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Test: 2 Sounds of Language: Phonetics

and Phonology
Name / ID:
Please input your name or other ID. This is just for printing on the test results and will not be saved elsewhere.
1) Most phones in most human languages are produced on egressive pulmonic air.
True
False
2) Voiced sounds involve regular vibrations of the epiglottis.

True
False
3) To make a nasal phone, which of the following do you do:
Raise the velum

Raise the dorsum
Make a pharyngeal closure
Lower the velum
Make a blockage in the nasal cavity
4) Clicks are normally made with egressive air.
True
False
5) Which of the two main types of phones involve the unimpeded flow of air through the oral
cavity?
Vowels
Consonants
6) Vowels are characterised by which of the following properties?
The place and manner of articulation.

The position of the velum and the shape of the pharynx.
The position of the high point of the tongue in the oral cavity and shape of the lips.
The position of the dorsum and the shape of the larynx.
Whether the tongue is high or low in the oral cavity, and whether it is in the front or
back.
7) Which of the following are the most vowel-like consonants?
Nasals
Stops
Glides
Rhotics
Fricatives
8) The first stop in the English word stop is most adequately described in which of the
following ways:
Unreleased
Released
Aspirated
Unaspirated
Nasalised
9) Voice onset time (VOT) refers to the time between the beginning of the closure for a stop
and the beginning of regular vibration of the vocal folds.
True
False
10) What sort of lateral do you get when the back of the tongue is raised towards the velum:
Dark
Glottalic
Rhotacised
Clear
11) Non-low back vowels are usually accompanied by lip rounding.
True
False
12) Central vowels are produced with the highest part of the tongue roughly mid-way in
height between its position for high and low vowels.
True
False
13) Ejectives are produced on which of the following sorts of airstream:
Egressive velaric
Ingressive pulmonic
Egressive glottalic
Ingressive glottalic
14) Which of the following is the most common syllable shape in the world's languages:
C
VCC
VC
CV
V
15) Vowels and consonants are called suprasegmentals or prosodies because they are the
main types of segmental sounds.
True
False
16) In tone languages different tones on a word give it different meanings.
True
False
17) Intonation is concerned with patterns of pitch variation over sentence sized utterances.
True
False
18) Acoustic phonetics is concerned with which of the following:
The production of sounds in human languages

The generation of speech sounds by computer.
The way the brain interprets the sound waves reaching the ear.
The perception of sounds of human languages.
The properties of the sound waves of human speech.
19) Stress in Hungarian goes on the first syllable of a word; therefore it is phonemic.
True
False
20) To say that two sounds are in complementary distribution means:

The two sounds are found in the same phonetic environment
The two sounds do not occur in the same phonetic environment(s)
They always occur next to one another
You can always replace one of them by the other
Some speakers use one of the sounds, other speakers use the other.
They are suspicious pairs.
21) Phonemic transcription is just another name for broad phonetic transcription.
True
False
22) If you find no minimal pairs for two phonetically similar phones, what do you do next,
given that you are trying to discover whether or not they are allophones?
Conclude they are allophones of a single phoneme.

Conclude they are separate phonemes.
Look for near minimal pairs.
Look for suspicious pairs.
23) Which of the following ranges gives the best indication of the normal extent of variation
in numbers of phonemes in a language?
10-100
50-100
20-200
1-50
100-200
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Updated: Feb. 11, 2009

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Test: 1 Introduction
Name / ID:
1) Linguistics is concerned with prescribing how people ought to speak their language.
True
False
2) Most linguistic signs are symbolic.

True
False
3) Onomatopoeic words are iconic signs.
True
False
4) Language is a system of signs.
True
False
5) Paradigmatic relations are the relations between two items occurring together: for and
example are in paradigmatic relation in for example.
True
False
6) Which of the following best describes the meaning of Charles Hockett's feature
displacement?
The property of something (e.g. a word) being in the wrong place.

Capability of communicating about the system of communication.
Ability to communicate about things not actually present.
Capability of being able to produce new meanings.
Property of something being lost in the process of communication.
7) Only human languages have the property of arbitrariness.
True
False
8) Which of the following gives the best description of duality in Hockett's scheme?
The linguistic sign has two aspects: form and meaning.

Both form and meaning components of the sign are patterned.
Human languages can be both spoken and written.
Users take on alternately the roles of producer and receiver of messages.
Some languages (like Sanskrit) have a special dual form of nouns meaning 'two'.
9) The Chinese writing system is pictographic, that is, each character directly represents an
idea.
True
False
10) Systems of signing used by deaf people such as ASL (American Sign Language) are
genuine and full human languages.
True
False
11) All signs of Auslan (Australian Sign Language) are iconic.
True
False
12) All systems of writing represent sounds to some extent.
True
False
13) English has 5 vowels, a, e, i, o, and u.
True
False
14) British Sign Language is a system for representing English by means of hand-signs.
True
False
15) Sign languages like Danish Sign Language, American Sign Language, British Sign
Language, and Nicaraguan Sign Language are as similar to one another as British English
and American English.
True
False
16) People all around the world talk about speaking and language.
True
False
17) Which of the following was the earliest known tradition of linguistics?
Greek
Arabic
Chinese
Babylonian
Hindu
18) The main division of modern linguistic theories is into which of the following
oppositions:
Historical vs. Structuralist

Formal vs. Functional
Formal vs. Informal
Modernism vs. Postmodernism
Structuralist vs. Poststructuralist
19) According to functional theories of linguistics only meaning is of interest, and the notion
of the linguistic sign is rejected.
True
False
20) The founding father of modern linguistics is generally considered to be which of the
following men:
Charles Darwin
Leonard Bloomfield
Ferdinand de Saussure
Nicholai Trubetzkoy
Daniel Jones
Noam Chomsky
21) Which of the following is not an example of a sign?

