...Language Essay Ryan Butler Psychology 360 August 29, 2011 Professor Newlin LANGUAGE Have you ever wondered how we speak? How about why our communication is considered a language and other animal’s communication is not considered language? A wide range of beliefs exist on what defines language. Thus, by exploring the definition of language and lexicon, evaluating language’s key features, the four levels of language structure and processing, and the role of language in Cognitive Psychology, an understanding of what language is becomes clear. Let us begin by defining language and a term named lexicon. LANGUAGE AND LEXICON DEFINITION One big question, when the subject of language comes up, is exactly what language is. What constitutes something as a language? By explaining one definition of a language, and a term associated with language, called a lexicon, a definition of language transpires. Thus, the Willingham (2007) text mentions four certain characteristics communication must possess to, officially, be considered a language. One of these characteristics is that language must be communicative, and thus be communication between individuals in some form or another. Secondly, the symbols standing for words must be arbitrary, and thus have no reason for representing a word. Third, a language must be structured, and not arbitrary. For example, if I say a dog was walking on a sidewalk I cannot say a sidewalk was walking on a dog. etc. Fourth, a language must be...
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...Language Analysis Essay Not all workers are equal The editorial, ‘Not all workers are equal’ featured in the Age on 15 August 2012 focuses on the issue that workers in Pakistan work in conditions that are not safe and can lead to extreme dangers . The editorial is accompanied by a photo that focuses on two sad women who appear to be in mourning, this evidently support the writing piece displayed after the death of all the people in Pakistan due to the poor work conditions. The writer contends that Australians should care about this problem and acknowledge that what is happening over in Pakistan would be illegal over here. The writer uses a sad and authoritative tone to enhance the emotions that are intended to get across to the audience, this is revealed a lot throughout the text from words such as “appalling” and “disturbing:. The writer opens strongly by capturing the reader’s guilt, using comparison and appeal to relate our comfortable lives to the unfortunate lives and events in Third World Countries around the world. The writer focused on the appeal of guilt to endure the audience and alarm them about those people whose lives have been torn apart and then focusing on the harmful lives of workers in Pakistan. From getting the attention of the readers at this point, the writer then goes on to use facts and figures to back up and support their point. ‘Of the estimated 500 people said to be in the three-storey concrete building at the time, at least 264 died.’ This fact...
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...Intro:- In this piece of writing I will be analysing the differences of the way informal/formal language is used by myself and the people around me, within our era. I will be focusing my full attention on how I adapt my own terminology to different situations to suit the scenario I am surrounded within. Also the features found in spoken language, and the issues arising from the public attitude to spoken language. First paragraph:- I, myself have grown up in the Aylesbury bucks district. A very small, quiet town, where the youngsters terminology is mainly influenced by other places in the UK. London would be one of the main places in the UK where the youth of Aylesbury pick up their slang words and "ghetto talk" from. Like words such as "enit", "bruv", "wagwarn" etc are the most common words interpurated from East London. Many phrases such as these may not be familiar with the elder generation as their use of slang is very diffrent to the 21st century terminology of slang words. Along the years slang words have become more and more informal and harder to understand for people who are not common with those types of words. Slang is mainly used amongst people of the age group of 25 and younger. Slang is not used all the time in every day life, it is most commonly used amongst friends and other youngsters who are familiar with that fashion of speech. However, I would, (along with many other youngsters), change my idiolect for those who are older than me, or when I'm in a much...
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...!1 Topic: Explain one of your hobbies, and persuade a friend to take up this hobby. Play Handball My favorite hobby is playing handball which I have been exercising for about 20 years. Handball is a very popular sport in Europe and is known as “Olympic Handball” in North America. I grew up in Germany and came to the US about one and a half years ago. My whole family used to be active member in a handball club and I started to play it when I was only six years old. At that time my dad used to be the coach of a handball team for kids between the ages of five and seven. Initially I was not interested in practicing it at all but he took me to a game once and I suddenly became quite excited. Maybe it was because I have seen all those kids running around chasing a ball… However, I’d like to bring you a bit closer to the sport of handball and hope to encourage you in taking up this activity. I believe handball is an excellent sport for children. Practice with small children usually starts with general motor exercises. They jump, jump on one foot, run, try to catch and throw a ball while running, do balance exercises, and the list just goes on. It’s a great sport to get your child moving, stay active and get into the habit of weekly exercises. Additionally, it keeps them away from playing with electronic gadgets day in and day out. Besides, handball is a team sport. An individual alone cannot have any success in this activity. The younger you are to start it the better...
