WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:01.901 align:middle line:90% [SQUEAKING] 00:00:01.901 --> 00:00:03.837 align:middle line:90% [RUSTLING] 00:00:03.837 --> 00:00:12.312 align:middle line:84% [CLICKING] NORVIN W. RICHARDS: So OK, problem 00:00:12.312 --> 00:00:16.949 align:middle line:84% set 0, which some of you have already handed in-- it's 00:00:16.949 --> 00:00:17.617 align:middle line:90% not due. 00:00:17.617 --> 00:00:20.353 align:middle line:84% Don't panic if you haven't handed it in yet. 00:00:20.353 --> 00:00:23.990 align:middle line:84% It's partly a getting to know you problem set. 00:00:23.990 --> 00:00:27.327 align:middle line:84% We're asking you why you're here and what 00:00:27.327 --> 00:00:29.462 align:middle line:84% you're hoping to get out of the class 00:00:29.462 --> 00:00:33.233 align:middle line:84% so we can try to tailor the class to your interests. 00:00:33.233 --> 00:00:35.201 align:middle line:84% But one of the other things we ask you to do 00:00:35.201 --> 00:00:39.172 align:middle line:84% is to get started on the process of finding 00:00:39.172 --> 00:00:41.341 align:middle line:84% somebody to do field work with, so 00:00:41.341 --> 00:00:43.843 align:middle line:84% somebody who speaks a language that you don't speak and have 00:00:43.843 --> 00:00:45.612 align:middle line:84% never studied, that you're going to spend 00:00:45.612 --> 00:00:48.415 align:middle line:90% the semester harassing. 00:00:48.415 --> 00:00:50.984 align:middle line:84% So you'll be meeting with this person every so often 00:00:50.984 --> 00:00:53.620 align:middle line:84% to ask them questions about how to do things in their language. 00:00:53.620 --> 00:00:56.856 align:middle line:84% And so you'll have assignments, problem sets, 00:00:56.856 --> 00:00:58.324 align:middle line:84% in which we'll ask you to find out 00:00:58.324 --> 00:01:01.127 align:middle line:84% this, or that, or the other thing about your language. 00:01:01.127 --> 00:01:03.430 align:middle line:84% So what I wanted to start with today 00:01:03.430 --> 00:01:08.768 align:middle line:84% was to talk a little bit about how to do that because it's not 00:01:08.768 --> 00:01:09.402 align:middle line:90% obvious. 00:01:09.402 --> 00:01:12.172 align:middle line:84% And you'll get better at it as the semester goes along. 00:01:12.172 --> 00:01:15.742 align:middle line:84% That's one of the reasons we're asking you to do it. 00:01:15.742 --> 00:01:18.078 align:middle line:84% So in order to talk about how to do this, 00:01:18.078 --> 00:01:22.148 align:middle line:84% I'm going to make up a language, sort of a fictional language. 00:01:22.148 --> 00:01:24.250 align:middle line:84% I thought about how to demonstrate to you how 00:01:24.250 --> 00:01:25.251 align:middle line:90% to do this kind of work. 00:01:25.251 --> 00:01:27.681 align:middle line:84% And I thought about using an actual language. 00:01:27.681 --> 00:01:30.056 align:middle line:84% But of course, at this point, I don't know what languages 00:01:30.056 --> 00:01:31.424 align:middle line:90% you folks are going to work on. 00:01:31.424 --> 00:01:34.259 align:middle line:84% And so there's a danger that I might accidentally 00:01:34.259 --> 00:01:36.229 align:middle line:84% use a language that somebody is using. 00:01:36.229 --> 00:01:39.566 align:middle line:84% So instead, I'm going to work on Martian. 00:01:39.566 --> 00:01:43.069 align:middle line:84% So pretend that I have found a Martian to interview. 00:01:43.069 --> 00:01:46.106 align:middle line:84% And we're doing Martian fieldwork. 00:01:46.106 --> 00:01:48.908 align:middle line:84% The first thing I like to do if I'm 00:01:48.908 --> 00:01:50.509 align:middle line:84% working with an unfamiliar language 00:01:50.509 --> 00:01:54.372 align:middle line:84% is to ask the person to-- or the alien, 00:01:54.372 --> 00:01:58.051 align:middle line:84% if it's an alien-- to give me a name. 00:01:58.051 --> 00:02:01.421 align:middle line:84% That's partly to make it simpler for you. 00:02:01.421 --> 00:02:02.922 align:middle line:84% Pretty soon, you're going to move on 00:02:02.922 --> 00:02:04.624 align:middle line:90% to asking about sentences. 00:02:04.624 --> 00:02:06.860 align:middle line:84% And if the sentences have a name in them, then 00:02:06.860 --> 00:02:08.695 align:middle line:84% at least you know that word in the sentence. 00:02:08.695 --> 00:02:12.532 align:middle line:84% That wipes out one piece of the puzzle for you. 00:02:12.532 --> 00:02:16.002 align:middle line:84% So I asked my Martian for a popular Martian name, 00:02:16.002 --> 00:02:18.771 align:middle line:90% and he gave me the name X!oo. 00:02:18.771 --> 00:02:20.607 align:middle line:84% Now, we haven't yet talked about how 00:02:20.607 --> 00:02:23.076 align:middle line:90% to transcribe strange sounds. 00:02:23.076 --> 00:02:26.540 align:middle line:84% So when you are writing down things in your language, 00:02:26.540 --> 00:02:28.248 align:middle line:84% we'll talk about this on the problem set, 00:02:28.248 --> 00:02:30.917 align:middle line:84% but there are at least two things you can do. 00:02:30.917 --> 00:02:35.221 align:middle line:84% If your language is standardly written in the Roman alphabet, 00:02:35.221 --> 00:02:36.856 align:middle line:84% then you should feel free to just write 00:02:36.856 --> 00:02:40.493 align:middle line:84% things in the alphabet of the language. 00:02:40.493 --> 00:02:42.428 align:middle line:84% So if you're working with a language that 00:02:42.428 --> 00:02:44.597 align:middle line:84% uses the Roman alphabet, just go ahead and use it. 00:02:44.597 --> 00:02:46.099 align:middle line:84% If you're working with language that 00:02:46.099 --> 00:02:50.470 align:middle line:84% doesn't use the Roman alphabet, then you can make something up. 00:02:50.470 --> 00:02:52.071 align:middle line:84% And you can ask the person you're 00:02:52.071 --> 00:02:53.373 align:middle line:84% working with if there's a standard way 00:02:53.373 --> 00:02:55.290 align:middle line:84% to write their language in the Roman alphabet. 00:02:55.290 --> 00:02:58.011 align:middle line:84% That's sometimes something that happens. 00:02:58.011 --> 00:03:00.940 align:middle line:84% But if not-- so in this example, the Martians 00:03:00.940 --> 00:03:02.148 align:middle line:90% don't use the Roman alphabet. 00:03:02.148 --> 00:03:03.283 align:middle line:90% I asked the guy for a name. 00:03:03.283 --> 00:03:03.950 align:middle line:90% He said, "X!oo." 00:03:03.950 --> 00:03:06.786 align:middle line:84% I was, like, OK, I'll use X, exclamation point 00:03:06.786 --> 00:03:08.421 align:middle line:84% for that clicky noise at the beginning. 00:03:08.421 --> 00:03:09.822 align:middle line:90% And we'll go on. 00:03:09.822 --> 00:03:11.357 align:middle line:84% Later, as I said, we'll be talking 00:03:11.357 --> 00:03:13.893 align:middle line:84% about how to think about how to write 00:03:13.893 --> 00:03:17.864 align:middle line:84% strange sounds, unfamiliar sounds, 00:03:17.864 --> 00:03:19.999 align:middle line:84% sounds that aren't contained in the languages 00:03:19.999 --> 00:03:21.901 align:middle line:84% that you're familiar with, maybe. 00:03:21.901 --> 00:03:24.070 align:middle line:84% So we'll be talking about the International Phonetic 00:03:24.070 --> 00:03:27.874 align:middle line:84% Alphabet, which is a system for transcribing speech sounds. 00:03:27.874 --> 00:03:29.876 align:middle line:84% But for now, since we haven't done that yet, 00:03:29.876 --> 00:03:31.211 align:middle line:90% we'll just make stuff up so. 00:03:31.211 --> 00:03:35.582 align:middle line:90% There's a Martian name, X!oo. 00:03:35.582 --> 00:03:40.553 align:middle line:84% And then, you get started on sentences. 00:03:40.553 --> 00:03:43.022 align:middle line:84% And you might want to start with simple sentences, 00:03:43.022 --> 00:03:44.156 align:middle line:90% like "X!oo is a linguist." 00:03:44.156 --> 00:03:50.697 align:middle line:84% I got that one for Martian, "X!oo kuulduud bii." 00:03:50.697 --> 00:03:52.165 align:middle line:90% And that's a sentence. 00:03:52.165 --> 00:03:54.667 align:middle line:84% I asked my Martian, how many words are in that sentence? 00:03:54.667 --> 00:03:56.402 align:middle line:84% And they told me there are three. 00:03:56.402 --> 00:04:01.073 align:middle line:84% And you might wonder-- well, I started with a name 00:04:01.073 --> 00:04:02.942 align:middle line:90% partly to make my life simpler. 00:04:02.942 --> 00:04:04.544 align:middle line:84% I know what the first word means, 00:04:04.544 --> 00:04:06.412 align:middle line:84% but what do the second and third words mean? 00:04:06.412 --> 00:04:08.381 align:middle line:84% And there are various ways to do that as you're 00:04:08.381 --> 00:04:10.717 align:middle line:84% working with the person that you're working with. 00:04:10.717 --> 00:04:12.485 align:middle line:84% You could just straight up ask them 00:04:12.485 --> 00:04:16.789 align:middle line:84% things like, "Which word in here is the word for "linguist?" 00:04:16.789 --> 00:04:18.925 align:middle line:84% You could just say, "What's the word for linguist?" 00:04:18.925 --> 00:04:21.827 align:middle line:84% Or you could ask for another sentence that's 00:04:21.827 --> 00:04:23.529 align:middle line:84% minimally different from this one, 00:04:23.529 --> 00:04:25.465 align:middle line:84% just in, say, the word for linguist. 00:04:25.465 --> 00:04:29.602 align:middle line:84% So ask, "How do you say X!oo is a physicist?" 00:04:29.602 --> 00:04:30.970 align:middle line:90% So you get that. 00:04:30.970 --> 00:04:34.880 align:middle line:84% You discover that this sentence consists of three words, 00:04:34.880 --> 00:04:38.028 align:middle line:84% "X!oo," and then the word for linguist, which is "kuulduud," 00:04:38.028 --> 00:04:41.814 align:middle line:84% and the word for is, which is "bii." 00:04:41.814 --> 00:04:44.350 align:middle line:84% What I've done here is to present 00:04:44.350 --> 00:04:47.654 align:middle line:84% this piece of data, this sentence with the three words 00:04:47.654 --> 00:04:50.556 align:middle line:84% that have these three meanings, in the way that we're going 00:04:50.556 --> 00:04:52.091 align:middle line:90% to ask you to present the data. 00:04:52.091 --> 00:04:54.360 align:middle line:84% And we'll again, on the first problem set, 00:04:54.360 --> 00:04:55.728 align:middle line:90% will reiterate this. 00:04:55.728 --> 00:04:59.365 align:middle line:84% But this is the standard way you represent data in linguistics. 00:04:59.365 --> 00:05:03.002 align:middle line:84% You'll have a sentence in the language of interest. 00:05:03.002 --> 00:05:06.406 align:middle line:84% And under that sentence, under each word, 00:05:06.406 --> 00:05:08.675 align:middle line:84% you'll have a translation for that word. 00:05:08.675 --> 00:05:10.443 align:middle line:90% So that's called the gloss. 00:05:10.443 --> 00:05:14.580 align:middle line:84% So the gloss for "kuulduud" here is "linguist." 00:05:14.580 --> 00:05:17.082 align:middle line:84% And then on the third line, you have a translation 00:05:17.082 --> 00:05:19.185 align:middle line:84% of the entire sentence into English. 00:05:19.185 --> 00:05:22.188 align:middle line:84% There's more to say, but for now that's what you need to know. 00:05:22.188 --> 00:05:23.656 align:middle line:90% Does that make sense? 00:05:23.656 --> 00:05:25.491 align:middle line:84% One of the things you do by doing it 00:05:25.491 --> 00:05:27.860 align:middle line:84% this way is it's an easy way to get across the fact 00:05:27.860 --> 00:05:30.296 align:middle line:84% that the word order of Martian is not the same as the word 00:05:30.296 --> 00:05:32.932 align:middle line:84% order of English, since the Martian sentence ends 00:05:32.932 --> 00:05:35.168 align:middle line:90% with the Martian word for "is." 00:05:35.168 --> 00:05:39.839 align:middle line:84% We're learning something about Martian word order. 00:05:39.839 --> 00:05:43.843 align:middle line:84% Moving on, you get some more Martian sentences. 00:05:43.843 --> 00:05:46.612 align:middle line:84% "X!oo amsterdam dig dug," so "X!oo dug a canal," 00:05:46.612 --> 00:05:49.382 align:middle line:84% "X!oo is digging a canal," and so on. 00:05:49.382 --> 00:05:54.120 align:middle line:84% So just depending on what we've asked you to find out, 00:05:54.120 --> 00:05:56.422 align:middle line:84% you that's going to guide what particular 00:05:56.422 --> 00:05:58.358 align:middle line:90% sentences you might ask for. 00:05:58.358 --> 00:05:59.759 align:middle line:84% Probably what we'll do is ask you 00:05:59.759 --> 00:06:01.828 align:middle line:84% to get some basic sentences in the language. 00:06:01.828 --> 00:06:04.530 align:middle line:84% And you'll want to have some sentences that have subjects 00:06:04.530 --> 00:06:08.301 align:middle line:84% and objects, like "X!oo dug a canal." 00:06:08.301 --> 00:06:10.103 align:middle line:84% One of the first things we'll ask you to do 00:06:10.103 --> 00:06:13.439 align:middle line:84% is to find out how to negate sentences, 00:06:13.439 --> 00:06:16.442 align:middle line:84% so how to say that something is not true. 00:06:16.442 --> 00:06:19.312 align:middle line:84% So in this particular case, what I 00:06:19.312 --> 00:06:21.114 align:middle line:84% did was to get three Martian sentences, 00:06:21.114 --> 00:06:23.649 align:middle line:84% and then to get minimally different sentences 00:06:23.649 --> 00:06:25.318 align:middle line:90% in which we negated things. 00:06:25.318 --> 00:06:27.787 align:middle line:84% So we're not going to say "X!oo is a linguist," 00:06:27.787 --> 00:06:29.222 align:middle line:84% we'll say "X!oo isn't a linguist." 00:06:29.222 --> 00:06:31.391 align:middle line:84% And that changes it from "X!oo kuulduud bii" 00:06:31.391 --> 00:06:35.395 align:middle line:90% to "X!oo kuulduud noowee." 00:06:35.395 --> 00:06:39.604 align:middle line:84% Or the way you do "X!oo didn't dig a canal" 00:06:39.604 --> 00:06:42.435 align:middle line:90% is "X!oo amsterdam digwedug." 00:06:42.435 --> 00:06:45.405 align:middle line:84% So we've changed the verb "digdug," which means "dug," 00:06:45.405 --> 00:06:46.272 align:middle line:90% to "digwedug." 00:06:46.272 --> 00:06:48.908 align:middle line:90% That makes it negative. 00:06:48.908 --> 00:06:52.111 align:middle line:84% So this is a way of gathering, bit by bit, 00:06:52.111 --> 00:06:53.880 align:middle line:90% bits of Martian data. 00:06:53.880 --> 00:06:57.216 align:middle line:84% So in particular here, we're interested in Martian negation. 00:06:57.216 --> 00:06:59.085 align:middle line:84% And we're finding things out about how 00:06:59.085 --> 00:07:04.357 align:middle line:90% negation is expressed. 00:07:04.357 --> 00:07:08.795 align:middle line:84% So a hypothesis I came up with on the basis of these facts 00:07:08.795 --> 00:07:13.533 align:middle line:84% looks as though the negative of "is" is just irregular. 00:07:13.533 --> 00:07:17.336 align:middle line:84% So "bii" is "is," but "noowee" is "is not." 00:07:17.336 --> 00:07:19.772 align:middle line:84% Those don't look related to each other at all. 00:07:19.772 --> 00:07:22.175 align:middle line:84% That just looks like an irregular correspondence, 00:07:22.175 --> 00:07:28.648 align:middle line:84% but that for "dig" changed to "digwedug," and "gudgid" 00:07:28.648 --> 00:07:30.082 align:middle line:90% changed to "gudwegid." 00:07:30.082 --> 00:07:33.352 align:middle line:84% And that makes me think, there's a "we" 00:07:33.352 --> 00:07:36.389 align:middle line:84% that goes in the middle of those words somewhere. 00:07:36.389 --> 00:07:39.158 align:middle line:84% So for "digdug," we got "digwedug," and for "gudgid," 00:07:39.158 --> 00:07:41.127 align:middle line:90% we got "gudwegid." 00:07:41.127 --> 00:07:43.429 align:middle line:84% And at this point, we might have a number of hypotheses 00:07:43.429 --> 00:07:45.631 align:middle line:90% about where "we" goes. 00:07:45.631 --> 00:07:47.066 align:middle line:84% I've put a couple of them up here. 00:07:47.066 --> 00:07:50.236 align:middle line:84% Sorry, I should have made you guys generate the hypotheses. 00:07:50.236 --> 00:07:52.939 align:middle line:84% Maybe we could think that "we" goes after the first syllable, 00:07:52.939 --> 00:07:55.408 align:middle line:84% so you start with "digdug" and you get "digwedug." 00:07:55.408 --> 00:07:57.844 align:middle line:84% Or maybe that it goes before the last syllable, 00:07:57.844 --> 00:07:59.979 align:middle line:84% so you start with "digdug," and you get "digwedug." 00:07:59.979 --> 00:08:02.909 align:middle line:84% That covers those two bits of data. 00:08:02.909 --> 00:08:04.617 align:middle line:84% Anybody have another hypothesis they want 00:08:04.617 --> 00:08:08.154 align:middle line:90% to float about where "we" goes? 00:08:08.154 --> 00:08:10.723 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:08:10.723 --> 00:08:16.290 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: I'm not actually sure-- did you just completely reverse 00:08:16.290 --> 00:08:17.396 align:middle line:90% the order? 00:08:17.396 --> 00:08:20.132 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: Yeah, to get from "digdug" to "gudgid," 00:08:20.132 --> 00:08:21.968 align:middle line:84% yeah, to get from the past into the present. 00:08:21.968 --> 00:08:23.936 align:middle line:90% Yes. 00:08:23.936 --> 00:08:25.605 align:middle line:84% But I'm asking you to give me hypotheses 00:08:25.605 --> 00:08:26.839 align:middle line:90% about negation right now. 00:08:26.839 --> 00:08:27.473 align:middle line:90% But yes, you're right. 00:08:27.473 --> 00:08:29.242 align:middle line:84% That's a hypothesis about how tense works. 00:08:29.242 --> 00:08:31.310 align:middle line:84% The tense involves saying words backwards. 00:08:31.310 --> 00:08:32.278 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:08:32.278 --> 00:08:34.447 align:middle line:84% And we would want to find out whether that was true. 00:08:34.447 --> 00:08:36.048 align:middle line:84% It would be exciting if that were true 00:08:36.048 --> 00:08:38.484 align:middle line:84% because there are not human languages that work that way. 00:08:38.484 --> 00:08:42.522 align:middle line:84% But of course, this is Martian, so all bets are off, I guess. 00:08:42.522 --> 00:08:43.523 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:08:43.523 --> 00:08:46.025 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: In the exact middle of the word. 00:08:46.025 --> 00:08:48.861 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: Yeah, so count letters, and these 00:08:48.861 --> 00:08:50.696 align:middle line:84% are six-letter words, and so you put "we" 00:08:50.696 --> 00:08:52.431 align:middle line:90% between letters three and four. 00:08:52.431 --> 00:08:55.101 align:middle line:90% It could be that. 00:08:55.101 --> 00:08:56.569 align:middle line:84% Any theories people want to push? 00:08:56.569 --> 00:08:57.069 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:08:57.069 --> 00:09:01.207 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: It could also be like in between syllables. 00:09:01.207 --> 00:09:03.109 align:middle line:90% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: Yeah. 00:09:03.109 --> 00:09:04.544 align:middle line:90% STUDENT: What is it that's-- 00:09:04.544 --> 00:09:10.049 align:middle line:84% I would ask-- in that case, I would ask for-- 00:09:10.049 --> 00:09:12.812 align:middle line:84% I would try to find a six-letter word that 00:09:12.812 --> 00:09:13.979 align:middle line:90% has-- that looks like a 4-2. 