The word and
The letter g in the word give
The word bird
The H in H2O
22) Which of the following branches of linguistics is primarily concerned with changes in a
language or several languages over time?
Historical linguistics
Sociolinguistics
Morphology
Evolutionary linguistics
Typology
Semantics
23) Roughly how many languages are spoken in the world today?
500
2000
7000
100
100,000
and open.
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Test: 3 Structure of Words: Morphology

Name / ID:
1) Morphemes are minimal linguistic signs in the sense that they can't be divided into further
signs.
True
False
2) A word can't be a morpheme.

True
False
3) Which of the following is the correct division of the English word repaired (meaning
'mended, fixed') into morphemes?
re-pair-ed
re-pai-red
repair-ed
re-paired
repaired
repai-red
4) Which of the following is the correct division of the English word repainted into
morphemes?
re-paint-ed
re-pain-ted
repaint-ed
re-painted
repainted
repain-ted
5) Bound morphemes are called affixes.
True
False
6) Which of the following types of morpheme gives different forms of a root morpheme?
Clitic
Inflectional
Derivational
Allomorphs
7) What sort of morpheme is -ing in the English word clippings?
Root
Prefix
Infix
Suffix
Free
8) Which of the following is a stem?
A root plus a clitic

A root plus inflections
A root plus derivational morphemes
A root plus derivatinal and inflectional morphemes.
A bound root
9) Depending on the language, an inflectional affix can be a clitic or a free grammatical word.
True
False
10) An example of a clitic in English is the plural number marker for nouns, -s ~ -z ~ -z.
True
False
11) Inflectional affixes are generally more productive than derivational affixes.
True
False
12) The bound morphemes that are normally least prosodically integrated with the morpheme
they are attached to are:
Clitics
Derivational morphemes
Inflectional morphemes
13) Phonologically similar allomorphs are called:
Morphs
Suppletive allomorphs
Phonological allomorphs
Free allomorphs
14) Roots are always free.
True
False
15) English has no suppletive allomorphs for any lexical roots.
True
False
16) Are the allomorphs of a morpheme necessarily in complementary distribution?
Yes
No
17) Attaching a derivational morpheme to a root always changes its part-of-speech.
True
False
18) Does English have agreement inflection on verbs?
Yes
No
19) Does English have inflectional case marking of nouns?
Yes
No
20) Which of the following is not a grammatical morpheme in English?
curtain
a ~ an
this
to
of
21) Which of the following is an unusual (exceptional, or marked) order for the morphemes
of a word?
Inflectional prefix + Root + Derivational suffix

Derivational prefix + Proclitic + Root
Proclitic + Inflectional prefix + Root
Proclitic + Inflectional prefix + Derivational prefix + Root
Derivational prefix + Root + Enclitic
Inflectional prefix + Root + Derivational suffix + Enclitic
22) A morpheme that can be attached to any word of a sentence is almost certainly a clitic.
True
False
23) If allomorphs are conditioned lexically, their distribution depends on which of the
following:
The number of syllables of the lexical word to which they are attached.
Their immediate phonological environment.
The other grammatical morphemes in the word.
The particular lexical item to which they are attached.
None of the previous.
and open.
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Test: 4 Lexicon
Name / ID:
1) The lexicon of a language is a listing of all of the morphemes (grammatical and lexical) in
the language, that provides information on the form and meaning, as well as information on
the morpheme's part of speech, etc..
True
False
2) Both the set of lexical and the set of grammatical morphemes in a language change over
time.
True
False
3) The English word good is an adjective because it describes a property of something.

True
False
4) All languages identify the same parts-of-speech.
True
False
5) Interjections are words like of, to, for, from, etc.
True
False
6) Which of the following words is a blend?
Spanglish
telly
kangaroo
googol
algebra
7) Which of the following is not a way of making new lexical items in a language.
clipping
blending
borrowing
inflecting
acronyming
8) Which of the following illustrates phonaesthesia in English?
eat
phonology
slither
small
away
9) The process of forming wambajarndu 'people' in Warrwa from wamba 'man' and jarndu
'woman' is:
acronyming
reduplication
derivation
calquing
backformation
compounding
10) The meaning of an idiom is not predictable from the meaning of the words making it up,
and the grammar of the expression.
True
False
11) The meaning of an idiom is always completely arbitrary.
True
False
12) Which of the following sorts of expression is salt and pepper in English:
a collocation
a compound
an idiom
a derived noun
a euphemism
13) Which one of the following processes of lexeme formation is restricted to languages with
traditions of writing?
acronyming
coinage
calquing
borrowing
blending
14) Many languages use idioms involving body part terms in expressions for emotions.
True
False
15) Which of the following terms refers to the process of forming a new lexical item by
removing a part of a word that is wrongly identified as a morpheme?
derivation
etymology
calquing
backformation
meaning extension
16) Does English have a large number of borrowed words from other languages?
Yes
No
17) Indirect or evasive expressions for unpleasant things are called dysphemisms.
True
False
18) Which of the following is a dysphemistic expression for a human corpse?
a cadaver
the remains
a stiff
a body
19) Avoidance of the name of a recently deceased person is an example of which of the
following phenomena:
dysphemism
colloquialism
euphemism
clipping
word taboo
20) Which of the following is a euphemistic expression for the cessation of a human life?
pass away
croak
die
drop dead
21) Grammatical morphemes in a language are more resistant to replacement than lexical
morphemes.
True
False
22) Calques are borrowings that have been adopted to the phonological patterns of the
recipient language.
True
False
23) According to Humpty Dumpty's explanation of wabe, what sort of word formation does it
involve?
phonaesthesia
backformation
meaning extension
compounding
blending
and open.
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Test: 5 Structure of Sentences: Syntax