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...Despite the fact that language learning or acquisition is an apparent requirement for translation, the role that translation might play in language learning and acquisition has been considered one of the most hotly debated issue in both Translation Studies and language pedagogy in the West as well as Arab world. Thus, translation studies have been taught in translation classes without being seen in normal foreign or second language (FL) classrooms. In spite of the claims in opposition to make use of translation in English language classroom, recent studies regard highly that far from being counter-productive and fruitless, translation can be an effective boost in (FL) learning and teaching. In most of Arabic countries, the mother tongue, Arabic,...
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...Can Sign Language Help Deaf Children Learn English? One of the most important things to learn in a deaf community is to learn language it is in critical condition. Because of some public schools having deaf students, they have to come up with new ways of teaching English to them. High school graduates that are deaf can read and write, but only at a fourth grade level. This is not good and that is why they have to come up with new ways of teaching children who are deaf. Recently, there have been ideas on what is the best way to teach deaf children language. This was based more on strong feelings then science. Psychologist hopes to change that though. They are providing a scientific base to help them debate of rather or not deaf children should be taught English or should just English be taught? To learn English only it provides oral training, this concentrates on lip reading and written English. It also teaches “total communication” training, which uses English and Sign English. Signed English is just English that is translated into signs. ASL though is a different forum of English; it has its own vocabulary and grammatical structure. To learn oral only and total communication training that has over powered the American education of deaf and hearing children. Did you know that more then ninety percent deaf children are born to hearing parents? These parents want their children in an English only program. They think that learning ASL will “impede” learning English and that...
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...Dorothy Reed Grand Canyon University: ECH-425 June 13, 2014 In this paper I will be discussing the different ways language abilities and deficiencies impact the literacy development for the different age groups up to age eight. I will also include how teachers should support the English language learners when they are trying to grasp the concept of learning a new language. The word deficiency means not having enough of something that is important or necessary (Merriam-Webster dictionary). Learning to read and write ant an early age is what will help set the tone for a child’s learning in their later years of school. It was established that the early childhood years serve as an important foundation for subsequent literacy development (Neuman and Dickerson, 2001; Snow, Burns, and Griffin 1998; Whitehurst and Lonigan, 2001).Reading books aloud is the best way to help children at a young age develop good literacy skills. In a forum that I came across while I was doing my research talked about how only 58 percent of children ages 3-5 are read to daily by family members (Forum on Child and Family Statistics, 2004). Just think if we as teachers, parents, and family members read to our children more throughout the week, what an impact we would be making on a child’s life and on their literacy skills for reading and writing. I have four grandchildren and I read to them at least three times a week when they are at my house. My granddaughter is seven and she helps me read to her...
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...examples of what a modern day audience would consider non-standard. However, to an 18th century audience, the grammar used is evidently standardised as there is clear pattern throughout. One example of how language has changed is through the implementation of standard capitalisation. Whilst it is now used for the onset of sentences and proper nouns, the text shows it being used for both proper and abstract nouns, an example of this being “Blow”, in the declarative, “having received a sever Blow”. The capitalisation here is used to add emphasis and focus the reader’s attention on the lexeme. The focus works as a persuasive device in Preston’s favour as it adds to the severity of the action, making him seem like the victim in the situation. This links to the mode of the text as it is a transcribed version of his spoken testimony, intended to persuade the reader of his innocence. A further grammatical change is the use of irregular past tense verbs. The newspaper article, written using a narrative style uses both directed and reported speech. Reported speech indicates that the author must be telling the story in past tense. However, the article states how “two soldiers were attacked and beat”. The past participle nowadays would be “beaten”, indicating how the standardisation of language has resulted in a change of suffix’s in order to indicate the tense. Furthermore, in terms of grammar, the article is written wholly using compound and complex sentence structures. This is due to the...
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...Figurative language in the novel Frankenstein is consistent throughout the book except for the beginning. Robert Walton was writing letters to his sister which made the beginning of the story first person Personification appears in chapter 24 for example “I was hurried away by fury; revenge alone endowed me with strength and composure; it molded my feeling, and allowed me to be calculating and calm, at periods when otherwise delirium or death would have been my potion” Metaphor, “my present situation was one in which all voluntary thought was swallowed up and lost” Metaphor “I cannot doubt it, yet I am lost in surprise and admiration” Ironic Devices This novel is highly ironic, in the novel situational, dramatic and verbal irony all appear...
