Introducing English Linguistics

subject
. For instance, the declarative sentence We are late becomes a
yes/no question by inverting the operator are and subject We: Are we late?
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GLOSSARY

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1 The study of language
1. 1 b, 2 c, 3 d, 4 a
2. All languages have rules that specify how constructions are formed, and principles that gov-
ern how these constructions are actually used. Rules are tied to competence: the abstract
underlying knowledge of a language that any speaker will possess. Principles are tied to per-
formance: how we use the structures that rules create. Thus, if you are studying rules of syn-
tax, you are studying linguistic competence: our knowledge of how we put words together to
form phrases and clauses, not our knowledge of how we use these structures once they’ve
been formed.
3. In general, linguists prefer descriptive rather than prescriptive approaches to language study.
A descriptivist simply describes language structure, laying out the facts about Language X or
Language Y in objective and scientific terms. A prescriptivist, on the other hand, is more
interested in telling people how to use language, often times in very subjective and emotional
language (e.g. double negatives are illogical and reflect sloppy thinking).
4. A sentence is grammatical if it is rule-governed. Although He don’t know nothin’ is non-
standard, it is rule-governed and thus grammatical. This sentence illustrates a differing rule
for subject–verb agreement than is found in Standard English: don’t, which is used in
Standard English for plural subjects, is used by some speakers with singular subjects such as
he. The sentence also contains a double negative, a systematic and rule-governed process
whereby the negative is copied on the indefinite pronoun (anything becomes nothing). But
while this sentence is grammatical, for many people it is unacceptable because of its associa-
tion with non-standard English. Acceptability involves people’s personal judgments of linguis-
tic forms and can be highly subjective.
5. English or Spanish are considered languages because we can isolate rules for forming, for
instance, grammatical sentences in Spanish. In other words, all languages have a grammar.
Even though American Sign Language (ASL) is not spoken but gestured, there are rules for
how the gestures are structured. As a result, because ASL has a grammar, it would be consid-
ered a language. If ASL were simply gestures modeled on English, it would not have the status
of a language.
6. In a system of grammatical gender, gender is somewhat arbitrarily assigned. For instance,
in German, das Mädchen (‘girl’) is assigned neuter gender, even though a girl is biologically
feminine. In a system of natural gender, there is a more direct association between biologi-
cal gender and the assignment of gender. This is why in Modern English, the pronouns he
and she always refer to males and females, respectively. There are cases of uses of generic he,
as in An employee must make sure he arrives on time for work, in which he refers to both males
and females. But this usage is dying out in English, and actually sounds a bit archaic to
some.
Answers to 
self-study activities

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7. The two initial quotes are statements of facts: it is true that most nations contain bilingual
(even multilingual) populations, and that multilingualism alone does not necessarily lead to
“civil discord.” However, the statement becomes much more prescriptive when it states that
multilingual speakers should be allowed to speak whatever language they want to “publicly
or privately” and “to maintain their native language... and pass it on to their children.” These
statements illustrate verbal hygiene because they reveal a certain attitude towards language,
specifically that all languages should be valued and their speakers given certain rights.