Don’t fake accents, study the science of linguistics

Linguistics is for anyone with a natural flair for languages and its finer aspects. In simple terms Linguistics is the study of language, how it works, how it is acquired and how people use it to communicate. It involves the scientific study of language and its structure, including the study of grammar, syntax, and phonetics.

A linguist is not to be confused with a polyglot. A polyglot can speak several languages. A truck driver, who drives around many states in India, picks up several languages but does not know the science behind languages. A linguist is interested in other languages to make a comparative study of languages, but he may not necessarily be a polyglot.

At the basic level, three aspects of linguistics help us in usage – Phonetics, Semantics and Stylistics.

Phonetics

Phonetics is a branch of linguistics that studies how humans produce and perceive sounds. Learning the correct sounds of words is the first step in learning a language. In most Indian languages every sound is represented by a letter or symbol. However, English has 44 sounds (20 vowel sounds and 24 consonants) but only 26 letters to represent them. This makes English difficult who study it for the first time.

Under phonetics, we have three branches: articulatory phonetics studies the production of speech sounds by the human vocal tract; auditory phonetics studies the perception of speech sounds by the human perceptual system and acoustic phonetics studies the physical properties of speech sounds.

Semantics

Semantics is the study of meaning in language. It can be applied to entire texts or single words. For example, “destination” and “last stop” technically mean the same thing, but students of semantics analyse their subtle shades of meaning.

Many words have very similar meanings and it is important to be able to distinguish subtle differences between them. For example, ‘anger’ and ‘rage’ are similar in meaning (synonyms) but ‘rage’ implies a stronger human reaction to a situation than ‘anger.

A word or phrase can have any of the seven types of meaning - conceptual meaning, connotative meaning, collocative meaning, affective meaning, social meaning, reflected meaning, and thematic meaning.

Stylistics

Stylistics is that branch of linguistics which studies the varieties of speech or writing, appropriate to different situations and develops the student’s awareness and control of these varieties. The kind of language used is determined by the social situation.

Stylistics is a branch of applied linguistics concerned with the study of style in texts, especially, but not exclusively, in literary works. Also called literary linguistics, stylistics focuses on the figures, tropes, and other rhetorical devices used to provide variety and a distinctness to someone’s writing. The author P G Wodehouse has a distinct writing style which can be analysed using stylistics.

Advance linguistics

At the advanced level, linguistics can branch out into specific branches such as sociolinguistics, dialectology, psycholinguistics, computational linguistics, comparative linguistics, and structural linguistics.

Sociolinguistics is a branch of linguistics that studies how social factors impact language use. Examples of sociolinguistic study include gendered language differences, regional differences, and how social class impacts language use. Sociolinguistics is the descriptive study of the effect of any or all aspects of society, including cultural norms, expectations, and context, on the way language is used, and society’s effect on language.

Psycholinguistics is the discipline that investigates and describes the psychological processes that make it possible for humans to master and use language. Psycholinguists conduct research on speech development and language development and how individuals of all ages comprehend and produce language. It covers three main aspects namely: language comprehension, language production and language acquisition.

Dialectology is defined as the study of the regional forms of a language that are spoken by certain groups of people, particularly in specific geographical areas. For instance, Kannada spoken in North Karnataka is broadly different from the Kannada spoken in the South.

Why study linguistics?

In an increasingly globalised world, a study of linguistics helps us to understand the nuances, intricacies and ambiguities of a language. It makes us understand why people have different accents, intonations and pronunciations. It promotes better understanding between people. There is no superior or inferior language in the world. Each language is developed in relation to the environment in which it exists.

It helps us understand the difference between textbook language and colloquial language. This is important for development communication professionals who work among marginalised, tribal and minority communities.

A screenplay writer understands that epics like Ramayana and Mahabharata need highly Sanskritised words and avoids Urdu words as the latter language did not exist during the epic age.

Applied linguistics is the branch of linguistics concerned with practical applications of language studies, for example, language teaching, translation, and speech therapy.

(The author is a teacher of English language, literature and linguistics)