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...Critical Thinking and Language Essay University of Phoenix PHL 251: Critical Thinking February 6, 2006 Course Facilitator: William Salmon The purpose of this essay is multifaceted. I will describe an aspect of my life using metaphors; discuss the role that language and language diversity play in the critical thinking process; discuss how language can limit or empower the expression of our thoughts; and discuss the role of critical thinking in persuasion. Life has its ups and downs and in the past several months I have faced more downs than ups. As nurses we are trained to care for other and be aware for the signs and symptoms of multiple disease processes. When it comes to ourselves we tend to ignore all the warning signs of our body when it comes to any impending illnesses. In September a seemingly harmless virus turned into a painful auto immune disease that will affect me for the rest of my life. I usually avoid doctors and hospitals like the plaque when I’m not at work, so by the time I was forced to go to the emergency room I was as weak as a kitten. My gut was twisted in knots while I waited for the doctor imagining every possible cause of my problem. After hearing the diagnosis and being told that I had to be admitted to the hospital I was at the end of my rope. I was in denial, I don’t get sick often and it’s never serious. I’m a nurse I get exposed to countless germs and am never sick more than a few days; I was too young to be...
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...The roles of speech-language pathologists seem to be shifting and expanding as the 21st century presents society with continuous technological transformations, rising costs of healthcare services, increasing demand for services as the population ages, rising numbers of Autism diagnoses, and the growing diversity of the United States population. Thus, the role of speech-language pathologists within a healthcare setting will depend upon several factors and new models of service delivery will likely be necessary to achieve client success within the ever-changing society of the 21st century. The increasing costs of healthcare services not only affects where speech-language pathologists provide treatment, but also who can receive treatment....
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...Cachau Bant: Mind Your Language Back in the days when the British Empire ruled, the English language spread all across the world forcing a lot of people to take upon English if they wanted better in life. Because of English being one of the most dominant languages in the world, a lot of native languages were lost a long the way - one of those languages being Welsh. Why and how this happened to particular Welsh is what Tom Law discusses in his article Cachau Bant: Mind Your Language from 2013. In this article Tom Law accuses the British Empire for being the cause of the people living in Wales and speaking Welsh dropping drastically during the last couple of 100 years. The cause of this being that England took over the Welsh school system and made teaching English a first priority and Welsh was being taught like German or French is taught in schools nowadays. "[Welsh] was treated the same as any other foreign language – like French or German. It gave you tourist Welsh – enough to ask directions to the nearest zoo in Colwyn Bay – and not much else.” Frustrated with how people today react when hearing about the Welsh losing their native language, Law makes up a fictional scenario where everybody speaks German instead of English. The people who still speak English are considered as being dumb or poor, and with no job prospects if you cannot speak German. Law does admit that this is a rather drastic example, “Now this all sounds absolutely nuts (…) But this is what has happened to...
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...In the Shakespeare’s classic, Hamlet, the young prince is in constant torment over the death of his father at his brother’s hand. Part of his torment comes from his mother’s decision to remarry his uncle. In act 3, scene 3, Hamlet, reaching a boiling point, finally decides to confront his mother about her marriage. Shakespeare uses a clothesline of figurative language to help draw in the audience and to add drama to scene as it plays out. After batting back and forth with words, Hamlet grabs his mother and pulls out picture’s of both his father and his uncle. He forces his mother to look at both pictures and states “Look here upon this picture, and on this, the counterfeit presentment of two brothers” (73). This is a connotation that helps...
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...There always will be a debate regarding the official language of the United States. Furthermore, this has been debated so often over the years that the dead horse being beaten is a pile of dust and bones. While the U.S. has no official language appointed, it does not need one: every language should be the official language of the U.S. From what others have said throughout the years, America has always welcomed immigrants. America has always put itself first and foremost in the media. The United States is one of the safest and most progressive countries in the world. Many of the best companies in the United States owe their progression to immigrant minds. For example, without immigrants (who may or may not speak English), America wouldn't have Google, AT&T, Ebay, Comcast, Big Lots, Yahoo, Colgate, Sara Lee, DuPont, and Pfizer. It makes no sense to make English the “official” language of the United States when so many of the biggest names in the US are from other countries. Similarly, countless travelers moving to America and who helped bring in the Industrial Revolution did not know English. Scores of shipyard workers were from Scotland. Coal miners hailed from Wales. Ireland suffered the potato famine and came over with no English skills, along with the Poles, Germans, other Scandinavians. Not...
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...Arabic is such an important language to so many countries, it's ranked among the top 6th languages; it's the official languages of twenty-two countries, 1.1 million Americans speak Arabic, and 200 million people speak Arabic overall. The language is widely used throughout Muslims. Arabic is a Semitic language coming from the Arabian peninsula. As the Muslim world starts increasing, Arabic went into North Africa and Western Asia. Everyone would like to know where a language began especially if it’s a language we all really want to speak or learn about. Well, let’s start it began in the eighteenth century as a religious language it even became a literature; it also went through Spain, and it influences European language. “It is believed to have originated in the Arabian Peninsula.’ (Arab Academy) Although Arabic is well known...
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