replaced' in its clause or sentence by a single
word that is roughly its equivalent. Thus in the sentence, 'That old guy over
there has been patiently waiting for three and a half hours already', the noun
phrase, 'The tall man over there' could be replaced by 'he'; the verb phrase
'has been patiently waiting' could be replaced by 'waited', the prepositional
phrase 'for three and a half hours' could be replaced by 'ages'!

A phrase acts as a unit with individual meaning, but without
sufficiently completeness to be a clause or sentence by itself.
Noun phrase
A noun phrase always has a noun as its
head word, e.g. "a cat"; "the naughty
cat"; "that furry black mangy old cat".
Verb phrase
A verb phrase always has a verb as its
(sometimes called a head word, "drink"; "has drunk"; "has
verb chain)
been drinking"; "seems"; "will be";
"might have been"; "explained"; "has
been explaining".
Adjective phrase (or An adjective phrase always has an
adjectival phrase)
adjective as its head word, e.g. "gory",
"absolutely foul".
Adverb phrase (or
A phrase with an adverb as its head word,
adverbial phrase)
e.g. soundly; too evidently; as quickly
as possible
Prepositional
A phrase which has been constructed from
phrase (a special
a preposition with a noun phrase linked
kind of adverbial
to it to form a single unit of meaning, e.g.
phrase)
"up the road"; "across the street"; "round
the bend".
Phrases - with words - are the basic building blocks of clauses and
sentences. A phrase can always be split into two parts: its head word which
is linked to some kind of modification of the head word. The head word is
the central part of the phrase and the remaining words act to modify this
head word in some way, e.g. "The peculiarly strong creature" - can you see
that the head word of this noun phrase is the noun, "creature"?
As suggested above, a phrase does, in fact, act just like an individual word.
The next example sentence contains three phrases and a single main clause.
Can you recognise which are the phrases and which is the clause?
In a frenzy, without thinking, he grabbed him by the neck.
You might like to think that, between each word of the three phrases above,
there exists a kind of 'word glue' that gives the phrase its coherent quality.
The phrases "In a frenzy", "without thinking" and "by the neck" all can be seen
to exist as individual units of meaning, i.e. as individual phrases.

Notice that the clause in the above sentence cannot be called a phrase
because it is built around a verb (i.e. a verb phrase), "he grabbed
him"
Pragmatics
Pragmatics is an aspect of how language generates meaning - and as such, it
(pragmatic)
falls under the 'umbrella' of semantics, which is the study of meaning.
Semantics is often, simplistically, said to be the the study of surface 'sentence
meaning' and pragmatics to be the study of the deeper, inferred 'social force'
of language.
The clearest way we can communicate our ideas and thoughts is through
language. To achieve this, the ideas and thoughts we want to communicate
become 'encoded' either phonologically (by the sound of spoken words) or
graphically (through marks on a handwritten or printed page). When this
meaning is conveyed semantically, the encoded meaning - the words, phrases
and sentences we create - can be easily de-coded without particular thought
of the context. Sometimes, however, a deeper, inferred meaning is also
encoded within language, and this creates a pragmatic force within the text.
Thus, pragmatics operates whenever we write or say one thing semantically
but mean to infer extra force to our text or utterance.

Pragmatics is an absolutely key aspect of any A-level textual analysis
as it is so very revealing of important linguistic aspects.

If you ignore the pragmatic force of language in your analyses, you will
lose many marks.
An example will make this clearer. If you think about the phrase, 'Give him
one!', the meaning this contains will very much depend upon the social
situation in which it is used. It is the noun 'one' that, in certain social
situations, will carry different levels of force: it is a pragmatically loaded
word, where its precise meaning can only be inferred by the context of the
language use.

Pragmatic meanings can be inferred in this way because, owing to the
context of the language use, we are able to 'read into' a word the extra
meaning - the utterance's pragmatic force - conferred on it by the
way it is used within a particular social situation.
Pragmatics can allow language to be used in interesting and social ways:
knowing that your listener or reader shares certain knowledge with you allows
your conversation to be more personal, lively or less extended. It also allows
you to use words and give them inferred elements such as power aspects,
because your listener is aware of your social standing, for example. Similarly,
language can act in ideological ways to reinforce a society's values - again,
pragmatically. At another level, language users can rely on pragmatics to help
them cut down on the number of words needed to make meaning clear - and
hence contributes to a more lively style.
Here are a few examples that require more than a semantic analysis to reveal
the intended meaning of the text's words and phrases, but where the
pragmatic meaning is perfectly clear:

'BABY SALE - GOING CHEAP' (poster seen in shop window - but no
babies are for sale).