Name / ID:
1) The syntax of a language is relatively more "open" than the morphology or phonology.
True
False
2) By definition a sentence is the largest linguistic unit with grammatical structure.
True
False
3) Does They followed his dripping blood until nightfall, didn't they? constitute a single
sentence?
Yes
No
4) The ambiguity test shows that I like the port has two different grammatical structures.
True
False
5) Which of the following is ungrammatical but interpretable in English?
Colourless green ideas sleep furiously

The horse raced past the barn fell
The farmer was sawn kill the duckling
Where did you go to?
6) Which of the following contsists of just a single clause?
I smelt the farmer spreading manure on the field.

The farmer will spread manure on the field at daybreak.
The farmer spread manure on the field and killed the duckling.
When I arrived at the piggery, the farmer was spreading manure on the field.
Who did you say spread manure on the field?
7) Sentences are always clauses, but clauses are not always sentences.
Both claims are true

Both claims are false
The first claim is false, the second is true
The first is claim true, the second false
8) In He tripped and fell in the river the words fell in the river do not make a clause because
they can't stand alone as an independent utterance.
True; the reasoning is good.

False; the reasoning is bad.
9) A noun phrase can consist of no more than a single noun or pronoun (possibly along with
words of other parts-of-speech).
True
False
10) A clause always consists of at least one NP and at least one VP.
True
False
11) One interpretation of The police shot the man with a rifle involves a PP embedded in an
NP. In this interpretation of the clause could you rephrase the clause as It was with a rifle
that the police shot the man?
Yes
No
12) Which of the following groups of words involves conjunction of NPs?
the man and his dog

the man on the moon
the man's dog
the green and white dress
13) Actor and Undergoer are purely meaningful categories, and have nothing to do with the
grammar of English or any other language.
True
False
14) In The cat fell off the wall the NP the cat is in the Undergoer role.
True
False
15) Which role(s) does the key serve in The key was broken by the farmer?
Just Subject
Just Undergoer
Subject and Actor
Object and Actor
Subject and Undergoer
Object and Undergoer
16) Which role(s) does the key serve in The key broke?
Just Subject
Just Undergoer
Subject and Actor
Object and Actor
Subject and Undergoer
Object and Undergoer
17) Adding a tag question to a clause identifies the Theme by the pronoun that occurs in the
tag.
True
False
18) Is Theme a grammatical relation?
Yes
No
19) Which of the following is a minor clause in English:
Yes!
Come!
He's sick.
Go away!
A dog.
No, never again.
20) Does English have both prepositional phrases and postpositional phrases?
Yes
No
21) In which of the following clauses can the PP with binoculars be interpreted as either
belonging along with the NP the criminal in a larger word group, or not so belonging?
The criminal with binoculars was seen by the police.
The police with binoculars saw the criminal.
With binoculars the police saw the criminal.
The criminal saw the police with binoculars.
22) It is useful to recognise grammatical relations in syntax, but not in morphology.
True
False
23) Can a sentence consist of just a single morpheme?
Yes
No
and open.
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Test: 6 Meaning
Name / ID:
1) Reference is the same thing as the signified or concept in the Saussurean sign.
True
False
2) Not all words have reference, but all have sense.
True
False
3) If two terms have the same reference they must also have the same sense:
True
False
4) Which of the following types of meaning extension refers to the situation where the
meaning of a term for a part of an object extends to cover the whole object?
metaphor
extension
metonymy
synonomy
polysemy
synecdoche
5) What is the study of utterance meaning called?
Semantics
Pragmatics
6) What type of the meaning extension does the bolded term in the following sentence
illustrate?
The car ploughed through the hedge. (i.e. moved through the hedge like a plough)
Metonymy
Metaphor
Synecdoche
None of these
illustrate?
Do you think Hollywood will be interested in my story? (i.e. the movie industry)
Metonymy
Metaphor
Synecdoche
None of these
illustrate?
Have you got wheels? (i.e. a car)
Metonymy
Metaphor
Synecdoche
None of these
illustrate?
I want to get some shut-eye. (i.e. sleep)
Metonymy
Metaphor
Synecdoche
None of these
illustrate?
That guy is a real baby. (i.e. behaves in a babyish way)
Metonymy
Metaphor
Synecdoche
None of these
11) The three senses of eye (a) organ of vision of humans and animals (People generally
have two eyes) , (b) ability at discriminating details of a visual representation (She has an
eye for detail), and (c) discerning interest in a person or thing (He has an eye for pretty
women) illustrate which of the following?
Polysemy
Vagueness
Homophony
Synonymy
Antonymy
12) Are eye, I, and aye in English homophones?
Yes
No
13) Polysemy is not the same thing as vagueness.
True
False
14) If a pair of words express opposite meanings but allow intermediate degrees between the
two extremes, they are called:
Synonyms
Converses
Hyponyms
Reverses
Gradable antonyms
15) Exact synonyms are rare in human languages.
True
False
16) Which of the following pairs is an example of converses (there is just one such pair):
short-long
in-out
give-receive
plant-flower
give-take
17) Salmon is a hyponym of fish.
True
False
18) Which of the following is not a meronym of body:
toenail
leg
trunk
arm
head
19) The meaning of an idiom is compositional.
True
False
20) Which of the following is not a speech act verb?
apologise
request
preach
question
believe
21) Performatives are sentences that make explicit their illocutionary force.
True
False
22) What illocutionary force is typically associated with an imperative?
command
interrogative
statement
transitive
question
23) Which of the following is an indirect speech act?
An interrogative used as a question

