scholarly journals Phonemic Comparison of English and Punjabi

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (4) ◽  
pp. 347
Author(s):  
Muhammad Nadeem Chohan ◽  
Maria Isabel Maldonado García
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
First Language ◽  
Theoretical Framework ◽  
The West ◽  
West Germanic ◽  
The People ◽  
Considerable Work ◽  
Germanic Languages ◽  
Official Status ◽  
Phonemic Similarity

English and Punjabi are languages which do not belong to the same families of languages. English is one of the West Germanic languages whereas; Punjabi is a part of the Indo-Aryan family. Punjabi is spoken by various nations on the globe, especially Pakistan and its province Punjab as well as in Indian Panjab. Both English and Punjabi manifest themselves through various dialects on the basis of diversified geographical areas. English is used as the first language by 379,007,140 speakers and further 753,359,540 speakers use it as a second language in more than 104 nations. So, the total speakers of English around the globe are 1,132,366,680 (Ethnologue, 2019). The importance of Punjabi cannot be denied being the 10th most widely used language on the globe (Ghai & Singh, 2013). According to Ethnologue (2019), the total number of Punjabi speakers is 125,326,840. In Pakistan, it is the language of the majority of the people residing in the most populous province of Pakistan, Punjab. It is among twenty-two languages that have obtained official status. Unfortunately, no considerable work has been done on its phonology. This study is an attempt to describe the phonemic differences between English and Punjabi by using the theoretical framework of the Levenshtein algorithm. The index of differences and similarities is determined through the inventories of both languages. The inventories are used as data in this research paper. The Levenshtein algorithm (Levenshtein, 1965) is used to analyse the inventories to calculate the ratio of differences and similarities. The outcome of the current research shows that both English and Punjabi have a phonemic similarity level of 56.25% whereas the index of difference is 43.75%.

Grammatical Gender in the German Multiethnolect

2021 ◽  
Vol 33 (1) ◽  
pp. 5-29
Author(s):  
Peter Auer ◽  
Vanessa Siegel
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
First Language ◽  
Spontaneous Speech ◽  
Grammatical Gender ◽  
Grammatical Category ◽  
Immigrant Background ◽  
Frequent Use ◽  
Bare Nouns ◽  
Gender System ◽  
Germanic Languages

While major restructurings and simplifications have been reported for gender systems of other Germanic languages in multiethnolectal speech, this article demonstrates that the three-way gender distinction of German is relatively stable among young speakers from an immigrant background. We investigate gender in a German multiethnolect based on a corpus of approximately 17 hours of spontaneous speech produced by 28 young speakers in Stuttgart (mainly from Turkish and Balkan background). German is not their second language, but (one of) their first language(s), which they have fully acquired from childhood. We show that the gender system does not show signs of reduction in the direction of a two-gender system, nor of wholesale loss. We also argue that the position of gender in the grammar is weakened by independent innovations, such as the frequent use of bare nouns in grammatical contexts where German requires a determiner. Another phenomenon that weakens the position of gender is the simplification of adjective-noun agreement and the emergence of a generalized gender-neutral suffix for prenominal adjectives (that is, schwa). The disappearance of gender and case marking in the adjective means that the grammatical category of gender is lost in Adj + N phrases (without a determiner).

scholarly journals Germanic Preterite-Present Verbs and their Morphological and Semantic Peculiarities

2019 ◽  
pp. 74-88
Author(s):  
Andriy Botsman ◽  
Olga Dmytruk
Keyword(s):  
Morphological Characteristics ◽  
Morphological Features ◽  
The West ◽  
Phonological Processes ◽  
West Germanic ◽  
Historical Method ◽  
European Languages ◽  
Germanic Languages ◽  
Semantic Aspect

The purpose of this article is to give detailed description to all possible semantic and morphological features of Germanic preterite-present verbs. Some research has dealt with the problem of preterite-present present verbs; however, semantic and morphological functions of these verbs were studied only by singling out verb characteristics, peculiarities, potential possibilities in different Germanic languages without any alignment of the obtained results. There is little information available on preterite-present verbs within the west Germanic and North Germanic (Scandinavian) subgroups. Semantic aspect of these verbs was analysed by some scholars, but it is still unknown how these verbs were formed in other Indo-European languages (Baltic, Slavonic, Romantic). The contradicting point of the available research is how those verbs are reflected in Latin and Greek. In spite of the fact that preterite-present verbs were studied in detail in terms of phonological characteristics, their morphological and semantic peculiarities were not taken into account and compared. Special attention should be given to the functioning and correlation of phonological and morphological peculiarities of those verbs. This paper offers the results of a detailed and consistent analysis of phonological and morphological peculiarities of preterite-present verbs. The paper aims at determining the morphological characteristics of preterite-present verbs, which were formed under the influence of phonological processes. The purpose of this study was to investigate the connection of Germanic preterite-present verbs with possible sources in other Indo-European languages. The authors define a set of characteristics peculiar of preterite-present verbs semantics. The functions of these verbs are analysed in detail. The authors attempt to analyse the nature of these verbs. The attention is paid to the functions of preterite- present verbs not only in the Germanic languages, but in other Indo-European languages, too. The comparative historical method is used here as the main one. The authors see this valid way of investigation as reliable and appropriate for the preterite-present verb analysis.

