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Why is semantics limited to the study of the "literal" meaning of words in this article? I have been doing semantic research for 30 years and many of the most interesting observations have to do with non-literal usages of words. I have never before seen a definition of semantics limited as it is in this article, and am curious as to the rationale. There is probably a reasonable rationale, in which case, as a minimum, we need to find some area of linguistics where the non-literal meanings of words is studied. (lexicography?)
Wayne Leman Linguist my Cheyenne language website: http://www.geocities.com/cheyenne_language
"Linguists can be partitioned with a reasonable degree of success..."
Oh, Christopher, so much to answer for... Jacquerie27 06:12 May 1, 2003 (UTC)
Could we just combine "historical linguistics" and "comparative" linguistics? (Under the heading of Linguistics is also studied with other disciplines, thus:...) There is a Historical-comparative linguistics entry, after all. -- Devotchka
We are going to have a problem here. On the Language page, languages are being categorized by their origin. This entry, Southeast Asian languages, is a classification by geographical area. Both are possible and should be on separate pages. I am not at all sure this entry belongs directly on the Linguistcs page. Perhaps a languages by geography page should be added to the LanguagE page?
Do you think it's necessary to separate out geography of languages like that? As far as national languages go, there's nothing wrong with just linking to them from the appropriate country pages. I think what we probably need is some higher level geographical categories, like Southeast Asia, which can handle languages, countries, and a lot more besides.
I was just suggesting some way to separate out language families by origin and by geography. I am not wedded to any particular scheme. I wouldn't want readers to assume that SouthEastAsianLanguages are necessarily similar. Also, eventually, casual language descriptions of a particular language shoud be separated from Linguistic analysis of particular languages, I should think. Assuming the content appears...:-).---- Neither etymology nor philology are strictly speaking areas in the modern study in Linguistics. Both these areas have nothing to do with making generalizations about Language with a capital L. For example, etymology studies specific words and their origins, but not the processes involved in a change. This later general discussion is part of Historical linguistics.---- There is now duplicate material on "phonemes" on this page and the phoneme page.
It's been a long time since I had a class in linguistics, but wouldn't "make" be the better example of a morpheme? I thought morphemes were the smallest units of meaningful language, whereas phonemes were the smallest units of sounds that make a difference in the language. I am not criticizing, I'm just confused and want enlightenment. -- LMS --
-- Revising an earlier comment, which appears not to have been saved. The linguist's definition of a phoneme is what's given in the article, the smallest unit of sound that makes a difference in meaning. It's identified by paired-sound tests and some comments on field procedure emphasize that one is only gathering sounds--they're supposed to be analytically distinct from meanings. So in that sense, phonetic research is only supposed to find out what distinctions of sound a native speaker can recognize. But, to repeat, the article's definition is correct so far as I know. The 's' in "makes" is an example of a morpheme that is one phoneme long. Correct as an example, I think, but possibly confusing. Using "make" as an example opens up another confusion though--a morpheme is not a word.AMT
I'm not saying it's not correct. I'm saying it's confusing. It needs to be clarified for those who have not studied linguistics. -- LMS
It may be that the term Adamic language is only used specifically by the Mormons, in general linguistics I know this concept as the Proto-World language (as for example Proto-Bantu, a language which has been reconstructed as the ancestor of the Bantu language family). Additional reserarch needed. Hannes_Hirzel
Do we really want a separate list of linguists on here and in the 'Linguist' article? I note that there is more detail here than there, but I'd be tempted to copy this list there and delete it here, combining the two lists there. (BRG)
This article was starting to ramble on about certain "linguistic layers", especially morphology. I have replaced the ramblings with a more concise summary. Some will undoubtedly be upset. I have not destroyed people's work, however; I have copied the ramblings to the appropriate articles, e.g. I've copied the morphology stuff to morphology (linguistics).
The only claim I've completely eliminated is this:
Why "must" it be this way? It seems to me that one could start with any linguistic layer. Say the linguist was not particularly good at formally writing down phonetics, but nonetheless manager to learned the language under consideration. Could she not skip straight away to describing, say, the syntax (her forte), and leave phonetic considerations to someone else?
-- Ryguasu
I doubt if the opening citation is really worthwile. Linguistics is arguably the most hotly contested property in the academic realm. It is soaked with the blood of poets, theologians, philosophers, philologists, psychologists, biologists, and neurologists, along with whatever blood can be got out of grammarians. (Rymer, p. 48, quoted in Fauconnier and Turner, p. 353) In other disciplines there are debates over the field as well. I would like to have a better opening but I can not make up my mind about it at the moment - perhaps later. -- Hirzel
My new feeling is that it should be moved to a new "quotes about Linguistics" section. I actually don't like the article overall, even those I've made some extensive revisions; it's too focused on conflict and probably false dualities. In-fighting between different schools should probably be mentioned, but I don't think they need to be the core of the article. -- Ryguasu 16:47 May 1, 2003 (UTC)
______ Where's the discussion of Applied Linguistics???--CQ
I would be grateful if someone more familiar with the web of linguistic articles than me placed some links to whistled speech somewhere.