'Quick! Fire!' (and you know you must run).

'Pass the salt' (and you know it's not an order).

'Are you going into town?' (and you know it's a request for the
person to come with you).

'He's got a knife!' (and you don't ask how sharp it is)

'I promise to be good.' (and you don't expect a repeat of the bad
deed).

'The present King of England is bald.' (said on TV, yet you can work
out what is meant even though we have a queen).

'Another pint...?' (and you know you've already had one).

'I said, 'Now!'' (and you know when).

'Gosh - it's cold in here!' (and someone shuts the door or window).
An important area of pragmatics is in the study of language and power. The
implicit understanding of a power relationship between, say, two speakers, is
often indicated by the meanings implied by the language used. This meaning
can be very context dependent.
Predicate
The predicate is all that is written or said in a sentence or clause about its
grammatical subject, e.g. The young choir boy [subject] sang every song in
the book [predicate].
Prefix
A prefix is a type of affix (i.e. a bound morpheme) that is added to the
beginning of a word to change its grammatical function or meaning (e.g.
un+happy) - see suffix.
Preposition
A small word or phrase that begins a longer adverbial phrase (called the
(prepositional)
object of the preposition) that acts to tell about place, time or manner and
relate this aspect to some other word in the sentence, e.g. in, on, by, ahead
of, near.
Progressive /
A verb form created from the present (i.e. -ing) participle to tell of a
continuous
continuing event, e.g. he is laughing his socks off.
Pronoun
A word used often - but not always - to replace a noun, e.g. Alex, when the
teacher came into the classroom, you mean you really didn't see her? See also
person.
Purpose
Purpose is the reason why a text was created. This may be, for example, to
entertain, explain, instruct, persuade or inform. The purpose of a text is its
writer or speaker's controlling idea: the message they wish the text to leave
with the reader or listener. When you consider a text's purpose, you need to
recognise how the writer has chosen stylistic devices to bring about a
particular series of effects on the reader. One of the most common purposes is
to persuade - and it can be one of the most difficult to determine because
professional writers are experts at making persuasion appear to be
information: quite a different thing (as wartime propaganda has shown).
Audience is also a way to categorise texts.
Referent
A referent is the word to which another word in a sentence or text refers. It is
an important element of textual cohesion. For example, a pronoun must
have a referent noun which is already understood (this noun is called the
pronoun's antecedent) or its meaning will be unclear or ambiguous.
Referents can be exophoric (when the referent is outside of the text),
endophoric (when the referent is within the text), anaphoric (when the
reference precedes the pronoun, e.g. 'John will cook the meal he is a fine
chef.' Here, the pronoun, 'he' is an anaphoric referent) or cataphoric (when
the referent follows the pronoun, e.g. 'I know what he means about it' said
the captain about the steward's behaviour.' - here, the pronouns 'I', 'he'
and 'it' all have cataphoric referents).
Register
When context results in a commonly recognisable style to be produced, the
resulting style is called a register (e.g. an informal register, a medical
register, a scientific register). Context can be an effective way to categorise
texts.
Relative clause
A kind of clause (a group of words built around a subject and verb) that is a
variety of adjectival clause. Relative clauses are used to give extra detail
about the subject or object noun of a main clause in a sentence. e.g. A main
clause might be, 'The butcher sold me some sausages.' and a relative clause
could be, 'who works in Tesco's' . The sentence could then become, 'The
butcher, who works in Tesco's, sold me some sausages.'
A relative clause usually begins with a relative pronoun such as: that,
which, who, whom, although 'that' is often elided as in: 'He knew [that] we
were going early.'.
Repossession
Repossession is a term used in the study of language change. It is used to
describe a word that has fallen out of general use because it is deemed
politically incorrect begins to be reused by the minority group it once referred
to, e.g. the use of the word 'queer' to refer to a homosexual.
Root words
A free morpheme to which can be added a affix (a prefix or suffix) that
acts to change the root word's meaning or function.
Semantics
Semantics is the study of word and phrase meaning (but also see
(semantic)
pragmatics). In the new exam specifications for A-level English Language
(from 2008-9), it has been combined with lexis.
Writers often play with semantics to create interesting stylistic effects or to
create a style suited to a particular context or audience. For example, a
simplified semantic level would be chosen to suit a younger audience, and so
on. When examining a text at the level of its lexis and semantics, it's
important to look out for uses of, for example, irony, simile, semantic fields
(see below) metaphor or hyperbole (called figurative language).

