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Terms: I

Explore 933 linguistic terms, with definitions, examples, and connections to the bigger picture.

933 terms
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Identity Of Illocutionary Forces

Identity of illocutionary forces is a relationship between two illocutionary forces such that when they are employed with the same propositional content, …

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Ideophone

An ideophone is a member of a set of words that are phonologically distinguishable from other words in a language are often onomatopoeic, and form one or …

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Idiom

An idiom is a multiword construction that is a semantic unit whose meaning cannot be deduced from the meanings of its constituents, and has a …

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Illative Case

Illative case is a case that expresses motion into or direction toward the referent of the noun it marks.

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Illocutionary Act

An illocutionary act is a complete speech act, made in a typical utterance, that consists of the delivery of the propositional content of the utterance …

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Illocutionary Conditional

An illocutionary conditional is a complex illocutionary act that consists of an illocutionary act, and a stated condition for the performance of that act.

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Illocutionary Connective

An illocutionary connective is a connective that is used to join two or more illocutionary acts in one utterance.

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Illocutionary Consistency

Illocutionary consistency is a property of a set of illocutionary acts such that it is possible, in at least one context of utterance, for the speaker to …

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Illocutionary Denegation

An illocutionary denegation is an illocutionary act that is made complex by the negation of its illocutionary force. It expresses that the speaker is not …

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Illocutionary Force

Illocutionary force is the combination of the illocutionary point of an utterance, and particular presuppositions and attitudes that must accompany that …

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Illocutionary Force Indicating Device

An illocutionary force indicating device is any linguistic element that indicates or delimits the illocutionary force of an utterance.

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Illocutionary Inconsistency

Illocutionary inconsistency is a property of a set of illocutionary acts such that it is not possible, in any context of utterance, for the speaker to be …

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Illocutionary Point

An illocutionary point is the basic purpose of a speaker in making an utterance. It is a component of illocutionary force.

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Illocutionary Verb

An illocutionary verb is a verb that, as part of its meaning, expresses at least one illocutionary force, or a quality of some component of illocutionary …

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Illustrative Sentence

An illustrative sentence is an example that clarifies the usage of a particular sense of a lexeme.

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Image Schema

An image schema is a mental pattern that recurrently provides structured understanding of various experiences, and is available for use in metaphor as a …

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Immediacy

Immediacy is a distinction in place deixis that indicates location at a distance intermediate between locations considered proximal and distal.

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Immediate Constituent

An immediate constituent is any one of the largest grammatical units that constitute a construction. Immediate constituents are often further reducible.

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Immediate Imperative Mood

Immediate imperative mood is an imperative mood that signals that the command or request is to be carried out right away.

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Immediate Past Tense

Immediate past tense is past tense that refers to a time considered very recent in relation to the moment of utterance.

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Imperative Mood

Imperative mood is mood that signals directive modality, especially in commands. Its use may be extended to signal permission.

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Imperfective Aspect

Imperfective aspect is an aspect that expresses an event or state, with respect to its internal structure, instead of expressing it as a simple whole.

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Impermissible Mixed Metaphors

Impermissible mixed metaphors are metaphors that conflict because they serve different purposes.

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Impersonal Verb

An impersonal verb is a verb that occurs only in third person singular forms has no specified agent, and has a dummy subject or no subject.

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Implicational Scale

An implicational scale is a set of lexical items that are of the same constituent category, and ordered in terms of their informativeness. Any sentence …

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Implicature

An implicature is anything that is inferred from an utterance but that is not a condition for the truth of the utterance.

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Imprecative Mood

Imprecative mood is a volitive mood that signals the speaker's wish that an unfavorable proposition will come about.

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Inalienable Noun

An inalienable noun is a noun that refers to something viewed as permanently and necessarily possessed, and is thus obligatorily expressed as possessed. It …

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Inanimate Class

An inanimate class is a category of nouns that do not have human or animal referents.

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Inchoative Aspect

Inchoative aspect is an aspect that expresses the beginning of an event or state.

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Inclusive Alternative Relation

An inclusive alternative relation is an alternative relation in which more than one of the propositions may be true or fulfilled.

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Inclusive First Person Deixis

Inclusive first person deixis is deixis that refers to a group including the addressee(s).

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Indefinite Concessive Relation

An indefinite concessive relation is a concession relation in which the clause that expresses the concession contains a form, such as the following, that …

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Indefinite Pronoun

An indefinite pronoun is a pronoun that belongs to a class whose members indicate indefinite reference.

