The Acquisition of Interjections in Early Childhood

Stange, Ulrike

The Acquisition of Interjections in Early Childhood

Pädagogik - Kindergarten, Vorschule, frühkindl. Erziehung

Zusammenfassung

Inhaltsangabe:Introduction:
The question of how and if children acquire language has long been of perennial interest: is language innate or not? If it is, what then is the proto-language? The first phylogenetic study was conducted as early as the 7th century BC: pharaoh Psammetich I. undertook to determine what the proto-language is by giving two infants to a foster father who was not allowed to talk to them. After two years of no linguistic input they could only speak one word bek which was assumed to be the Phrygian word for bread (bekos). In the 16th century Akbar the Great initiated the first ontogenetic study. By having two infants raised by a mute woman he proved that children do not learn to speak if they do not hear anyone speak. Since then ample questions concerning first language acquisition have been faced and replied to in detail and at great length. Yet, there are still some left unanswered or even unasked. One of the topics that have not been of great interest so far is the acquisition of interjections not only in first language but also in foreign language learning.
In fact, interjections play an important role in communicative as well as non-communicative contexts, and their actual linguistic value and role were underestimated and misjudged for quite a long time:
Interjections are among the most little studied of language phenomena; as one looks for references to them in the works of linguists, one is struck by the fact that they are very rarely mentioned, and where they are mentioned, it is usually only briefly and cursorily.
Only recently have linguists delved into the subject of interjections and discovered that this particular linguistic phenomenon provides in fact ample opportunity for study and research. Moreover, with the interest in interjections the problem arose to determine what actually defines an interjection. As we shall see, opinions on this point differ considerably and attempts at agreeing upon the definition of interjections have been unsuccessful so far. Yet, there are some general tendencies which will form the basis for how the term interjection is used in this paper, and discussion of this point will be postponed until part II.
Now, this M.A. thesis aims at gaining an insight into the acquisition of interjections in early childhood. This field has been neglected so far but merits in fact extensive and thorough inspection. This paper consists of three main parts, with the first two parts forming […]

Leseprobe

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Ulrike Stange

The Acquisition of Interjections in Early Childhood

ISBN: 978-3-8366-2481-7

Herstellung: Diplomica® Verlag GmbH, Hamburg, 2009

Zugl. Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz, Mainz, Deutschland, Magisterarbeit, 2008

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Table of Contents

Introduction

Part I.

Part I. ---- Child Language Acquisition

Child Language Acquisition

I.1

Preliminary Remarks

I.1.1

Why Do We Learn to Speak at All?

I.1.2

Anatomic Implications

I.2

Basic Principles

I.2.1

The Neonate

I.2.2

First Vocalisations

I.2.3

The Babbling Period

I.2.4

Prosodics

I.2.5

Early Word Comprehension and Production

I.3

Phonology

I.4

Grammatical Acquisition

I.5

Semantics

I.6

Summary: Child Language Acquisition

II.

Part II.

Part II. ---- Interjections

Interjections

II.1

What Is an Interjection? Approaches and Introduction

II.2

Brief Overview: History of the Study of Interjections

II.3

Primary and Secondary Interjections

II.4

Features of Interjections

II.4.1

Why Are There Similarities across Different Languages?

II.4.1.1

The Pooh-pooh Theory

II.4.1.2

Physiological Determinants

II.4.1.3

Formal Constraints

II.4.2

An Attempt at Classifying Interjections

II.4.2.1

Tesnière's Classification of Interjections

II.4.2.2

Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm's Classification of Interjections

II.4.2.3

Ameka's Classification of Interjections

II.4.3

Parameters of Interjectionality

II.4.3.1

Functional and Pragmatic Features

II.4.3.1.1 Emotivity and Expressiveness

II.4.3.1.2 Non-referentiality

II.4.3.1.3 The Role of Interjections in Speech Acts

II.4.3.1.4 Monologicity

II.4.3.2

Formal Features

II.4.3.2.1 Prosodic and Suprasegmental Characteristics

II.4.3.2.2 Phonotactics and Syllable Structure

II.4.3.2.3 Phonology

II.4.3.3

Orthography

II.4.3.4

Morphology

II.4.3.5

Lexical Structures

II.4.3.6

Syntax

II.4.3.7

Semiotic Structures

II.4.3.8

Semantic Properties

II.4.3.9

Summary: Features of Primary and Secondary Interjections 54

II.4.3.10 The Linguisticality of Interjections

II.5

Interjections in the English Language

II.5.1

Interjections of Disgust

II.5.2

Interjections Containing an Element of Surprise

II.5.2.1

Oh!