An important area of semantics is in the use of idioms or idiomatic
language.
Semantic/lexical
This term refers to a relationship that exists between some of the words or
field or set
phrases used in a text. This might be because the words have all been chosen
from a similar area of knowledge or interest, e.g. the lexical field/set of
agriculture includes: farm, farming, tractor, meadow, crop, etc. Semantic or
lexical fields can be important in the use of metaphor. A metaphor is a
figurative use of language in which a thing from one semantic field is
described in terms of a different semantic field. For example, in the following
description of a football match, the semantic/lexical field of war is used to
create particular rhetorical effects: 'The home side gunned down the opposing
side with consummate ease'.
Semantic value
The semantic value of a unit of something is the meaning it contains. By
forming words and structuring sentences following the rules of standard
grammar, the semantic value of the sentence and its words and phrases will
be clear and unambiguous.
Sentence
A sentence is a sequence of words constructed in accordance with the
conventions of standard grammar. Such a group will have a sense of
completeness and a clarity of meaning. It will usually be constructed
around a noun phrase acting as the subject of a finite verb, i.e. it will contain
at least one main clause. The rules of grammar concern the order of words in
a sentence, technically called its syntax and the form of the words, called
their morphology.
Sentence 1) below shows standard syntax and morphology (i.e. standard
grammar):
1). 'The cat sat on the mat.'
Sentence 2) shows non-standard morphology:
2). 'The cat sitted the mat on.'
Sentence 3) shows non-standard syntax:
3). 'The cat on the mat sat.'
A group of words that is a sentence is made obvious to the eye (i.e. in writing)
by an opening capital letter and a final full stop, question mark or exclamation
mark. It is made obvious to the ear (i.e. in speech) by the use of pauses. It is
made obvious to the mind because it makes sense alone.
A sentence may loosely be said to be a coherent group of words that
expresses a single complete thought about something (or someone).
A sentence can be one of three main types:
1. A simple sentence is a sentence that contains a single subject and verb,
i.e. an independent clause.
2. A compound sentence is a sentence that contains more than one main
clause. These clauses must be linked by co-ordinating conjunction or a
semicolon.
3. A complex sentence is a sentence that contains a mixture of clause
types. A complex sentence must contain (as all sentences) at least one main
clause but will also contain a second kind of clause acting as a dependent or
subordinate clause. Subordinate clauses often begin with a
subordinating conjunction such as however, although, even though,
because, etc. There is also a special kind of sentence, often used in speech,
called a 'minor sentence'.
A sentence can fulfil one of four functions:
1. It can make a statement. This is called a declarative sentence, e.g. 'I
am overweight.' Declaratives usually follow the word order SV (subject first,
verb second)
2. It can ask a question. This is called an interrogative sentence, e.g. 'Am
I overweight?' and indicated by a question mark. Interrogatives usually follow
the word order VS (verb first, subject second)
3. It can demand an action. This is called an imperative sentence, e.g. 'Sit
down, please.' indicated by a lack of subject (but 'you' is implied).
4. It can make an exclamation. This is called an exclamatory sentence,
e.g. 'What a mess!', indicated by an exclamation mark.
'Minor sentence'
A minor is a sentence without a subject and/or verb. Exclamations are an
example, 'Not on your life!' Poets and writers use them to create the effect of
real conversation.
Sociolect
A sociolect is a variety of language used by a particular social group; a
dialect is a variety of language used in a particular geographical region; and
an idiolect is the variety of language used by a particular individual.
Sign / signifier /
A sign is anything that creates meaning. Words are an important kind of sign
signified
composed of symbols called letters. The brain recognises a word and
unconsciously gives it an agreed meaning, but, in fact, the word is merely a
symbolic code, one that we learn, mostly during childhood, to 'decode' to find
its meaning.
Standard English
This is the agreed standard national dialect of English. Standard English is
generally considered to be the clearest way of expressing meaning and as
such is accepted for use in most textbooks, by teachers, in the news media
and as the basis for English teaching across the world. Non-standard
English includes regional dialects and slang. There are also 'standard forms'
of important international English languages such as 'standard American
English'.
Stem
The 'core' part of a word to which prefixes and suffixes can be added, e.g.
interest which can become uninteresting by adding affixes, the prefix un- and
the suffix -ing.
Structure
The structure of something refers to the form of the complete item - such as a
(structured /
sentence or a text - and the way its individual parts have been put together to
structural)
create a coherent (interrelated) whole. In a phrase, clause or sentence the
individual words are related both by their grammatical structure and their
semantic properties in a text, the relationship and connections between its
structural parts (e.g. its sentences and paragraphs) is considered using
discourse analysis.
Style
