Reflection on Topic 3 : Morphology

Finally, we finished the topic Morphology. Meaning that, I have to write another reflection on it. Honestly, I’m running out of ideas again. I don’t know what I should write here but the funny thing is, I still write. I will try to gain ideas by reading. :)

Part of my readings is as follows:

"The term 'morphology' has been taken over from biology where it is used to denote the study of the forms of plants and animals. It was first used for linguistic purposes in 1859 by the German linguist August Schleicher (Salmon 2000), to refer to the study of the form of words. In present-day linguistics, the term 'morphology' refers to the study of the internal structure of words, and of the systematic form-meaning correspondences between words.”

Morphology. What is Morphology? When I “Google” the word Morphology on the internet, I was surprised that Morphology actually can be contributed to many types. For instances, Mathematical Morphology, Geomorphology, Biology Morphology, Astronomy Morphology, Linguistic Morphology, Urban Morphology, River Morphology et cetera. From my reading, I can conclude that morphology actually means the study of a structure, form or shape. 

        Obviously, for English class, we will learn the Linguistic Morphology. Wikipedia stated that Linguistic Morphology is the study of the structure and content of word forms. From my “linguistically” point-of-view, Morphology means the study of Morphemes and Morphemes are words, word stems, and affixes, basically the unit of language one up from phonemes.

           The clearest learning that pops in my mind now is on affixes.  There are several kind of affixes which are:

1.    Suffixes are attached to the end of the stem;

2.    Prefixes are attached to the front of the stem;

3.    Infixes are put in the middle of the word;

4.    Ablaut is a change in a vowel that carries extra meaning; and

5.    Reduplication is a matter of doubling a syllable to do the same.

           Above all, Suffixes are the most common, and English uses them.  For example, the past tense of most verbs is a matter of adding -ed to the stem; the present participle is made by adding -ing; the plural of a noun is made by adding -s.

          I would say morphology is fun, and it’s also a useful way of packing a lot of meaning into a small space, but sometimes there’s a tendency to get a little carried away with it. For instance; directionality of a line of blood drops, where the word direction would have done just as well. From a morphological standpoint, the noun directionality is formed from the noun direction, plus the suffix -al to turn it into an adjective, plus the suffix -ity to turn it back into a noun again. 

Sometimes suffixes do carry specific meanings, such as employer and employee. But sometimes, as in the word directionality, I can’t see that they do the suffix -ality, in particular, often seems to serve the sole purpose of increasing the length of a word. To illustrate the ability of morphemes to carry specific meaning, consider invisibility. Without all those little morphemes, one would have to say something like “the property of not being able to be seen”, which is a long-long thing to say.

***To be continued (I’m running out of ideas again *sigh*)

 

 *Sweet Little Thing*

:)

:)

Dad to son: 

"son, one day you will make a women very happy,and you two will fall in love and get married. But one day she will leave you for another man. This man is called a musician."

Reflection on Topic 2 : Introduction to Phonology

The second topic that we had learned is Introduction to Phonology. Actually, we had learned this topic back when we were in foundation program. But I totally forgot all the symbols and sounds. So, it is a recall for all of us.

There are three keywords that are synonyms with Phonology which are Phonetics, Phonetics Script, and Phonemes. In order to master phonology, we must first explore these three keywords. We also got to carry our dearest Oxford Dictionary all over, all the time in order to explore the phonetics script. Still, we made lots of mistake in our translation.

Besides, we also learned the speech organs. There are words that are unfamiliar to me such as labial, alveolar ridge and palate. Each one of the speech organ is significant for us. Lack of an organ can impair our speech. For example, if we got no front teeth, it is hard for us to utter the word ‘teeth’.

   

           There are three sound production processes which are intonation, phonation and articulation. Each of the process are important to make the word we utters sounds right.

          In order to enrich our pronunciation, we had the tongue twister competition among groups. Our group had chosen three texts of tongue twisters:

I wish to wish the wish you wish to wish but if you wish the wish the witch wishes, I won’t wish the wish you wish to wish.