Early Latin loan-words in Old English

1993 ◽  
Vol 22 ◽  
pp. 1-26 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alfred Wollman
Keyword(s):  
Old English ◽  
Complete List ◽  
The West ◽  
Loan Words ◽  
West Germanic ◽  
Celtic Languages ◽  
Germanic Languages

It is a well-known fact that Old English is rich in Latin loan-words. Although the precise number is not yet known, it is a fairly safe assumption that there are at least 600 to 700 loan-words in Old English. This compares with 800 Latin loan-words borrowed in different periods in the Brittonic languages (Welsh, Cornish, Breton), and at least 500 early Latin loan-words common to the West Germanic languages. These rather vague overall numbers do not lend themselves, however, to a serious analysis of Latin influence on the Germanic and Celtic languages, because they include different periods of borrowing which are not really comparable to each other. The basis of these estimates, moreover, is often not stated very clearly. Although the establishment of a complete list of Latin loan-words in the various Germanic languages is a desideratum, it can only be achieved in a later stage of our studies.

scholarly journals On the Distribution and Acquisition of the West Germanic ‘Need’-Verbs: German between Dutch and English

2016 ◽  
Vol 28 (4) ◽  
pp. 349-369
Author(s):  
Jing Lin
Keyword(s):  
Similar Pattern ◽  
Child Language ◽  
Negative Polarity ◽  
Input Frequency ◽  
Negative Polarity Items ◽  
The West ◽  
Polarity Items ◽  
West Germanic ◽  
Two Factors ◽  
Germanic Languages

This paper investigates three verbs expressing necessity in the three West Germanic languages: Dutchhoeven, Englishneed, and Germanbrauchen. These three verbs are all categorized as negative polarity items(npis). However, there are differences in their distribution as NPIs, which posit Germanbrauchenbetween Englishneedand Dutchhoeven.By analyzing two factors that may influence acquisition, namely, opacity and input frequency, this paper moreover presents a similar pattern for the acquisition of these NPIs: The Dutch NPIhoevenemerges earlier in child language than its German counterpart, which in turn arises earlier than the English NPIneed.

Dummy auxiliaries in the second language acquisition of Moroccan learners of Dutch: Form and function

2010 ◽  
Vol 26 (4) ◽  
pp. 473-500 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ineke van de Craats ◽  
Roeland van Hout
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Second Language Acquisition ◽  
Language Acquisition ◽  
First Language ◽  
Semantic Content ◽  
Form And Function ◽  
Syntactic Function ◽  
Syntactic Properties ◽  
And Function ◽  
Germanic Languages

This study examines an interlanguage in which Moroccan learners of Dutch use non-thematic verbs in combination with thematic verbs that can be inflected as well. These non-thematic verbs are real dummy auxiliaries because they are deprived of semantic content and primarily have a syntactic function. Whereas in earlier second language (L2) research only patterns with ‘be’ were found for learners of three Germanic languages with various first language (L1) backgrounds, an alternative dummy auxiliary pattern was observed with ‘go’ in the data of the Moroccan learners of Dutch. We argue that the auxiliary pattern with ‘go’ is bootstrapped by the unique similarities between Dutch (L2) and Arabic (L1). The emergence of dummy auxiliaries precedes movement of the thematic verb, and it turns out that adult L2 learners can be plainly focused on expressing syntactic properties.

A case study in grammaticalized inflectional morphology

Diachronica ◽  
2010 ◽  
Vol 27 (3) ◽  
pp. 411-458 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eugen Hill
Keyword(s):  
Historical Development ◽  
Inflectional Morphology ◽  
The West ◽  
West Germanic ◽  
The Common ◽  
Germanic Languages

This paper deals with one of the oldest and most controversial problems in the historical morphology of the Germanic branch of Indo-European: the origin and historical development of the so-called ‘weak preterite’. In Germanic, the weak preterite is the only means of forming the preterite tense of a derived verb. In spite of two hundred years of research into the weak preterite and a large number of hypotheses concerning its origin, it is not even securely established how the inflectional endings of this formation should be reconstructed for the common prehistory of the attested Germanic languages. Traditionally the inflectional endings of the weak preterite are conceived of as reflecting free inflectional forms of the verb “do”, only recently having been grammaticalized as inflectional morphology for derived verbs. But it has never been possible to identify the inflectional forms in question satisfactorily within the paradigm of “do”. This paper reconsiders the evidence of the Germanic daughter languages by taking into account West Germanic irregularities previously neglected or viewed as irrelevant. It is shown that the West Germanic evidence provides a key to understanding the origin and the later developments of the weak preterite inflectional endings.

