Selected Subfields

• History of English
  • Focus and Content
    • The Early Modern Period - Sociohistorical Context
      • Timeline
      • The Printing Press
      • Standardisation
      • Renaissance
      • Reformation
      • Elizabethan Age
      • Jacobean Age
      • The Status of the English Language
      • Literacy
      • Most Important Communicative Needs And Genres
      • Lexical Inventory
      • Shakespearean Firsts

    • Identifying central problems
      • Phonology
        • Definition
          • Great Vowel Shift
        • Now it is your turn 1
          • Mission I
          • Mission II
          • Mission III
          • Mission IV
          • Mission V

      • Morphonology
        • Definition Morphonology
          • Morphonology in word classes
        • Now it is your turn 2
          • Misson A
            • Part 1: Romeo and Juliet
            • Part 2: The nightingale
          • Mission B
          • Mission C
          • Mission D

      • Morphology
        • Morphology Task 1
        • Morphology Task 2
        • Morphology Task 3
        • Morphology Task 4
        • Morphology Task 5
        • Possessive Case
        • Verb Endings
        • Verb Endings

      • Syntax
        • In the Spotlight
        • Word-Order Developments
        • Triggering Inversion
        • Inversion Tasks
          • Task 1: Sentence- and Clause-Initial Elements
          • Task 2: Verb-Second Constraint
        • Auxiliary do
        • Auxiliary Tasks
          • Task 1: Patterns of Affirmative Sentences
          • Task 2: Patterns of Interrogatives
          • Task 3: Patterns in Shakespeare?
        • Modals
          • Modals Task 1
          • Modals Task 2
          • Modals Task 3
          • Modals Task 4
        • Negation
          • Negation Task 1
          • Negation Task 2
          • Negation Task 3
          • Negation Task 4

      • Semantics
        • In the Spotlight
        • The Necessity for Lexical Enrichment
        • Borrowings or Loan Words
        • Borrowings or Loan Words Tasks
          • Task 1: Confusion of Terms?
          • Task 2: Etymology and Trailing
          • Task 3: How to Borrow Words
        • Word Coinage
        • Word Coinage Tasks
          • Task 1: How to Coin a New Word
          • Task 2: Reconstructing Neologisms
        • The "Inkhorn" Debate

          • "Inkhorn" Tasks

          • Task 1: Inkpot and Quills?
          • Task 2: Searching for Elegant Terms
        • Bibliography

      • Pragmatics
        • Deixis - An introduction
          • The deictic center
          • Different usages of deixis
            • Deictic gestural usage
            • Deictic symbolic usage
            • Non-deictic anaphoric usage
            • Non-deictic non-anaphoric usage
            • Exercises to different usages of deixis
          • Different forms of deixis
            • Personal deixis
              • Exercises to personal deixis
            • Temporal deixis
              • Exercises to temporal deixis
            • Spatial deixis
              • Exercises to spatial deixis
            • Social deixis
              • Exercises to Social deixis
            • Discourse deixis
              • Exercises to discourse deixis
          • Conclusion and further exercises

        • The use of "thou" and "you"
          • Introduction or: Why deal with pronouns of address?
          • Development of "thou" and "you"
            • How did "you" come into play?
            • Why - and when - did "thou" disappear?
            • Check your knowledge Part 1
          • Sources for research
            • Records of trials
              • Example 1
              • Example 2
            • Shakespeare's plays
            • Check you knowledge Part 2
          • When did you use which pronoun?
            • Check you knowledge Part 3
            • Explore "thou" and "you" in Shakespeare's plays
          • "Thou" after the Early Modern English period
            • Excursus: The use of "thou" in church
            • The use of "thou" by the Quakers
            • Check you knowledge Part 4
          • A few closing remarks

        • Insults
          • Theoretical background
            • Grice's Cooperative Principle and Maxims of Conversation
            • Politeness theory and face
            • Face-threatening acts
            • Distance, power and impostion
            • Exercises to the theoretical background
          • Definition: What is an insult?
            • What is an insult - part 1
            • What is an insult - part 2
          • The history of insults
            • Old English Period
            • Middle English Period

            • Early Modern English Period
              • Name-calling
              • Creative name-calling
              • Non-verbal insults
              • Verbal duels
                • Exercises to the Early Modern English Period

            • Contemporary English
            • Exercises to the historical background
        • Bibliography

