BATANGAS STATE UNIVERSITY

COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES

Pablo Borbon Main I, Batangas City

Directions: Answer the following substantially through comprehensive and veracious

discussion, and appropriate citation using the APA format. Attach the reference list of the
sources that you utilized.

1. Explicate the primary causes of linguistic change in the history of the English
language.

Language is always changing. We've seen that language changes across space and
across social group. Language also varies across time. Generation by generation,
pronunciations evolve, new words are borrowed or invented, the meaning of old words
drifts, and morphology develops or decays. The rate of change varies, but whether the
changes are faster or slower, they build up until the "mother tongue" becomes arbitrarily
distant and different. After a thousand years, the original and new languages will not be
mutually intelligible. After ten thousand years, the relationship will be essentially
indistinguishable from chance relationships between historically unrelated languages.
Lightfoot (2003) claims that one has a theory of language and a theory of
acquisition, it is quite unclear what a theory of change is supposed to be a theory of.” The
idea that the main cause of change, at least as far as so-called internal causes are
concerned. It lies in imperfect language transmission from one generation to the next.  
Languages change in all their aspects, in their pronunciation, word forms, syntax,
and word meanings semantic. These changes are mostly very gradual in their operation,
becoming noticeable only cumulatively over the course of several generations. But, in
some areas of vocabulary, particular words closely related to rapid cultural change are
subject to equally rapid and therefore noticeable changes within a generation or even
within a decade. Migration, conquest and trade bring speakers of one language into
contact with speakers of another language. In such contact situations, languages often
borrow words, sounds, constructions and so on.
Social groups adopt distinctive norms, culture, gesture and so forth; Linguistic
distinctiveness can be achieved through vocabulary (slang or jargon), pronunciation
usually via exaggeration of some variants already available in the environment. Through
repetition, particular cases may become conventionalized, and therefore produced even in
slower or more careful speech. Every decade sees new slang terms like these appearing in
the English language. And while some words or abbreviations do come from internet or
text conversations, others may appear as entirely new words, a new meaning for an
existing word, or a word that becomes more generalized than its former meaning, brought
about by any one of the reasons above. Knowing all these facts, it comes down to
realization that changes in language is inevitable and cannot be avoided. This give us the
knowledge that language is rich and can adapt to ever changing environment and era in
this world

2. Expound on each of the following statements and cite specific learning

situations where they are prevalent:

The structure of words reveals either the peculiarities or the fundamental compositions
of written language
Composition is another word for writing — the act of writing or the piece of
writing that results. It also refers to what something is made of. Today, when anyone can
be their own publisher, we see more and more examples of poor writing skills both in
print and on the web.  Poor writing skills create poor first impressions and many readers
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will have an immediate negative reaction if they spot a spelling or grammatical mistake.

You should avoid using any language whose purpose is deceitful. Euphemisms are terms
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that attempt to cover up that which is wrong, unethical, taboo, or harsh. Sentence
structure refers to the physical nature of a sentence and how the elements of that sentence
 BATANGAS STATE UNIVERSITY
COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES
Pablo Borbon Main I, Batangas City

are presented. Just like word choice, writers should strive to vary their sentence structure
to create rhythmic prose and keep their reader interested. 
According to a statement from Study.com (2019), the purpose of structure of
words is about formation. It involves rules for creating sentences by focusing on word
order, phrases, clauses, and the relationships among them.. This shows reveals that the
structure of words has the fundamental compositions of written language.

The sounds of a language are representations of its identity as well as the influences
that shape it.

A language is sometimes made for fun but primarily for communication. The
sound of a language we recognize is its trademark. Language from various location or
geography differ and it somehow shows and represents individuals from specific
ethnicity. American English is different from British English. Language we hear from an
American is differs from British. From the words they use to the grammar or rules they
follow. American speakers tend to have different accent and upon hearing them we can
recognize its identity that is American’s. Even in other countries, they tend to have their
unique languages that will distinguish them from others. And this I believe what makes
the sound of a language represents its identity as well as the influences that shape it.
Languages shape the perspective of a nation even their cultures and beliefs.
Language manifest even the traditions of a specific. The sounds of a language
reminded us that a particular sound may correspond to its own identity. This formed our
mind to the notion that language emerges with its own sound as influenced by its people.