Billy Button bought a buttered biscuit. Did Billy Button bought a buttered biscuit? If Billy Button bought a buttered biscuit, where’s the buttered biscuit Billy Button bought?

If Freaky Fred found fifty feet of fruit and fed forty feet to his friend Frank, how many feet of fruit did Freaky Fred find?

         

          Our next lesson is on Minimal pairs. A minimal pair is a set of two words that are only differentiated by one tiny sound. If we can distinguish these tiny sounds, it will help us with pronunciation and comprehension. So, each group is required to list down five sets of minimal pairs for initial, medial and final part. The outcome of our group discussion is as below:

INITIAL	MEDIAL	FINAL
1.   Park, bark	Simple, symbol	Cop, cob
2.   Sue, zoo	Buses, buzzes	Peace, peas
3.   Kit, bit	Rocker, robber	Tuck, Tub
4.   Train, brain	Later, labour	Nit, nib
5.   Moon, noon	Dimmer, dinner	Loom, loon

INITIAL	MEDIAL	FINAL
1.   /pɑːk/, /bɑːk/	/'sɪmpl/, /'sɪmbl/	/kaːp/, /kaːb/
2.   /su:/, /zu:/	/'bʌsəs/, /'bʌzəs/	/piːs/, /piːz/
3.   /kɪt/, /bɪt/	/'rɒkeə(r)/, /'rɒbeə(r)/	/tʌk/, /tʌb/
4.   /treɪn/, /breɪn/	/'laɪte(r)/, /'laɪbe(r)/	/nɪt/, /nɪb/
5.   /muːn/, /nuːn/	/'dɪmə(r)/, /'dɪnə(r)/	/luːm/, /luːn/

         

It is hard to do if our pronunciation is not so good. We took a lot of effort by searching throughout dictionaries and the internet. Sometime, words are spelled merely the same and we thought that they are minimal pair but it isn’t! Even words that are spelled exactly the same can be pronounced differently. It is such a head-twister for us. But in the end, we still manage to accomplish the task given. :)

          Summing up, I had learned a lot more than I expected from this topic. Now I can explain how sounds are produced and how to produce it accurately. All thanks to Mdm Ira for her guidance and also to my group members for their collaboration. ;)

For more guidance on pronunciation, simply click the link below: http://www.britishcouncil.org/parents-help-pronunciation.htm

Happy Learning! :)

Quotes on Language

Language forces us to perceive the world as man presents it to us.  ~Julia Penelope

English is a funny language; that explains why we park our car on the driveway and drive our car on the parkway.  ~Author Unknown

No one means all he says, and yet very few say all they mean, for words are slippery and thought is viscous.  ~Henry Brooks Adams, The Education of Henry Adams, 1907

One man's frankness is another man's vulgarity.  ~Kevin Smith

I personally believe we developed language because of our deep inner need to complain.  ~Jane Wagner

Slang is a language that rolls up its sleeves, spits on its hands and goes to work.  ~Carl Sandburg, New York Times, 13 February 1959

At no time is freedom of speech more precious than when a man hits his thumb with a hammer.  ~Marshall Lumsden

What words say does not last.  The words last.  Because words are always the same, and what they say is never the same.  ~Antonio Porchia, Voces, 1943, translated from Spanish by W.S. Merwin

Language is the blood of the soul into which thoughts run and out of which they grow.  ~Oliver Wendell Holmes

We have too many high sounding words and too few actions that correspond with them.  ~Abigail Adams

Man is a creature who lives not upon bread alone, but primarily by catchwords.  ~Robert Louis Stevenson

If you can speak three languages you're trilingual.  If you can speak two languages you're bilingual.  If you can speak only one language you're an American.  ~Author Unknown

Words signify man's refusal to accept the world as it is.  ~Walter Kaufmann

The English language is nobody's special property.  It is the property of the imagination: it is the property of the language itself.  ~Derek Walcott

Language is the dress of thought.  ~Samuel Johnson

The great thing about human language is that it prevents us from sticking to the matter at hand.  ~Lewis Thomas


Language is the most imperfect and expensive means yet discovered for communicating thought.  ~William James