Style is the result of the choices a writer (or speaker) makes regarding
(stylistic)
aspects of language, language features and structure with regard to creating a
text or discourse that will suit a particular genre, context, audience and
purpose. Three key aspects of style that are often worthy of comment are a
text's degree of formality or informality, its use of standard or non-standard
grammar and its discourse structure. Some skilled writers also develop
distinctive, individual aspects of style, which may also be called a 'voice' - akin
to a person's spoken idiolect.
Subject and object
The word 'subject' needs care as it has a particular - and very important meaning that is quite distinct to grammar and which is different from its
everyday, non-grammar meaning.
In grammar, the subject (S) is a syntactical position or element within a
clause. The subject can be either a word or a phrase, usually a noun phrase.
In the sentence, 'I gave him a present', 'I' is the grammatical subject and
'gave' is its associated verb in the sentence (in the past tense). In the simple
sentence, 'The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog', the subject is 'The
quick brown fox'. This is a noun phrase that has as its associated finite
verb, 'jumped'. Most English sentences need a subject but sometimes this can
be one of the small words (called pronouns) 'it' or 'there'. This type of subject
can be tricky to recognise as proper subjects.
Some typical word orders of simple declarative sentences are: SV (subjectverb), SVO (subject-verb-object), SVC (subject-verb-complement) or SVA
(subject-verb-adverbial).
Some types of verb transfer their action from their subject onto something
else (the thing receiving the action of the verb is called its object). These are
called transitive verbs. In the above sentence, the verb 'gave' is transitive as
action transfers to the object, the noun 'a present'.
Verbs are called intransitive if they do not transfer action, but, instead, act to
tell what their subject is doing, e.g. 'He is working.', 'It died.' Some verbs can
be either transitive or intransitive according to their usage in the sentence,
e.g. 'He is singing.' (intransitive) and 'He is singing a song.' (transitive).
A few special verbs (stative verbs) have no sense of direct action but,
instead, act to make a statement about their subject's state of being. These
verbs are called copular or linking verbs, e.g. He seems ill, She is clever,
he was a criminal, it appears dark, etc.. The word that follows a stative verb
has no action passing on to it so it cannot be called an object; instead, it is
termed a complement.
Confusingly, Some verbs can take two objects:
'I gave Sally a present.' (i.e. 'I gave a present to Sally')
In this type of sentence, the object is 'a present' (= the thing given; this is
called the DIRECT OBJECT); but there is a second 'object' - the 'receiver' of
the direct object. This is termed the INDIRECT OBJECT. Notice that all
sentences of this type can be re-written as shown using the word 'to'.
Subjunctive
Verb mood used to show a hypothetical situation, e.g. If it were possible, I
would do it.
Suffix
An affix (a morpheme) added to the end of a word to alter its grammatical
function, e.g. the noun luck can become an adjective by adding the suffix
(or 'adjective marker') -y, as in lucky.
Synonym / antonym A word that has a closely similar meaning to another word. English has very
few true synonyms (e.g. sofa / couch / settee), but many near synonyms, e.g.
house - dwelling - home - abode - pad. The existence of synonyms allows
variety of word choice according to style and register. A list of synonyms is
available in a thesaurus.
An antonym is a word with directly 'opposite' meaning, e.g. black/white
good/bad.
Syntax
Syntax is the most important aspect of English grammar. It refers to the
(syntactic /
way words are put together in a group to create meaning as phrases, clauses
syntactical)
or as a sentence. Studying the syntax of a sentence involves investigating the
structure and relationships of its words.
Standard syntax refers to the syntax of a particular dialect of English called
Standard English - this is the syntax you will read in most written texts and
hear from teachers in lessons, newsreaders and in any other more formal
context. Non-standard syntax is a normal part of much spoken English and
is common in regional dialects. Syntax does not have to be standard for
meaning to be clear such as here in the screen play from the film Star Wars
when Yoda speaks:
YODA
Ready, are you? What know you
of ready? For eight hundred years
have I trained Jedi. My own counsel
will I keep on who is to be trained!
A Jedi must have the deepest
commitment, the most serious mind.
(to the invisible
Ben, indicating Luke)
This one a long time have I watched.
All his life has he looked away...
to the future, to the horizon.
Never his mind on where he was.
Hmm? What he was doing. Hmph.
Adventure. Heh! Excitement. Heh!
A Jedi craves not these things.
(turning to Luke)
You are reckless.
Tense
Tense refers to the way the time of an action can be directly indicated in a
verb by changing its form (i.e. morphologically). English only has two verb
tenses - present tense 'I leave.' and past tense, 'I left.'. However, we have
many other ways of creating the idea of tense by using auxiliary verbs or
other structures that indicate the time of an action. For example, each of the
following grammatical structures suggests a future event, or a future aspect
(the 'will' construction is often, but loosely, called 'the English future tense'):