A declarative used as a statement
A declarative used as a question
An exclamative used as an exclamation
An imperative used as a command.
24) Is it true that indirect speech acts are often used for reasons of politeness?
Yes
No
25) Which one of the following verbs of thought presupposes the truth of the proposition
thought about?
believe
realize
hope
think
guess
26) Presuppositions remain if the sentence is negated.
True
False
27) People often lie. Therefore the Maxim of Quality can't be valid, so the cooperative
principle has to be rejected. Is this reasoning valid?
Yes
No
and open.
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Test: 7 Sociolinguistics: Language in

Social Context
Name / ID:
1) The term accent is used of dialectal varieties that differ just in grammar.
True
False
2) A dialect continuum is a chain of mutually intelligible dialects of a language.
True
False
3) Dialectal variation refers to variation in linguistic forms associated primarily with which of
the following phenomena?
social groups
illiterate speakers
geographical regions
rural regions
different individuals
4) Which of the following best describes the term isogloss?
boundary of a region in which a single dialect is spoken

boundary of a region where a particular feature of a language is found
boundary of region where a single language is spoken
none of the previous
5) Dialectal variation can be in any aspect of a language -- in phonetics, phonology,

morphology, syntax, semantics, or lexicon.
True
False
6) Did Labov's study of the speech of New Yorkers reveal that different social groups use
different allophones of the voiceless dental fricative phoneme?
Yes
No
7) Which of the following characteristics is not likely to correlate with systematic variation in
a language?
age
religion
sex
ethnicity
handedness
8) Which of the following varieties is not a register?
British English
medical English
an anti-language
legalese
scientific Danish
9) The choice of language by speakers in a bilingual community is not normally completely

random.
True
False
10) One factor that can influence the choice of language in a bilingual situation is the domain
of the speech interaction.
True
False
11) Language chioce in bilingual speech communities can usually be explained completely
by the domain of the speech interaction.
True
False
12) Code switching refers to which of the following phenomena:
Switching from written to spoken codes

Changing languages in different domains
Changing languages within a single discourse
13) In a bilingual community choice of which of the following language varieties is most
likely to be used to indicate solidarity among members of the community?
A global language like English

A national language
A regional language or dialect
A local language or language variety
14) Code-switching is a bad habit, and should be remedied via education and training.
True
False
15) Language shift is a slow process, extending over centuries.
True
False
16) As languages become obsolescent they often become structurally less complex.
True
False
17) Which of the following is not a cause of language shift?

Inadequacies in the grammar or lexicon of one of the languages
Physical separation of the speakers
Attitudes to the languages in use in the community
Symbolic value associated with the languages
Separation of children from adults in the community
18) Which of the following is not true?
Throughout human history languages have always become endangered and died.
Many languages of Australia and the Americas have become endangered in post-colonial
times.
There are no attested cases of successful language revival.
If the present rate of language death and endangerment continues a considerable number
of the world's languages will die in the next century.
Speakers of many -- though not all -- endangered languages are concerned about the fate
of their language.
19) Mandarin Chinese and Cantonese are dialects of Chinese.
True
False
20) The situation in which interlocutors adopt features of one another's speech is called:
affiliation
idiolectal variation
accommodation
convergence
disaffiliation
21) Reduction of word final consonant clusters is a defining feature of African American
Vernacular English.
True
False
22) What sort of speech variety would a variety of a language used when speaking to animals
be?
a dialect
a register
a secret variety
a respect variety
a distinct language
23) Use of a second person plural pronoun for a single addressee is in many languages
associated with which of the following:
intimacy
respectfulness
disrespect
secret varieties or anti-languages
deception or lying
and open.
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Test: 7 Sociolinguistics: Language in

Social Context
Name / ID:
1) The term accent is used of dialectal varieties that differ just in grammar.
True
False
2) A dialect continuum is a chain of mutually intelligible dialects of a language.
True
False
3) Dialectal variation refers to variation in linguistic forms associated primarily with which of
the following phenomena?
social groups
illiterate speakers
geographical regions
rural regions
different individuals
4) Which of the following best describes the term isogloss?
boundary of a region in which a single dialect is spoken

boundary of a region where a particular feature of a language is found
boundary of region where a single language is spoken
none of the previous
5) Dialectal variation can be in any aspect of a language -- in phonetics, phonology,

morphology, syntax, semantics, or lexicon.
True
False
6) Did Labov's study of the speech of New Yorkers reveal that different social groups use
different allophones of the voiceless dental fricative phoneme?
Yes
No
7) Which of the following characteristics is not likely to correlate with systematic variation in
a language?
age
religion
sex
ethnicity
handedness
8) Which of the following varieties is not a register?
British English
medical English
an anti-language
legalese
scientific Danish
9) The choice of language by speakers in a bilingual community is not normally completely

random.
True
False
10) One factor that can influence the choice of language in a bilingual situation is the domain
of the speech interaction.
True
False
11) Language chioce in bilingual speech communities can usually be explained completely
by the domain of the speech interaction.
True
False
12) Code switching refers to which of the following phenomena:
Switching from written to spoken codes

Changing languages in different domains
Changing languages within a single discourse
13) In a bilingual community choice of which of the following language varieties is most
likely to be used to indicate solidarity among members of the community?
A global language like English

A national language
A regional language or dialect
A local language or language variety
14) Code-switching is a bad habit, and should be remedied via education and training.
True
False
15) Language shift is a slow process, extending over centuries.
True
False
16) As languages become obsolescent they often become structurally less complex.
True
False
17) Which of the following is not a cause of language shift?
Inadequacies in the grammar or lexicon of one of the languages