3. Explain the parallelism between sound patterns and semantics. Prove your
claims through citing examples.

Parallelism is the use of components in a sentence that are grammatically the same; or
similar in their construction, sound, meaning, or meter. It explains the relationship that
may be understood between units of linguistic structures. One type of parallelism is that
of sound patterns or phonological parallelism. The occurrence of repeated sound or
similar sound in a given context is called repetition. In this case we can see that sound
pattern and rhyme is interrelated. Lexical items with identical form or there may be
related by lexico-semantic relationship such as synonyms, hyponymy and antonyms

4. Discuss factors which you consider essential in making language influential

and thus, widely used across disciplines and social contexts.

English has certainly been seen as “international language” and many have stressed
the importance of learning Mandarin as China’s economy continues to grow. These
statements make me say that “The more influential your country is, the more influential
your language will be. But what it takes to make a language popular. Language is
influential in the sense that this is widely adapt in different places. In other discipline,
English is widely used and practice. According to Hannah (2008), the popularity of a
language is influenced by societal differences Through this, it will become widely used in
different disciplines and this will influence others in using the same material. Aside from
the use of written language, it can also be experienced first-hand through the use of
authentic and real speakers. With the help of education, a language can be widely used
because of its authenticity and its popularity.
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To make a language popular across disciplines and social context, it should be the
center of linguistic norms and policies. Through this, the use of language is continuous
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and strictly contained within every discipline. By having the standard language which is
widely used, schools could easily access the linguistic features of a language to which is
 BATANGAS STATE UNIVERSITY
COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES
Pablo Borbon Main I, Batangas City

very essential also in language learning. Another factor is introducing new learning
materials written in different languages.
5. Compare and contrast the following:

Syntax and Grammar

Grammar implies an abstract system containing set of rules governing the basics
of a language as a form, structure and order of words. It refers to the study of word
classes, their conjugation, functions and relation in a particular sentence. Grammar is a
branch of linguistics which is concerned with syntax, morphology, semantics and
phonology. As against, the syntax is just a part of grammar, indicating the way in which
the words are sequenced to create sentences. While syntax is arrangement the words in a
sentence, bases on the form of a sentence or the context. Grammar consist of entire
system of rules that allows people to form and interpret words, clauses, phrases, and
sentences in their language (Surbhi, 2019). It is based on the context or the meaning of
the specific sentence. Meaning there should be coherence to be said grammatically
correct. On the other hand, syntax is said as set of principles that defines the order words,
clauses and phrases to form proper sentence in particular language.
On the contrary, grammar and syntax is not the same.

Phonetics and Phonology

Phonetics – the manifestation of language sound. Ashby and Maidment (2005)
provide a detailed introduction to the subject area of phonetics. From the phonetic
perspective, “sound” refers to mechanical pressure waves and the sensations arising when
such a pressure wave strikes your ear. In a physical sound, the wave changes
continuously, and can be 2 introducing phonology graphed as a waveform showing the
amplitude on the vertical axis and time on the horizontal axis.
Phonology: the symbolic perspective on sound. Physical sound is too variable
and contains too much information to allow us to make meaningful and general
statements about the grammar of language sound. We require a way to represent just the
essentials of language sounds, as mental objects which grammars can manipulate. A
phonological representation of an utterance reduces this great mass of phonetic
information to a cognitive minimum, namely a sequence of discrete segments. The basic
tool for converting the continuous stream of speech sound into discrete units is the
phonetic transcription.The idea behind a transcription is that the variability and continuity
of speech can be reduced to sequences of abstract symbols whose interpretation is
predefined, a symbol standing for all of the concrete variants of the sound.
Phonology
The study of higher-level patterns of language sound, conceived in terms of discrete
mental symbols, whereas phonetics is the study of how those mental symbols are
manifested as continuous muscular contractions and acoustic waveforms, or how such
waveforms are perceived as the discrete symbols that the grammar acts on.

6. Create your own learning model (paradigm) on any macro or micro content of
any of the following linguistic areas:
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 BATANGAS STATE UNIVERSITY
COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES
Pablo Borbon Main I, Batangas City

lexicon

structure syntax semantic

phonology

References:

http://writing.ku.edu/writing-process

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_change#cite_note-Cambridge-6

https://wwnorton.com/college/english/write/we/ch6/21a.htm

https://www.britannica.com/topic/language/Linguistic-change

https://www.english.com/blog/english-language-has-changed/

https://www.linguisticsociety.org/content/english-changing

Richard Nordquist. 2018. Grammatical Oddities That You Probably Never Hear About.

Traugott Elizabeth Closs, Dasher Richard B. Regularity in Semantic Change. Cambridge University
Press; Cambridge, UK: 2001. [Google Scholar] [Ref list]
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