Foundations of Language and Linguistics
What the questions test
Candidates must move confidently across the five traditional levels of language analysis. Phonology covers phonemes, allophones, minimal pairs, place/manner/voicing of consonants, and suprasegmentals (stress, intonation, juncture). Morphology covers free and bound morphemes, derivational versus inflectional affixes, and word-formation processes such as compounding, blending, and clipping. Syntax covers phrase structure, constituent order, embedding, and the difference between deep and surface structure. Semantics covers homonymy, polysemy, synonymy, antonymy, hyponymy, and semantic features. Pragmatics covers speech acts, implicature, deixis, and Gricean maxims; discourse covers cohesion and coherence across sentences.
Traps that catch candidates
- Counting letters instead of phonemes. Catch has five letters but three phonemes (/k/, /æ/, /tʃ/).
- Counting syllables instead of morphemes. Cats is one syllable but two morphemes.
- Confusing derivational with inflectional morphology: inflection changes grammatical function without changing the word class (walk → walked); derivation typically changes word class (teach → teacher).
- Assuming a single English letter maps to a single sound - English orthography is far from phonemic.
- Treating pragmatics as vocabulary knowledge when the question concerns meaning inferred from context.
Worked example
Question: How many morphemes and phonemes are in unbelievable? Morphemes: un- (bound, derivational) + believe (free) + -able (bound, derivational) = three morphemes. Phonemes: /ʌ n b ɪ l i v ə b ə l/ = eleven phonemes. Note that the spelling has twelve letters, so letter counting would give the wrong answer.
Rule of thumb
If swapping one sound changes the meaning (bat/cat), you have isolated a phoneme. If removing a unit removes meaning or grammatical information (play/played), you have isolated a morpheme.