Physical separation of the speakers
Attitudes to the languages in use in the community
Symbolic value associated with the languages
Separation of children from adults in the community
18) Which of the following is not true?
Throughout human history languages have always become endangered and died.
Many languages of Australia and the Americas have become endangered in post-colonial
times.
There are no attested cases of successful language revival.
If the present rate of language death and endangerment continues a considerable number
of the world's languages will die in the next century.
Speakers of many -- though not all -- endangered languages are concerned about the fate
of their language.
19) Mandarin Chinese and Cantonese are dialects of Chinese.
True
False
20) The situation in which interlocutors adopt features of one another's speech is called:
affiliation
idiolectal variation
accommodation
convergence
disaffiliation
21) Reduction of word final consonant clusters is a defining feature of African American
Vernacular English.
True
False
22) What sort of speech variety would a variety of a language used when speaking to animals
be?
a dialect
a register
a secret variety
a respect variety
a distinct language
23) Use of a second person plural pronoun for a single addressee is in many languages
associated with which of the following:
intimacy
respectfulness
disrespect
secret varieties or anti-languages
deception or lying
and open.
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Test: 9 Language Acquisition

Name / ID:
1) Human beings are genetically predisposed to speak the language of their biological
parents.
True
False
2) The child's acquisition of language is a staged process, which is broadly similar for all
languages.
True
False
3) The normal child acquires a basic mastery of the language of the community it is born into
by about what age?
1.5 years
2 years
2-3 years
4-5 years
8 years
12 years
4) Which of the following best describes telegraphic speech?
utterances are a single word long

utterances have few lexical items
utterances consist of lexical items, with few grammatical items
utterances have no intonation contour
the type of speech used by a mother to a child
5) Deaf children who are exposed to sign language learn it spontaneously.
True
False
6) Is caretaker speech characterised by high pitch in all languages?
Yes
No
7) The earliest acquired consonants are generally:
stops and nasals

glides
rhotics
laterals
fricatives
8) Which of the following phone replacements are not expected in the speech of children?
Of velars by alveolars
Of fricatives by stops
Of alveolars by velars
Of laterals by glides
Of consonant clusters by single consonants
9) A general characteristic of language acquisition is that perception and recognition precedes

production.
True
False
10) Consonants are most likely to be first produced correctly in which position?
end of a word
in a consonant cluster
beginning of a word
between vowels
11) Morphology tends to acquired earlier in morphologically rich languages than in

morphologically simple languages.
True
False
12) Which of the following is the most common type of semantic error made by children?
over-extension of meaning
under-extension of meaning
mismatch of meaning
13) Which of the following stages in acquisition of number marking on nouns in English
occurs latest?
use of the allomorphs -s and -z

all overgeneralizations are corrected
existence of just a few high frequency irregular plural forms
a single form for each noun, unmarked for number
14) The order of acquisition of words and grammatical structures accurately reflects their
frequency in adult language usage.
True
False
15) Innateness refers to the idea that human beings are genetically endowed to acquire
language generally, though not any particular language.
True
False
16) Can stages in acquisition of grammatical structures overlap?
Yes
No
17) It is impossible to acquire a native-like accent in a language learnt in adulthood.
True
No
18) Does the fact that children may be unable to precisely immitate an utterance of a certain
type argue against the role of immitation in acquisition?
Yes
No
19) The notion that word meanings can be inferred from the grammatical features of an
utterance is called:
syntactic bootstrapping hypothesis

semantic bootstrapping hypothesis
poverty of the stimulus
novel name-new category hypothesis
hypothesis testing
20) Stages in acquisition of a second language in adulthood are:
identical with stages in acquiring first language in childhood

completely different to stages of acquiring a first languge in childhood
similar to, but not identical with stages of acquiring a first language in childhood
non-existent: second languages are not learnt in stages
21) Is the critical period hypothesis supported by clear-cut biological evidence?
Yes
No
22) The system of a second language acquired in adulthood can affect (and change) a
corresponding system in the person's first language.
True
False
23) Negative transfer is most easily corrected in phonetics and phonology.
True
False
and open.
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Test: 10 Language in its Biological

Context
Name / ID:
1) Involuntary bodily behaviour of animals such as erection of hair represent which of the
following types of sign?
symbols
icons
indexes
2) The dances of honey bees shows evidence of a limited degree of displacement.
True
False
3) The available evidence suggests which of the following is the most likely to be true?
bee dance is primarily culturally transmitted

bee dance is primarily genetically encoded
4) Evidence of a critical period for acquisition of songs by some species of song-birds argues
for a genetic component to songs in that species, and some degree of cultural transmission.
True
False
5) There is evidence that vervet monkeys alarm calls are to some degree culturally
transmitted.
True
False
6) Which of the following best characterises the vocalisations of apes?
they are mainly culturally transmitted

they are largely voluntary
they are largely involuntary
they are mainly used for describing the world
7) The number of vocalised calls used in natural (or wild) chimpanzee populations is
approximately:
two or three
about 20
about 100
about 1,000
Unlimited
8) The intentional gestures of chimpanzees are:
largely innate
entirely culturally transmitted
mainly iconic
mainly used to direct attention of conspecifics for sharing interest in some object
used for attracting attention to the signer and requesting action
9) The natural vocalised calls of chimpanzees show no evidence of internal structure, or

possibilities of combination.
True
False
10) There is no evidence of productivity in the natural communication systems of any

animals.
True
False
11) Study of natural animal communication systems reveals which of the following?
Animals do not use communication systems with the full potential of human language.
Some animals are capable of using systems with the full potential of human language.
Some animal communication systems show all of the design features of human
languages.
None of the preceding.
12) The novel name-new category principle is unique to human beings: other animals cannot
use this strategy to determine meaning or reference of signs.
True
False
13) Why did early attempts to teach chimpanzees to speak fail?
Poor training methods: the attempts would have succeeded otherwise.