      • Lexicography
        • What is a dictionary?
        • Johnson's Dictionary
          • The Early Years
          • First Attempts
          • A Dictionary of the English Language
          • The Problems of Lexicography
            • Development of a Method
            • Failure of the First Attempt
          • Johnson's Method
            • The Quotations
            • The First Manuscript
        • The Oxford English Dictionary
          • How it Began
          • Writing the Dictionary
            • Collecting and Sorting
            • Defining Words
            • First Achievements
          • More Editors
          • First Edition
          • Keeping it up-to-date
          • Making it Modern
        • Create Your Own Dictionary Entry
          • Note
          • Bridle
            • Get Creative
        • Different types of dictionaries
        • Key elements and important aspects of dictionaries
          • The entry term
          • Alphabetization
          • Grammatical information
          • Pronunciation
          • Etymology
          • Synonymy
          • Front and back matter
          • Defining
        • Comparison of Dictionaries
        • Works cited

    • Morphology in Early Modern English
      • General Overview
      • The noun
        • The old weak plurals {-n}
        • The umlaut plurals
        • The zero plurals
        • The dominant plural
          • The Middle English changes
      • The pronoun
        • The replacement of neuter
        • The loss of the sg./ pl. distinction in the second person
      • The verb
        • Verbs in Old English
        • Verbs in Middle English
        • Verbs in Early Modern and Modern English
      • Tasks
      • Results
      • Bibliography

    • Phonology in Early Modern English
      • I Vowel Changes
        • The Great Vowel Shift
        • Diphthongs
        • Short Vowels
        • Exercises Vowel Changes
        • Solution Vowel Changes
      • II Consonant Changes
        • Exercises Consonant Changes
        • Exercises
      • III Stress Shifts
      • IV Final Exercise

    • The invention of new words by Shakespeare
      • The English Language at Shakespeare's Time
      • Reactions on the introduction of new words in England
      • Meanings and Origins
      • How Shakespeare invented words
        • Examples: Using old words to form a new one
      • Our Little Shakespeare Quiz
      • Examples: Using old words to form a new one
      • List of words coined by Shakespeare
      • How many words did Shakespeare know?
        • Suggested Reading and Bibliography

• Syntactic Theory
  • Focus and Content
    • Traditional Grammar (Advanced Topics)
      • Passive (discussed in the GB section and in the HPSG section)
      • Binding Theory (discussed in the GB section and in the HPSG section)
      • Relative Clauses
        • Relative Clauses vs. Complement Clauses
        • Restrictive vs. Non-restrictive Relative Clauses
        • The Status of that
    • Government & Binding (GB)
      • Knowledge of Language
        • The T-Model
      • The Argument Structure of Predicates
        • Subcategorization
        • Argument Structure
        • Theta Theory
        • The Projection Principle
      • X-Bar Theory
        • Graph Theoretical Concepts
          • C-command
          • M-command
          • Government
      • Case Theory
        • Abstract vs. Morphological Case
      • Binding Theory
        • Reflexives and Reciprocals
        • Pronouns
        • R-Expressions
      • Wh-Movement

        • Organization
        • General definition

        • Different Types and Constraints
          • Wh-Movement in the Main Clause
          • Constraints on Wh-movement
          • Wh-movement in the Relative Clause
          • Wh-movement in the Subordinate Clause
          • Pied-piping
        • Conclusion of Wh-movement
      • NP-Movement