II.5.2.2

Wow!

II.5.2.3

Whoops! and Oops!

II.5.3

Interjections of Pain

II.5.4

Other Interjections

II.6

The Acquisition of Interjections

III.

Part III.

Part III. ---- Study: The A

Study: The A

Study: The Acquisition of Interjections in Early Childhood

cquisition of Interjections in Early Childhood

III.1

Introductory Remarks

III.1.1

Definition of Interjections

III.1.2

Previous Studies

III.1.3

Purpose of Present Study

III.2

Criteria for Selection and Detailed Description of the Interjections for

Analysis

III.2.1

Interjections of Pain

III.2.1.1

Function

III.2.1.2

Usage

III.2.1.3

Degree of Linguisticality

III.2.1.4

Origin

III.2.1.5

Form

III.2.1.6

Affiliation to Words and Phrases

III.2.2

Interjections of Disgust

III.2.2.1

Function

III.2.2.2

Usage

III.2.2.2.1

Ugh!

III.2.2.2.2 Yuck!

III.2.2.2.3 Phew!

III.2.2.3

Degree of Linguisticality

III.2.2.4

Origin

III.2.2.5

Form

III.2.2.6

Affiliation to Words and Phrases

III.2.3

"Spill Cries"

III.2.3.1

Function

III.2.3.2

Usage

III.2.3.3

Degree of Linguisticality

III.2.3.4

Origin

III.2.3.5

Form

III.2.3.6

Affiliation to Words and Phrases

III.2.4

Preliminary Thoughts and Hypotheses about the Outcome of My Study

III.2.4.1

Interjections of Pain

III.2.4.2

Interjections of Disgust

III.2.4.3

"Spill Cries"

III.3

Database and Method

III.3.1

Source and Format of Data

III.3.2

Characteristics of Data

III.3.3

Method

III.4

Results

III.4.1

Interjections of Pain

III.4.1.1

Ow!

III.4.1.2

Ouch!

III.4.2

Interjections of Disgust

III.4.2.1

Ugh!

III.4.2.2

Yuck!

III.4.2.3

Phew!

III.4.3

"Spill Cries"

III.4.3.1

Whoops! and Its Variants

III.4.3.2

Whoopsadaisy! and Its Variants

102

III.5

Discussion

103

III.5.1

Order of Acquisition

103

III.5.2

Uses and Their Developmental Change

105

III.5.3

Comparison of Study Results: Asano - Stange

105

III.6

For Further Study

108

III.7

Conclusion

110

References

Appendix

App. 1

IPA symbols used to transcribe the speech sounds in this thesis

App. 2

Reasons for the production of Ow! - interjectional usage only

App. 3

Deutsche Zusammenfassung der Arbeit

Index: Figures and Tables

Figure 1:

Tesnière's classification of the so-called phrasillons

[interjections]

Figure2:

Ameka's classification of interjections

Figure 3:

Continuum: discourse markers interjections

Figure 4:

Ameka's illocutionary continuum

Figure 5:

Overlapping speech and affect expression

Figure 6:

Frequency of interjections in British English

Figure 7:

Stange's classification of interjections

Figure 8:

Continuum: Sensation of pain in speaker at production of Ow! or

Ouch!

Figure 9:

Ow! - Ratio of usage in the Wells corpus

Figure 10:

Main reasons for the production of Ow!

Figure 11:

Main reasons for the production of Ow! adults' usage

Figure 12:

Main reasons for the production of Ow! children's usage I.

Figure 13:

Main reasons for the production of Ow! children's usage II.

Figure 14:

Ratio of usage of Whoops! and its variants in the Wells corpus

Figure 15:

Results yielded for frequency of production of selected

interjections with adults and children

105

Figure 16:

Results yielded for frequency of production of selected

interjections with speakers of American and British English

respectively

107

Table 1:

Vocalizations produced by infants during their first year of life

Table 2:

The first stage of phonological development

Table 3:

Postulated order of acquisition for single segments in syllable

structure

Table 4:

Grammatical acquisition

Table 5:

Language development compared with motor development

Table 6:

Nübling's lexical and referential parameters of interjectionality

with examples of the English language

Table 7:

Features of primary and secondary interjections

Table 8:

Interjections selected for study

Table 9:

Contexts of usage for interjections of disgust

Table 10:

Results yielded for Ow! from the Wells corpus

Table 11:

Extracted data for Whoops! and its variants Oops! and Ups!