00:09:13.979 --> 00:09:15.895 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: Yeah, I see what you mean. 00:09:15.895 --> 00:09:17.557 align:middle line:84% So I just said you're counting letters, 00:09:17.557 --> 00:09:19.559 align:middle line:84% but you're absolutely right-- we could be counting syllables. 00:09:19.559 --> 00:09:21.093 align:middle line:84% These are two-syllable words, and you put it 00:09:21.093 --> 00:09:22.495 align:middle line:84% between the first and the second syllable. 00:09:22.495 --> 00:09:23.763 align:middle line:90% Yeah, that's absolutely right. 00:09:23.763 --> 00:09:26.699 align:middle line:84% You guys have collaborated on an excellent hypothesis there. 00:09:26.699 --> 00:09:29.335 align:middle line:90% Yeah, another thing? 00:09:29.335 --> 00:09:30.703 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:09:30.703 --> 00:09:32.605 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: You're also using the same verb 00:09:32.605 --> 00:09:33.906 align:middle line:90% for both of these situations. 00:09:33.906 --> 00:09:35.485 align:middle line:90% [INAUDIBLE] 00:09:35.485 --> 00:09:36.943 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: Could be, yeah. 00:09:36.943 --> 00:09:40.613 align:middle line:84% So I took the flying leap of faith 00:09:40.613 --> 00:09:42.848 align:middle line:84% that yeah, there was something special about "bii." 00:09:42.848 --> 00:09:45.503 align:middle line:84% But maybe "dig" is something that's 00:09:45.503 --> 00:09:47.086 align:middle line:84% going to illustrate a general pattern, 00:09:47.086 --> 00:09:48.254 align:middle line:90% but you're absolutely right. 00:09:48.254 --> 00:09:49.956 align:middle line:90% Could be this is also irregular. 00:09:49.956 --> 00:09:51.790 align:middle line:84% Clearly what we need is more verbs. 00:09:51.790 --> 00:09:53.259 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:09:53.259 --> 00:09:57.530 align:middle line:90% STUDENT: Language [INAUDIBLE]. 00:09:57.530 --> 00:09:59.465 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: Oh, that's a nice thought. 00:09:59.465 --> 00:10:01.567 align:middle line:84% So yeah, maybe "we" goes after the stress 00:10:01.567 --> 00:10:02.602 align:middle line:90% or before the stress. 00:10:02.602 --> 00:10:04.670 align:middle line:90% Yeah, that's cool. 00:10:04.670 --> 00:10:06.205 align:middle line:84% My Martian accent is not so great. 00:10:06.205 --> 00:10:07.873 align:middle line:84% So we haven't been able to work on that. 00:10:07.873 --> 00:10:10.242 align:middle line:90% But yeah, nice. 00:10:10.242 --> 00:10:11.477 align:middle line:90% These are nice ideas. 00:10:11.477 --> 00:10:13.907 align:middle line:84% So what we need to do is find more words. 00:10:13.907 --> 00:10:16.115 align:middle line:84% How, for example, are we going to distinguish the two 00:10:16.115 --> 00:10:18.012 align:middle line:84% hypotheses that I have on the board 00:10:18.012 --> 00:10:19.819 align:middle line:84% here-- so after the first syllable 00:10:19.819 --> 00:10:21.354 align:middle line:90% or before the last syllable? 00:10:21.354 --> 00:10:22.221 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:10:22.221 --> 00:10:23.522 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: I want to get a word with three syllables. 00:10:23.522 --> 00:10:25.224 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: Yeah, I want to get a longer word. 00:10:25.224 --> 00:10:26.292 align:middle line:84% So if we have a longer, word we'll 00:10:26.292 --> 00:10:27.360 align:middle line:84% be able to find out what that is. 00:10:27.360 --> 00:10:28.461 align:middle line:90% This was your point, too. 00:10:28.461 --> 00:10:30.889 align:middle line:84% If we have a word where one syllable is really long, 00:10:30.889 --> 00:10:32.264 align:middle line:84% another syllable is really short, 00:10:32.264 --> 00:10:35.067 align:middle line:84% maybe we can learn something by doing that, 00:10:35.067 --> 00:10:38.337 align:middle line:90% so get some more words. 00:10:38.337 --> 00:10:42.208 align:middle line:84% Here's "X!oo is singing," "X!oo yodeleehihuu," 00:10:42.208 --> 00:10:45.611 align:middle line:84% and "X!oo destroyed a spacecraft," 00:10:45.611 --> 00:10:48.314 align:middle line:90% "X!oo roovaa munchmunchyum." 00:10:48.314 --> 00:10:51.350 align:middle line:84% So here are two verbs that are longer. 00:10:51.350 --> 00:10:54.553 align:middle line:84% And so we'll be able to tell, by negating these, which 00:10:54.553 --> 00:10:56.756 align:middle line:84% of the various hypotheses we've been floating 00:10:56.756 --> 00:10:59.725 align:middle line:90% are the most attractive ones. 00:10:59.725 --> 00:11:06.732 align:middle line:84% Turns out we get "yowedeleehihuu" and 00:11:06.732 --> 00:11:08.100 align:middle line:90% "munchwemunchyum." 00:11:08.100 --> 00:11:11.971 align:middle line:84% So you're right, I'm not saying it right. 00:11:11.971 --> 00:11:14.106 align:middle line:90% So what's the rule? 00:11:14.106 --> 00:11:15.408 align:middle line:90% Where does "we" go? 00:11:15.408 --> 00:11:17.076 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: After the first consonant. 00:11:17.076 --> 00:11:19.512 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: After the first consonant, looks like. 00:11:19.512 --> 00:11:21.113 align:middle line:84% Or if stress is on the first syllable, 00:11:21.113 --> 00:11:22.581 align:middle line:84% it could still be after the stress. 00:11:22.581 --> 00:11:23.916 align:middle line:90% We have to study that. 00:11:23.916 --> 00:11:25.110 align:middle line:90% That's absolutely right. 00:11:25.110 --> 00:11:26.652 align:middle line:84% So now, we have a working hypothesis. 00:11:26.652 --> 00:11:29.088 align:middle line:84% We could go get more verbs and test the hypothesis 00:11:29.088 --> 00:11:32.224 align:middle line:84% against-- if we could find a verb that had maybe 00:11:32.224 --> 00:11:34.627 align:middle line:84% all of these have initial stress, and if we work harder, 00:11:34.627 --> 00:11:36.328 align:middle line:84% we'll find a verb that has final stress. 00:11:36.328 --> 00:11:38.631 align:middle line:84% And we'll learn something about whether stress matters. 00:11:38.631 --> 00:11:41.300 align:middle line:84% Yeah, basically, I'm asking you to do science. 00:11:41.300 --> 00:11:44.537 align:middle line:84% So you're going to gather data, generate a hypothesis 00:11:44.537 --> 00:11:47.206 align:middle line:84% about the data, realize that there 00:11:47.206 --> 00:11:49.642 align:middle line:84% are multiple hypotheses that are compatible with the data, 00:11:49.642 --> 00:11:51.110 align:middle line:84% try to figure out what kind of data 00:11:51.110 --> 00:11:53.612 align:middle line:84% you'd like to have that allow you to test your hypothesis 00:11:53.612 --> 00:11:56.682 align:middle line:90% further, go gather those data. 00:11:56.682 --> 00:11:57.917 align:middle line:90% That's the idea. 00:11:57.917 --> 00:12:00.019 align:middle line:90% Any questions about that so far? 00:12:00.019 --> 00:12:06.492 align:middle line:90% That's the goal. 00:12:06.492 --> 00:12:09.732 align:middle line:84% A couple of general things-- maybe 00:12:09.732 --> 00:12:11.163 align:middle line:84% I should start with the last one. 00:12:11.163 --> 00:12:13.532 align:middle line:84% You should be very nice to this person, the person 00:12:13.532 --> 00:12:16.068 align:middle line:90% that you're working with. 00:12:16.068 --> 00:12:19.271 align:middle line:84% We're asking you to do some work for you. 00:12:19.271 --> 00:12:21.807 align:middle line:84% But the Linguistics Department isn't offering to pay them, 00:12:21.807 --> 00:12:23.209 align:middle line:90% for example. 00:12:23.209 --> 00:12:25.211 align:middle line:84% We're just hoping that you will be nice to them. 00:12:25.211 --> 00:12:27.713 align:middle line:84% So we encourage you to treat them 00:12:27.713 --> 00:12:31.450 align:middle line:84% the way you would treat anybody who is helping you a lot, which 00:12:31.450 --> 00:12:33.545 align:middle line:90% hopefully, is nicely. 00:12:33.545 --> 00:12:35.087 align:middle line:84% Find out what their favorite food is. 00:12:35.087 --> 00:12:37.123 align:middle line:90% Bring it to them. 00:12:37.123 --> 00:12:39.525 align:middle line:84% Offer to be nice to them in whatever way they need 00:12:39.525 --> 00:12:42.228 align:middle line:90% niceness. 00:12:42.228 --> 00:12:44.263 align:middle line:84% It's maybe important to emphasize that, 00:12:44.263 --> 00:12:47.833 align:middle line:84% not just because these people aren't being paid, but also 00:12:47.833 --> 00:12:50.770 align:middle line:84% because this is something I have-- see, 00:12:50.770 --> 00:12:54.373 align:middle line:84% I teach a Field Methods class for graduate students. 00:12:54.373 --> 00:12:56.809 align:middle line:84% And this kind of work, where you're 00:12:56.809 --> 00:12:59.845 align:middle line:84% working with a human being, is pretty different 00:12:59.845 --> 00:13:03.467 align:middle line:84% from, well, a lot of the kinds of scientific work that you do, 00:13:03.467 --> 00:13:05.384 align:middle line:84% and even a lot of the kinds of scientific work 00:13:05.384 --> 00:13:06.137 align:middle line:90% that linguists do. 00:13:06.137 --> 00:13:08.220 align:middle line:84% Often, when we're gathering data about a language, 00:13:08.220 --> 00:13:09.855 align:middle line:84% we're doing it by reading your grammar, 00:13:09.855 --> 00:13:12.158 align:middle line:84% or by talking to a linguist, which 00:13:12.158 --> 00:13:15.628 align:middle line:84% is not quite the same as talking to a human being. 00:13:15.628 --> 00:13:18.631 align:middle line:84% Linguists-- we can take shortcuts. 00:13:18.631 --> 00:13:21.300 align:middle line:84% We know how to talk to each other in linguistic code 00:13:21.300 --> 00:13:23.903 align:middle line:84% and to get quickly to what it is that we want. 00:13:23.903 --> 00:13:26.138 align:middle line:84% If you're talking to a normal human being, 00:13:26.138 --> 00:13:29.175 align:middle line:84% it's especially important to be nice, 00:13:29.175 --> 00:13:31.143 align:middle line:90% to remind yourself to be nice. 00:13:31.143 --> 00:13:32.945 align:middle line:84% Because it's easy to find yourself 00:13:32.945 --> 00:13:36.315 align:middle line:84% irritated with this person when they disprove your hypotheses. 00:13:36.315 --> 00:13:41.420 align:middle line:84% So if you've got a hypothesis, and the person then gives you 00:13:41.420 --> 00:13:43.756 align:middle line:84% data that disprove your hypothesis-- it's something 00:13:43.756 --> 00:13:45.524 align:middle line:90% I often see people do in class. 00:13:45.524 --> 00:13:47.893 align:middle line:84% They try to talk the person out of it. 00:13:47.893 --> 00:13:49.295 align:middle line:90% They're, like, "No, wait. 00:13:49.295 --> 00:13:50.129 align:middle line:90% Are you sure?" 00:13:50.129 --> 00:13:52.231 align:middle line:90% So don't do that. 00:13:52.231 --> 00:13:53.599 align:middle line:90% Just gather the data. 00:13:53.599 --> 00:13:56.836 align:middle line:84% Don't get emotionally attached to your hypotheses. 00:13:56.836 --> 00:13:58.871 align:middle line:84% Be happy when you see your hypotheses die 00:13:58.871 --> 00:14:03.409 align:middle line:84% and get replaced by other hypotheses. 00:14:03.409 --> 00:14:04.927 align:middle line:84% You should try-- I guess I'm going 00:14:04.927 --> 00:14:07.713 align:middle line:84% through this list backwards-- you should try to be organized. 00:14:07.713 --> 00:14:11.684 align:middle line:84% And by that what I mean is this kind of work, 00:14:11.684 --> 00:14:14.787 align:middle line:84% it involves being fast on your feet to a certain extent. 00:14:14.787 --> 00:14:18.490 align:middle line:84% So when I was doing that first bit of Martian data, 00:14:18.490 --> 00:14:22.027 align:middle line:84% it's like, OK, there's a "we" that indicates negation. 00:14:22.027 --> 00:14:24.163 align:middle line:84% And it's going in the middle of the verb somewhere. 00:14:24.163 --> 00:14:26.498 align:middle line:84% But what exactly do I mean by "middle of the verb?" 00:14:26.498 --> 00:14:28.667 align:middle line:84% And then we were generating various hypotheses 00:14:28.667 --> 00:14:29.628 align:middle line:90% about what that meant. 00:14:29.628 --> 00:14:31.170 align:middle line:84% And that makes it clear what you need 00:14:31.170 --> 00:14:34.206 align:middle line:84% to do next, which is to get more verbs. 00:14:34.206 --> 00:14:36.040 align:middle line:84% That's something that you discover 00:14:36.040 --> 00:14:37.276 align:middle line:90% in the middle of the session. 00:14:37.276 --> 00:14:38.744 align:middle line:90% You find out how negation works. 00:14:38.744 --> 00:14:41.280 align:middle line:84% Oh, it goes in the middle of the verb. 00:14:41.280 --> 00:14:43.816 align:middle line:84% Then what I need is more verbs so that I can define middle 00:14:43.816 --> 00:14:46.318 align:middle line:90% in the appropriate way. 00:14:46.318 --> 00:14:50.222 align:middle line:84% So you want to go into the session with a plan 00:14:50.222 --> 00:14:52.424 align:middle line:84% for what exactly you're going to try to find out 00:14:52.424 --> 00:14:54.393 align:middle line:90% and in what order. 00:14:54.393 --> 00:15:01.333 align:middle line:84% And then two things-- my plans often look like flowcharts, 00:15:01.333 --> 00:15:04.103 align:middle line:84% or choose your own adventure novels, or something like that. 00:15:04.103 --> 00:15:06.505 align:middle line:84% It's like I will ask this, and if they say yes, then I 00:15:06.505 --> 00:15:07.082 align:middle line:90% go over here. 00:15:07.082 --> 00:15:08.540 align:middle line:84% And if they say no, I go over here. 00:15:08.540 --> 00:15:10.910 align:middle line:84% If they say no to that, well, then we go over here. 00:15:10.910 --> 00:15:15.514 align:middle line:84% So you make yourself a set of ways 00:15:15.514 --> 00:15:19.370 align:middle line:84% of dealing with various possible things that they might say. 00:15:19.370 --> 00:15:20.953 align:middle line:84% and then the other thing you do is not 00:15:20.953 --> 00:15:22.655 align:middle line:84% get too attached to that, either. 00:15:22.655 --> 00:15:25.958 align:middle line:84% So they may say something you didn't imagine them saying. 00:15:25.958 --> 00:15:29.161 align:middle line:84% And you have to be ready to think on your feet, 00:15:29.161 --> 00:15:34.233 align:middle line:84% be ready to do whatever it is that they say. 00:15:34.233 --> 00:15:36.035 align:middle line:84% So when I say be organized, what I mean is, 00:15:36.035 --> 00:15:39.305 align:middle line:84% think ahead about what you will do under various circumstances. 00:15:39.305 --> 00:15:42.802 align:middle line:84% But then also, be quick thinking. 00:15:42.802 --> 00:15:44.510 align:middle line:84% And that's something you'll get better at 00:15:44.510 --> 00:15:48.814 align:middle line:90% as you do more and more of it. 00:15:48.814 --> 00:15:51.650 align:middle line:84% Don't assume that you're getting what you're asking for. 00:15:51.650 --> 00:15:54.453 align:middle line:90% What do I mean by that? 00:15:54.453 --> 00:15:57.423 align:middle line:84% I've done some field work on a language called Lardil, which 00:15:57.423 --> 00:16:01.327 align:middle line:84% is an Aboriginal language spoken on Mornington Island, which 00:16:01.327 --> 00:16:03.929 align:middle line:84% is a beautiful island off the northern coast of Australia. 00:16:03.929 --> 00:16:06.031 align:middle line:84% So if you look at the map of Australia, 00:16:06.031 --> 00:16:09.034 align:middle line:84% there's a big dent in the northern coast. 00:16:09.034 --> 00:16:11.570 align:middle line:84% That's the Gulf of Carpentaria, and Mornington Island 00:16:11.570 --> 00:16:13.072 align:middle line:90% is in the middle of that. 00:16:13.072 --> 00:16:15.207 align:middle line:84% Lardil is spoken by Aborigines who have lived there 00:16:15.207 --> 00:16:19.278 align:middle line:90% for thousands of years. 00:16:19.278 --> 00:16:25.551 align:middle line:84% I was once walking with a Lardil speaker and talking with him. 00:16:25.551 --> 00:16:30.315 align:middle line:84% And we walked by a truck that was parked in front of a house. 00:16:30.315 --> 00:16:31.857 align:middle line:84% And I asked him, hey, how do you say, 00:16:31.857 --> 00:16:33.359 align:middle line:84% "The truck is in front of the house?" 00:16:33.359 --> 00:16:34.760 align:middle line:84% And he thought about that for a second, 00:16:34.760 --> 00:16:36.495 align:middle line:84% and he said something to me in Lardil 00:16:36.495 --> 00:16:40.532 align:middle line:84% which meant, "The truck is to the south of the house," 00:16:40.532 --> 00:16:42.334 align:middle line:84% because in Lardil, that's what you do. 00:16:42.334 --> 00:16:44.670 align:middle line:84% You talk about spatial relations entirely in terms 00:16:44.670 --> 00:16:46.305 align:middle line:90% of cardinal directions. 00:16:46.305 --> 00:16:48.368 align:middle line:84% It's not that Lardil doesn't have a word for it 00:16:48.368 --> 00:16:50.743 align:middle line:84% "in front of," but it would have been unnatural in Lardil 00:16:50.743 --> 00:16:53.479 align:middle line:84% to say, "The truck is in front of the house." 00:16:53.479 --> 00:16:55.914 align:middle line:84% So he didn't answer my question, in a sense. 00:16:55.914 --> 00:16:57.383 align:middle line:90% And in another sense, he did. 00:16:57.383 --> 00:16:58.951 align:middle line:84% He told me what a Lardil person would 00:16:58.951 --> 00:17:02.121 align:middle line:84% say to describe what I wanted them to describe. 00:17:02.121 --> 00:17:03.555 align:middle line:90% That may happen to you. 00:17:03.555 --> 00:17:05.550 align:middle line:84% So you may ask somebody how to say something, 00:17:05.550 --> 00:17:07.092 align:middle line:84% and they may tell you something which 00:17:07.092 --> 00:17:09.627 align:middle line:90% is not exactly what you meant. 00:17:09.627 --> 00:17:12.798 align:middle line:84% There sort of isn't any way to prepare for that. 00:17:12.798 --> 00:17:14.599 align:middle line:84% You just have to do the best you can. 00:17:14.599 --> 00:17:17.169 align:middle line:84% So find out everything about the parts of what they've asked. 00:17:17.169 --> 00:17:20.705 align:middle line:84% So as we started off, I said, "X!oo kuulduud bii." 00:17:20.705 --> 00:17:22.340 align:middle line:84% That means, "X!oo is a linguist." 00:17:22.340 --> 00:17:24.309 align:middle line:84% And then you do some work to find out 00:17:24.309 --> 00:17:25.711 align:middle line:90% what does each word mean. 00:17:25.711 --> 00:17:27.479 align:middle line:84% And as you do that work, you may be 00:17:27.479 --> 00:17:29.548 align:middle line:84% able to avoid some of these kinds of problems. 00:17:29.548 --> 00:17:33.752 align:middle line:84% So there's a recording-- oh, yeah. 00:17:33.752 --> 00:17:37.589 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: What if-- not that they don't necessarily have a word 00:17:37.589 --> 00:17:39.992 align:middle line:84% for something, but it's the English word that they just 00:17:39.992 --> 00:17:41.160 align:middle line:90% don't have another-- 00:17:41.160 --> 00:17:41.727 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: You should probably 00:17:41.727 --> 00:17:42.961 align:middle line:84% try to find something else, then. 00:17:42.961 --> 00:17:44.003 align:middle line:90% That's a very good point. 