I will leave in the morning.

I am going to leave in the morning.

I shall leave in the morning.

I leave in the morning.

I am leaving in the morning.
Text
Within linguistics, the word 'text' means any continuous and coherent
(textual)
sequence of writing or speech. See also discourse.
Utterance
A linguistic term that refers to a spoken text of any kind.
Verb
Combined with its subject, the verb becomes the central element of a
(verbal)
sentence or clause.

A main verb is the head word of a verb phrase - sometimes called a
verb chain, e.g. 'He hit him hard.'

A lexical verb is the part of the verb chain that suggests the action
involved, e.g. He might have hit him.

A verb that tells of a 'state of being' is a copular or stative verb, e.g.
is, was, seems, appears, becomes, etc.
Verbs that work along with a subject are called finite (e.g. the girl looked).
But verbs do not have to work with a subject within a sentence - these are
called a verb's non-finite forms (e.g. I like to run). Non-finite forms of verbs
can act as other parts of speech:

The infinitive from of the verb (often used with 'to'), e.g. 'He used to
love me.'

The -ed participle form (usually ending with the suffix -ed):
o

Verb chain / phrase
'Only the cooked apples should be used.'
The -ing participle form:
o
'He used cooking apples' (adjective).
o
'The cooking was superb' (noun).
o
'He will be cooking this evening' (continuous aspect).
A verb chain has a head word that is a main verb along with one or more
'helper' or auxiliary verbs. Many grammarians reserve the term verb chain
for the verb elements alone and use the term verb phrase to include any
adverbials that function to modify it, e.g. The car was parked / on the
pavement.
Grammatically, a verb chain is always directly linked to and usually follows its
subject, usually a noun phrase. The two grammatical units create a clause.
In a verb chain, the main verb can be inflected to show tense (e.g. eat,
eaten, ate), agreement (e.g. I eat, she eats) or continuous action (e.g. He is
eating). It can also be pre-modified with an adverb (e.g. He is quietly
eating). The auxiliary verbs in a verb chain can be inverted to form a
question (e.g. Do you eat spaghetti?).
Voice
The voice of a verb can be either active or passive. The active voice is the
most common and preferred in English usage. In an active clause the subject
and object of the main verb are in their usual position, i.e. SVO, 'Alex caught
the thief' however, in a passive sentence, the object is transferred to the
subject position, e.g. 'The thief was caught by Alex.' This can have the effect
of emphasising the object or diminishing the effect of the subject. in fact, in a
passive construction, the subject can be hidden completely, e.g. 'The thief was
caught.'
Word class
One of the eight parts of speech of traditional grammar: noun, pronoun,
adjective, verb, adverb, preposition, conjunction and interjection.