Table 12:

Earliest occurrences of selected interjections

103

Table 13:

Developmental change of usage of Whoops! and its variants

106

- 1 -

The Acquisition of Interjections in Early Childhood

Introduction

The question of how and if children acquire language has long been of

perennial interest: is language innate or not? If it is, what then is the proto-

language? The first phylogenetic

"study" was conducted as early as the 7

century

BC: pharaoh Psammetich I. undertook to determine what the proto-language is by

giving two infants to a foster father who was not allowed to talk to them. After two

years of no linguistic input they could only speak one word "bek" which was

assumed to be the Phrygian word for bread (bekos). In the 16

century Akbar the

Great initiated the first ontogenetic study. By having two infants raised by a mute

woman he proved that children do not learn to speak if they do not hear anyone

speak. Since then ample questions concerning first language acquisition have been

faced and replied to in detail and at great length. Yet, there are still some left

unanswered or even unasked. One of the topics that have not been of great interest

so far is the acquisition of interjections not only in first language but also in foreign

language learning.

In fact, interjections play an important role in communicative as well as non-

communicative contexts, and their actual linguistic value and role were

underestimated and misjudged for quite a long time:

Interjections are among the most little studied of language phenomena; as

one looks for references to them in the works of linguists, one is struck by

the fact that they are very rarely mentioned, and where they are mentioned,

it is usually only briefly and cursorily (James 1978: 1).

Only recently have linguists delved into the subject of interjections and

discovered that this particular linguistic phenomenon provides in fact ample

opportunity for study and research. Moreover, with the interest in interjections the

problem arose to determine what actually defines an interjection. As we shall see,

opinions on this point differ considerably and attempts at agreeing upon the

definition of interjections have been unsuccessful so far. Yet, there are some

general tendencies which will form the basis for how the term interjection is used in

this paper, and discussion of this point will be postponed until part II.

Phylogenetic studies aim at determining the origins of language or what the proto-language

is, whereas ontogenetic studies are concerned with the process of language acquisition.

- 2 -

Now, this M.A. thesis aims at gaining an insight into the acquisition of

interjections in early childhood. This field has been neglected so far but merits in

fact extensive and thorough inspection. This paper consists of three main parts,

with the first two parts forming the basis for my study in part III.: in the first part I will

provide a brief overview on child language acquisition, focussing particularly on

phonological development. The second part consists of a theoretical disquisition on

interjections to illustrate what characteristics they have and what peculiarities they

show. In the third and final part I will come to my study on the acquisition of

interjections in early childhood.

Eine Sprache zu erwerben ist eine komplexe Aufgabe. ... Spracherwerb

bedeutet auch zu lernen, wie mit Sprache eigene Gedanken und Gefühle

ausgedrückt ... werden können (Klann-Delius 1999: 22).

- 3 -

Part I

Part I... ---- Child Language Acquisition

Child Language Acquisition

It is essential to roughly outline the process of child language acquisition, for

it is directly related to the acquisition of interjections in early childhood. I will focus

on phonological development in particular and present the lexical, semantic and

grammatical aspects briefly only. A list of works that deal with child language

acquisition in detail can be found in the list of references.

I.1

Preliminary Remarks

The question of how children acquire language is of perennial interest. The

first section of this concise overview will deal with the subject of language

acquisition as such. How come we learn language? What are the motives behind it?

Why does the child suddenly produce adult-like sounds approximately six months

after birth when he

had mainly been crying before? These questions will be

addressed before we enter into the second section of the different aspects in

language development, i.e. phonology, grammar, and semantics.

I.1.1

Why Do We Learn to Speak at All?

Children learn language for expressing what cannot otherwise be known and

shared with other persons rather than as an instrument for getting things

done in the world (Bloom 1993: 11).

As Bloom points out, the aim of language acquisition is the ability to

represent mental meanings in the acts of expression and interpretation. From this

theoretical point of view three principles can be deduced (Bloom 1993: 15f.): the

first principle, the so-called Principle of Relevance, states that only those words are

learnt by the child which are relevant to what he has in mind.

The Principle of Discrepancy describes the fact that what the child has in mind

becomes more and more different from the input he gets. Therefore, the child

needs to learn to express himself in order to share his state of mind with other

people. Lastly, the Principle of Elaboration maintains that since the contents of

mind become increasingly complex and intricate, the child needs language to

express what the "elements and relations between elements in [his] intentional

states are" (Bloom 1993: 16).