For physiological reasons: chimps don't have the right anatomical hardware for human
speech.
For social reasons: the chimps were not properly socialised in human families.
Bad choices: if smarter chimps were chosen they would have been successful.
14) Chimpanzees who have been taught ASL, plastic tokens, or lexigrams, are able to put
signs together into sequences to form more complex utterances.
True
False
15) Sign systems taught to chimpanzees reveal no evidence of which of the following design
features of human language?
displacement
reflexivity
productivity
cultural transmission
arbitrariness
16) Roughly how many signs have chimpanzees like Kanzi learnt?
two or three
about 20
about 100
200 or so
about 1,000
17) Evidence suggests that chimpanzees' use of signs is to a significant extent motivated by
desire to acquire rewards, especially of food.
True
False
18) Evidence from studies of apes suggests that our common ancestors did not use
vocalisations intentionally, but may have had intentional control of manual gestures.
Yes
No
19) According to the yakkety-yak theory (the gossip or grooming hypothesis) human
language arose for the purpose of:
cementing interpersonal relations among individuals

informing others about the social world in order to identify free-loaders
informing others about the material world in order to identify free-loaders
to foster rivalries amongst individuals and foment breaking up of social groups, leading
to emergence of new languages and societies
20) Does the available evidence from genetics conclusively prove that FOXP2 is the
language gene?
Yes
No
21) Genetic evidence argues in favour which of the following two possibilities?
FOXP2 was a target of natural selection

A single genetic mutation occurred in FOXP2
22) According to the looky-look (or social cognition theory) theory we have a language ready
body (including brain), but that the last steps in the emergence of language were cultural.
True
False
23) Which of the following is false?
Many fundamental biological components and processes involved in human vocal

production and perception are shared with animals
The communicative systems and abilities of animals unassailably supports the gradual
evolution of language from other communication systems
Investigation of non-human systems of communication provides a useful perspective on
the evolution of language
Language evolution is best approached from various different disciplines
and open.
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Test: 11 Unity and Diversity in Language

Structure
Name / ID:
1) There is no limit on the variation that is possible within human languages.
True
False
2) A sample of 200 languages represents a better basis for doing typological linguistics than a
sample of 50 languages.
True
False
Possibly, but not necessarily
3) Which of the following is not an implicational universal? (Note that you are not asked
whether or not they are valid, just whether they are implicational universals.)
If a language has voiceless nasals it has voiced nasals
All languages with a trial number distinction in nouns also have a dual distinction
All languages have consonants and vowels
All languages with affricates have fricatives
4) Which of the following is a non-absolute universal? (Note that you are not asked whether
or not they are valid universals.)
All languages have vowels and consonants

If a language has affricates it usually has fricatives
If a language has clicks, it has nasals
All langauges have at least one phonemic stop
5) Which of the following implicational universals is better formulated as a non-implicational

universal:
If a language has verbs, it has adpositions

If a language has more than two consonants, it has more than one vowel
If a language has clicks, it has lexical tone
If a language has a large number of consonants it usually also has a large number of
vowels
If a language has lexical tone, it also has stress
6) Based on your knowledge of linguistics, which of the following is least likely to be an

absolute universal?
Languages have vowels

Languages have stop phones
If a language has a dual category for pronouns it will also distinguish singular from plural
in pronouns
Languages have a voicing distinction for stops
7) Based on the data shown in the following figure, which of the generalisations below is not
valid? (Each balloon represents a different language.)
The verb tends to occur before the object

If a language has prepositions it has VSO word order
If a language has SVO word order it has postpositions
If a language has postpositions it has SVO word order
If a language has VSO word order it has prepositions
8) Based on the data in the figure in Question 7, is it the case that languages have initial
subjects if and only if they have postpositions?
Yes
No
9) Based on the data shown in the following figure, which of the generalisations below is
valid?
The verb tends to occur after the subject
If a language has prepositions it has VSO word order
Languages tend to have both prepositions and initial subjects
If a language has postpositions the subject precedes the verb
If a language has SVO word order it has prepositions
10) Based on the data in the above figure, is it true that languages have prepositions if and
only if the verb precedes the object?
Yes
No
11) Which type of language is characterised by morphologically complex words in which it is

not easy to separate morphemes from one another?
isolating
agglutinating
fusional
polysynthetic
12) Given that twalamnagak means 'I sharpened the knife' in Chukchee, what
morphological type would you expect this language to be?
isolating
agglutinating
fusional
polysynthetic
13) If three number distinctions are marked on nouns in a language by inflections, which
category will normally be the unmarked one?
singular
dual
plural
14) In a language that distinguishes number inflectionally on nouns, if an irregular noun does
not make the distinction, which regular form is the irregular noun most likely to resemble?
singular
plural
15) Which of the following is not normally a feature of the unmarked category in an
opposition?
Smaller in phonological size than marked category

More frequent in use than marked category
Admits fewer distinctions in cross-cutting dimensions
Tends to occur where the oppositon is neutralised
16) Is it true that the unmarked category in an opposition tends to be found most frequently
across languages?
Yes
No
17) Supposing that the following hierarchy accounts for the use of alienable and inalienable
possessive constructions cross-linguistically, which end would you expect inalienable
possession to extend out from?
Left
Right
18) If in a given language we find that kin are treated as alienable possessions, what does the
above hierarchy indicate about clothing?
It is also treated as an alienable possession