Be not the slave of Words.  ~Thomas Carlyle, Sartor Resartus, Book I, chapter 8

Language is the means of getting an idea from my brain into yours without surgery.  ~Mark Amidon

Any man who does not make himself proficient in at least two languages other than his own is a fool.  ~Martin H. Fischer

It is a safe rule to apply that, when a mathematical or philosophical author writes with a misty profundity, he is talking nonsense.  ~Alfred North Whitehead

He who does not know foreign languages does not know anything about his own.  ~Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Kunst and Alterthum

A definition is the enclosing a wilderness of idea within a wall of words.  ~Samuel Butler (1835-1902), Note-Books

I would never use a long word where a short one would answer the purpose.  I know there are professors in this country who 'ligate' arteries.  Other surgeons only tie them, and it stops the bleeding just as well.  ~Oliver Wendell Holmes

Whenever ideas fail, men invent words.  ~Martin H. Fischer

Every American child should grow up knowing a second language, preferably English.  ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Neurotic's Notebook, 1960

A different language is a different vision of life.  ~Federico Fellini

Conversation is the slowest form of human communication.  ~Author Unknown

Learn a new language and get a new soul.  ~Czech Proverb

Reflection on Topic 1 : Language and Communication

It’s been a while since the last time I strained myself to learn English. I don’t know when English started to be a tough subject to learn for me. Reminiscing the good old days back in primary school, learning English is so much fun – except the part when we have to write essays. Maybe I don’t like writing essay because I’m not good at it. I’m always running out of ideas on what should I write. Plus, my grammar is still not upgrading since I’m in high school. I still feel like I’m at the same level all the time. I should be working more on it. Well, I did actually. I read books! I mean LOTS of books. Well, maybe not books, they're novel. 

For this semester, we are having another course for English which is English for Language Teacher. After reviewing the topics listed, I feel that it is convenient for us as English teachers to take this course because it contains all the basic skills to teach kids at younger stage, especially Primary school kids to learn English. If we as teachers could not be a good role model for them, they will grow up with the wrong ideas that they learned from us. 

For the first topic, Language and Communication, we had learned the meaning of language and how does it related to communication. From my understandings, language is a code to represent thoughts and ideas and this will happen through communication. It can be either verbal or non-verbal communication. There are thousands of languages used all around the world. During lecture, we have been shown with some examples of various languages. Among these are Tamil, Mandarin, Arabic and Japanese. Different language has different sentence structure. But mostly are same as English as in S-V-O order.

We had been working on our tutorial which requires us to discuss on how Malaysian culture affects English Language. There are four factors listed which are:

1.    Multicultural society – major ethnic groups & dialects groups

2.    Urban and rural settings

3.    Political / historical influence

4.    Educational policies

            I will my reflect more on my group’s discussion which is considering the urban and rural settings. From our discussion and several references, we found out that settings really play important roles in learning English. For students in rural areas, they seldom get the chance to use English. Plus, lack of facilities is one of the major factors that lead to poor achievement in English learning. Compare to the students in urban areas, they have a lot more exposure to English language. Magazines, entertainment, commercials, television shows, all of it are in English. As we can see, in Miri alone, children speak English everywhere. It is rare for us to hear children speak in other languages. If in rural areas, people will say that you are crazy or trying to show-off if you speak English. They only speak English during English class. 

            Based on my experience, I might say that it is true. I was schooling for Primary school in rural area. The facilities are not upgraded and teachers tend to use chalk and talk teaching method. Lots of the time, the teacher will use mother tongue to do the explaining. We also didn’t have the enough chance to communicate in English. So, when I moved to an elite school in urban area in Kuching for Secondary school, I was having a culture shock. The English teachers are all overseas graduated and the facilities are advanced with high-tech. There also 24-hours internet access. With such advantages, the English learning can be more effective.

            Other subject from other groups that attract my attention is PPSMI. I strongly disagree with the government’s action to abolish PPSMI. I mean, why do we have to learn Maths and Science in Bahasa Melayu from Pre-school till Form 5 while in the upper stage such as Form 6, Matriculation and Universities we have to use English? Isn’t it such a head-twister for the students? Anyway, I’m not in any position to choose.