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Indefiniteness

Indefiniteness is a kind of definiteness indicating that the referent(s) of an expression are not presumed to be identifiable. The referent is not …

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Indirect Illocution

Indirect illocution is an illocutionary act in which the speaker expresses another illocutionary force other than that literally expressed in the utterance …

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Indirect Object

An indirect object is a grammatical relation that is one means of expressing the semantic role of goal and other similar roles. It is proposed for …

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Indirect Speech

Indirect speech is reported speech that is presented with grammatical modifications, rather than as it might have been uttered by the original speaker.

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Individual-Group Lexical Relation

An individual-group lexical relation is an association between two lexical units in which one lexical unit is a collective term of the other.

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Inessive Case

Inessive case is a case that expresses a location within the referent of the noun it marks.

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Inferable Entity

An inferable entity is a referent that may be inferred by the addressee from other information that has already been given.

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Inferior Status

Inferior status is social deixis that encodes a low degree of status.

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Infield Distinction

An infield distinction is a distinction in place deixis that indicates that a location is in visual range.

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Infinitive

An infinitive is the base form of a verb. It is unmarked for inflectional categories such as the following: Aspect Modality Number Person Tense

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Infix

An infix is an affix that is inserted within a root or stem .

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Infixation

Infixation is a morphological process whereby a bound morpheme attaches within a root or stem . The kind of affix involved in this process is called an …

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Inflection

Inflection is variation in the form of a word, typically by means of an affix, that expresses a grammatical contrast which is obligatory for the stem’s …

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Inflectional Affix

An inflectional affix is an affix that: expresses a grammatical contrast that is obligatory for its stem's word class in some given grammatical context …

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Inflectional Category

An inflectional category is a class of affixes that share a common grammatical feature.

Also known as Grammatical Category
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Informal Language

Informal language is language use characterized by: spontaneous speech in situations that may be described as natural or "real-life," and the use of a …

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Informativeness Principle

The informativeness principle is an implicature in which the addressee is licensed to apply his or her knowledge of the world to infer an implicature that …

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Initiative Time Latency

An initiative time latency is the time between the end of a participant's turn and the resumption of his or her speakership in the absence of a response …

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Insertion Sequence

An insertion sequence is a sequence of turns that intervenes between the first and second parts of an adjacency pair .

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Instrument As A Semantic Role

Instrument is the semantic role of an inanimate thing that an agent uses to implement an event. It is the stimulus or immediate physical cause of an event.

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Instrumental Case

Instrumental case is a case indicating that the referent of the noun it marks is the means of the accomplishment of the action expressed by the clause .

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Intended Perlocutionary Effect

An intended perlocutionary effect is what a speaker intends an utterance to achieve in an addressee

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Intensifier

An intensifier heightens or lowers the intensity of meaning of an item.

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Interjection

An interjection is a form, typically brief, such as one syllable or word, which is used most often as an exclamation or part of an exclamation. An …

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Internal Relation

An internal relation is an interpropositional relation that relates the situations described in the propositions by their communicative usage as opposed to …

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Internal Relative Clause

An internal relative clause is a relative clause whose head noun phrase occurs within the relative clause itself.

Also known as Internal-headed relative clause
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Interpretation Relation

An interpretation relation is an interpropositional relation in which some proposition(s) relate the content of some other proposition(s) to a different …

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Interpropositional Relation

An interpropositional relation is an explicit or inferred coherence relation between propositions or groups of propositions that are typically expressed by …

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Interrogative Mood

An interrogative mood is an epistemic mood that signals that the speaker wishes to elicit information concerning the content of his or her utterance from …

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Interrogative Pro-Form

An interrogative pro-form is a pro-form that is used in questions to stand for the item questioned.

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Intimate Social Deixis

Intimate social deixis is deixis that expresses a very high degree of solidarity between the speaker and the addressee .

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Intonation

Intonation is the system of levels (rising and falling) and variations in pitch sequences within speech.

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Intransitivity

Intransitivity is a term that describes a verb or clause that is unable to take a direct object .

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Irony

Irony is a trope in which an expression is used in such a fashion as to convey the opposite meaning of what is expressed.

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Irrealis Modality

Irrealis modality is a modality that connotes that the proposition with which it is associated is nonactual or nonfactual.

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Irregular Verb

An irregular verb is a verb which does not conform to an expected inflectional pattern.

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Isolating Language

An isolating language is a language in which almost every word consists of a single morpheme.

Also known as Analytic language
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Iterative Aspect

Iterative aspect is an aspect that expresses the repetition of an event or state.

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