    • Head-driven Phrase Structure Grammar (HPSG)
      • What is HPSG?
      • Context-free Phrase Structure Grammar
      • Formalism
        • Talking about Trees
        • Feature Structures
          • Feature Graphs
          • Real Feature Structures
          • Attribute-Value-Matrices (AVMs)
          • How to draw AVMs in a common word processor
          • Correspondence between Feature Graphs and AVMs
          • Unification
      • Selection
      • Constituent Structure
        • Constituent Structure Trees
        • Grammar Rules
        • General Principles
        • Valence Principle
        • Argument Realization Principle
        • Specifier-Head Agreement
        • An Example
      • Lexicon
        • Lexemes
        • Lexical Rules
      • Binding Theory
      • Passive
        • Introduction
        • Properties of the Active - Passive Relation
        • The Passive Lexical Rule
        • The Verb Be in Passive Sentences
  • Exercises
    • for Traditional Grammar
      • Identifying words
      • Syntactic rules
      • Identify what causes ungrammaticality
      • Identify nouns
      • Diagnostic environments for subclasses of nouns
      • Assign major pos-labels
      • Identify pronouns
        • Solution to the exercise 'Identify pronouns'
      • Assign part of speech labels
      • Identify structural ambiguities
      • Apply constituent tests
      • Bracketting Constituents
      • Internal structure of NPs
      • Internal structure of VPs
      • Assign phrasal categories
      • Construct sentences with grammatical functions
      • Identify grammatical functions
      • Assign grammatical functions
      • Simple exercises on relative clauses (no online solutions)
      • Restrictive vs. non-restrictive relative clauses
      • Identify parts of relative clauses
    • for GB
      • Draw X-bar structures
        • Solution to sentence 1
        • Solution to sentence 2
        • Solution to sentence 3
        • Solution to sentence 4
        • Solution to sentence 5
        • Solution to sentence 6
      • X-bar structure of an ambiguous NP
        • First reading
        • Second reading
        • Third reading
        • Fourth reading
      • Theta Roles
      • Questions on wh-movement
    • for HPSG
      • CFG
        • Generating sentences
      • Constituent Structure
        • Identify the grammar rules
      • Selection
        • Determine ARG-ST and VAL values
      • Binding Theory
        • More exercises on argument structure
        • Binding in prepositional phrases
        • Ungrammatical sentences
      • Passive
        • Properties of the Active - Passive Relation
        • Explaining the Passive Lexical Rule
        • Deriving a Passive Participle
        • Tree Structure was chased
  • Tools and Extras
    • Links
      • List of Contributors
    • Podcasts
      • Six Steps in a Syntactic Analysis, version with slides.
      • Thematic Roles, version with slides.
      • Explaining X-bar Theory
      • How to draw AVMs in a common word processor.
      • Lecture on Binding in PPs, with slides.
    • Reading List

• Cognitive Approaches
  • MAIN SITE
  • Focus and Content
    • The Cognitive Linguistics Enterprise
      • Historical Background
      • The nature of CL
      • Universals & variation
        • Linguistic typology and typological universals
        • Universals in formal linguistics
        • Universals in cognitive linguistics
        • Do we think the way we speak?
        • Linguistic relativity
      • Language in use
        • Knowledge of language
        • Language change
        • Language acquisition

    • Cognitive Semantics
      • Embodiment and conceptual structure
        • Image schemas
        • Conceptual structure
      • The encyclopaedic view of meaning
        • Frame semantics
        • The theory of domains
      • Categorisation and cognitive models
        • Categorisation
        • Prototype theory
        • Theory of idealized cognitive models
      • Metaphor and Metonymy
        • Conceptual Metaphor Theory
        • Primary Metaphor Theory
        • Conceptual metonymy
      • WoPage linkrd? meaning and radial categories
        • Words as radial categories
        • The Principles Polysemy Approach
      • Meaning construction and mental spaces
        • Mental space construction
        • The dynamic nature of meaning construction
      • Conceptual blending
        • The nature of blending
        • Vital relations and compressions
        • Taxonomy of integration networks
        • Constraining Blending Theory

    • Cognitive approaches to grammar
      • A cognitive model of grammar
      • Conceptual basis of grammar
        • Talmy's "Conceptual Structuring System Model"
        • Langacker's theory of Cognitive Grammar
      • Word classes
        • Nominal predications: nouns
        • Temporal versus atemporal relations
        • Nominal grounding predications
        • Perfective and imperfective uses of verbs
      • Constructions
        • Phrase structure
        • Word structure
        • Clauses
      • Tense, aspect, mood and voice
        • The causal head
        • The grounding predication: mood and tense
      • Construction grammar
        • Goldberg's construction grammar
        • Radical Construction Grammar
        • Embodied Construction Grammar
      • Grammaticalization

    • Cognitive linguistics and discourse analysis

  • Exercises
    • Universal Grammar
    • Nativism
    • Georgian versus English
    • Restrictions and implications
    • Constraints on human conceptualization
    • Gestalt principles
    • Perception
    • Perception of the world
    • Research Piraha

    • Research exercise: What's the meaning of meh?

    • Develop a semantic frame
    • Find the right frame
    • Help me finding the right frame!
    • COMMERCIAL EVENT frame

    • Rate the items in each category
    • List criteria for rating items

    • Metaphor characteristics
    • Metaphors
    • Identify metaphors I
    • Identify metaphors II
    • Metaphors & colour categories
    • Source concepts
    • Metonymy characteristics
    • Relationships concerning metonymy
    • Metaphor or Metonymy?