00:17:44.003 --> 00:17:46.932 align:middle line:84% So you should do things that are culturally appropriate. 00:17:46.932 --> 00:17:48.967 align:middle line:84% I like to start, often, by asking people 00:17:48.967 --> 00:17:50.803 align:middle line:90% what their favorite food is. 00:17:50.803 --> 00:17:56.408 align:middle line:84% And then, if they tell you, "My favorite food is apples," 00:17:56.408 --> 00:17:58.977 align:middle line:84% then all your sentences can be about apples. 00:17:58.977 --> 00:18:00.979 align:middle line:84% "I'm eating apples," or whatever. 00:18:00.979 --> 00:18:02.281 align:middle line:90% Yeah, that's a very good point. 00:18:02.281 --> 00:18:03.682 align:middle line:90% Yes. 00:18:03.682 --> 00:18:05.884 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: We have to verify [INAUDIBLE].... 00:18:05.884 --> 00:18:10.015 align:middle line:84% So for example, in your example, if you have a hypothesis that 00:18:10.015 --> 00:18:12.558 align:middle line:84% no goes after the first syllable, 00:18:12.558 --> 00:18:15.594 align:middle line:84% does it make sense to [INAUDIBLE]???? 00:18:15.594 --> 00:18:17.763 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: Oh, it absolutely does. 00:18:17.763 --> 00:18:19.264 align:middle line:84% So let me just repeat your question. 00:18:19.264 --> 00:18:20.966 align:middle line:84% Does it make sense to ask the native speaker? 00:18:20.966 --> 00:18:23.102 align:middle line:84% I've got this hypothesis, now, about what's going on. 00:18:23.102 --> 00:18:25.144 align:middle line:84% It looks like "we" goes after the first syllable. 00:18:25.144 --> 00:18:27.272 align:middle line:84% It absolutely does make sense to ask 00:18:27.272 --> 00:18:29.208 align:middle line:90% and it's totally fine to ask. 00:18:29.208 --> 00:18:32.244 align:middle line:84% You shouldn't necessarily assume that they're 00:18:32.244 --> 00:18:34.580 align:middle line:90% right when they tell you. 00:18:34.580 --> 00:18:39.785 align:middle line:84% Because-- this came up when we were talking last week-- 00:18:39.785 --> 00:18:42.287 align:middle line:84% you know many things about your native language 00:18:42.287 --> 00:18:45.357 align:middle line:84% that you don't have to think about in order to speak it. 00:18:45.357 --> 00:18:48.694 align:middle line:84% And the consequence of that is that if somebody suddenly 00:18:48.694 --> 00:18:51.663 align:middle line:84% asks you, hey, what's the rule for this, 00:18:51.663 --> 00:18:53.665 align:middle line:90% you might not actually know. 00:18:53.665 --> 00:18:55.234 align:middle line:90% Because it's effortless for you. 00:18:55.234 --> 00:18:57.970 align:middle line:84% And so you may get a good response 00:18:57.970 --> 00:18:59.972 align:middle line:84% when you ask that question and you may not. 00:18:59.972 --> 00:19:02.407 align:middle line:84% That means that there are two kinds of possible mistakes 00:19:02.407 --> 00:19:04.743 align:middle line:84% that you could make when somebody tells you their theory 00:19:04.743 --> 00:19:05.911 align:middle line:90% about what's going on. 00:19:05.911 --> 00:19:08.580 align:middle line:84% One is to uncritically believe it 00:19:08.580 --> 00:19:10.282 align:middle line:84% because they're a native speaker. 00:19:10.282 --> 00:19:12.017 align:middle line:84% And the other would be to discard it. 00:19:12.017 --> 00:19:13.418 align:middle line:90% You see linguists do that, too. 00:19:13.418 --> 00:19:14.686 align:middle line:84% They're, like, "I'm the linguist here. 00:19:14.686 --> 00:19:16.355 align:middle line:84% I'm not going to listen to this person." 00:19:16.355 --> 00:19:18.891 align:middle line:84% That's also a mistake because of course, their input on this 00:19:18.891 --> 00:19:19.658 align:middle line:90% is valuable. 00:19:19.658 --> 00:19:22.094 align:middle line:84% It's just one valuable source of information, 00:19:22.094 --> 00:19:24.429 align:middle line:84% which you need to weigh against any other sources 00:19:24.429 --> 00:19:25.931 align:middle line:90% of information that you have. 00:19:25.931 --> 00:19:27.366 align:middle line:90% Does that make sense? 00:19:27.366 --> 00:19:30.068 align:middle line:90% It's a really good question. 00:19:30.068 --> 00:19:33.472 align:middle line:84% Sorry, I have one other anecdote about Lardil. 00:19:33.472 --> 00:19:37.643 align:middle line:84% I found a recording, one of the first recordings of Lardil, 00:19:37.643 --> 00:19:40.279 align:middle line:90% by an aircraft pilot. 00:19:40.279 --> 00:19:41.280 align:middle line:90% So he wasn't a linguist. 00:19:41.280 --> 00:19:44.216 align:middle line:84% He flew regular roots to Mornington Island, 00:19:44.216 --> 00:19:46.285 align:middle line:84% this really isolated place, and he got interested 00:19:46.285 --> 00:19:47.152 align:middle line:90% in the language. 00:19:47.152 --> 00:19:50.389 align:middle line:84% And he sat down a Lardil speaker, 00:19:50.389 --> 00:19:52.257 align:middle line:84% and he was going to record a word list. 00:19:52.257 --> 00:19:54.893 align:middle line:84% He'd gotten hold of a list of basic vocabulary. 00:19:54.893 --> 00:19:56.795 align:middle line:84% And so he was going to try to get 00:19:56.795 --> 00:19:58.730 align:middle line:84% the person to record translations for all 00:19:58.730 --> 00:20:00.399 align:middle line:90% these basic English words. 00:20:00.399 --> 00:20:03.170 align:middle line:84% And his list clearly started with pronouns. 00:20:03.170 --> 00:20:05.003 align:middle line:84% So he was going to list a bunch of pronouns. 00:20:05.003 --> 00:20:08.073 align:middle line:84% So he started with "I," said, tell me the word for "I." 00:20:08.073 --> 00:20:10.475 align:middle line:84% And the guy gave him the word for what you see with, 00:20:10.475 --> 00:20:12.411 align:middle line:90% this kind of eye. 00:20:12.411 --> 00:20:14.980 align:middle line:84% Then he said the word for "thou." 00:20:14.980 --> 00:20:16.648 align:middle line:84% And there's this pause on the tape. 00:20:16.648 --> 00:20:18.913 align:middle line:84% You can hear the Lardil speaking, "thou, 00:20:18.913 --> 00:20:19.885 align:middle line:90% what the heck?" 00:20:19.885 --> 00:20:22.321 align:middle line:84% And then he gives him the third person singular, 00:20:22.321 --> 00:20:24.769 align:middle line:84% the word for "he or she," which is actually 00:20:24.769 --> 00:20:27.203 align:middle line:84% a pretty good answer because in Lardil, you 00:20:27.203 --> 00:20:30.702 align:middle line:84% use the third person "he or she" under certain cultural 00:20:30.702 --> 00:20:32.744 align:middle line:84% circumstances, to indicate respect for the person 00:20:32.744 --> 00:20:33.744 align:middle line:90% that you're speaking to. 00:20:33.744 --> 00:20:35.419 align:middle line:84% You speak to them as though they're 00:20:35.419 --> 00:20:37.169 align:middle line:84% in the third person instead of the second. 00:20:37.169 --> 00:20:40.272 align:middle line:84% So you don't say "you" to them, you say "he" or "she." 00:20:40.272 --> 00:20:42.207 align:middle line:84% So he gave him a fancy word for "you," 00:20:42.207 --> 00:20:43.642 align:middle line:84% which is a pretty good translation 00:20:43.642 --> 00:20:45.143 align:middle line:90% for that whole action. 00:20:45.143 --> 00:20:47.764 align:middle line:84% But these are just examples of you may not get 00:20:47.764 --> 00:20:49.014 align:middle line:90% what you ask for, necessarily. 00:20:49.014 --> 00:20:54.553 align:middle line:90% You should be prepared for that. 00:20:54.553 --> 00:20:57.589 align:middle line:84% Now we're up to the second sentence on this slide. 00:20:57.589 --> 00:21:00.325 align:middle line:84% So start with simple culturally appropriate sentences. 00:21:00.325 --> 00:21:02.127 align:middle line:84% This is kind of what you were asking about. 00:21:02.127 --> 00:21:04.529 align:middle line:84% So by "culturally appropriate," I 00:21:04.529 --> 00:21:06.932 align:middle line:84% mean if you're talking to someone 00:21:06.932 --> 00:21:09.334 align:middle line:84% from a tropical climate, don't make all of your sentences 00:21:09.334 --> 00:21:11.570 align:middle line:90% about snow and ice. 00:21:11.570 --> 00:21:14.006 align:middle line:84% If you're talking to someone from one religion, 00:21:14.006 --> 00:21:16.675 align:middle line:84% don't make references to another religion in your questions. 00:21:16.675 --> 00:21:18.777 align:middle line:84% In fact, maybe try to avoid references 00:21:18.777 --> 00:21:23.333 align:middle line:84% to religion in your questions, period-- basic stuff like that. 00:21:23.333 --> 00:21:25.083 align:middle line:84% Like I say, I like to start by asking them 00:21:25.083 --> 00:21:25.917 align:middle line:90% their favorite food. 00:21:25.917 --> 00:21:30.589 align:middle line:84% And then we ask lots of questions about X!oo ate this 00:21:30.589 --> 00:21:33.458 align:middle line:84% or X!oo is cooking that and things like that. 00:21:33.458 --> 00:21:36.094 align:middle line:84% Sometimes, you make discoveries about what counts as culturally 00:21:36.094 --> 00:21:36.595 align:middle line:90% appropriate. 00:21:36.595 --> 00:21:40.198 align:middle line:84% I once taught a Field Methods class on a Semitic language 00:21:40.198 --> 00:21:42.701 align:middle line:90% from Ethiopia called Chaha. 00:21:42.701 --> 00:21:43.535 align:middle line:90% I started the class. 00:21:43.535 --> 00:21:45.837 align:middle line:84% I was like, OK, I'm going to get a basic sentence 00:21:45.837 --> 00:21:47.739 align:middle line:84% with a subject, and an object, and a verb. 00:21:47.739 --> 00:21:49.975 align:middle line:84% How do you say, "The man cooked the meat." 00:21:49.975 --> 00:21:51.476 align:middle line:84% The guy said, "I cannot say that." 00:21:51.476 --> 00:21:52.411 align:middle line:90% I'm, like, OK, why? 00:21:52.411 --> 00:21:54.813 align:middle line:90% He said, "Men do not cook. 00:21:54.813 --> 00:21:59.551 align:middle line:84% And also, you do not cook meat," he said. 00:21:59.551 --> 00:22:01.252 align:middle line:84% "You're supposed to eat meat raw, 00:22:01.252 --> 00:22:03.889 align:middle line:84% unless there's something wrong with it." 00:22:03.889 --> 00:22:04.423 align:middle line:90% I said, "OK, 00:22:04.423 --> 00:22:06.768 align:middle line:84% 'The woman cooked the cabbage.'" He's, like, "Yes, 00:22:06.768 --> 00:22:08.160 align:middle line:90% we can say that." 00:22:08.160 --> 00:22:13.231 align:middle line:90% We started with that. 00:22:13.231 --> 00:22:18.337 align:middle line:84% Whoops, I thought I told you not to do that, computer. 00:22:18.337 --> 00:22:22.040 align:middle line:84% And then, going up to the first bullet point-- 00:22:22.040 --> 00:22:26.287 align:middle line:84% I should work on this slide a little more-- one of the things 00:22:26.287 --> 00:22:30.586 align:middle line:84% you want to do, and this may be hard, is to try to convince 00:22:30.586 --> 00:22:34.035 align:middle line:84% the person you're working with that you are really, really 00:22:34.035 --> 00:22:39.257 align:middle line:84% interested in how they actually talk. 00:22:39.257 --> 00:22:43.161 align:middle line:84% Depending on the language, a lot of people 00:22:43.161 --> 00:22:47.165 align:middle line:84% are taught by the educational systems 00:22:47.165 --> 00:22:50.235 align:middle line:84% that they grew up with that there is a correct way 00:22:50.235 --> 00:22:51.536 align:middle line:90% to speak their language. 00:22:51.536 --> 00:22:54.005 align:middle line:84% And sometimes, they're taught that their way of speaking it 00:22:54.005 --> 00:22:55.607 align:middle line:84% is not the correct one, that they're 00:22:55.607 --> 00:22:57.175 align:middle line:90% bad at their native language. 00:22:57.175 --> 00:22:59.511 align:middle line:90% That's distressingly common. 00:22:59.511 --> 00:23:01.113 align:middle line:84% I do a fair amount of work on Tagalog, 00:23:01.113 --> 00:23:03.166 align:middle line:84% which is the language from the Philippines. 00:23:03.166 --> 00:23:04.916 align:middle line:84% And Tagalog speakers often, when I'm first 00:23:04.916 --> 00:23:06.385 align:middle line:84% starting to work with them, they'll 00:23:06.385 --> 00:23:08.954 align:middle line:84% start by telling me that they're not very good at Tagalog, 00:23:08.954 --> 00:23:10.789 align:middle line:90% which is their native language. 00:23:10.789 --> 00:23:12.624 align:middle line:90% They grew up speaking Tagalog. 00:23:12.624 --> 00:23:14.493 align:middle line:84% But what they mean is they've been 00:23:14.493 --> 00:23:20.198 align:middle line:84% taught that real Tagalog doesn't have any borrowings 00:23:20.198 --> 00:23:22.868 align:middle line:84% from Spanish or English, that real Tagalog is 00:23:22.868 --> 00:23:25.971 align:middle line:84% the Tagalog that's spoken in isolated villages 00:23:25.971 --> 00:23:28.340 align:middle line:84% that they've never been to, where they speak 00:23:28.340 --> 00:23:30.375 align:middle line:84% the real, proper kind of Tagalog, 00:23:30.375 --> 00:23:31.771 align:middle line:90% which very few people speak. 00:23:31.771 --> 00:23:33.979 align:middle line:84% And the people that I'm working with don't speak that 00:23:33.979 --> 00:23:36.114 align:middle line:90% and they feel bad about that. 00:23:36.114 --> 00:23:40.619 align:middle line:84% So you have to make some attempt to convince a person like that 00:23:40.619 --> 00:23:43.555 align:middle line:84% that their version of the language 00:23:43.555 --> 00:23:45.791 align:middle line:84% is what you're really interested in. 00:23:45.791 --> 00:23:49.628 align:middle line:84% And maybe you can tell them, I'm doing science. 00:23:49.628 --> 00:23:51.329 align:middle line:90% I'm not here to judge you. 00:23:51.329 --> 00:23:53.732 align:middle line:84% I'm not trying to find out whether you speak correctly 00:23:53.732 --> 00:23:54.466 align:middle line:90% or not. 00:23:54.466 --> 00:23:57.068 align:middle line:84% I'm trying to find out how you speak. 00:23:57.068 --> 00:24:03.408 align:middle line:84% And so I promise not to send a note to your parents 00:24:03.408 --> 00:24:05.811 align:middle line:84% or to your teachers in high school reporting 00:24:05.811 --> 00:24:06.678 align:middle line:90% on what you tell me. 00:24:06.678 --> 00:24:08.547 align:middle line:90% That's not how this works. 00:24:08.547 --> 00:24:11.583 align:middle line:84% This is I'm trying to understand how people actually talk. 00:24:11.583 --> 00:24:13.852 align:middle line:84% That's what linguistics is about. 00:24:13.852 --> 00:24:17.155 align:middle line:84% It's not about the rules that you learn in high school, 00:24:17.155 --> 00:24:20.859 align:middle line:84% which sometimes describe what you actually do and sometimes 00:24:20.859 --> 00:24:22.994 align:middle line:90% don't. 00:24:22.994 --> 00:24:24.095 align:middle line:90% Does that make sense? 00:24:24.095 --> 00:24:29.134 align:middle line:84% These are all things you may want to do. 00:24:29.134 --> 00:24:36.029 align:middle line:84% All right, well, then, today-- where are we-- today, 00:24:36.029 --> 00:24:39.044 align:middle line:84% we're going to get started on morphology. 00:24:39.044 --> 00:24:41.780 align:middle line:90% That's our first topic. 00:24:41.780 --> 00:24:44.583 align:middle line:84% And so things that we will get to, 00:24:44.583 --> 00:24:46.585 align:middle line:84% depending on how far we get today-- oh, yes. 00:24:46.585 --> 00:24:48.086 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: Just as a question, is it 00:24:48.086 --> 00:24:52.290 align:middle line:84% appropriate to hypothesize about paradigms or just one element 00:24:52.290 --> 00:24:56.261 align:middle line:90% of [INAUDIBLE]? 00:24:56.261 --> 00:24:58.730 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: I'm sorry, can you say more about that? 00:24:58.730 --> 00:25:00.632 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: So if you're trying to create, 00:25:00.632 --> 00:25:04.135 align:middle line:84% for example, a chart of pronouns, 00:25:04.135 --> 00:25:07.138 align:middle line:84% is that a good thing to do or should you 00:25:07.138 --> 00:25:08.473 align:middle line:90% just focus on one word or what? 00:25:08.473 --> 00:25:09.741 align:middle line:90% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: Oh, I see. 00:25:09.741 --> 00:25:13.111 align:middle line:84% So in the problem set, we will ask you to find out something 00:25:13.111 --> 00:25:14.679 align:middle line:90% in particular. 00:25:14.679 --> 00:25:16.314 align:middle line:84% So we'll ask you-- we'll have something 00:25:16.314 --> 00:25:17.883 align:middle line:90% that we want you to find out. 00:25:17.883 --> 00:25:20.485 align:middle line:84% So that would be the thing to concentrate on. 00:25:20.485 --> 00:25:23.688 align:middle line:84% In general, if you're working on a language, 00:25:23.688 --> 00:25:26.658 align:middle line:84% there kind of aren't guidelines about what it's OK to work on 00:25:26.658 --> 00:25:27.592 align:middle line:90% and what it's not. 00:25:27.592 --> 00:25:30.395 align:middle line:84% So I'd encourage you, if you're working with this person 00:25:30.395 --> 00:25:32.898 align:middle line:84% and you discover that you've answered the question 00:25:32.898 --> 00:25:35.800 align:middle line:84% we've asked you to answer quickly in the session, 00:25:35.800 --> 00:25:38.837 align:middle line:84% then one of the things you can do-- part of being prepared-- 00:25:38.837 --> 00:25:40.739 align:middle line:84% is to do some thinking about other things 00:25:40.739 --> 00:25:41.540 align:middle line:90% you'd like to know. 00:25:41.540 --> 00:25:43.842 align:middle line:84% And that could be-- one way is to sit down and get 00:25:43.842 --> 00:25:46.011 align:middle line:84% a paradigm of pronouns, or paradigm 00:25:46.011 --> 00:25:49.114 align:middle line:84% of verbs in the present tense, or whatever. 00:25:49.114 --> 00:25:52.335 align:middle line:84% And of course, depending on the language you're working on, 00:25:52.335 --> 00:25:54.085 align:middle line:84% something like getting a paradigm of verbs 00:25:54.085 --> 00:25:57.122 align:middle line:84% in the present tense could be trivial 00:25:57.122 --> 00:25:59.324 align:middle line:90% or it could be impossible. 00:25:59.324 --> 00:26:01.793 align:middle line:84% So you'll just have to find out what kind of language 00:26:01.793 --> 00:26:03.695 align:middle line:90% you're working on. 00:26:03.695 --> 00:26:05.397 align:middle line:90% Yes. 00:26:05.397 --> 00:26:07.332 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: So kind of two questions. 00:26:07.332 --> 00:26:12.804 align:middle line:84% One, when you say that you want how people really speak, 00:26:12.804 --> 00:26:15.240 align:middle line:84% if they're incorporating a slang, 00:26:15.240 --> 00:26:18.476 align:middle line:84% is that something that you want to just pick up or do you 00:26:18.476 --> 00:26:21.146 align:middle line:84% want to kind of tell them that [INAUDIBLE]?? 