It is treated as an inalienable possession
No conclusion can be drawn
19) If in a given language we find that kin are treated as inalienable possessions, what does
the above hierarchy indicate about clothing?
It is also treated as an inalienable possession

It is treated as an alienable possession
No conclusion can be drawn
20) Supposing that body part nouns in a given language were treated as inalienable (if
attached to people or aninmals) or alienable (if detached or amputated), and all other nouns as
alienable, what modification would you make to the hierarchy of Question 17?
Replace body part in the hierarchy by attached body part > detached body part
Replace body part in the hierarchy by detached body part > attached body part
Nothing: the hierarchy must be rejected as invalid
21) Which case is normally unmarked in ergative-absolutive case systems?
ergative
absolutive
neither
22) Is it true that in the majority of fixed word order languages S precedes O.
Yes
No
23) Which of the following case-marking systems is inconsistent with Silverstein's hierarchy?
Nominative-accusative system for pronouns; ergative-absolutive for all nouns

Nominative-accusative for pronouns, proper nouns, kin terms, human nouns and animate
nouns; ergative-absolutive for inanimate nouns
Nominative-accusative for first and second person pronouns; ergative-absolutive for third
person pronouns and all nouns
Nominative-accusative for pronouns, proper nouns, kin terms, and human nouns;
ergative-absolutive for inanimate nouns; no marking for animate nouns
Nominative-accusative system for pronouns; ergative-absolutive for all nouns except
inanimate nouns, which get no case-marking
and open.
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Test: 12 Language Change

Name / ID:
1) Languages change very rapidly compared to complex animal species such as primates.
True
False
2) Languages change is not constant, but varies within certain limits.
True
False
3) Which of the following is not a type of sound change?
assimilation
dissimilation
deletion
insertion
metathesis
bleaching
4) Which of the following sound changes is not an example of assimilation? (Forms are given
in IPA.)
maror > marol

bimp > bimb
singa > siga
bapa > baba
5) The sound change k > t in skama > stama is an example of regressive assimilation.
True
False
6) According to Grimm's law, proto-Indo-European voiceless stops became voiceless

fricatives in Germanic. Is this an example of a chain shift?
Yes
No
7) Which of the following is an example of metathesis? (Forms are given in IPA.)
aks > ask

aks > akas
aks > ak
aks > ats
aks > ak
8) Which of the following is an example of assimilation? (Forms are given in IPA.)

film > fiml
film > firm
film > film
film > filn
film > fim
9) Only free morphemes can be borrowed.
True
False
10) Which of the following hypothetical changes in English plural forms would be an
example of an analogical levelling?
kts > ktn

mn > mnz
bndz > bnd
dgz > dks
11) The humorous plural spice of the singular spouse illustrates which sort of morphological
change?
analogical levelling
analogical extension
reanalysis
grammaticalization
12) Word order patterns are too abstract to be borrowed.
True
False
13) In a certain language we find that what used to be a reflexive construction a century ago
is now used also to express reciprocal meanings (i.e. acting on one another). Which of the
following processes does this illustrate?
borrowing
extension
reanalysis
dissimilation
14) If a grammatical structure or construction is borrowed from one language to another, the
grammatical morphemes marking it in the source language will always be translated into the
borrowing language.
True
False
15) Which of the following processes does not normally happen to a morpheme when it
undergoes grammaticalization?
semantic bleaching
concretisation of meaning
phonological reduction
16) Which of the following pair of changes is the more likely?
change from verb to preposition

change from preposition to verb
17) Which of the following types of marker is the most likely for be going to to
grammaticalize into?
a marker of present tense

a marker of past tense
a marker of future tense
a marker of continuous aspect
18) Is pejoration the process by which a word takes on a more positive connotation?
Yes
No
19) A change in the meaning of a verb from 'hit' to 'kill' is an example of which sort of
semantic change?
pejoration
understatement
bleaching
elevation
hyperbole
20) A change in meaning from left hand to evil illustrates which of the following types of
semantic change?
pejoration
understatement
bleaching
elevation
hyperbole
21) Which of the following is the least likely or poorest explanation for a sound change from
[ng] to[]?
laziness
economising of articulatory gestures
22) There is a tendency for grammatical systems to change so as to become (more)

symmetrical, filling in gaps in paradigms.
True
False
23) The replacement of the pronoun /aju/ 'I' by /mi/ in a language because of its
phonological similarity to the name of a deceased person is an example of what type of
change:
semantic bleacing
regularisation
taboo replacement
pejoration
foreign influence
and open.
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Test: 13 Languages of the World

Name / ID:
1) The linguistic diversity of the world is decreasing rapidly.
True
False
2) Which of the following corresponds best to the linguistic conception of a single language?
mutually intelligibile varieties

varieties associated with a religion
varieties associated with an individual speaker
varieties associated with a nation state
3) If you were to draw a graph showing the number of speakers of languages against numbers
of languages with those speakerships, would this look like a normal bell curve?
Yes
No
4) Languages are genetically related if they:
are typologically similar

derive from a single proto-language
are spoken by genetically related groups of people
are spoken in the same geographical region (e.g. contintent)
share the same two parent languages
5) The regional density of languages correlates directly with population density.
True
False
6) The most reliable method of establishing the genetic relatedness of a group of languages
is:
mass-comparison
comparative method
lexicostatistics
typology
7) Cognates are lexical items that:
are identical in form and meaning in a pair of languages

are similar in form and meaning in a pair of languages
derive from the same item in an ancestor language
have been borrowed from another language
are accidentally similar in form and meaning
8) If you were going to reconstruct proto-Indo-European (p.278), the ancestor language of