  • Tools and Extras
    • Links
    • Podcasts
    • ReadingList

• Language and Media
  • Focus and Content
    • Language of Newspapers
      • British Newspapers and their political allegiance
        • Part 2: Tabloids
        • Newspaper formats
      • Critical Linguistics
      • Oral Models in the Press
        • I. Typography
        • II. Register
        • III. Syntax and Morphology
    • Language of Advertising
      • British Newspapers online
      • Words, sound and pictures
      • A closer look

    • Language of SMS
      • The Influence of SMS Language on Literacy Skills
      • Structure of SMS-Communication
        • Topology of SMS-Dialogues
      • Language Varieties and Language Reduction of SMS-Communication
        • The Use of Abbreviations in SMS-Communication
        • The Use of Emoticons in SMS-Communication
    • Language and Propaganda
      • Speeches
        • Propaganda - Language and Politics
        • Presuppositions
        • Implicatures
        • Metaphors
        • Euphemism
        • Parallelism
        • Pronouns
      • Models of Persuasion
        • Attention-Getting
        • Confidence-Building
        • Desire-Stimulating
        • Urgency-Stressing
        • Response-Seeking
        • The Threat
        • The Bonding
        • The Cause
        • The Response
    • TV language
      • Television - an introduction?
      • Signification in TV language?
      • TV Genres?
      • 'Live' talk??
      • Represented talk?
      • Discourse and television texts?
      • Sources?
    • Instant Messaging
      • Some facts about IM
      • Language and Structure of Instant Messaging
      • A survey on IM usage
      • Popular instant messengers

  • Exercises
  • Tools and Extras
    • Links
    • Podcasts
    • Reading List

• Sociolinguistics
  • Focus and content
    • Sociolinguistic Perspectives
      • Traditional and Modern Dialectology
        • Major Dialect Regions in England and the USA
    • Central Terminology
      • Variety
      • Language and Dialect
      • Dialect and Accent
      • Standard and Prestige
        • The Characteristics of British Standard English and American Standard English
      • Speech Situation
      • Register and Style
      • Linguistic Repertoire and Communicative Competence
    • Sociolinguistic Patterns
      • Class Pattern: Language and Socio-economic Status
        • William Labov: New York City, USA (1966)
        • Peter Trudgill: Norwich, England (1974)
        • Hypercorrection
      • Stylistic Pattern: Language and Style
      • Gender Pattern: Language and Sex
      • Age Pattern: Language and Age
        • The Linguistic Marketplace
      • Ethnic Pattern: Language and Ethnicity
      • Language and Social Networks
      • Sociolinguistic Patterns and Language Change
        • Stable Variables and Variables Involved in Linguistic Change
        • Apparent Time and Real Time Studies of Language Change
        • Change from Above and Change from Below
        • Language Change and the Problems of Actuation, Transition and Embedding
    • Linguistic Variation in the Situational Context
      • Linguistic politeness: Brown and Levinson’s Politeness Theory
      • Linguistic Accommodation: Accommodation Theory
        • Two Examples for Convergence and Divergence
      • Textual Variation: Registers, Jargon, Slang
        • Lexical Markers
          • Slang and Jargon
            • Jargon: Two Examples
        • Phonological Markers
        • Grammatical Markers
        • Semantic Markers
        • Register Variation
    • Language Choice
      • Multilingualism
        • Individual Bilingualism
        • Societal Bilingualism
      • Diglossia
        • Ferguson's (1959) Concept of Diglossia
        • Fishman's (1967) Concept of Diglossia
      • Code-switching
        • Central Factors Involved in Code-Switching
          • The term 'Domain'
    • Language Birth: Pidgin and Creole Languages
      • The Location of Pidgins and Creoles
      • Pidgins
        • Design Features of Pidgin Grammars
          • Lack of Surface Grammatical Complexity
            • No Definite or Indefinite Article
            • Omission of Copula 'be'
            • Tense, Aspect, Modality, Negation Marked Externally to the Verb
            • Reduction in Overall Sentence Complexity
              • The Syntactic Structure of Questions in Pidgins
          • Lack of Morphological Complexity
          • Preference for Semantic Transparency
          • Reduction in Vocabulary
          • Phonological Simplicity
          • Theories of Genesis
            • Monogenetic Theories
            • Polygenetic Theories
            • Universalist Theories
              • The Language Bioprogram Hypothesis
            • Substrate Theories
        • Stages of Pidgin Development
        • Tok Pisin
        • Fanakalo
      • Creoles
        • The Post-Creole Continuum
          • The Jamaican Post-Creole Continuum
        • African-American Vernacular English (AAVE)
          • The Linguistic Characteristics of AAVE
          • The Anglicist Hypothesis
          • The Creolist Hypothesis
          • The Neo-Anglicist Hypothesis
    • Language and Gender
      • The Terms 'Sex' and 'Gender' in Language and Gender Research
      • The Conversational Styles of Women and Men
        • Two Examples of Female and Male Conversational Style
      • Explanations
  • Exercises
    • Define Sociolinguistics
    • Define traditional and modern dialectology
    • Define traditional and modern dialectology (II)
    • The characteristics of British English and American English
    • Define lexical differences between British English and American English (I): cars and their components
    • Define lexical differences between British English and American English (II): mixed items
    • Define central terms
    • Define urban dialectology
    • Define the sociolinguistic variable
    • Describe the class pattern
    • Describe the stylistic pattern
    • The class pattern: describe social stratification
    • The class pattern: describe social stratification (II)
    • The class pattern: describe social and stylistic stratification
    • The class pattern: describe social and stylistic stratification (II)
    • The class pattern: describe social and stylistic stratification (III)
    • The gender pattern: describe the gender pattern
    • The age pattern: define the age pattern
    • The linguistic marketplace: explain linguistic variation
    • Define the social network concept
    • Sociolinguistic patterns and language change: define central terms
    • Define 'register'
    • Research exercise: define jargon expressions
    • Research exercise: define slang expressions
    • Determine the use of H and L
    • Define domains and varieties/codes
    • Name reasons for code switching
    • Research exercise: countries and their official languages
    • Define the characteristics of pidgins
    • Define the characteristics of creoles
    • Pidgins and creoles: define central terms
    • Define the developmental stages of a pidgin
    • Semantic Transparency
    • Define the characteristics of AAVE
    • Identify linguistic features of AAVE (I)
    • Identify linguistic features of AAVE (II)
    • Determine the use of 'be' in AAVE (I)
    • Determine the use of 'be' in AAVE (II)
    • Language and gender: name central terms
  • Tools and Extras
    • Links
    • Podcasts
    • Reading List