00:26:21.146 --> 00:26:22.113 align:middle line:90% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: Oh. 00:26:22.113 --> 00:26:25.450 align:middle line:84% So basically, you want to write down everything 00:26:25.450 --> 00:26:26.651 align:middle line:90% that they tell you. 00:26:26.651 --> 00:26:29.888 align:middle line:84% So if somebody says a sentence, and then they say, 00:26:29.888 --> 00:26:32.424 align:middle line:90% oh, but that's actually slang. 00:26:32.424 --> 00:26:35.093 align:middle line:84% Here's the way you'd say it without slang. 00:26:35.093 --> 00:26:37.228 align:middle line:84% You want to write down both of those sentences. 00:26:37.228 --> 00:26:38.630 align:middle line:90% It's all data. 00:26:38.630 --> 00:26:40.699 align:middle line:84% You're going to try to find everything else out. 00:26:40.699 --> 00:26:43.535 align:middle line:84% It could be worth it to try to find out, 00:26:43.535 --> 00:26:47.272 align:middle line:84% when you say this as slang, what do you mean exactly? 00:26:47.272 --> 00:26:53.211 align:middle line:84% Because that could mean this is only used by teenagers, 00:26:53.211 --> 00:26:55.513 align:middle line:84% and everybody is expected to grow out of this, 00:26:55.513 --> 00:26:59.084 align:middle line:84% and my mother would wash my mouth out with soap if she 00:26:59.084 --> 00:27:00.285 align:middle line:90% heard me speaking this way. 00:27:00.285 --> 00:27:01.620 align:middle line:90% It could be that. 00:27:01.620 --> 00:27:03.655 align:middle line:84% Or it could be-- so in the Philippines, 00:27:03.655 --> 00:27:06.124 align:middle line:84% I have people tell me, oh, this is slang. 00:27:06.124 --> 00:27:09.494 align:middle line:84% And what they mean is it's not the Tagalog word for it. 00:27:09.494 --> 00:27:10.795 align:middle line:90% It's the Spanish word for it. 00:27:10.795 --> 00:27:13.932 align:middle line:84% And everyone uses the Spanish word for it all the time. 00:27:13.932 --> 00:27:16.167 align:middle line:84% It's just that we feel guilty about it. 00:27:16.167 --> 00:27:18.870 align:middle line:84% And so you'll have to find out which of those situations 00:27:18.870 --> 00:27:20.005 align:middle line:90% you're in. 00:27:20.005 --> 00:27:23.108 align:middle line:84% It would be surprising if you could find it out on day one. 00:27:23.108 --> 00:27:25.343 align:middle line:84% So for day one, probably what you want to do 00:27:25.343 --> 00:27:27.545 align:middle line:84% is write down both versions of the sentence, 00:27:27.545 --> 00:27:30.749 align:middle line:84% and maybe try to ask about what they mean exactly when they 00:27:30.749 --> 00:27:31.383 align:middle line:90% say it's slang. 00:27:31.383 --> 00:27:32.050 align:middle line:90% Does that make sense? 00:27:32.050 --> 00:27:32.651 align:middle line:90% STUDENT: Yeah. 00:27:32.651 --> 00:27:34.085 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: So you may indeed 00:27:34.085 --> 00:27:36.221 align:middle line:84% get someone who tells you, here's how you say this. 00:27:36.221 --> 00:27:37.756 align:middle line:90% Oh, but it's a bad way. 00:27:37.756 --> 00:27:41.559 align:middle line:84% And you have to try to find out what they mean. 00:27:41.559 --> 00:27:44.362 align:middle line:84% But if they just mean my high school 00:27:44.362 --> 00:27:45.864 align:middle line:84% English teacher would be displeased, 00:27:45.864 --> 00:27:47.999 align:middle line:84% my high school whatever teacher would be displeased 00:27:47.999 --> 00:27:51.169 align:middle line:84% if they heard me say that, then that's still data. 00:27:51.169 --> 00:27:55.540 align:middle line:84% We're not passing judgment on things like this. 00:27:55.540 --> 00:27:57.375 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:27:57.375 --> 00:27:59.770 align:middle line:90% And then the other question? 00:27:59.770 --> 00:28:01.312 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: I just have another question 00:28:01.312 --> 00:28:09.454 align:middle line:84% about when you said, like men cooking, and how they like 00:28:09.454 --> 00:28:10.288 align:middle line:90% [INAUDIBLE]. 00:28:10.288 --> 00:28:12.490 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: Can't say that, yeah. 00:28:12.490 --> 00:28:14.826 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: I was wondering if you were ever in a situation 00:28:14.826 --> 00:28:17.762 align:middle line:84% where you just asked, oh, well, hypothetically, how would 00:28:17.762 --> 00:28:19.164 align:middle line:90% you say that or-- 00:28:19.164 --> 00:28:21.666 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: So in that particular situation, which 00:28:21.666 --> 00:28:24.202 align:middle line:84% was day one of the Field Methods class, 00:28:24.202 --> 00:28:26.838 align:middle line:84% I decided not to have that particular fight. 00:28:26.838 --> 00:28:31.142 align:middle line:84% So we found out how to use the verb "to cook." 00:28:31.142 --> 00:28:32.937 align:middle line:84% And we found out the word for "man." 00:28:32.937 --> 00:28:34.312 align:middle line:84% And by the end, we probably could 00:28:34.312 --> 00:28:36.614 align:middle line:84% have figured out how to say, "The man cooked the meat." 00:28:36.614 --> 00:28:42.721 align:middle line:84% But that's another place for not being judgmental 00:28:42.721 --> 00:28:45.356 align:middle line:84% about the person you're working with, I guess. 00:28:45.356 --> 00:28:47.726 align:middle line:84% If that's what they think, then fine. 00:28:47.726 --> 00:28:53.465 align:middle line:84% We're not going to try to talk them out of that. 00:28:53.465 --> 00:28:56.835 align:middle line:84% We can, but not while we're doing linguistics. 00:28:56.835 --> 00:28:58.103 align:middle line:90% Other questions about that? 00:28:58.103 --> 00:29:00.939 align:middle line:90% Those are good questions. 00:29:00.939 --> 00:29:02.340 align:middle line:90% OK. 00:29:02.340 --> 00:29:08.546 align:middle line:84% So morphology, then-- so questions 00:29:08.546 --> 00:29:11.716 align:middle line:84% like what do you know when you know a word? 00:29:11.716 --> 00:29:12.884 align:middle line:90% What's universal? 00:29:12.884 --> 00:29:13.985 align:middle line:90% What's learned? 00:29:13.985 --> 00:29:17.455 align:middle line:84% And why is the word "unlockable" ambiguous? 00:29:17.455 --> 00:29:18.823 align:middle line:90% We'll talk about that, too. 00:29:18.823 --> 00:29:22.494 align:middle line:90% So this is a cat. 00:29:22.494 --> 00:29:23.928 align:middle line:90% Any questions? 00:29:23.928 --> 00:29:25.029 align:middle line:90% It's clear so far. 00:29:25.029 --> 00:29:29.834 align:middle line:84% So the word "cat" refers to certain kinds of things, 00:29:29.834 --> 00:29:33.838 align:middle line:84% including the thing that I've got a picture of here. 00:29:33.838 --> 00:29:39.210 align:middle line:84% Now, I said, one of the things we're going to talk about 00:29:39.210 --> 00:29:42.447 align:middle line:84% is what things about language do you 00:29:42.447 --> 00:29:44.582 align:middle line:84% have to learn when you learn your native language, 00:29:44.582 --> 00:29:45.617 align:middle line:90% or any language? 00:29:45.617 --> 00:29:48.520 align:middle line:84% And what other things are universal? 00:29:48.520 --> 00:29:52.223 align:middle line:84% So we talked a little bit last time about the hypothesis 00:29:52.223 --> 00:29:55.293 align:middle line:84% that our brains are set up in such a way 00:29:55.293 --> 00:29:58.963 align:middle line:84% that we can only create language in some ways, and not others. 00:29:58.963 --> 00:30:01.366 align:middle line:84% And one of the ways we find out about those aspects 00:30:01.366 --> 00:30:05.127 align:middle line:84% of our brains is by finding things, surprising things, that 00:30:05.127 --> 00:30:08.711 align:middle line:84% are true of every language that we know anything about-- so 00:30:08.711 --> 00:30:10.742 align:middle line:84% "universals," we call those things, things 00:30:10.742 --> 00:30:12.544 align:middle line:90% that are just always true. 00:30:12.544 --> 00:30:14.612 align:middle line:84% Is it always true in every language 00:30:14.612 --> 00:30:16.748 align:middle line:90% that this is called a cat? 00:30:16.748 --> 00:30:20.151 align:middle line:84% No, this is a lousy candidate for a universal. 00:30:20.151 --> 00:30:24.055 align:middle line:84% There are a zillion words for cat out there in the world. 00:30:24.055 --> 00:30:26.124 align:middle line:90% Here are some of them. 00:30:26.124 --> 00:30:31.462 align:middle line:84% The famous linguist Saussure who had a French phrase which 00:30:31.462 --> 00:30:33.832 align:middle line:84% has been translated in English as the arbitrariness 00:30:33.832 --> 00:30:37.769 align:middle line:84% of the sign as the name for this phenomenon. 00:30:37.769 --> 00:30:40.505 align:middle line:84% The fact that this is called a cat in English 00:30:40.505 --> 00:30:44.008 align:middle line:84% doesn't follow from anything else about English 00:30:44.008 --> 00:30:45.243 align:middle line:90% or about any other language. 00:30:45.243 --> 00:30:47.512 align:middle line:84% And if you're going to learn a language, you've got to learn, 00:30:47.512 --> 00:30:49.280 align:middle line:84% assuming that language has a word for cat, 00:30:49.280 --> 00:30:52.283 align:middle line:84% you've got to learn that language's word for cat. 00:30:52.283 --> 00:30:56.020 align:middle line:90% Questions about that? 00:30:56.020 --> 00:31:01.259 align:middle line:84% Arbitrariness of the sign-- quick sidebar about that-- 00:31:01.259 --> 00:31:03.194 align:middle line:84% of course, there are places where 00:31:03.194 --> 00:31:04.963 align:middle line:84% the arbitrariness of the sign seems 00:31:04.963 --> 00:31:06.664 align:middle line:90% not to be all that arbitrary. 00:31:06.664 --> 00:31:09.100 align:middle line:84% So here are some Passamaquoddy words. 00:31:09.100 --> 00:31:11.369 align:middle line:84% Passamaquoddy is a Native American language, 00:31:11.369 --> 00:31:14.272 align:middle line:84% Algonquian language spoken up in Maine. 00:31:14.272 --> 00:31:16.441 align:middle line:84% There's a kind of bird in Passamaquoddy 00:31:16.441 --> 00:31:19.143 align:middle line:90% which is called kuhkukhahs. 00:31:19.143 --> 00:31:25.650 align:middle line:84% What kind of bird do you think that is, kuhkukhahs? 00:31:25.650 --> 00:31:26.784 align:middle line:90% It could be a cuckoo. 00:31:26.784 --> 00:31:29.354 align:middle line:90% Any other theories? 00:31:29.354 --> 00:31:30.355 align:middle line:90% It's an owl. 00:31:30.355 --> 00:31:33.558 align:middle line:84% So it's their name for a great-horned owl. 00:31:33.558 --> 00:31:37.662 align:middle line:84% They have another kind of bird called a kocokikilahsis, 00:31:37.662 --> 00:31:39.364 align:middle line:90% kocokikilahsis. 00:31:39.364 --> 00:31:39.898 align:middle line:90% What's that? 00:31:39.898 --> 00:31:41.232 align:middle line:90% STUDENT: [INAUDIBLE]. 00:31:41.232 --> 00:31:43.635 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: No, it's a chickadee. 00:31:43.635 --> 00:31:46.237 align:middle line:90% Chickadee, kocokikilahsis. 00:31:46.237 --> 00:31:48.740 align:middle line:84% So sometimes, there are things that 00:31:48.740 --> 00:31:51.109 align:middle line:84% are named after what they sound like. 00:31:51.109 --> 00:31:56.547 align:middle line:84% Japanese has a kind of an adverb, "pikapika." 00:31:56.547 --> 00:32:00.818 align:middle line:84% It refers to a kind of light, a quality of light. 00:32:00.818 --> 00:32:02.654 align:middle line:84% What quality of light do you think it is? 00:32:02.654 --> 00:32:03.888 align:middle line:90% STUDENT: Electric. 00:32:03.888 --> 00:32:06.925 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: Yeah, has to do with electricity, yes. 00:32:06.925 --> 00:32:08.243 align:middle line:90% Pikapika. 00:32:08.243 --> 00:32:08.993 align:middle line:90% STUDENT: Flashing. 00:32:08.993 --> 00:32:09.494 align:middle line:90% Flickering. 00:32:09.494 --> 00:32:11.462 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: Yeah, flickering, flashing. 00:32:11.462 --> 00:32:11.996 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:32:11.996 --> 00:32:16.534 align:middle line:84% So some of you may have heard of Pikachu. 00:32:16.534 --> 00:32:18.836 align:middle line:84% "Chu" is the noise that a mouse makes. 00:32:18.836 --> 00:32:24.108 align:middle line:84% It's like "squeak," so Pikachu's like "flash squeak," 00:32:24.108 --> 00:32:26.044 align:middle line:90% that particular Pokemon. 00:32:26.044 --> 00:32:30.848 align:middle line:84% So yeah, "pikapika" means a flashing brilliant light. 00:32:30.848 --> 00:32:34.407 align:middle line:84% If I had told you that "pikapika" meant a soft, 00:32:34.407 --> 00:32:37.822 align:middle line:84% gentle glow, that would have been kind of surprising. 00:32:37.822 --> 00:32:40.124 align:middle line:84% So there's something non-arbitrary 00:32:40.124 --> 00:32:42.093 align:middle line:84% about certain places in the sign. 00:32:42.093 --> 00:32:43.695 align:middle line:84% There are experiments on this where 00:32:43.695 --> 00:32:46.564 align:middle line:90% people show people shapes. 00:32:46.564 --> 00:32:50.668 align:middle line:84% And you show people either a jagged shape or a gentle shape 00:32:50.668 --> 00:32:52.036 align:middle line:90% with lots of rounded corners. 00:32:52.036 --> 00:32:54.539 align:middle line:84% And you say, "One of these is a dub dub, 00:32:54.539 --> 00:32:56.074 align:middle line:90% and the other is a tick tick." 00:32:56.074 --> 00:32:58.343 align:middle line:84% And people are, like, "Yeah, the thing with the jagged corners-- 00:32:58.343 --> 00:32:59.260 align:middle line:90% that's the tick tick." 00:32:59.260 --> 00:33:00.244 align:middle line:90% That's clear. 00:33:00.244 --> 00:33:04.182 align:middle line:90% I have that idea. 00:33:04.182 --> 00:33:07.852 align:middle line:84% But putting aside those kinds of cases, signs are arbitrary. 00:33:07.852 --> 00:33:09.487 align:middle line:90% In English, we call cats "cats." 00:33:09.487 --> 00:33:11.789 align:middle line:84% But in Japanese, they're "neko" and they have 00:33:11.789 --> 00:33:15.827 align:middle line:90% other names in other languages. 00:33:15.827 --> 00:33:18.329 align:middle line:84% And even in cases of onomatopoeia-- 00:33:18.329 --> 00:33:21.165 align:middle line:84% so these Passamaquoddy words are onomatopoeic. 00:33:21.165 --> 00:33:24.369 align:middle line:84% They are named for things that are named after the sounds 00:33:24.369 --> 00:33:25.703 align:middle line:90% that they make. 00:33:25.703 --> 00:33:29.674 align:middle line:90% But take something like a frog. 00:33:29.674 --> 00:33:32.744 align:middle line:84% They are onomatopoeic words for what 00:33:32.744 --> 00:33:34.545 align:middle line:84% frogs say in different languages, 00:33:34.545 --> 00:33:36.848 align:middle line:84% and they're pretty strikingly different from language 00:33:36.848 --> 00:33:37.348 align:middle line:90% to language. 00:33:37.348 --> 00:33:39.598 align:middle line:84% Everybody seems to be able to hear something different 00:33:39.598 --> 00:33:43.988 align:middle line:90% in the call of a frog. 00:33:43.988 --> 00:33:48.659 align:middle line:84% So if we're trying to make a list of everything 00:33:48.659 --> 00:33:51.662 align:middle line:84% that you know about your native language, 00:33:51.662 --> 00:33:53.197 align:middle line:84% if you're talking about English, one 00:33:53.197 --> 00:33:54.699 align:middle line:84% of the things that we've got to list 00:33:54.699 --> 00:33:58.803 align:middle line:84% is that you know the word "cat" means cat. 00:33:58.803 --> 00:34:01.472 align:middle line:84% And that's one of the many bits of information 00:34:01.472 --> 00:34:02.373 align:middle line:90% that's in your head. 00:34:02.373 --> 00:34:03.841 align:middle line:90% Doesn't follow from anything. 00:34:03.841 --> 00:34:07.245 align:middle line:90% We've just got to learn that. 00:34:07.245 --> 00:34:10.181 align:middle line:84% So now, let's think what else is in your mental lexicon, 00:34:10.181 --> 00:34:15.753 align:middle line:84% your little list of everything you know about your language? 00:34:15.753 --> 00:34:19.824 align:middle line:84% Well, this could be lexical entry number two, "cats." 00:34:19.824 --> 00:34:20.891 align:middle line:90% Maybe. 00:34:20.891 --> 00:34:22.994 align:middle line:84% So you could have a lexical entry for "cat" 00:34:22.994 --> 00:34:25.663 align:middle line:84% that says cat refers to these little, furry things that 00:34:25.663 --> 00:34:26.697 align:middle line:90% chase mice. 00:34:26.697 --> 00:34:28.666 align:middle line:84% And then you could have another entry, 00:34:28.666 --> 00:34:32.603 align:middle line:84% "cats," that refers to more than one of those things. 00:34:32.603 --> 00:34:37.708 align:middle line:84% That's one way we could do our lexical entries. 00:34:37.708 --> 00:34:42.980 align:middle line:84% But that seems kind of, I don't know, wasteful and inelegant. 00:34:42.980 --> 00:34:47.784 align:middle line:84% Because what we're failing to recognize, 00:34:47.784 --> 00:34:50.588 align:middle line:84% if we decide to have one lexical entry for "cat" 00:34:50.588 --> 00:34:53.658 align:middle line:84% and another one for "cats," is that those two lexical entries 00:34:53.658 --> 00:34:55.025 align:middle line:90% seem to have a lot in common. 00:34:55.025 --> 00:34:57.094 align:middle line:90% They both start with "cat." 00:34:57.094 --> 00:35:01.023 align:middle line:84% And they both refer to groups of things-- one of them 00:35:01.023 --> 00:35:03.701 align:middle line:84% just one of those things and the other one more than one 00:35:03.701 --> 00:35:06.704 align:middle line:84% of those things-- that are furry, and chase mice, 00:35:06.704 --> 00:35:10.875 align:middle line:84% and chase laser pointers, those things. 00:35:10.875 --> 00:35:14.879 align:middle line:84% And moreover, the difference between them 00:35:14.879 --> 00:35:16.948 align:middle line:84% has to do with this S that's at the end. 00:35:16.948 --> 00:35:21.052 align:middle line:84% And we see pairs of words that have that S at the end in lots 00:35:21.052 --> 00:35:21.838 align:middle line:90% of places. 00:35:21.838 --> 00:35:24.088 align:middle line:84% It's not just "cat" and "cats," it's "dog" and "dogs," 00:35:24.088 --> 00:35:26.546 align:middle line:84% and "banana" and "bananas," and "computer" and "computers." 00:35:26.546 --> 00:35:29.627 align:middle line:84% There's lots of things like that. 00:35:29.627 --> 00:35:32.896 align:middle line:84% So there are two kinds of lexicons that we could imagine 00:35:32.896 --> 00:35:36.860 align:middle line:84% having, then-- one where we have lexical entries for "cat" 00:35:36.860 --> 00:35:39.036 align:middle line:84% and "cats," and "dog" and "dogs," and "computer" 00:35:39.036 --> 00:35:42.831 align:middle line:84% and "computers," and so on, and another where we have lexical 00:35:42.831 --> 00:35:47.544 align:middle line:84% entries for "cat," and "dog," and "banana," and "computer," 00:35:47.544 --> 00:35:51.994 align:middle line:84% and "-s"-- a lexical entry for this other thing that you get 00:35:51.994 --> 00:35:55.586 align:middle line:84% to add to nouns to make them plural. 