Language in Context
Chapter 10
Outline
1. Reading: Bottom-Up and Top-Down Processes
1. Perceptual Issues in Reading
2. Lexical Processes in Reading
2. Language and Thought
1. Differences between Languages
2. Bilingualism and Dialects
3. Slips of the Tongue
3. Language in a Social Context
1. Speech Acts
2. Conversational Postulates
3. Gender and Language
4. Neuropsychology of Language
1. Reading: Bottom-Up and TopDown Processes
1. Perceptual Issues in Reading
• Perception of orthographic aspects of
words
– Recognizing a particular letter when
presented in visual form
• Translating letters into phonological code
– Translating the letter into the corresponding
sound
1. Reading: Bottom-Up and TopDown Processes
2. Lexical Processes in Reading
– Put letters together and identify words
• When reading our eyes move in saccades
– Rapid sequential movements as they fixate on
successive clumps of text
– Saccadic movements leap an average of
about 7 to 9 characters between successive
fixations
1. Reading: Bottom-Up and TopDown Processes
2. Lexical Processes in Reading
• Lexical access
– the identification of a word that allows us to gain access to the
meaning of the word from memory
• Word-superiority effect
– Letters are read more easily when they are embedded in words
than when they are presented either in isolation or with letters
that do not form words
• Sentence-superiority effect (Sentence context effect)
– When a word (e.g. “window”) is standing by itself it is more
difficult to recognize than when it is preceded by a sentence
context such as “There were several repair jobs to be done. The
first was to fix the ________.
2. Language and Thought
•
1. Differences between Languages
Differences in lexicon
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–
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People in Burma distinguish among many different
kinds of rice
Nomadic Arabs have more than 20 different words
for camels
Differences in syntax
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–
Order of subject, verb, and object in a typical
declarative sentence (e.g. Japanese vs. English)
Range of grammatical inflections and other
markings (e.g. Russian vs. English)
2. Language and Thought
•
1. Differences between Languages
Linguistic Relativity: The Sapir-Whorf
Hypothesis
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•
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The assertion that the speakers of different
languages have differing cognitive systems and
that these different cognitive systems influence
the ways in which people speaking the various
languages think about the world
Language shapes thought
Major proponents: Edward Sapir and Benjamin
Lee Whorf
2. Language and Thought
•
1. Differences between Languages
Linguistic Relativity: The Sapir-Whorf
Hypothesis
– Current view – milder form
•
•
•
Language may not determine thought, but
language certainly may influence thought
Language facilitates mental representation and
manipulation
Language affects how we encode, store, and
retrieve information in memory
2. Language and Thought
•
1. Differences between Languages
Linguistic universals
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–
Characteristic patterns across languages of various
cultures
Example
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•
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Languages name colors quite differently, but the languages
do not divide the color spectrum arbitrarily
All languages seem to take their basic color terms from a
set of just 11 color names organized into a hierarchy of five
levels: (1) black, white; (2) red; (3) yellow, green, blue; (4)
brown; and (5) purple, pink, orange, gray
If a language names only two colors they will be black and
white, if it names three colors, they will be black, white and
red
2. Language and Thought
•
2. Bilingualism and Dialects
Bilingualism
–
Bilinguals
•
•
•
–
Monolinguals
•
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People who can speak two languages
Simultaneous bilingualism occurs when a child learns two
languages from birth
Sequential bilingualism occurs when an individual first
learns one language and then another
People who can speak only one language
In general it seems that bilingualism results in
increased thinking ability
2. Language and Thought
•
2. Bilingualism and Dialects
Bilingualism
– Single-system hypothesis
•
The two languages are represented in just one
system
– Dual-system hypothesis
•
•
The two languages are represented somehow in
separate systems in the mind
When recovery of language after trauma is
studied, sometimes the first language recovers
first, sometimes the second language recovers
first
2. Language and Thought
•
2. Bilingualism and Dialects
Language Mixtures and Change
–
Pidgin
•
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Creole
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When people of two different language groups are in
prolonged contact with one another, the language users of
the two groups begin to share some vocabulary that is
superimposed onto each group’s syntax
When pidgin develops into a distinct linguistic form (new
language) with its own grammar, it becomes a Creole
Dialect
•
A regional variety of a language distinguished by features
such as vocabulary, syntax, and pronunciation
2. Language and Thought
•
3. Slips of the Tongue
Slips of the Tongue
– Linguistic errors in what we say, which may
occur at any level of linguistic analysis:
phonemes, morphemes, or larger units of
language
•
E.g. spoonerisms at the phonological level
– “you have hissed all my mystery lectures”
•
E.g. Substitution at the semantic level
– “after it is too late,” when you meant “before it is too
late”
3. Language in a Social Context
- Pragmatics
- the study of how people use language, including
sociolinguistics and other aspects of the social
context of language
1. Speech Acts
• Direct speech acts
– The speech act is expressed directly (e.g. “Shut the
door!”)
• Indirect speech acts
– We accomplish our goals in speaking in an oblique
fashion (e.g. “Could you please shut the door?”)
3. Language in a Social Context
1. Speech Acts
• Taxonomy of direct speech acts (Searle,
1975)
– Representative
• A speech act by which a person conveys a belief
that a given proposition is true
• E.g. “My students are smart.”
– Directive
• An attempt by a speaker to get a listener to do
something, such as supplying the answer to
question
• E.g. “Shut the door!”
3. Language in a Social Context
1. Speech Acts
• Taxonomy of direct speech acts (Searle,
1975)
– Commissive
• A commitment by the speaker to engage in some
future course of action
• E.g. “I’ll be there.”
– Expressive
• A statement regarding the speaker’s psychological
state
• E.g. “I’m happy.”
3. Language in a Social Context
1. Speech Acts
• Taxonomy of direct speech acts (Searle,
1975)
– Declaration
• A speech act by which the very act of making a
statement brings about an intended new state of
affairs
• E.g. “I now pronounce you husband and wife”
3. Language in a Social Context
2. Conversational Postulates (Grice, 1967)
• The maxim of quantity
– Make your contribution to a conversation as
informative as required but no more
informative than is appropriate
• The maxim of quality
– Your contribution to a conversation should be
truthful
– You are expected to say what you believe to
be the case
3. Language in a Social Context
2. Conversational Postulates (Grice, 1967)
• The maxim of relation
– You should make your contributions to a
conversation relevant to the aims of the
conversation
• The maxim of manner
– You should try to avoid obscure expressions,
vague utterances, and purposeful obfuscation
of your point
3. Language in a Social Context
3. Gender and Language
• Gender differences has been found in the
content of what we say and what kind of
conversation style we use
– Man
• Focus on information
• Conversation is viewed as competition
– Women
• Focus more on feelings
• Try to establish connection between participants in
conversation; want to consult things
3. Neuropsychology of Language
• Broca’s aphasia
– Problem in production
– Patient Tan-Tan who could not speak but
understood speech
• Wernicke’s aphasia
– Problem in comprehension
– Language-deficient patients who can speak
but whose speech makes no sense
3. Neuropsychology of Language
• Event-related potential (ERP) evidence
– N400
• Sensitive to semantic anomaly in sentences such
as “The officer shot the man with a moon.”
– P600
• Sensitive to syntactic anomalies in sentences such
as “The broker persuaded to sell the stock.”