On a separate note: I agree that the introductory quote overemphasizes controversies, and is probably to blame for the devisive tone of much of the rest of the article. AxelBoldt 10:06, 23 Sep 2003 (UTC)
Edit table at Mediawiki:linguistics - SV (talk) 08:18, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)
This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 1 | Archive 2 | Archive 3 | → | Archive 5 |
Why is semantics limited to the study of the "literal" meaning of words in this article? I have been doing semantic research for 30 years and many of the most interesting observations have to do with non-literal usages of words. I have never before seen a definition of semantics limited as it is in this article, and am curious as to the rationale. There is probably a reasonable rationale, in which case, as a minimum, we need to find some area of linguistics where the non-literal meanings of words is studied. (lexicography?)
Wayne Leman Linguist my Cheyenne language website: http://www.geocities.com/cheyenne_language
"Linguists can be partitioned with a reasonable degree of success..."
Oh, Christopher, so much to answer for... Jacquerie27 06:12 May 1, 2003 (UTC)
Could we just combine "historical linguistics" and "comparative" linguistics? (Under the heading of Linguistics is also studied with other disciplines, thus:...) There is a Historical-comparative linguistics entry, after all. -- Devotchka
We are going to have a problem here. On the Language page, languages are being categorized by their origin. This entry, Southeast Asian languages, is a classification by geographical area. Both are possible and should be on separate pages. I am not at all sure this entry belongs directly on the Linguistcs page. Perhaps a languages by geography page should be added to the LanguagE page?
Do you think it's necessary to separate out geography of languages like that? As far as national languages go, there's nothing wrong with just linking to them from the appropriate country pages. I think what we probably need is some higher level geographical categories, like Southeast Asia, which can handle languages, countries, and a lot more besides.
I was just suggesting some way to separate out language families by origin and by geography. I am not wedded to any particular scheme. I wouldn't want readers to assume that SouthEastAsianLanguages are necessarily similar. Also, eventually, casual language descriptions of a particular language shoud be separated from Linguistic analysis of particular languages, I should think. Assuming the content appears...:-).---- Neither etymology nor philology are strictly speaking areas in the modern study in Linguistics. Both these areas have nothing to do with making generalizations about Language with a capital L. For example, etymology studies specific words and their origins, but not the processes involved in a change. This later general discussion is part of Historical linguistics.---- There is now duplicate material on "phonemes" on this page and the phoneme page.
It's been a long time since I had a class in linguistics, but wouldn't "make" be the better example of a morpheme? I thought morphemes were the smallest units of meaningful language, whereas phonemes were the smallest units of sounds that make a difference in the language. I am not criticizing, I'm just confused and want enlightenment. -- LMS --
-- Revising an earlier comment, which appears not to have been saved. The linguist's definition of a phoneme is what's given in the article, the smallest unit of sound that makes a difference in meaning. It's identified by paired-sound tests and some comments on field procedure emphasize that one is only gathering sounds--they're supposed to be analytically distinct from meanings. So in that sense, phonetic research is only supposed to find out what distinctions of sound a native speaker can recognize. But, to repeat, the article's definition is correct so far as I know. The 's' in "makes" is an example of a morpheme that is one phoneme long. Correct as an example, I think, but possibly confusing. Using "make" as an example opens up another confusion though--a morpheme is not a word.AMT
I'm not saying it's not correct. I'm saying it's confusing. It needs to be clarified for those who have not studied linguistics. -- LMS
It may be that the term Adamic language is only used specifically by the Mormons, in general linguistics I know this concept as the Proto-World language (as for example Proto-Bantu, a language which has been reconstructed as the ancestor of the Bantu language family). Additional reserarch needed. Hannes_Hirzel
Do we really want a separate list of linguists on here and in the 'Linguist' article? I note that there is more detail here than there, but I'd be tempted to copy this list there and delete it here, combining the two lists there. (BRG)
This article was starting to ramble on about certain "linguistic layers", especially morphology. I have replaced the ramblings with a more concise summary. Some will undoubtedly be upset. I have not destroyed people's work, however; I have copied the ramblings to the appropriate articles, e.g. I've copied the morphology stuff to morphology (linguistics).
The only claim I've completely eliminated is this:
Why "must" it be this way? It seems to me that one could start with any linguistic layer. Say the linguist was not particularly good at formally writing down phonetics, but nonetheless manager to learned the language under consideration. Could she not skip straight away to describing, say, the syntax (her forte), and leave phonetic considerations to someone else?
-- Ryguasu
I doubt if the opening citation is really worthwile. Linguistics is arguably the most hotly contested property in the academic realm. It is soaked with the blood of poets, theologians, philosophers, philologists, psychologists, biologists, and neurologists, along with whatever blood can be got out of grammarians. (Rymer, p. 48, quoted in Fauconnier and Turner, p. 353) In other disciplines there are debates over the field as well. I would like to have a better opening but I can not make up my mind about it at the moment - perhaps later. -- Hirzel
My new feeling is that it should be moved to a new "quotes about Linguistics" section. I actually don't like the article overall, even those I've made some extensive revisions; it's too focused on conflict and probably false dualities. In-fighting between different schools should probably be mentioned, but I don't think they need to be the core of the article. -- Ryguasu 16:47 May 1, 2003 (UTC)
______ Where's the discussion of Applied Linguistics???--CQ
I would be grateful if someone more familiar with the web of linguistic articles than me placed some links to whistled speech somewhere.
On a separate note: I agree that the introductory quote overemphasizes controversies, and is probably to blame for the devisive tone of much of the rest of the article. AxelBoldt 10:06, 23 Sep 2003 (UTC)
Edit table at Mediawiki:linguistics - SV (talk) 08:18, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)