00:35:55.586 --> 00:36:00.258 align:middle line:84% And for one thing, if there's any premium 00:36:00.258 --> 00:36:02.493 align:middle line:84% at all on storage space, if it's at all 00:36:02.493 --> 00:36:05.429 align:middle line:84% useful to have a lexicon that's not all that large, 00:36:05.429 --> 00:36:07.365 align:middle line:84% well, lexicon number one is going 00:36:07.365 --> 00:36:09.467 align:middle line:84% to be larger than lexicon number two 00:36:09.467 --> 00:36:13.771 align:middle line:84% as long as you have any nouns in your lexicon at all. 00:36:13.771 --> 00:36:16.140 align:middle line:84% Because lexicon number one-- if you have n nouns, 00:36:16.140 --> 00:36:19.944 align:middle line:84% you need 2n forms, singular and plurals, for each of them. 00:36:19.944 --> 00:36:23.214 align:middle line:84% Whereas lexicon number two, if you have n nouns, 00:36:23.214 --> 00:36:28.853 align:middle line:84% you need n plus 1 forms-- forms for all your nouns plus "-s." 00:36:28.853 --> 00:36:30.488 align:middle line:90% I'm oversimplifying, obviously. 00:36:30.488 --> 00:36:34.125 align:middle line:84% Not every noun makes its plural with an S. Talk about that. 00:36:34.125 --> 00:36:37.161 align:middle line:84% But do people see what I mean there? 00:36:37.161 --> 00:36:39.030 align:middle line:84% So there's at least a prima facie reason 00:36:39.030 --> 00:36:44.502 align:middle line:84% to take seriously the idea that a word like "cats" is complex. 00:36:44.502 --> 00:36:45.970 align:middle line:90% It has two parts. 00:36:45.970 --> 00:36:51.842 align:middle line:84% There's the "cat" part and there's the "-s" part. 00:36:51.842 --> 00:36:55.846 align:middle line:90% Anyone want to object to that? 00:36:55.846 --> 00:36:57.148 align:middle line:90% Sorry. 00:36:57.148 --> 00:36:59.717 align:middle line:84% In some languages, it would be really 00:36:59.717 --> 00:37:02.286 align:middle line:84% wasteful to try to have a lexical entry 00:37:02.286 --> 00:37:04.155 align:middle line:90% for every form of every word. 00:37:04.155 --> 00:37:06.090 align:middle line:84% Here's a language of Papua New Guinea. 00:37:06.090 --> 00:37:08.125 align:middle line:90% It's called Nimboran. 00:37:08.125 --> 00:37:11.009 align:middle line:84% It has four different tenses-- future, 00:37:11.009 --> 00:37:14.065 align:middle line:84% and past, and recent past, and distant past. 00:37:14.065 --> 00:37:16.567 align:middle line:84% There are suffixes on the verb that 00:37:16.567 --> 00:37:19.503 align:middle line:84% tell you things about the subject and the object, 00:37:19.503 --> 00:37:22.740 align:middle line:84% where there are 14 different types of subjects and objects 00:37:22.740 --> 00:37:23.941 align:middle line:90% that it recognizes. 00:37:23.941 --> 00:37:28.946 align:middle line:84% So the subject could be singular, or dual, or plural. 00:37:28.946 --> 00:37:30.281 align:middle line:90% There are locative suffixes. 00:37:30.281 --> 00:37:31.549 align:middle line:90% There are aspects. 00:37:31.549 --> 00:37:33.851 align:middle line:84% The result is that if you have a transitive verb, 00:37:33.851 --> 00:37:37.888 align:middle line:84% it has 23 and 1/2 thousand forms. 00:37:37.888 --> 00:37:39.824 align:middle line:84% Whereas if you have a transitive verb 00:37:39.824 --> 00:37:42.293 align:middle line:84% and you are just going to list all of these suffixes, 00:37:42.293 --> 00:37:46.197 align:middle line:84% well, you need 49 of the suffixes. 00:37:46.197 --> 00:37:49.810 align:middle line:84% So I said for English, if you were trying 00:37:49.810 --> 00:37:52.826 align:middle line:84% to list every form-- "cat," "cats," "dog," "dogs," 00:37:52.826 --> 00:37:54.805 align:middle line:84% "computer," "computers," you would need 00:37:54.805 --> 00:37:57.608 align:middle line:90% 2n forms if you have n nouns. 00:37:57.608 --> 00:38:00.911 align:middle line:84% Well, in Nimboran, if you have v verbs, 00:38:00.911 --> 00:38:05.716 align:middle line:84% you need 23,520v lexical entries if you're going to list every 00:38:05.716 --> 00:38:07.285 align:middle line:90% lexical entry. 00:38:07.285 --> 00:38:09.654 align:middle line:90% Take pity on the Nimborans. 00:38:09.654 --> 00:38:14.692 align:middle line:84% Don't make them lists 23,520 forms in their heads. 00:38:14.692 --> 00:38:18.863 align:middle line:84% Allow them, instead, to list their verbs, and the suffixes 00:38:18.863 --> 00:38:21.124 align:middle line:84% that go on the verbs, and rules for how 00:38:21.124 --> 00:38:22.166 align:middle line:90% those things go together. 00:38:22.166 --> 00:38:24.101 align:middle line:84% That will be computationally much simpler. 00:38:24.101 --> 00:38:27.171 align:middle line:84% They will not have to store as much stuff. 00:38:27.171 --> 00:38:29.440 align:middle line:90% Does that make sense? 00:38:29.440 --> 00:38:32.543 align:middle line:84% So that's a hypothesis that we're going to take seriously 00:38:32.543 --> 00:38:38.482 align:middle line:84% that our mental lexicon-- yeah, it contains words like "cat," 00:38:38.482 --> 00:38:42.720 align:middle line:84% but it also contains parts of words like "-s," 00:38:42.720 --> 00:38:47.992 align:middle line:84% this suffix that you can add to "cat" to make it plural. 00:38:47.992 --> 00:38:51.329 align:middle line:84% And so we're going to try to understand 00:38:51.329 --> 00:38:57.168 align:middle line:84% how those kinds of things interact now. 00:38:57.168 --> 00:39:01.717 align:middle line:84% We actually have various kinds of evidence-- it's not just, 00:39:01.717 --> 00:39:04.508 align:middle line:84% well, it would save space in your lexicon-- 00:39:04.508 --> 00:39:09.880 align:middle line:84% Various kinds of evidence that human beings do divide words 00:39:09.880 --> 00:39:11.982 align:middle line:84% into these parts, that a word like "cats" 00:39:11.982 --> 00:39:15.553 align:middle line:84% is a word with two parts, "cat" and "-s." 00:39:15.553 --> 00:39:19.824 align:middle line:84% One straightforward one is the fact that these are productive. 00:39:19.824 --> 00:39:26.152 align:middle line:84% So if I make up a new word in English, if I tell you 00:39:26.152 --> 00:39:30.020 align:middle line:84% I have invented a cool, new machine which everyone 00:39:30.020 --> 00:39:33.204 align:middle line:84% is going to want to have in their house-- 00:39:33.204 --> 00:39:36.486 align:middle line:84% it's going to be extremely useful-- and it is called, 00:39:36.486 --> 00:39:38.376 align:middle line:90% let's see, I'll give it a name. 00:39:38.376 --> 00:39:41.512 align:middle line:90% It's called a Blurk. 00:39:41.512 --> 00:39:42.947 align:middle line:90% So that's my brand name. 00:39:42.947 --> 00:39:45.316 align:middle line:90% I'm going to sell the Blurk. 00:39:45.316 --> 00:39:46.317 align:middle line:90% I'll make millions. 00:39:46.317 --> 00:39:49.887 align:middle line:84% Don't worry, I'll remember all of you when I'm on my yacht, 00:39:49.887 --> 00:39:52.089 align:middle line:90% working on my tan. 00:39:52.089 --> 00:39:59.130 align:middle line:84% And the Blurk-- what's the plural of "Blurk" going to be? 00:39:59.130 --> 00:39:59.990 align:middle line:90% STUDENT: "Blurks." 00:39:59.990 --> 00:40:01.532 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: Yeah, if you want 00:40:01.532 --> 00:40:05.202 align:middle line:84% to buy more than one Blurk, as I recommend that you do, 00:40:05.202 --> 00:40:08.606 align:middle line:84% those things are going to be Blurks. 00:40:08.606 --> 00:40:11.242 align:middle line:84% And there's no difficulty about that. 00:40:11.242 --> 00:40:14.645 align:middle line:84% You know that English has this suffix that makes plurals, 00:40:14.645 --> 00:40:17.948 align:middle line:84% and you can add it to a word that you've never heard before 00:40:17.948 --> 00:40:20.117 align:middle line:90% because I just made it up. 00:40:20.117 --> 00:40:22.988 align:middle line:84% That would be surprising if your mental lexicon contained "cat," 00:40:22.988 --> 00:40:24.988 align:middle line:84% "cats," "dog," "dogs," "computer," "computers"-- 00:40:24.988 --> 00:40:28.554 align:middle line:84% just a bunch of words that accidentally kind of resemble 00:40:28.554 --> 00:40:29.326 align:middle line:90% each other. 00:40:29.326 --> 00:40:31.829 align:middle line:84% It looks as though that's not what your lexicon contains. 00:40:31.829 --> 00:40:34.899 align:middle line:84% It contains a bunch of nouns and a general principle 00:40:34.899 --> 00:40:36.567 align:middle line:84% for how you make things plural, which 00:40:36.567 --> 00:40:38.969 align:middle line:90% you get to apply to "Blurk." 00:40:38.969 --> 00:40:41.839 align:middle line:90% Does that make sense? 00:40:41.839 --> 00:40:44.308 align:middle line:84% It's been shown-- we've shown this classic series 00:40:44.308 --> 00:40:49.246 align:middle line:84% of experiments by Berko in the '50s. 00:40:49.246 --> 00:40:52.183 align:middle line:84% It's been shown that very young children can do this. 00:40:52.183 --> 00:40:53.918 align:middle line:84% We will talk more about this later, 00:40:53.918 --> 00:40:56.053 align:middle line:90% but she had these pictures. 00:40:56.053 --> 00:40:57.988 align:middle line:84% So she would show kids a picture of something. 00:40:57.988 --> 00:40:59.590 align:middle line:84% She'd say, "This is a wug," and then 00:40:59.590 --> 00:41:01.843 align:middle line:84% the picture of two of the things that she had created. 00:41:01.843 --> 00:41:03.093 align:middle line:90% And now there are two of them. 00:41:03.093 --> 00:41:07.064 align:middle line:84% There are two-- and the kids would all go, "Wugs." 00:41:07.064 --> 00:41:11.902 align:middle line:84% Later, people began selling things with wugs on them. 00:41:11.902 --> 00:41:14.238 align:middle line:84% They're a big deal among linguists. 00:41:14.238 --> 00:41:19.009 align:middle line:84% So one reason we have to think that you have lexical entry 00:41:19.009 --> 00:41:22.259 align:middle line:84% for "-s" is that it's a procedure that you can apply 00:41:22.259 --> 00:41:23.881 align:middle line:90% to novel words. 00:41:23.881 --> 00:41:26.650 align:middle line:84% Similarly, we seem to be hungry to create 00:41:26.650 --> 00:41:29.820 align:middle line:90% these things, these suffixes. 00:41:29.820 --> 00:41:31.822 align:middle line:90% Classic case is "gate." 00:41:31.822 --> 00:41:35.659 align:middle line:84% So the original gate was Watergate, 00:41:35.659 --> 00:41:41.432 align:middle line:84% which was before I was born, so a really long time ago. 00:41:41.432 --> 00:41:43.234 align:middle line:84% So sometime in the previous millennium, 00:41:43.234 --> 00:41:48.405 align:middle line:84% there was this scandal involving President Nixon and something 00:41:48.405 --> 00:41:51.742 align:middle line:84% that happened at the Watergate Hotel. 00:41:51.742 --> 00:41:55.746 align:middle line:84% The Watergate scandal was not a scandal about water. 00:41:55.746 --> 00:41:58.048 align:middle line:84% It got its name because it happened at the Watergate 00:41:58.048 --> 00:41:58.883 align:middle line:90% Hotel. 00:41:58.883 --> 00:42:02.920 align:middle line:84% But people took the "gate" of Watergate-- 00:42:02.920 --> 00:42:06.423 align:middle line:84% because Watergate is so easily divisible into these two parts, 00:42:06.423 --> 00:42:09.448 align:middle line:84% because "water" is a word-- people took "gate," 00:42:09.448 --> 00:42:11.362 align:middle line:90% and it's become a suffix now. 00:42:11.362 --> 00:42:15.232 align:middle line:84% So it's attached to words to give names for scandals. 00:42:15.232 --> 00:42:21.105 align:middle line:84% So Nixon had Watergate, Clinton had Monicagate. 00:42:21.105 --> 00:42:21.906 align:middle line:90% There was Irangate. 00:42:21.906 --> 00:42:23.908 align:middle line:90% There have been various gates. 00:42:23.908 --> 00:42:27.244 align:middle line:84% So "-gate" is now a suffix meaning "scandal." 00:42:27.244 --> 00:42:29.206 align:middle line:84% People seem to be hungry to create suffixes, 00:42:29.206 --> 00:42:30.748 align:middle line:84% even where they weren't there before. 00:42:30.748 --> 00:42:31.325 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:42:31.325 --> 00:42:33.117 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: So like "-burger" and "-mageddon"? 00:42:33.117 --> 00:42:35.742 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: Yes, right, like "-mageddon" or "-palooza." 00:42:35.742 --> 00:42:39.256 align:middle line:84% Yeah, there are many of these that people create out 00:42:39.256 --> 00:42:40.057 align:middle line:90% of whole cloth. 00:42:40.057 --> 00:42:43.761 align:middle line:90% That's a very good example. 00:42:43.761 --> 00:42:46.564 align:middle line:84% Other examples in the history of English-- 00:42:46.564 --> 00:42:50.690 align:middle line:84% there are words like "sculptor," and "beggar," 00:42:50.690 --> 00:42:55.773 align:middle line:84% and "swindler," which entered the languages as nouns. 00:42:55.773 --> 00:42:58.976 align:middle line:84% So "sculptor" is from a Latin verb. 00:42:58.976 --> 00:43:01.635 align:middle line:84% It involves a Latin suffix "-tor," 00:43:01.635 --> 00:43:06.717 align:middle line:84% which is used to create people who do things. 00:43:06.717 --> 00:43:09.753 align:middle line:84% And "beggar" and "swindler," similarly. 00:43:09.753 --> 00:43:13.057 align:middle line:84% It's an accident that they end in "-er." 00:43:13.057 --> 00:43:18.455 align:middle line:84% But "-er" in English is a suffix that you add to verbs to create 00:43:18.455 --> 00:43:20.731 align:middle line:84% nouns meaning person who does that. 00:43:20.731 --> 00:43:23.634 align:middle line:84% So you get "teach" and "teacher" or "sing" and "singer." 00:43:23.634 --> 00:43:26.870 align:middle line:84% And so through a process of what's called back formation, 00:43:26.870 --> 00:43:29.440 align:middle line:84% people heard these words that ended in "-er," 00:43:29.440 --> 00:43:31.308 align:middle line:84% and they thought, "Oh, that's '-er.' 00:43:31.308 --> 00:43:32.843 align:middle line:84% I know that from 'teach, teacher.'" 00:43:32.843 --> 00:43:36.246 align:middle line:84% And so they made up verbs that didn't exist before, 00:43:36.246 --> 00:43:40.784 align:middle line:84% like "sculpt," and "beg," and swindle by "removing" 00:43:40.784 --> 00:43:44.989 align:middle line:84% the "-er," basically, which hadn't originally been added. 00:43:44.989 --> 00:43:46.624 align:middle line:90% Similar thing with "pea." 00:43:46.624 --> 00:43:51.362 align:middle line:84% So originally, "pease" was a mass noun. 00:43:51.362 --> 00:43:57.635 align:middle line:84% It referred to this group of small, little, round, green 00:43:57.635 --> 00:43:59.403 align:middle line:84% things that you could eat lots of. 00:43:59.403 --> 00:44:00.938 align:middle line:90% So "pease" was a mass noun. 00:44:00.938 --> 00:44:03.841 align:middle line:84% It was like "water," or "sand," or "ketchup." 00:44:03.841 --> 00:44:08.379 align:middle line:84% But it happened to end in "-s," so it looks like a plural. 00:44:08.379 --> 00:44:10.114 align:middle line:84% And it refers to something that you 00:44:10.114 --> 00:44:13.017 align:middle line:84% can divide into lots of-- there are the individual little, 00:44:13.017 --> 00:44:14.251 align:middle line:90% round, green things. 00:44:14.251 --> 00:44:17.021 align:middle line:84% And so people made up a singular "pea." 00:44:17.021 --> 00:44:18.355 align:middle line:90% And that's where that came from. 00:44:18.355 --> 00:44:21.330 align:middle line:84% But originally, the word that we get from old English 00:44:21.330 --> 00:44:21.925 align:middle line:90% is "pease." 00:44:21.925 --> 00:44:25.963 align:middle line:84% And it was originally not a plural. 00:44:25.963 --> 00:44:28.565 align:middle line:84% People reinterpreted it as a plural. 00:44:28.565 --> 00:44:33.537 align:middle line:84% So our mental dictionary, our lexicon, 00:44:33.537 --> 00:44:36.306 align:middle line:84% seems to have these things, these parts of words. 00:44:36.306 --> 00:44:40.744 align:middle line:84% And in fact, so we can use them on unfamiliar words. 00:44:40.744 --> 00:44:44.014 align:middle line:84% And we seem to be hungry to create them in places 00:44:44.014 --> 00:44:47.184 align:middle line:84% where there's any suggestion that a word could 00:44:47.184 --> 00:44:49.353 align:middle line:90% be divided into parts. 00:44:49.353 --> 00:44:52.149 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:44:52.149 --> 00:44:53.857 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: When you use the word "lexicon," 00:44:53.857 --> 00:44:56.960 align:middle line:84% do we think of it as a dictionary of words 00:44:56.960 --> 00:44:57.528 align:middle line:90% and workings? 00:44:57.528 --> 00:45:00.230 align:middle line:84% Or are we talking about the rules as well? 00:45:00.230 --> 00:45:02.533 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: So it's day two. 00:45:02.533 --> 00:45:05.202 align:middle line:84% It's not too clear yet what we're talking about, is it? 00:45:05.202 --> 00:45:07.037 align:middle line:84% But I think right now, all we have 00:45:07.037 --> 00:45:10.059 align:middle line:84% to be talking about is a list of the words and the morphemes. 00:45:10.059 --> 00:45:12.309 align:middle line:84% And you're absolutely right-- another thing that we'll 00:45:12.309 --> 00:45:15.179 align:middle line:84% have to have is a set of rules for how those things combine. 00:45:15.179 --> 00:45:17.881 align:middle line:84% Actually, that's what we're going to move on to next. 00:45:17.881 --> 00:45:20.884 align:middle line:90% That's absolutely right. 00:45:20.884 --> 00:45:23.287 align:middle line:84% So for example, on day one, we talked about the fact 00:45:23.287 --> 00:45:25.889 align:middle line:84% that the S has different pronunciations depending 00:45:25.889 --> 00:45:27.491 align:middle line:90% on what you're attaching it to. 00:45:27.491 --> 00:45:30.794 align:middle line:84% We want to have an account of that kind of thing. 00:45:30.794 --> 00:45:33.764 align:middle line:84% Sometimes it sounds like an S and sometimes like a Z. 00:45:33.764 --> 00:45:36.467 align:middle line:84% Sometimes, there are nouns that don't take an S at all. 00:45:36.467 --> 00:45:38.736 align:middle line:90% So the plural of "ox" is "oxen." 00:45:38.736 --> 00:45:40.170 align:middle line:84% I'll have to talk about that, too. 00:45:40.170 --> 00:45:41.739 align:middle line:90% Good question. 00:45:41.739 --> 00:45:44.308 align:middle line:90% Other questions about this? 00:45:44.308 --> 00:45:47.311 align:middle line:84% These are all reasons to make you take seriously the idea 00:45:47.311 --> 00:45:49.747 align:middle line:84% that words can be divided into parts, 00:45:49.747 --> 00:45:53.517 align:middle line:84% that "cats" consists of "cat" plus a suffix, both of which 00:45:53.517 --> 00:45:56.053 align:middle line:84% are maybe listed in the set of things 00:45:56.053 --> 00:45:59.289 align:middle line:84% that you know in the lexicon, this list of things 00:45:59.289 --> 00:46:03.961 align:middle line:90% you know about your language. 00:46:03.961 --> 00:46:07.231 align:middle line:90% OK, good. 00:46:07.231 --> 00:46:09.133 align:middle line:84% So now, some terminology, including 00:46:09.133 --> 00:46:15.372 align:middle line:84% a word that Raquel just said, so get all of you caught up. 00:46:15.372 --> 00:46:18.842 align:middle line:84% Words like "cats," or "dogs," or "atrocity," or "culpable," 00:46:18.842 --> 00:46:21.945 align:middle line:84% or "unworthy"-- we're saying these are 00:46:21.945 --> 00:46:23.781 align:middle line:90% words that have multiple parts. 