General Linguistics
Instructor: Zhang Shaoquan (张绍全）
One day, John went shopping with his mother. On the way their car was hit by a truck and his mother was killed. John was seriously injured and taken to a hospital in an ambulance. One of the nurses in the emergency room was startled, and cried, ‘Oh my god, that’s my son!’ Who was this nurse?
Why study linguistics
• One famous scholar says that language is an interesting subject to study on its own right, for the simple reason that everybody uses it every day. It is unbelievable that we know very little about something we are so familiar with. Just a few questions will arouse our interest in language.
How about the meaning of the sentence below:
My husband will come back. A: Will you invite me to go upstairs to have a cup of tea? B: My room is in a mess.
Markedness and Unmarkedness
• That’s why it is odd to say * ‘a female nurse’, while it is reasonable to say ‘a male nurse’.
• In everyday language female is the unmarked (usual, common) sex for
(1) John fell in love with his beautiful secretary.
(2) John and his beautiful secretary fell in love.
To put it differently, the English expression to fall in love describes the mental state of the subject only. In the first case John has those feelings, while in the second they both do, as both are mentioned in the subject of the sentence.
Consider the following two sentences:
(1) I met your girlfriend in the bookstore.
(2) ? Your girlfriend met me in the bookstore.
The second sentence is unusual because it suggests that the girl came to the speaker as part of a previous arrangement.
Consider the following sentences:
Colorless green ideas sleep furiously. Sincerity admires John. He is an infant bachelor.
Do you think the following two sentences have the same meaning?
secretaries, midwives, prostitutes, ballet dancers, and house-keepers as well.
• The opposite situation, maleness as
the unmarked sex, is found in many
professions and occupations,
including surgeons, pilots, sailors, and
most jobs whose names end in –man, such as policeman, salesman, postman, and fireman.
• Why should we call the thing we sit on chair? Can’t we call chair table and table chair? How is it that children don’t seem to make a big effort in learning their first language while we adults have to work very hard to learn a second language?
•ressions
reflected male chauvinism and have
campaigned to substitute –woman or – person for –man, as in policewoman, chairperson, and freshwoman.