• Theories and Methods in Linguistics
  • Focus and Content
    • The History of Linguistic Theory
    • Tradition: from ancient times to 19th century
      • Historical approach
      • Greek-Latin tradition
      • The prescriptive tradition
    • Modern linguistics I: the Formalism of the 20th century
      • Transition from traditional to systemic linguistics
      • Structuralism
        • American Structuralism
          • Discovery Procedures of American Structuralism
        • European Structuralism (Formalism)
          • Prague School (Language Function)
            • Prague School: Trubetzkoy's theory of phonology
      • Generative linguistics
        • Psychologicalization of Linguistics
        • Grammar of Ideal Speakers and Hearers as Algorithm
        • Universal Grammar: Principles and Parameters
        • Generative Accounts of Language Acquisition
    • Modern linguistics II: Functionalism and Contextualism in 20th and 21st centuries
      • Language and Context
        • Functional aspect of sentence structure and the role of situational contexts
          • Sentence level
          • Situation (British contextualism)
        • Speech Act theory and Discourse/Conversational Analysis
        • Linguistic Interaction: Ethnography of speaking, modern sociolinguistics

    • Modern linguistics III: Criticism of System Linguistics
      • Variationist approaches
        • Verbal action and interaction
      • Corpus Linguistics
      • Cognitive Linguistics

  • Exercises
    • Identify related languages
    • Reconstruct proto-forms
    • Traditional Grammar: Basic Notions
    • Criticism of Historical linguistics
    • Prescriptive Grammar
    • Structuralism: Basic Notions
    • American Structuralism: Basic Notions
    • American Structuralism: Discovery Procedures
    • European Structuralism: Basic Notions
    • European Structuralism: Distinctive Features
    • the Prague School: Basic Notions
    • Generative Linguistics: Basic Notions 1
    • Generative Linguistics: Basic Notions 2
    • Characteristics of Generative Linguistics
    • Generative Linguistics: Determine Parameter Values
    • Generative Linguistics: Determine Parameter Values 2
      • Solution To: Determine Parameter Values 2
    • Three Levels of Meaning
    • Sentences: Form-Function Relation
    • Categories of Information Structure
    • Context and Discourse
    • Basic notions: Theories of language use
    • Speech Acts
    • Multifunctionality of Speech Acts
    • Conversational Maxims
    • Turn-taking
    • Representatives
    • Halliday
    • Communicative Competence: Basic Notions
    • Ethnography: Basic Notions
    • Characteristics of variationist approach
    • Method of variationist approach
    • Representatives
    • Corpus Linguistics
    • Cognitive Linguistics
    • Methods and Approaches
    • Periods and Representatives

  • Tools and Extras
    • Links
    • Podcasts
    • Reading List