00:46:23.781 --> 00:46:25.949 align:middle line:84% We can productively divide them and it's 00:46:25.949 --> 00:46:29.086 align:middle line:84% useful to divide them into parts. 00:46:29.086 --> 00:46:32.256 align:middle line:84% Any part of a word, these parts of words, 00:46:32.256 --> 00:46:34.024 align:middle line:90% are what are called morphemes. 00:46:34.024 --> 00:46:35.692 align:middle line:90% So "cat" is a morpheme. 00:46:35.692 --> 00:46:36.894 align:middle line:90% "Dog" is a morpheme. 00:46:36.894 --> 00:46:39.029 align:middle line:90% "-s" is a morphine. 00:46:39.029 --> 00:46:42.833 align:middle line:84% So is "atroc-" and "-ity" in "atrocity." 00:46:42.833 --> 00:46:44.067 align:middle line:90% Those are all morphemes. 00:46:44.067 --> 00:46:49.940 align:middle line:84% So that's the name for these parts of words combined. 00:46:49.940 --> 00:46:53.610 align:middle line:84% People sometimes distinguish the root, 00:46:53.610 --> 00:46:59.249 align:middle line:84% which is the thing to which prefixes or suffixes are added, 00:46:59.249 --> 00:47:03.590 align:middle line:84% things like "cat," and "dog," and "culp-," and "worth-," 00:47:03.590 --> 00:47:04.555 align:middle line:90% and "atroc-." 00:47:04.555 --> 00:47:07.468 align:middle line:90% Those are all roots. 00:47:07.468 --> 00:47:08.926 align:middle line:84% So they are the things to which you 00:47:08.926 --> 00:47:11.995 align:middle line:84% are going to add suffixes or prefixes, 00:47:11.995 --> 00:47:14.031 align:middle line:90% other kinds of things. 00:47:14.031 --> 00:47:18.165 align:middle line:84% And then "-s" and "-ity" and "-able" and "un-," 00:47:18.165 --> 00:47:20.003 align:middle line:90% those are all affixes. 00:47:20.003 --> 00:47:22.272 align:middle line:84% These are all-- most of them are suffixes. 00:47:22.272 --> 00:47:23.707 align:middle line:90% One of them is a prefix. 00:47:23.707 --> 00:47:29.179 align:middle line:84% But "affix" is a general term for these things 00:47:29.179 --> 00:47:33.843 align:middle line:90% that you add to roots. 00:47:33.843 --> 00:47:35.385 align:middle line:84% And then there's one last distinction 00:47:35.385 --> 00:47:38.422 align:middle line:84% to draw, which is between things that are free 00:47:38.422 --> 00:47:40.123 align:middle line:90% and things that are bound. 00:47:40.123 --> 00:47:43.594 align:middle line:84% So to say that a morpheme is free 00:47:43.594 --> 00:47:45.829 align:middle line:84% is to say that you don't have to add anything to it. 00:47:45.829 --> 00:47:47.464 align:middle line:90% It can be a word by itself. 00:47:47.464 --> 00:47:50.667 align:middle line:90% So "cat" is a free morpheme. 00:47:50.667 --> 00:47:53.503 align:middle line:90% "-s" is a bound morpheme. 00:47:53.503 --> 00:47:57.341 align:middle line:90% So is "culp-" and "atroc-." 00:47:57.341 --> 00:48:01.545 align:middle line:84% So "culp" isn't a word, "culpable" is a word. 00:48:01.545 --> 00:48:06.416 align:middle line:84% "culp-" is a root, so it's a bound root. 00:48:06.416 --> 00:48:08.652 align:middle line:84% You need to add a suffix to it, but it's something 00:48:08.652 --> 00:48:10.787 align:middle line:90% to which you add suffixes. 00:48:10.787 --> 00:48:11.555 align:middle line:90% Yes. 00:48:11.555 --> 00:48:14.224 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: Are all three morphemes in English? 00:48:14.224 --> 00:48:20.597 align:middle line:90% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: Yes. 00:48:20.597 --> 00:48:21.899 align:middle line:90% Yeah, good question. 00:48:21.899 --> 00:48:22.733 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:48:22.733 --> 00:48:34.229 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: That doesn't necessarily apply [INAUDIBLE] 00:48:34.229 --> 00:48:35.812 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: Yeah, so clitics-- 00:48:35.812 --> 00:48:37.514 align:middle line:84% I wonder whether we will manage to talk 00:48:37.514 --> 00:48:38.515 align:middle line:90% about clitics seriously. 00:48:38.515 --> 00:48:39.449 align:middle line:90% But yes, you're right. 00:48:39.449 --> 00:48:41.685 align:middle line:84% There's another kind of thing-- "clitic" 00:48:41.685 --> 00:48:44.700 align:middle line:84% is this name for these things-- that needs to be attached 00:48:44.700 --> 00:48:48.392 align:middle line:90% to something else. 00:48:48.392 --> 00:48:52.829 align:middle line:90% Yes, that's a very good point. 00:48:52.829 --> 00:48:55.332 align:middle line:90% Any questions? 00:48:55.332 --> 00:48:56.767 align:middle line:90% So this is just all terminology. 00:48:56.767 --> 00:49:00.003 align:middle line:84% It's terminology you will hear me use, probably. 00:49:00.003 --> 00:49:03.340 align:middle line:84% A word can consist of just one morpheme, like "cat" or "dog." 00:49:03.340 --> 00:49:06.223 align:middle line:84% And then there are other words, like "cats" 00:49:06.223 --> 00:49:13.850 align:middle line:84% or "industrialization," that consist of multiple morphemes. 00:49:13.850 --> 00:49:16.520 align:middle line:84% And then one other distinction that people draw-- 00:49:16.520 --> 00:49:19.957 align:middle line:84% and I hope that nobody will ask me to define this one very 00:49:19.957 --> 00:49:23.694 align:middle line:84% carefully, because it's a quick and dirty distinction people 00:49:23.694 --> 00:49:24.194 align:middle line:90% draw. 00:49:24.194 --> 00:49:29.166 align:middle line:84% I promise that I will never harm you 00:49:29.166 --> 00:49:31.902 align:middle line:90% in any way for misusing this. 00:49:31.902 --> 00:49:35.005 align:middle line:84% So you will not get counted off on problem sets for this. 00:49:35.005 --> 00:49:37.174 align:middle line:84% People sometimes draw a distinction between what are 00:49:37.174 --> 00:49:41.011 align:middle line:84% called "open-class morphemes" and "closed-class morphemes." 00:49:41.011 --> 00:49:43.347 align:middle line:84% The idea is open-class morphemes are 00:49:43.347 --> 00:49:45.949 align:middle line:84% supposed to be morphemes for which 00:49:45.949 --> 00:49:48.385 align:middle line:90% you could make up another one. 00:49:48.385 --> 00:49:51.722 align:middle line:84% You could add to the class of open-class morphemes, that's 00:49:51.722 --> 00:49:52.823 align:middle line:90% why it's called open. 00:49:52.823 --> 00:49:59.196 align:middle line:84% So there are nouns like "xerox" and "laser" that are new nouns. 00:49:59.196 --> 00:50:03.100 align:middle line:84% They came into the language comparatively recently. 00:50:03.100 --> 00:50:06.236 align:middle line:84% When you discover a new thing, you come up with a name for it, 00:50:06.236 --> 00:50:10.173 align:middle line:84% and that's a new noun, you add it to the open class of nouns. 00:50:10.173 --> 00:50:12.976 align:middle line:84% Or verbs-- there are verbs like "google" and "fax," 00:50:12.976 --> 00:50:17.075 align:middle line:84% or adjectives like "cromulent," that have been added 00:50:17.075 --> 00:50:19.182 align:middle line:84% to the language comparatively recently, 00:50:19.182 --> 00:50:23.338 align:middle line:84% as opposed to morphemes like "in," or "at," or "on"-- 00:50:23.338 --> 00:50:28.624 align:middle line:84% prepositions where it's unclear that you can make up a new 00:50:28.624 --> 00:50:32.102 align:middle line:84% preposition or a new determiner, a word like 00:50:32.102 --> 00:50:35.065 align:middle line:84% "the" or "an," or a new auxiliary, a word like "will" 00:50:35.065 --> 00:50:40.971 align:middle line:84% or "has," in "The professor has slipped on a banana peel." 00:50:40.971 --> 00:50:44.074 align:middle line:90% You have that kind of "has." 00:50:44.074 --> 00:50:45.976 align:middle line:84% We don't seem to be able to do that. 00:50:45.976 --> 00:50:51.715 align:middle line:84% Now, we invented new nouns like "xerox" and "laser," 00:50:51.715 --> 00:50:53.517 align:middle line:84% or new verbs like "google" and "fax," 00:50:53.517 --> 00:50:58.855 align:middle line:84% because technology created new things that we could do. 00:50:58.855 --> 00:51:03.293 align:middle line:84% I suppose you could imagine a future world in which, say, 00:51:03.293 --> 00:51:05.562 align:middle line:84% time travel suddenly becomes available. 00:51:05.562 --> 00:51:07.931 align:middle line:84% And then it would be useful to have an auxiliary that 00:51:07.931 --> 00:51:11.835 align:middle line:84% means something like "happened in the past from our viewpoint, 00:51:11.835 --> 00:51:14.171 align:middle line:84% but from the future from someone else's viewpoint," 00:51:14.171 --> 00:51:16.773 align:middle line:90% or something like that. 00:51:16.773 --> 00:51:18.756 align:middle line:84% It's unclear whether, when that happens, 00:51:18.756 --> 00:51:21.458 align:middle line:84% we will just do that-- make up those auxiliaries-- 00:51:21.458 --> 00:51:23.659 align:middle line:84% or whether we will be neurologically 00:51:23.659 --> 00:51:26.016 align:middle line:84% unable to because, well, auxiliaries 00:51:26.016 --> 00:51:27.317 align:middle line:90% are closed-class morphemes. 00:51:27.317 --> 00:51:29.686 align:middle line:90% And you can't make more. 00:51:29.686 --> 00:51:31.188 align:middle line:84% Interesting open question that we'll 00:51:31.188 --> 00:51:36.460 align:middle line:90% try not to talk about anymore. 00:51:36.460 --> 00:51:40.997 align:middle line:90% All terminology. 00:51:40.997 --> 00:51:43.600 align:middle line:84% One piece of literary evidence for the open and closed 00:51:43.600 --> 00:51:46.603 align:middle line:84% distinction-- this is a point that my colleague, 00:51:46.603 --> 00:51:49.005 align:middle line:84% David Pesetsky likes to make when he teaches this class. 00:51:49.005 --> 00:51:50.841 align:middle line:90% It's a nice point. 00:51:50.841 --> 00:51:56.012 align:middle line:84% The poem "Jabberwocky" from Alice in Wonderland, 00:51:56.012 --> 00:51:59.649 align:middle line:84% Alice Through the Looking Glass, is a poem 00:51:59.649 --> 00:52:02.719 align:middle line:90% which is tricky to understand. 00:52:02.719 --> 00:52:05.055 align:middle line:84% So many of the words in it have been 00:52:05.055 --> 00:52:08.125 align:middle line:90% replaced by nonsense words. 00:52:08.125 --> 00:52:09.583 align:middle line:84% But crucially, the words that have 00:52:09.583 --> 00:52:12.019 align:middle line:84% been replaced by nonsense words-- they're 00:52:12.019 --> 00:52:14.197 align:middle line:90% all open-class words. 00:52:14.197 --> 00:52:17.467 align:middle line:84% So "'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves did gyre (HARD G) 00:52:17.467 --> 00:52:21.171 align:middle line:84% and gimble in the-- gyre (SOFT G) and gimble in the wabe," 00:52:21.171 --> 00:52:23.940 align:middle line:84% those blue things, they're all open class. 00:52:23.940 --> 00:52:28.111 align:middle line:84% They're nouns, and verbs, and adjectives, 00:52:28.111 --> 00:52:31.014 align:middle line:84% so adjectives like "brillig" and "slithy," 00:52:31.014 --> 00:52:33.519 align:middle line:84% nouns like "toves" and "wabe," and verbs 00:52:33.519 --> 00:52:37.587 align:middle line:90% like "gyre" and "gimble." 00:52:37.587 --> 00:52:44.227 align:middle line:84% And the poem only works because we're open to the possibility 00:52:44.227 --> 00:52:47.297 align:middle line:84% that there are open-class nouns, and verbs, and adjectives out 00:52:47.297 --> 00:52:51.935 align:middle line:84% there that we don't know, so that's the sense in which we 00:52:51.935 --> 00:52:53.697 align:middle line:90% can make sense of this poem. 00:52:53.697 --> 00:52:55.739 align:middle line:84% And you can tell that these are nouns, and verbs, 00:52:55.739 --> 00:52:56.373 align:middle line:90% and adjectives. 00:52:56.373 --> 00:52:58.141 align:middle line:90% Like "toves" looks plural. 00:52:58.141 --> 00:53:01.678 align:middle line:84% It ends in that same "-s" that we get in "cats," and so on. 00:53:01.678 --> 00:53:03.613 align:middle line:84% If you tried to do "Jabberwocky," 00:53:03.613 --> 00:53:07.717 align:middle line:84% but replace the closed-class morphemes with nonsense-- 00:53:07.717 --> 00:53:13.709 align:middle line:84% so I tried to do that here-- it's 00:53:13.709 --> 00:53:17.060 align:middle line:84% also difficult to understand, but in a different way. 00:53:17.060 --> 00:53:19.396 align:middle line:84% So "Jabberwocky," you read it and you 00:53:19.396 --> 00:53:22.065 align:middle line:84% think, oh, my vocabulary must be too small. 00:53:22.065 --> 00:53:24.367 align:middle line:84% I wish I knew what these nouns were. 00:53:24.367 --> 00:53:28.071 align:middle line:84% Whereas this thing, you just think, oh, the professor 00:53:28.071 --> 00:53:30.874 align:middle line:84% has some type of neurological problem. 00:53:30.874 --> 00:53:32.175 align:middle line:90% Someone should call the police. 00:53:32.175 --> 00:53:34.945 align:middle line:84% Something terrible has just happened. 00:53:34.945 --> 00:53:36.479 align:middle line:84% I won't even try to read it aloud. 00:53:36.479 --> 00:53:38.281 align:middle line:90% It would be too upsetting. 00:53:38.281 --> 00:53:41.064 align:middle line:84% So all I've done here is to try to go through-- so all 00:53:41.064 --> 00:53:43.253 align:middle line:84% of the adjectives, and nouns, and verbs-- there 00:53:43.253 --> 00:53:48.758 align:middle line:84% are real ones, and I've just replaced the auxiliaries, 00:53:48.758 --> 00:53:51.094 align:middle line:84% and the word for and, and the prepositions, 00:53:51.094 --> 00:53:51.995 align:middle line:90% and the terminators. 00:53:51.995 --> 00:53:53.763 align:middle line:84% I've replaced those with nonsense. 00:53:53.763 --> 00:53:56.199 align:middle line:84% And the result of that is disturbing. 00:53:56.199 --> 00:53:58.835 align:middle line:84% It's not the same as "Jabberwocky." 00:53:58.835 --> 00:54:00.837 align:middle line:84% That's a reason to take seriously the idea 00:54:00.837 --> 00:54:03.273 align:middle line:84% that open-class and closed-class morphemes-- 00:54:03.273 --> 00:54:06.243 align:middle line:84% they're different in a way that something in our brain 00:54:06.243 --> 00:54:12.048 align:middle line:90% cares about deeply. 00:54:12.048 --> 00:54:12.983 align:middle line:90% OK, cool. 00:54:12.983 --> 00:54:15.685 align:middle line:90% So what's in our lexicon? 00:54:15.685 --> 00:54:21.024 align:middle line:84% We have these entries that have information about sound. 00:54:21.024 --> 00:54:22.559 align:middle line:90% So here's a word. 00:54:22.559 --> 00:54:24.861 align:middle line:90% It's pronounced "cat." 00:54:24.861 --> 00:54:28.665 align:middle line:84% We're going to talk later about how to talk carefully 00:54:28.665 --> 00:54:30.767 align:middle line:84% about how to pronounce words, like what exactly 00:54:30.767 --> 00:54:33.870 align:middle line:84% you're saying when you say that it's pronounced "cat." 00:54:33.870 --> 00:54:36.673 align:middle line:84% But yeah, so one of the things that's known about this word 00:54:36.673 --> 00:54:37.941 align:middle line:90% is that it's pronounced "cat." 00:54:37.941 --> 00:54:40.343 align:middle line:84% Something about its meaning-- whatever. 00:54:40.343 --> 00:54:41.978 align:middle line:84% I showed you a picture of a cat before. 00:54:41.978 --> 00:54:46.683 align:middle line:84% Maybe that was better than what I've done here. 00:54:46.683 --> 00:54:48.135 align:middle line:84% And then the kinds of information 00:54:48.135 --> 00:54:49.552 align:middle line:84% that I've been talking about-- you 00:54:49.552 --> 00:54:53.523 align:middle line:84% have to list whether the morpheme is bound or free. 00:54:53.523 --> 00:54:55.225 align:middle line:84% Because that's not the kind of thing 00:54:55.225 --> 00:54:58.695 align:middle line:84% that is uniform across languages, necessarily. 00:54:58.695 --> 00:55:02.232 align:middle line:84% So English, for example-- we've now several times 00:55:02.232 --> 00:55:06.002 align:middle line:84% said that the plural morpheme is a suffix, an affix. 00:55:06.002 --> 00:55:07.237 align:middle line:90% It's a bound morpheme. 00:55:07.237 --> 00:55:09.572 align:middle line:84% It needs to be attached to something. 00:55:09.572 --> 00:55:13.247 align:middle line:84% In Tagalog, the plural morpheme is pronounced "mga." 00:55:13.247 --> 00:55:16.012 align:middle line:84% It's the boldfaced morpheme there. 00:55:16.012 --> 00:55:17.547 align:middle line:90% And it's not a bound morpheme. 00:55:17.547 --> 00:55:20.317 align:middle line:84% It's a freestanding word, so it doesn't have 00:55:20.317 --> 00:55:21.584 align:middle line:90% to be attached to anything. 00:55:21.584 --> 00:55:24.054 align:middle line:84% So the way you say "big bananas" in Tagalog 00:55:24.054 --> 00:55:25.822 align:middle line:90% is "mga malalaking saging." 00:55:25.822 --> 00:55:27.424 align:middle line:90% "Mga" is this freestanding word. 00:55:27.424 --> 00:55:28.992 align:middle line:84% It's at the beginning of that phrase. 00:55:28.992 --> 00:55:31.795 align:middle line:84% It doesn't have to be anywhere near the word for banana. 00:55:31.795 --> 00:55:34.130 align:middle line:84% So it's not attached to anything. 00:55:34.130 --> 00:55:37.534 align:middle line:84% Tagalog orthography is mostly fairly straightforward. 00:55:37.534 --> 00:55:39.202 align:middle line:84% This is one of the two words in Tagalog 00:55:39.202 --> 00:55:41.856 align:middle line:84% that's not spelled more or less the way it's pronounced. 00:55:41.856 --> 00:55:43.106 align:middle line:90% So that's the plural morpheme. 00:55:43.106 --> 00:55:49.612 align:middle line:84% It's pronounced "manga," this thing that's spelled M-G-A. 00:55:49.612 --> 00:55:53.016 align:middle line:84% So you need to-- for a lexical entry, 00:55:53.016 --> 00:55:54.851 align:middle line:84% a word that's in your lexicon, we're 00:55:54.851 --> 00:55:57.287 align:middle line:84% going to need to list how it's pronounced, what it means, 00:55:57.287 --> 00:55:58.988 align:middle line:90% whether it's bound or free. 00:55:58.988 --> 00:56:01.885 align:middle line:84% Here's another example of languages varying 00:56:01.885 --> 00:56:03.927 align:middle line:84% with respect to whether things are bound or free. 00:56:03.927 --> 00:56:06.863 align:middle line:84% In English, the word "friend" is a free morpheme. 00:56:06.863 --> 00:56:10.600 align:middle line:84% In Passamaquoddy, the word for "friend" is a bound morpheme. 00:56:10.600 --> 00:56:12.235 align:middle line:84% It needs to be attached to something. 00:56:12.235 --> 00:56:14.604 align:middle line:84% So in English, you say, "my friend." 00:56:14.604 --> 00:56:17.307 align:middle line:84% The Passamaquoddy word for "my friend" is "itap." 00:56:17.307 --> 00:56:20.777 align:middle line:84% There isn't a Passamaquoddy word "itap," 00:56:20.777 --> 00:56:24.114 align:middle line:84% so you have to add a prefix to the word for "friend" 00:56:24.114 --> 00:56:28.418 align:middle line:84% in Passamaquoddy, indicating whose friend it is. 00:56:28.418 --> 00:56:30.954 align:middle line:84% It can't just be a word by itself. 