           Another matter is Manglish. Unconsciously, Manglish is in our soul. Whenever we speak English with Malaysian, we tend to use Manglish. The weird thing is, if I speak to foreign people such as tourist, automatically my Manglish is all gone. There I am, speaking the grammatical English. It occurs because of the slang of diverse culture in our country. So, slowly and without us noticing, it became a language although it is unofficial.

            Besides, we also had done a lot of activities for this topic. The first one is to be creative with language. Individually, we had composed a poem and my poem sounds like this:

I can give you the stars

I can give you the seas

I can give you anything

But just give me a kiss.

It’s really fun but need ideas. It is not an easy work. I’m always running out of ideas. 

            The next activity is to prepare a dialogue and role-play it during lecture. It is a group activity. The main idea is to let the other groups to identify the language functions that we had used in our dialogue. 

Group members:

Graciella (Grace)

Lydia Suzzance (Lydia)

Mohd. Khairizan R (Ijan)

Mohd. Khairuddin R (Dent)

Dent     : Wow, look at her! She’s so hot. Don’t you think so?

Ijan       : Yes, it is so true.

Dent     : Look at her long legs.

Ijan       : I can’t take my eyes off her. She’s just too good to be true.

Grace  : Hey guys! What’s so interesting here?

Dent     : No, no, nothing.

Lydia    : You guys are interested in that hot lady, right? Don’t try to fool us.

Ijan       : No, we just think that her dress is really nice. That’s all.

Grace  : Is it her dress or herself?

Dent     : I think both!

Lydia    : Then, why don’t you try to ask for her phone number?

Grace   : Yes, let’s see if you can, Casanova!

Dent     : Well, maybe next time. The weather today is too hot to be in action.

Ijan        : Yes, I totally agree with you! Hahaha.

Dent     : Me too. Hahaha.

Lydia    : You two are such losers!

Grace   : Let’s move before we miss the bus.

             Finally, we had done a non-verbal communication activity. We had prepared a mime dialogue for us to act out. During the lecture, our group had mime the dialogue and other groups had identify the situation that we acted out. Our situation is a depraved teenager who came home late and been slapped by his father. Our class member were able to guess correctly. :)

Group members:

Graciella (Minah)

Lydia Suzzance (Mother)

Mohd. Khairizan R (Mat)

Mohd. Khairuddin R (Father)

Two teenagers are hanging out, drinking alcohol and smoking.

Mat                  : Ahhh..these things taste like heaven. (Sipping beer and cigarette)

Minah             : Yeah, we should do it again sometimes.

Mat                 : It’s late already. We should get going now before my father found out.

Minah             : Haha..loser! Okay then, same place tomorrow.

Mat                  : Sure!

At home.

Mat opened the door slowly, hoping that no one will hear him.

Father            : Mat! Where have you been at this hour? Are you going to smoke with your friends again??

Mother            : (Folding clothes)

Mat                  : Err..I went to Minah’s house to do revision. (Showing his book)

Father            : Revision?? Don’t try to deny it Ahmad! (Throw the book aside). Hah! What is this smell? Are you….are you… Don’t tell me that you drank the alcohol Mat!

Mat                  : No…no, dad! I’m not!

Father            : Liar!!! (Slapping Mat, angrily) who teach you to be like this? Who? I told you not to mingle with the street kids! They are rubbish mat! Rubbish!

Mother            : Abangg!!! What are you doing? Don’t hit him! (Protecting Mat from being hit by his father)

Father            : What have you become son? Are you one of them now? The street kids? You are supposed to be an excellent student now. Not like this! (Frustrated).

Mother            : No, Mat. Tell your dad that all he said are lies son. Tell him.

Mat                  : No, mum. It’s true. I screw up.

Mother            : (Crying, frustrated)

 

We are having so much fun doing these activities. it feels like we were in the school again. Summing up, language is very important for communication. Without communication, we weren't be able to get to the level we are positioned now. :)