most languages spoken in Europe, which of the following glosses would you not set about
establishing cognate sets for?
'water'
'up'
'stand'
'musket'
'father'
9) Even if all languages spoken today do derive from a single ancestor language, it is unlikely
this will ever be convincingly demonstrated.
True
False
10) The method of mass comparison can be useful as an initial step in determining which
languages in a set of languages are genetically related.
True
False
11) Basic vocabulary of a language is believed to be more resistant to replacement (including

borrowing) than non-basic vocabulary.
True
False
12) Lexicostatistics is a statistical tool developed for which of the following purposes?
determining if languages are genetically related

determining subgrouping within an established genetic family
determining whether languages have borrowed extensively from one another
determining if languages are typologically similar
none of the preceding
13) Language isolates are languages that:

are not known to be related to any other languages
are spoken on isolated islands
have no dialectal or sociolectal varieties
are separated geographically from other members of their family
14) Does a large number of lexical similarities between a pair of languages indicate that are
genetically related?
Yes
No
15) Which of the following regions is the most linguistically diverse in terms of numbers of
languages?
Europe
North America
New Guinea and nearby islands
Tasmania
China
Africa
16) It is generally presumed that the area where a family of languages shows the greatest
linguistic diversity is the homeland of the family.
True
False
17) What is the largest genetic family in terms of number of speakers?
Sino-Tibetan
Austronesian
Afroasiatic
Niger-Congo
Indo-European
18) Which of the following four putative families of African languages is the best
established?
Khoisan
Nilo-Saharan
Afroasiatic
Niger-Congo
19) Rudimentary languages that sometimes arise in contact situations, when speakers of
mutually unintelligible languages come into contact with one another in a limited range of
social interactions are called:
creoles
pidgins
hibrid languages
mixed languages
lingua francas
20) Is it true that creoles are full languages, with lexical and grammatical complexities
comparable with those of other languages?
Yes
No
21) Which of the following is a mixed language?
Tok Pisin
Pidgin Yimas
Fanagalo
Michif
Cree
22) In a mixed language it is possible for two distinct phonological systems to coexist.
True
False
23) Which types of language cause greatest problems for the family tree model of genetic
relations?
mixed languages
language isolates
superstratum languages
substratum languages
none of these
and open.
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Test: 13 Languages of the World
Name / ID:
1) The linguistic diversity of the world is decreasing rapidly.
True
False
2) Which of the following corresponds best to the linguistic conception of a single language?
mutually intelligibile varieties

varieties associated with a religion
varieties associated with an individual speaker
varieties associated with a nation state
3) If you were to draw a graph showing the number of speakers of languages against numbers
of languages with those speakerships, would this look like a normal bell curve?
Yes
No
4) Languages are genetically related if they:
are typologically similar

derive from a single proto-language
are spoken by genetically related groups of people
are spoken in the same geographical region (e.g. contintent)
share the same two parent languages
5) The regional density of languages correlates directly with population density.
True
False
6) The most reliable method of establishing the genetic relatedness of a group of languages
is:
mass-comparison
comparative method
lexicostatistics
typology
7) Cognates are lexical items that:
are identical in form and meaning in a pair of languages

are similar in form and meaning in a pair of languages
derive from the same item in an ancestor language
have been borrowed from another language
are accidentally similar in form and meaning
8) If you were going to reconstruct proto-Indo-European (p.278), the ancestor language of

most languages spoken in Europe, which of the following glosses would you not set about
establishing cognate sets for?
'water'
'up'
'stand'
'musket'
'father'
9) Even if all languages spoken today do derive from a single ancestor language, it is unlikely
this will ever be convincingly demonstrated.
True
False
10) The method of mass comparison can be useful as an initial step in determining which
languages in a set of languages are genetically related.
True
False
11) Basic vocabulary of a language is believed to be more resistant to replacement (including

borrowing) than non-basic vocabulary.
True
False
12) Lexicostatistics is a statistical tool developed for which of the following purposes?
determining if languages are genetically related

determining subgrouping within an established genetic family
determining whether languages have borrowed extensively from one another
determining if languages are typologically similar
none of the preceding
13) Language isolates are languages that:
are not known to be related to any other languages

are spoken on isolated islands
have no dialectal or sociolectal varieties
are separated geographically from other members of their family
14) Does a large number of lexical similarities between a pair of languages indicate that are
genetically related?
Yes
No
15) Which of the following regions is the most linguistically diverse in terms of numbers of
languages?
Europe
North America
New Guinea and nearby islands
Tasmania
China
Africa
16) It is generally presumed that the area where a family of languages shows the greatest
linguistic diversity is the homeland of the family.
True
False
17) What is the largest genetic family in terms of number of speakers?

Sino-Tibetan
Austronesian
Afroasiatic
Niger-Congo
Indo-European
18) Which of the following four putative families of African languages is the best
established?
Khoisan
Nilo-Saharan
Afroasiatic
Niger-Congo
19) Rudimentary languages that sometimes arise in contact situations, when speakers of
mutually unintelligible languages come into contact with one another in a limited range of
social interactions are called:
creoles
pidgins
hibrid languages
mixed languages
lingua francas
20) Is it true that creoles are full languages, with lexical and grammatical complexities
comparable with those of other languages?
Yes
No
21) Which of the following is a mixed language?
Tok Pisin
Pidgin Yimas
Fanagalo
Michif
Cree
22) In a mixed language it is possible for two distinct phonological systems to coexist.
True
False
23) Which types of language cause greatest problems for the family tree model of genetic
relations?
mixed languages
language isolates
superstratum languages
substratum languages
none of these
and open.
2009 Continuum

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