00:56:30.954 --> 00:56:33.390 align:middle line:84% So it's bound, needs to be attached to something else. 00:56:33.390 --> 00:56:35.892 align:middle line:90% It's not a complete word. 00:56:35.892 --> 00:56:38.728 align:middle line:84% So the lexicon of a given language 00:56:38.728 --> 00:56:40.730 align:middle line:84% has to indicate whether particular morphemes are 00:56:40.730 --> 00:56:44.033 align:middle line:90% bound or free. 00:56:44.033 --> 00:56:45.935 align:middle line:84% It has to indicate whether morphemes 00:56:45.935 --> 00:56:47.637 align:middle line:90% are prefixes or suffixes. 00:56:47.637 --> 00:56:49.672 align:middle line:84% So for example, English has suffixes 00:56:49.672 --> 00:56:51.141 align:middle line:90% indicating the past tense. 00:56:51.141 --> 00:56:52.742 align:middle line:84% So we have the verb "dance," and it 00:56:52.742 --> 00:56:57.447 align:middle line:84% has a past tense "danced," where we add this D to make it past. 00:56:57.447 --> 00:57:00.850 align:middle line:84% Lardil has prefixes that indicate that verbs 00:57:00.850 --> 00:57:01.785 align:middle line:90% are in the past tense. 00:57:01.785 --> 00:57:03.286 align:middle line:84% So the verb "to dance" is "luuli," 00:57:03.286 --> 00:57:04.754 align:middle line:84% and the past tense is "yuud-luuli," 00:57:04.754 --> 00:57:08.391 align:middle line:84% so there's a prefix "yuud-" that you add to the verb to make it 00:57:08.391 --> 00:57:10.193 align:middle line:90% past. 00:57:10.193 --> 00:57:13.163 align:middle line:84% So you have to indicate whether morphemes are bound or free, 00:57:13.163 --> 00:57:16.166 align:middle line:84% whether they're prefixes, or suffixes, or something else. 00:57:16.166 --> 00:57:19.736 align:middle line:84% So languages can vary with respect to what kind of affixes 00:57:19.736 --> 00:57:22.939 align:middle line:84% they have, and where they go, and what they mean. 00:57:22.939 --> 00:57:26.910 align:middle line:84% And morphology is the study of the rules governing 00:57:26.910 --> 00:57:28.411 align:middle line:90% this kind of variability. 00:57:28.411 --> 00:57:30.713 align:middle line:84% And that's what we're going to start the semester with, 00:57:30.713 --> 00:57:33.950 align:middle line:84% is spending some time studying morphology. 00:57:33.950 --> 00:57:36.052 align:middle line:84% Part of the work of morphology is 00:57:36.052 --> 00:57:39.556 align:middle line:84% doing morphological analysis of languages that are not 00:57:39.556 --> 00:57:43.726 align:middle line:84% familiar, so looking at data sets 00:57:43.726 --> 00:57:46.729 align:middle line:84% and trying to piece together what all the morphemes are, 00:57:46.729 --> 00:57:48.832 align:middle line:84% trying to separate out the morphemes 00:57:48.832 --> 00:57:51.768 align:middle line:84% and figure out what they all mean. 00:57:51.768 --> 00:57:54.404 align:middle line:84% You will surely be given problem sets in which you 00:57:54.404 --> 00:57:55.982 align:middle line:90% are asked to do this. 00:57:55.982 --> 00:57:58.357 align:middle line:84% So I wanted-- I think this is what I'm doing next-- yeah, 00:57:58.357 --> 00:58:01.110 align:middle line:84% I wanted to show you a data set of the kind 00:58:01.110 --> 00:58:03.613 align:middle line:84% that we might ask you to deal with. 00:58:03.613 --> 00:58:06.382 align:middle line:84% And let's work through it together 00:58:06.382 --> 00:58:09.385 align:middle line:84% and try to figure out what the different morphemes are. 00:58:09.385 --> 00:58:11.855 align:middle line:84% So here are a bunch of verbs in Swahili. 00:58:11.855 --> 00:58:15.124 align:middle line:90% Anybody speak Swahili? 00:58:15.124 --> 00:58:15.625 align:middle line:90% Kind of? 00:58:15.625 --> 00:58:16.359 align:middle line:90% Sort of? 00:58:16.359 --> 00:58:19.762 align:middle line:84% Try to suppress your knowledge of Swahili for a second. 00:58:19.762 --> 00:58:24.033 align:middle line:84% Nobody ask her what the answers are. 00:58:24.033 --> 00:58:26.469 align:middle line:84% Here are a bunch of verbs in Swahili. 00:58:26.469 --> 00:58:28.938 align:middle line:84% The first thing you want to do is look through all of these 00:58:28.938 --> 00:58:33.443 align:middle line:84% and look for words that have something in common 00:58:33.443 --> 00:58:36.579 align:middle line:84% in their meaning, and also seem-- 00:58:36.579 --> 00:58:38.882 align:middle line:84% and then try to figure out which part of the word 00:58:38.882 --> 00:58:43.553 align:middle line:84% is the morpheme that has that meaning. 00:58:43.553 --> 00:58:45.722 align:middle line:84% This is where I wish it was easier 00:58:45.722 --> 00:58:47.357 align:middle line:84% to show you things on a blackboard. 00:58:47.357 --> 00:58:52.996 align:middle line:84% But does anybody see a morpheme in this list? 00:58:52.996 --> 00:58:54.264 align:middle line:90% Oh, many people see morphemes. 00:58:54.264 --> 00:58:54.797 align:middle line:90% Yes. 00:58:54.797 --> 00:58:56.359 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: "ni" tends to indicate "I." 00:58:56.359 --> 00:58:58.401 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: "ni" looks like it means "I." 00:58:58.401 --> 00:59:01.471 align:middle line:84% So we've got "ni" in the first one, "ni" in the third one, 00:59:01.471 --> 00:59:04.741 align:middle line:84% "ni" in the fourth one, "ni" in "I will get it." 00:59:04.741 --> 00:59:06.142 align:middle line:90% Yeah, a whole bunch of "ni"s. 00:59:06.142 --> 00:59:07.544 align:middle line:90% Yeah, sounds good. 00:59:07.544 --> 00:59:09.245 align:middle line:90% Yes. 00:59:09.245 --> 00:59:11.073 align:middle line:90% STUDENT: [INAUDIBLE]. 00:59:11.073 --> 00:59:12.448 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: Say it again. 00:59:12.448 --> 00:59:14.678 align:middle line:90% STUDENT: [INAUDIBLE]. 00:59:14.678 --> 00:59:16.553 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: Oh, yes, the verb "got"-- 00:59:16.553 --> 00:59:19.522 align:middle line:84% that's absolutely right-- looks like it's "pata." 00:59:19.522 --> 00:59:21.925 align:middle line:84% So all of the verbs that have "got" 00:59:21.925 --> 00:59:24.093 align:middle line:84% as part of their meaning-- if you look through this, 00:59:24.093 --> 00:59:27.430 align:middle line:84% I think there are only two verbs here-- there's "got" 00:59:27.430 --> 00:59:28.831 align:middle line:90% and there's "hit." 00:59:28.831 --> 00:59:30.667 align:middle line:84% And "got" looks like it's "pata." 00:59:30.667 --> 00:59:32.035 align:middle line:90% What's "hit?" 00:59:32.035 --> 00:59:33.236 align:middle line:90% STUDENT: "piga." 00:59:33.236 --> 00:59:34.938 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: "piga," yeah, good. 00:59:34.938 --> 00:59:36.839 align:middle line:90% Yes. 00:59:36.839 --> 00:59:39.642 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: Actually, it seems like "pata" is more [INAUDIBLE].... 00:59:39.642 --> 00:59:46.601 align:middle line:84% And then there's "li" versus [INAUDIBLE].... 00:59:46.601 --> 00:59:48.184 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: So there's a "li." 00:59:48.184 --> 00:59:49.419 align:middle line:90% So you're seeing a "li." 00:59:49.419 --> 00:59:50.687 align:middle line:90% Where are you seeing a "li"? 00:59:50.687 --> 00:59:54.857 align:middle line:90% STUDENT: [INAUDIBLE]. 00:59:54.857 --> 00:59:59.041 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: So you get "nilipata" for "I got" 00:59:59.041 --> 01:00:03.614 align:middle line:84% and "nita"-- do we see nitapaka or nita-- oh, 01:00:03.614 --> 01:00:07.103 align:middle line:84% we've got "nitakipata" for "I will get it," don't we? 01:00:07.103 --> 01:00:08.404 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 01:00:08.404 --> 01:00:10.373 align:middle line:90% Sounds good. 01:00:10.373 --> 01:00:12.241 align:middle line:84% Let me move forward on the slide. 01:00:12.241 --> 01:00:13.142 align:middle line:90% So this is great. 01:00:13.142 --> 01:00:15.278 align:middle line:84% People are doing exactly what you want to do. 01:00:15.278 --> 01:00:16.379 align:middle line:84% You can look through all of this stuff, 01:00:16.379 --> 01:00:18.147 align:middle line:84% look for patterns that you seem to see, 01:00:18.147 --> 01:00:23.052 align:middle line:84% try to isolate those patterns to figure out what's going on. 01:00:23.052 --> 01:00:26.456 align:middle line:84% So one way to do this would be to start by finding the verb 01:00:26.456 --> 01:00:27.056 align:middle line:90% stems. 01:00:27.056 --> 01:00:29.959 align:middle line:84% I deliberately jumbled the presentation at the beginning, 01:00:29.959 --> 01:00:34.097 align:middle line:90% just put them in a random order. 01:00:34.097 --> 01:00:36.098 align:middle line:84% But one thing to do, and you guys 01:00:36.098 --> 01:00:38.746 align:middle line:84% didn't need me to do this for you-- you did it 01:00:38.746 --> 01:00:40.766 align:middle line:84% in your heads-- you make yourself a list of all 01:00:40.766 --> 01:00:42.380 align:middle line:84% the words that have "get" or "got" 01:00:42.380 --> 01:00:44.207 align:middle line:84% and all the words that have "hit." 01:00:44.207 --> 01:00:46.542 align:middle line:84% And then you would discover that "pata" 01:00:46.542 --> 01:00:51.047 align:middle line:84% is the one for "get" and "piga" is the one for "hit." 01:00:51.047 --> 01:00:56.486 align:middle line:84% And then maybe similarly, keep sorting them by their affixes. 01:00:56.486 --> 01:00:59.055 align:middle line:84% And if you kept doing that, you would discover that there was 01:00:59.055 --> 01:01:02.025 align:middle line:84% a subject prefix at the beginning that's either "ni-" 01:01:02.025 --> 01:01:04.160 align:middle line:90% or "u-" or "wa-." 01:01:04.160 --> 01:01:09.932 align:middle line:84% And then, that there is a "li-" prefix for past and a "ta-" 01:01:09.932 --> 01:01:14.270 align:middle line:84% prefix for future, and that there are also prefixes 01:01:14.270 --> 01:01:17.407 align:middle line:84% for the objects, "ki-" and "ku-" and "tu-" and "wa-." 01:01:17.407 --> 01:01:19.909 align:middle line:84% So if we kept doing what we were just doing, 01:01:19.909 --> 01:01:21.577 align:middle line:84% this is where we'd eventually end up. 01:01:21.577 --> 01:01:24.747 align:middle line:84% That's the analysis we would end up with. 01:01:24.747 --> 01:01:25.882 align:middle line:90% Is that clear? 01:01:25.882 --> 01:01:26.876 align:middle line:90% Does that make sense? 01:01:26.876 --> 01:01:28.584 align:middle line:84% That's what we would be asking you to do. 01:01:28.584 --> 01:01:30.987 align:middle line:84% We will surely ask you to do this on a problem set. 01:01:30.987 --> 01:01:33.589 align:middle line:84% So we'll give you a bunch of data, and say, go through this. 01:01:33.589 --> 01:01:35.224 align:middle line:90% Find all the morphemes. 01:01:35.224 --> 01:01:41.148 align:middle line:84% And that's the kind of thing we'd want you to do. 01:01:41.148 --> 01:01:42.565 align:middle line:84% If there's anybody who is secretly 01:01:42.565 --> 01:01:45.435 align:middle line:84% thinking to themselves, I have no idea what just happened, 01:01:45.435 --> 01:01:48.705 align:middle line:84% that made no sense to me at all-- don't panic. 01:01:48.705 --> 01:01:53.409 align:middle line:84% Send me email or talk to your TA during recitation. 01:01:53.409 --> 01:01:54.911 align:middle line:84% This is the kind of thing that we'll 01:01:54.911 --> 01:02:01.317 align:middle line:84% try to practice some before you have to do it for real. 01:02:01.317 --> 01:02:03.886 align:middle line:84% And then the thing to do-- test yourself. 01:02:03.886 --> 01:02:06.599 align:middle line:84% How do you say, "They will get us?" 01:02:06.599 --> 01:02:08.057 align:middle line:84% How do you say, "They will get us?" 01:02:08.057 --> 01:02:11.060 align:middle line:90% So that was Swahili. 01:02:11.060 --> 01:02:13.362 align:middle line:84% The Swahili involved some verbs that had 01:02:13.362 --> 01:02:14.797 align:middle line:90% a bunch of prefixes on them. 01:02:14.797 --> 01:02:18.000 align:middle line:84% And we have mostly been talking about prefixes and suffixes 01:02:18.000 --> 01:02:22.004 align:middle line:84% as the kinds of affixes that you add to things. 01:02:22.004 --> 01:02:24.807 align:middle line:84% Just as a warning, there are other kinds of affixes 01:02:24.807 --> 01:02:26.175 align:middle line:90% out there in the world. 01:02:26.175 --> 01:02:28.478 align:middle line:84% So I want to show you some of the other kinds of things 01:02:28.478 --> 01:02:30.279 align:middle line:90% that exist. 01:02:30.279 --> 01:02:33.015 align:middle line:84% Tagalog is kind of famous for having 01:02:33.015 --> 01:02:34.650 align:middle line:90% what are called "infixes." 01:02:34.650 --> 01:02:39.756 align:middle line:84% So it has these morphemes that sometimes 01:02:39.756 --> 01:02:42.825 align:middle line:90% go in the middle of words. 01:02:42.825 --> 01:02:45.828 align:middle line:84% We've got a bunch of Tagalog words. 01:02:45.828 --> 01:02:48.364 align:middle line:90% They're all in the past tense. 01:02:48.364 --> 01:02:52.802 align:middle line:84% They all contain a past tense morpheme. 01:02:52.802 --> 01:02:55.289 align:middle line:90% What's the past tense morpheme? 01:02:55.289 --> 01:02:55.872 align:middle line:90% STUDENT: "um." 01:02:55.872 --> 01:02:57.840 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: "um," yes, it's "um." 01:02:57.840 --> 01:02:58.508 align:middle line:90% That's right. 01:02:58.508 --> 01:02:59.642 align:middle line:90% So you see it. 01:02:59.642 --> 01:03:01.811 align:middle line:84% I think I highlighted it on the next slide. 01:03:01.811 --> 01:03:03.946 align:middle line:84% I hope I was smart enough to do that. 01:03:03.946 --> 01:03:05.615 align:middle line:90% Yes, there we go. 01:03:05.615 --> 01:03:07.917 align:middle line:90% So Tagalog has infixes. 01:03:07.917 --> 01:03:12.588 align:middle line:90% "um" goes-- where does it go? 01:03:12.588 --> 01:03:14.423 align:middle line:84% What's the rule for where it goes? 01:03:14.423 --> 01:03:14.957 align:middle line:90% Yes. 01:03:14.957 --> 01:03:25.193 align:middle line:90% STUDENT: [INAUDIBLE]. 01:03:25.193 --> 01:03:26.235 align:middle line:90% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: Yeah. 01:03:26.235 --> 01:03:27.236 align:middle line:90% STUDENT: Before the first vowel. 01:03:27.236 --> 01:03:28.638 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: Before the first vowel is another way 01:03:28.638 --> 01:03:30.072 align:middle line:90% to say the same thing, yeah. 01:03:30.072 --> 01:03:33.278 align:middle line:84% So in the words that start with vowels, 01:03:33.278 --> 01:03:35.611 align:middle line:84% it goes at the beginning because that's the first vowel. 01:03:35.611 --> 01:03:37.280 align:middle line:84% In the words that start with consonants, 01:03:37.280 --> 01:03:38.981 align:middle line:84% well, it goes before the first vowel. 01:03:38.981 --> 01:03:39.582 align:middle line:90% Exactly. 01:03:39.582 --> 01:03:42.151 align:middle line:90% Yeah, that works. 01:03:42.151 --> 01:03:44.020 align:middle line:90% Yeah, that works for Tagalog. 01:03:44.020 --> 01:03:49.325 align:middle line:84% Now, we have to be careful when we say what an infix is. 01:03:49.325 --> 01:03:52.189 align:middle line:84% So let me try to be careful about it. 01:03:52.189 --> 01:03:54.397 align:middle line:84% Because I think I was careless about it a second ago. 01:03:54.397 --> 01:03:55.898 align:middle line:90% So let me be careful. 01:03:55.898 --> 01:04:01.158 align:middle line:84% An infix is an affix for which the rules say something 01:04:01.158 --> 01:04:04.588 align:middle line:84% like-- the rules for where it goes-- say something like, put 01:04:04.588 --> 01:04:07.514 align:middle line:84% it before the first vowel, or put it 01:04:07.514 --> 01:04:11.097 align:middle line:84% after the first consonant, or sometimes, put it 01:04:11.097 --> 01:04:13.249 align:middle line:90% after the first syllable. 01:04:13.249 --> 01:04:16.519 align:middle line:84% A prefix is an affix for which the rule says, put it 01:04:16.519 --> 01:04:18.187 align:middle line:90% at the beginning. 01:04:18.187 --> 01:04:20.857 align:middle line:84% A suffix says, put it at the end. 01:04:20.857 --> 01:04:24.687 align:middle line:84% That's what infixes and prefixes and suffixes are. 01:04:24.687 --> 01:04:26.562 align:middle line:84% And I'm being careful about this because this 01:04:26.562 --> 01:04:28.998 align:middle line:84% is something people sometimes get confused about. 01:04:28.998 --> 01:04:32.568 align:middle line:84% A Swahili verb, like "I will get you there," 01:04:32.568 --> 01:04:35.805 align:middle line:84% doesn't have any infixes in it at all. 01:04:35.805 --> 01:04:39.850 align:middle line:84% It's got a verb, "pata," which is preceded by three prefixes, 01:04:39.850 --> 01:04:44.342 align:middle line:84% each of which was put-- the rule for "ku-" says, 01:04:44.342 --> 01:04:47.116 align:middle line:90% put me right before the verb. 01:04:47.116 --> 01:04:51.087 align:middle line:84% And the rule for "ta-" says, put me right before "ku-." 01:04:51.087 --> 01:04:53.689 align:middle line:84% And the rule for "ni-" says, put me at the beginning. 01:04:53.689 --> 01:04:55.858 align:middle line:90% Those are all prefixes. 01:04:55.858 --> 01:05:00.630 align:middle line:84% So none of them say, put me inside something else. 01:05:00.630 --> 01:05:01.898 align:middle line:90% None of those are infixes. 01:05:01.898 --> 01:05:02.932 align:middle line:90% They're all prefixes. 01:05:02.932 --> 01:05:06.002 align:middle line:84% And I'm saying that slowly and carefully because by the time 01:05:06.002 --> 01:05:08.271 align:middle line:84% you're done with all these prefixes, well, 01:05:08.271 --> 01:05:10.907 align:middle line:84% they aren't all at the beginning of the word. 01:05:10.907 --> 01:05:14.243 align:middle line:84% There's a string of prefixes, but they're all prefixes. 01:05:14.243 --> 01:05:16.078 align:middle line:84% Does that make sense, the distinction 01:05:16.078 --> 01:05:18.232 align:middle line:84% that I am drawing between prefixes that, 01:05:18.232 --> 01:05:20.149 align:middle line:84% through no fault of their own, find themselves 01:05:20.149 --> 01:05:21.584 align:middle line:84% not at the beginning of the word, 01:05:21.584 --> 01:05:24.687 align:middle line:84% and infixes which have rules like, put me 01:05:24.687 --> 01:05:25.788 align:middle line:90% before the first vowel. 01:05:25.788 --> 01:05:29.125 align:middle line:84% I don't care where the word begins. 01:05:29.125 --> 01:05:31.327 align:middle line:90% Does that make sense? 01:05:31.327 --> 01:05:33.629 align:middle line:84% That's how we distinguish these things from each other. 01:05:33.629 --> 01:05:35.131 align:middle line:84% And as I say, I'm going through it 01:05:35.131 --> 01:05:37.099 align:middle line:84% slowly because it's something that's confusing. 01:05:37.099 --> 01:05:39.068 align:middle line:84% It's something people get confused by. 01:05:39.068 --> 01:05:46.175 align:middle line:84% So if you're feeling confused, speak up. 01:05:46.175 --> 01:05:47.410 align:middle line:90% Tagalog has infixes. 01:05:47.410 --> 01:05:49.779 align:middle line:84% There are languages like Egyptian Arabic, 01:05:49.779 --> 01:05:54.650 align:middle line:84% not every Arabic, that have what are called templates. 01:05:54.650 --> 01:05:58.788 align:middle line:84% Here are a bunch of verbs in Egyptian Arabic involving 01:05:58.788 --> 01:06:01.757 align:middle line:90% "live" and "enter." 