scholarly journals LATIN BORROWINGS DENOTING AN INHABITED PLACE IN ENGLISH AND GERMAN: HISTORICAL ASPECT

2018 ◽  
pp. 61-66
Author(s):  
Oksana Kodubovska
Keyword(s):  
Historical Linguistics ◽  
Lexical Semantics ◽  
Semantic Structure ◽  
The West ◽  
Historical Aspect ◽  
Middle French ◽  
West Germanic ◽  
Contrasting Method ◽  
Germanic Languages ◽  
Development And Evolution

The article deals with Latin borrowings denoting an inhabited place and the ways they enter the West Germanic languages, namely English and German. The notion of an inhabited place reflects the realia, which is connected with the compact living of a group of individuals on a certain territory. The research is based on the principles of anthropocentrism, lexical semantics, etymology and historical linguistics. The paper argues that etymological aspect is one of the most important in understanding the development and evolution of the lexeme. The paper aims at singling out and classifying Latin borrowings with the seme ‘inhabited place’ in the West Germanic Languages. Etymological analysis used in the research helped to characterize borrowed appellatives. Contrasting method singled out common and divergent features in the development of Latin borrowings in English and German. It is stated that English and German are prominent for the enriching their vocabulary due to borrowings from Latin. A great deal of Latin elements entered the languages at different historical stages. Several groups of Latin borrowings were singled out in the research according to their evolution in the analyzed languages and the period they were borrowed. These groups combined borrowings with the following features: Common Germanic lexemes which show both the modification of form and meaning saving the seme ‘inhabited place’ in one of the languages at present; early Latin borrowings which lose the meaning of an inhabited place in both languages; words which demonstrate the different evolution of their semantic structure and develop the meaning of an inhabited place in one of the languages; borrowings which save the seme ‘inhabited place’ with certain modifications of meaning in both English and German; lexemes which have the seme at the time of borrowing but lose it later in one of the languages; appellatives which enter German directly and English via French; English appellatives that do not have correspondences in German and enter the language via Old and Middle French.

scholarly journals A Review of the Interlanguage on Performance and Competence Representation: Universal Grammar

2019 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 1
Author(s):  
Qurrata 'Ain ◽  
Pratomo Widodo
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Second Language Acquisition ◽  
Language Acquisition ◽  
Language Learners ◽  
Second Language Learners ◽  
Universal Grammar ◽  
First Language ◽  
Field Research ◽  
The People ◽  
And Performance

Interlanguage has been the main development of field research on second language acquisition (SLA). According to Richard et al (1996) Interlanguage is one of the kinds of language that can be produced by second language learners in the process of acquiring or learning a new language. The influence of the universal grammar of the first language in learning the second language is still debated whether or not universal grammar takes part in second language acquisition. In this article has the aim to investigate the interlanguage of competence and performance representation. In second language acquisition, there is a confusion between the interlanguage of competence and performance. When people perform the second language, it will different from native speakers and argue that demonstrates defects in competence aspect. So, there is a lack of universal grammar. Interlanguage is natural when people acquire a second language based on the theory interlanguage. It might have the knowledge of grammar but when the people produced the sentence or words. It will be grammatical errors. There is some performance factor that the second language learners' competence is hidden such as parsing or demands of processing.  It differences between pure knowledge and how people use the knowledge of its self. Both of them do not always coincide. This research tried to offer a descriptive review of the Interlanguage on performance and competence representation.

scholarly journals Orientalism, Balkanism and the Western Viewpoint in the Context of Former Yugoslavia

2015 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 311
Author(s):  
MA. Atdhe Hetemi
Keyword(s):  
Theoretical Analysis ◽  
Research Paper ◽  
Theoretical Framework ◽  
Former Yugoslavia ◽  
The South ◽  
The West ◽  
The People ◽  
The Way

This research paper examines the role of the Orientalist and Balkanist discourse in the Former Yugoslavia with a particular focus on Albanians. Here, Western Orientalist and Balkanist stereotypes of the Former Yugoslavia are examined arguing that the Orientalism and Balkanism of people living in the Former Yugoslavia is and was viewed differently from the standard by the West and by the people living in the Former Yugoslavia in the way how they perceive each other. The first part of this research paper treats the Orientalism and Balkanism in the context of people living in the Former Yugoslavia, in general.The second part of this research paper analyzes the case study of the application of the Orientalist and Balkanist theoretical lenses on one of the nations living in the Former Yugoslavia, namely Albanians. Here, some explorations and thoughts are provided on how Albanians define themselves and how they were perceived by the South Slavic majority living in the Former Yugoslavia.There are three authors and, subsequently, three seminal works that shall serve as pillars of this theoretical analysis: concepts of Edward Said’s “Orientalism,” Bakic-Hayden’s theories on Orientalist variations and nesting Orientalism, and Maria Todorova’s ground-breaking analysis of the external practices of Balkans representation. These provide a useful theoretical framework through which to explore the distribution of the Orientalist and Balkanist discourses in Former Yugoslavia.

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