01:06:01.757 --> 01:06:05.161 align:middle line:90% Anybody here speak Arabic? 01:06:05.161 --> 01:06:07.496 align:middle line:84% Yeah, OK, so again, try to suppress your knowledge 01:06:07.496 --> 01:06:12.068 align:middle line:90% of Arabic for just a second. 01:06:12.068 --> 01:06:18.874 align:middle line:84% What do you think the morpheme is that means live? 01:06:18.874 --> 01:06:22.712 align:middle line:90% STUDENT: Maybe S, K, vowel, N. 01:06:22.712 --> 01:06:24.981 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: So what do those verbs all 01:06:24.981 --> 01:06:27.817 align:middle line:90% have in common, those forms? 01:06:27.817 --> 01:06:35.563 align:middle line:84% Yeah, they all have S-K-N. Or enter-- those all have D, X, L. 01:06:35.563 --> 01:06:40.606 align:middle line:90% Now X is that sound. 01:06:40.606 --> 01:06:42.898 align:middle line:84% This is something the Semitic languages are famous for. 01:06:42.898 --> 01:06:45.701 align:middle line:84% They have what are called triliteral roots, 01:06:45.701 --> 01:06:50.206 align:middle line:84% verbs for which the morpheme is just a string of consonants, 01:06:50.206 --> 01:06:51.607 align:middle line:90% and usually three. 01:06:51.607 --> 01:06:55.978 align:middle line:90% There are verbs that have two. 01:06:55.978 --> 01:06:57.860 align:middle line:84% And the other morphemes-- the morphemes 01:06:57.860 --> 01:07:01.747 align:middle line:84% that tell you things like tense, and who the subject is, 01:07:01.747 --> 01:07:05.830 align:middle line:84% and things like that-- are often vowels that you 01:07:05.830 --> 01:07:10.092 align:middle line:84% put in between the constants that make up the verb. 01:07:10.092 --> 01:07:14.096 align:middle line:84% It's called templatic morphology. 01:07:14.096 --> 01:07:19.035 align:middle line:84% So S-K-N is to live in, and D-X-L is to enter. 01:07:19.035 --> 01:07:22.971 align:middle line:84% And past tense with the third person subject is two a's. 01:07:22.971 --> 01:07:25.408 align:middle line:84% So you get verbs like "sakan" and "daxal." 01:07:25.408 --> 01:07:26.709 align:middle line:90% I'm probably saying them badly. 01:07:26.709 --> 01:07:28.377 align:middle line:84% Do you want to pronounce them for us? 01:07:28.377 --> 01:07:29.578 align:middle line:84% I'm probably not pronouncing them right. 01:07:29.578 --> 01:07:30.279 align:middle line:90% Can you pronounce them? 01:07:30.279 --> 01:07:30.880 align:middle line:90% STUDENT: [INAUDIBLE]. 01:07:30.880 --> 01:07:32.255 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: Say it again. 01:07:32.255 --> 01:07:35.651 align:middle line:90% STUDENT: [INAUDIBLE] 01:07:35.651 --> 01:07:37.053 align:middle line:90% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: Cool. 01:07:37.053 --> 01:07:42.058 align:middle line:84% Yeah, so that's how this type of morphology works. 01:07:42.058 --> 01:07:44.386 align:middle line:84% Tagalog again-- Tagalog has another kind 01:07:44.386 --> 01:07:45.594 align:middle line:90% of morphology, which is cool. 01:07:45.594 --> 01:07:47.229 align:middle line:90% It's called reduplication. 01:07:47.229 --> 01:07:49.865 align:middle line:84% This is how you form the future tense of certain types of verbs 01:07:49.865 --> 01:07:50.566 align:middle line:90% in Tagalog. 01:07:50.566 --> 01:07:53.169 align:middle line:84% So the future of "swim" is "lalangoy." 01:07:53.169 --> 01:07:55.204 align:middle line:90% The future of "eat" is "kakain." 01:07:55.204 --> 01:07:58.040 align:middle line:84% The future of "become tall" is tataas. 01:07:58.040 --> 01:08:02.311 align:middle line:84% What's the future morpheme in Tagalog? 01:08:02.311 --> 01:08:03.538 align:middle line:90% STUDENT: [INAUDIBLE]. 01:08:03.538 --> 01:08:04.580 align:middle line:90% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: Yeah. 01:08:04.580 --> 01:08:07.316 align:middle line:90% STUDENT: [INAUDIBLE]. 01:08:07.316 --> 01:08:08.984 align:middle line:84% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: Yeah, it's like copy 01:08:08.984 --> 01:08:12.922 align:middle line:90% the first consonant and vowel. 01:08:12.922 --> 01:08:17.725 align:middle line:84% That's how you do futures in Tagalog. 01:08:17.725 --> 01:08:19.327 align:middle line:84% It's specifically the first consonant. 01:08:19.327 --> 01:08:24.433 align:middle line:84% And Tagalog does have syllables that end with consonants. 01:08:24.433 --> 01:08:34.510 align:middle line:84% And you don't copy the consonant at the end of the syllable. 01:08:34.510 --> 01:08:36.145 align:middle line:84% But Tagalog has several different kinds 01:08:36.145 --> 01:08:37.212 align:middle line:90% of reduplication. 01:08:37.212 --> 01:08:38.881 align:middle line:90% Here's another one. 01:08:38.881 --> 01:08:41.903 align:middle line:84% If you want to say that something is rather adjective, 01:08:41.903 --> 01:08:44.153 align:middle line:84% there are a bunch of adjectives that start with "ma-." 01:08:44.153 --> 01:08:46.778 align:middle line:84% Not all adjectives do, but there are a bunch of adjectives that 01:08:46.778 --> 01:08:48.090 align:middle line:90% start with a prefix "ma-." 01:08:48.090 --> 01:08:50.893 align:middle line:84% And then the way to say that something is rather adjective 01:08:50.893 --> 01:08:55.096 align:middle line:84% is to reduplicate the first two syllables of the adjective. 01:08:55.096 --> 01:08:57.265 align:middle line:84% If the adjective is only two syllables long, 01:08:57.265 --> 01:08:58.834 align:middle line:84% then you reduplicate the whole thing. 01:08:58.834 --> 01:09:00.803 align:middle line:84% So you get "mataas-taas" is "rather tall," 01:09:00.803 --> 01:09:04.372 align:middle line:84% or "malapit-lapit" is "rather close." 01:09:04.372 --> 01:09:07.042 align:middle line:84% If it's longer than that, then you just copy the first two. 01:09:07.042 --> 01:09:12.581 align:middle line:84% So you get "matali-talino" for "rather intelligent." 01:09:12.581 --> 01:09:15.317 align:middle line:84% So reduplicative morphemes-- there 01:09:15.317 --> 01:09:17.586 align:middle line:84% are three or four different types of reduplication 01:09:17.586 --> 01:09:18.854 align:middle line:90% in Tagalog. 01:09:18.854 --> 01:09:22.658 align:middle line:84% You've got a morpheme which is a prefix, 01:09:22.658 --> 01:09:27.328 align:middle line:84% and it is sort of specified for phonological content, 01:09:27.328 --> 01:09:31.033 align:middle line:90% but just how many syllables. 01:09:31.033 --> 01:09:34.030 align:middle line:84% Most prefixes, you've got a prefix, 01:09:34.030 --> 01:09:35.738 align:middle line:84% and it's got consonants and vowels in it, 01:09:35.738 --> 01:09:37.038 align:middle line:90% and you put that before. 01:09:37.038 --> 01:09:40.676 align:middle line:84% You get a English prefix, like "un-" for "unhappy"-- 01:09:40.676 --> 01:09:41.977 align:middle line:90% that's a prefix. 01:09:41.977 --> 01:09:43.345 align:middle line:90% It means whatever it means. 01:09:43.345 --> 01:09:47.917 align:middle line:84% And it consists of the vowel, "uh," and consonant, N. 01:09:47.917 --> 01:09:49.852 align:middle line:84% And you put that before adjectives 01:09:49.852 --> 01:09:53.822 align:middle line:84% to make other adjectives that mean not adjective. 01:09:53.822 --> 01:09:57.660 align:middle line:84% Reduplicative morphemes are also prefixes or suffixes, 01:09:57.660 --> 01:09:59.355 align:middle line:84% but they don't have any specification 01:09:59.355 --> 01:10:01.230 align:middle line:84% as to what consonants and vowels are in them. 01:10:01.230 --> 01:10:03.199 align:middle line:84% You just copy whatever is already there. 01:10:03.199 --> 01:10:09.038 align:middle line:84% That's how reduplication seems to work. 01:10:09.038 --> 01:10:10.472 align:middle line:84% When I was first studying Tagalog, 01:10:10.472 --> 01:10:17.746 align:middle line:84% we had contests to see who could repeat the most syllables. 01:10:17.746 --> 01:10:21.183 align:middle line:84% I remember one that we tried to pass off on our teacher 01:10:21.183 --> 01:10:26.789 align:middle line:84% was [SPEAKING TAGALOG] which means, "they are regretting it 01:10:26.789 --> 01:10:30.392 align:middle line:84% a little bit all the time," or something like that. 01:10:30.392 --> 01:10:34.863 align:middle line:84% There's a Tagalog joke Tagalogs like 01:10:34.863 --> 01:10:39.101 align:middle line:84% to tell about Filipinos who are in an elevator, 01:10:39.101 --> 01:10:42.137 align:middle line:84% and there there's an American who's 01:10:42.137 --> 01:10:44.873 align:middle line:84% also in the elevator who is astonished when the elevator 01:10:44.873 --> 01:10:50.879 align:middle line:84% doors open, and one of the Filipinos, who's outside, 01:10:50.879 --> 01:10:56.255 align:middle line:84% asks the other, "babalaba," which 01:10:56.255 --> 01:11:04.360 align:middle line:84% involves the verb "baba," which is "to go down," reduplication, 01:11:04.360 --> 01:11:07.496 align:middle line:84% and the question particle, which is "ba." 01:11:07.496 --> 01:11:11.433 align:middle line:90% So going down is "babalaba." 01:11:11.433 --> 01:11:13.135 align:middle line:84% Tagalogs like the idea of an American 01:11:13.135 --> 01:11:17.172 align:middle line:84% having to react to that conversation. 01:11:17.172 --> 01:11:22.811 align:middle line:90% So how are we doing? 01:11:22.811 --> 01:11:26.982 align:middle line:84% So this is all a little tour through non-intuitive kinds 01:11:26.982 --> 01:11:28.117 align:middle line:90% of morphemes. 01:11:28.117 --> 01:11:29.251 align:middle line:90% So yes, there are prefixes. 01:11:29.251 --> 01:11:30.219 align:middle line:90% Yes, there are suffixes. 01:11:30.219 --> 01:11:31.387 align:middle line:84% But there are other kinds of morphemes 01:11:31.387 --> 01:11:32.354 align:middle line:90% out there in the world. 01:11:32.354 --> 01:11:34.456 align:middle line:84% And I want to warn you about those 01:11:34.456 --> 01:11:36.058 align:middle line:84% partly because you guys are all going 01:11:36.058 --> 01:11:37.960 align:middle line:84% to scatter and work on whatever languages 01:11:37.960 --> 01:11:39.695 align:middle line:90% it is you found to work on. 01:11:39.695 --> 01:11:41.196 align:middle line:84% And I want you to be prepared if you 01:11:41.196 --> 01:11:43.632 align:middle line:84% encounter some of these types of morphology out there. 01:11:43.632 --> 01:11:44.800 align:middle line:90% there Is another kind. 01:11:44.800 --> 01:11:48.037 align:middle line:84% O'odham, which is a language spoken 01:11:48.037 --> 01:11:50.272 align:middle line:84% by the traditional owners of the area 01:11:50.272 --> 01:11:53.809 align:middle line:84% around Tucson, Arizona, the Tohono O'odham, the desert 01:11:53.809 --> 01:11:54.777 align:middle line:90% people. 01:11:54.777 --> 01:11:55.377 align:middle line:90% Yes. 01:11:55.377 --> 01:11:55.978 align:middle line:90% STUDENT: [INAUDIBLE]. 01:11:55.978 --> 01:11:57.279 align:middle line:90% NORVIN W. RICHARDS: Oh, cool. 01:11:57.279 --> 01:12:01.750 align:middle line:84% So yeah, this is the language of your place. 01:12:01.750 --> 01:12:04.219 align:middle line:84% So it has what are called imperfect and perfect forms 01:12:04.219 --> 01:12:06.055 align:middle line:84% of the verb, which you can think of as being 01:12:06.055 --> 01:12:08.724 align:middle line:84% kind of like present tense and past tense. 01:12:08.724 --> 01:12:11.480 align:middle line:84% And if you look at these, we're kind 01:12:11.480 --> 01:12:14.063 align:middle line:84% of cheating because I've got the name of this type of morpheme 01:12:14.063 --> 01:12:15.531 align:middle line:90% up there at the top. 01:12:15.531 --> 01:12:18.567 align:middle line:84% If you look at these, it turns out 01:12:18.567 --> 01:12:20.235 align:middle line:84% if you study a lot about O'odham, 01:12:20.235 --> 01:12:22.705 align:middle line:84% you can convince yourself-- so if you look at them, 01:12:22.705 --> 01:12:25.074 align:middle line:84% you can see the imperfect forms are a little bit longer 01:12:25.074 --> 01:12:26.642 align:middle line:90% than the perfect forms. 01:12:26.642 --> 01:12:30.612 align:middle line:84% So the perfect forms are things like "neo" and "nei" and "hin." 01:12:30.612 --> 01:12:34.116 align:middle line:84% And the imperfect forms are forms like "neok" and "neid" 01:12:34.116 --> 01:12:37.853 align:middle line:90% and "hink." 01:12:37.853 --> 01:12:41.623 align:middle line:84% So your first hope might be that the imperfect versions involve 01:12:41.623 --> 01:12:45.394 align:middle line:84% suffixes, that you're starting with the perfect versions 01:12:45.394 --> 01:12:48.263 align:middle line:90% and adding suffixes. 01:12:48.263 --> 01:12:50.466 align:middle line:84% But if you look at these verbs, you 01:12:50.466 --> 01:12:54.036 align:middle line:84% can hopefully convince yourself that that's hopeless. 01:12:54.036 --> 01:12:56.889 align:middle line:84% The suffix is just kind of-- the consonant 01:12:56.889 --> 01:13:01.276 align:middle line:84% that's at the end just varies a lot from verb to verb. 01:13:01.276 --> 01:13:02.945 align:middle line:90% Does that sound right? 01:13:02.945 --> 01:13:05.781 align:middle line:84% So in fact, the going hypothesis about what's 01:13:05.781 --> 01:13:08.751 align:middle line:84% going on in O'odham is that this is a linguistically very 01:13:08.751 --> 01:13:10.652 align:middle line:90% unusual kind of morpheme. 01:13:10.652 --> 01:13:11.920 align:middle line:90% It's called truncation. 01:13:11.920 --> 01:13:14.556 align:middle line:84% The way you form the perfect form of the verb 01:13:14.556 --> 01:13:16.658 align:middle line:84% is to take the imperfect form of the verb 01:13:16.658 --> 01:13:20.329 align:middle line:84% and remove its last consonant, whatever it is. 01:13:20.329 --> 01:13:23.065 align:middle line:90% So it's called truncation. 01:13:23.065 --> 01:13:24.266 align:middle line:90% You're not adding something. 01:13:24.266 --> 01:13:26.668 align:middle line:90% You're subtracting something. 01:13:26.668 --> 01:13:29.738 align:middle line:84% Morphology usually doesn't subtract, it usually adds. 01:13:29.738 --> 01:13:36.378 align:middle line:84% But this seems to be what's happening in O'odham. 01:13:36.378 --> 01:13:39.548 align:middle line:84% And then there are other things-- tone. 01:13:39.548 --> 01:13:43.752 align:middle line:84% So there are tonal languages in the world. 01:13:43.752 --> 01:13:46.155 align:middle line:84% If you've had the interaction with Mandarin, for example, 01:13:46.155 --> 01:13:48.757 align:middle line:84% you've heard of tonal languages, languages in which 01:13:48.757 --> 01:13:51.393 align:middle line:84% the pitch of your voice makes has an effect 01:13:51.393 --> 01:13:54.263 align:middle line:84% on the meaning of the words that you're saying. 01:13:54.263 --> 01:13:57.800 align:middle line:84% So there are languages out there in which there 01:13:57.800 --> 01:14:00.169 align:middle line:90% are morphemes that are tones. 01:14:00.169 --> 01:14:05.240 align:middle line:84% So Dinka, which is a Nilotic language spoken in South Sudan, 01:14:05.240 --> 01:14:08.115 align:middle line:84% there's a popular Dinka name, "Bol," 01:14:08.115 --> 01:14:10.512 align:middle line:90% which is a low-tone noun. 01:14:10.512 --> 01:14:13.816 align:middle line:84% It can be inflected for case, so to indicate 01:14:13.816 --> 01:14:15.918 align:middle line:84% that it is the possessor of another noun, 01:14:15.918 --> 01:14:19.321 align:middle line:84% for example, if you want to say things like "Bol's brother." 01:14:19.321 --> 01:14:22.391 align:middle line:84% But what you do is to change the tone of "Bol." 01:14:22.391 --> 01:14:25.260 align:middle line:84% So instead of just being "Bol," it's now "Bol," 01:14:25.260 --> 01:14:27.362 align:middle line:90% so it's a falling tone. 01:14:27.362 --> 01:14:32.334 align:middle line:84% So Bol's brother is "manh e Bol," so brother of Bol, 01:14:32.334 --> 01:14:34.903 align:middle line:90% and "Bol" changes its tone. 01:14:34.903 --> 01:14:36.438 align:middle line:84% There was an NBA basketball player 01:14:36.438 --> 01:14:38.540 align:middle line:84% for a while who was Dinka, Manute Bol. 01:14:38.540 --> 01:14:45.380 align:middle line:84% It's apparently a really common name. 01:14:45.380 --> 01:14:47.649 align:middle line:84% We spent a semester trying to understand 01:14:47.649 --> 01:14:50.886 align:middle line:84% Dinka in a graduate-level Field Methods class. 01:14:50.886 --> 01:14:54.323 align:middle line:84% Most Dinka morphology is tones, and vowel length, 01:14:54.323 --> 01:14:55.557 align:middle line:90% and other kinds of things. 01:14:55.557 --> 01:14:57.392 align:middle line:84% We were always deathly afraid that we 01:14:57.392 --> 01:14:59.027 align:middle line:84% were missing half of the morphemes 01:14:59.027 --> 01:15:01.196 align:middle line:84% because they're quite hard to hear. 01:15:01.196 --> 01:15:03.084 align:middle line:84% And then-- this is the last thing 01:15:03.084 --> 01:15:08.604 align:middle line:84% before I let you go-- there are arguably cases of morphemes 01:15:08.604 --> 01:15:10.458 align:middle line:90% that are not pronounced at all. 01:15:10.458 --> 01:15:12.708 align:middle line:84% So there are words like "cat," and "dog," and "sheep," 01:15:12.708 --> 01:15:14.843 align:middle line:84% and there are plural morphemes like "-s" 01:15:14.843 --> 01:15:17.179 align:middle line:84% And then maybe the plural of "sheep" 01:15:17.179 --> 01:15:18.547 align:middle line:90% also has a plural morpheme. 01:15:18.547 --> 01:15:22.684 align:middle line:84% It's just that that plural morpheme is pronounced-- 01:15:22.684 --> 01:15:25.387 align:middle line:84% You can't tell, but I'm opening my mouth. 01:15:25.387 --> 01:15:27.789 align:middle line:84% So maybe there are morphemes that 01:15:27.789 --> 01:15:31.520 align:middle line:84% have no pronunciation at all, they're just morphemes. 01:15:31.520 --> 01:15:32.895 align:middle line:84% You shouldn't necessarily believe 01:15:32.895 --> 01:15:35.364 align:middle line:84% that just looking at this, but it's a possibility 01:15:35.364 --> 01:15:38.166 align:middle line:84% that we might want to take seriously. 01:15:38.166 --> 01:15:40.002 align:middle line:90% All right, good. 01:15:40.002 --> 01:15:44.039 align:middle line:84% I think this is probably a good stopping point. 01:15:44.039 --> 01:15:47.109 align:middle line:84% So just to summarize, and then I'll 01:15:47.109 --> 01:15:48.830 align:middle line:84% let you go-- for every morpheme, we're 01:15:48.830 --> 01:15:51.413 align:middle line:84% going to want to indicate what's it sound, what's its meaning. 01:15:51.413 --> 01:15:53.382 align:middle line:84% Is it a bound morpheme or a free morpheme? 01:15:53.382 --> 01:15:55.717 align:middle line:84% And if it's bound, what kind of bound morpheme is it? 01:15:55.717 --> 01:15:59.121 align:middle line:84% Is it a prefix, a suffix, an infix, any of these other kinds 01:15:59.121 --> 01:15:59.922 align:middle line:90% of things? 01:15:59.922 --> 01:16:01.323 align:middle line:84% All kinds of things you'd want to understand 01:16:01.323 --> 01:16:02.824 align:middle line:84% if you want to understand everything 01:16:02.824 --> 01:16:04.927 align:middle line:84% about the morphology of a language. 01:16:04.927 --> 01:16:08.150 align:middle line:90% We'll pick it up here next time.