In the interest of legibility I will not distinguish between genders when talking about children

in general. Instead, I will use "he", always referring to both male and female children.

- 4 -

There are two ways of expressing what our mental meanings are about:

affect and language. Affect can be expressed from earliest infancy on and since its

forms are biologically determined, they are the same for all children

(cf. Bloom 1993: chapter 4; Darwin 1890). Once a child learns to speak he can

express what his internal states and feelings are about there's no need to name

his feelings as they are self-evident in his facial expression. Consequently, the

central argument in The Transition from Infancy to Language is that "children

acquire words and construct the grammar of a language in their efforts to express

what the contents of their beliefs, desires, and feelings are about"

(Bloom 1993: 26).

I.1.2

Anatomic Implications

Basically, one can maintain that child language acquisition starts in the

womb, at around six months after conception. It is then that the acoustic organ is

sufficiently developed, so that the foetus can perceive sounds

already. He cannot

distinguish sounds as such but the rhythm and melody of speech. This is why the

new born child can recognise his mother's voice and why music is supposed to have

an influence on the foetus' development.

The ability to produce sounds depends not only on certain functions of the

brain but also on the anatomy of the vocal tract. At birth the infant's vocal tract is

still considerably different from an adult's vocal tract, so it is impossible for the

infant to produce adult-like sounds (Ingram 1989: 97). According to Goldstein, the

four major differences between the two are the following: "(1) the infant's vocal

tract is appreciably shorter, (2) the pharynx is relatively shorter in the infant, (3) the

infant's tract is wider in relation to its length, and (4) because the infant does not

have erupted dentition, the oral cavity is flatter in the adult" (Goldstein 1979). The

consequence of these anatomic features is that the resonant cavities of the vocal

tract are fairly different for speech production, hence the dissimilarities between

infant and adult speech sounds. For details please see Ingram (1989: 98).

Approximately six months after birth, the shape of the child's vocal tract

changes and begins to resemble an adult vocal tract. It is exactly this change that

usually marks the onset of babbling.

- 5 -

I.2

Basic Principles

I.2.1

The Neonate

The sounds a newborn produces are first and foremost variations of crying

(pain, hunger, discomfort, etc.). However, the infant also shows sounds that are

more "segmental": these sounds are usually a by-product of crying or bodily

functions. As a result, "glottal stops, glottal affricates and glottal fricatives ... occur

as part of the tension associated with some types of crying ... [and]... as part of the

straining involved in defecation" (Cruttenden 1979: 2). The opening and closure of

the mouth during crying might also result in the occurrence of labial sounds, and

the sucking habit in the production of clicks (Cruttenden 1979: 2). Note though that

these "segmental" sounds are not produced intentionally and for no communicative

purpose.

I.2.2

First Vocalisations

Since the infant can hear the sounds he produces, he also discovers that

sounds are fun and plays with them so to speak. Cruttenden suggested that this

"play" may be due to restlessness "just before babies begin to cry as feeding time

approaches but [that] this activity is rapidly transferred to other times when they are

more content, e.g. immediately after food" (Cruttenden 1979: 3). Lewis put forward

the suggestion that the pre-prandial period results in the production of chiefly apical

and labial consonants because of the anticipation of food (hence the term

discomfort sounds), whereas the post-prandial period gives rise to velar sounds

when the infant is swallowing and burping (hence the term comfort sounds)

(Lewis 1936/51; Cruttenden 1979: 3).

The following table has been taken from Ingram and cites the results of

Lewis' study on vocalizations produced by infants during their first year of life

(Ingram 1989: 103; Lewis 1936/51: Table 1 Infant speech: a study of the

beginnings of language).

- 6 -

Table 1: Vocalizations produced by infants during their first year of life

This table shows that the child's early consonants are back or velar sounds,

whereas the more typical labial and dental consonants do not occur until later. Yet,

it is these more typical sounds that will be produced intentionally first.

I.2.3

The Babbling Period

As has been stated above, the ability to produce sounds depends not only on

certain functions of the brain but also on the anatomy of the vocal tract

(cf. chapter I.1.2). Only approximately six months after birth the child is physically

able to produce the first "proper" speech sounds. It is then that the stage referred

to as babbling starts,

and it continues well into the phase of one-word utterances.

Jakobson made a very interesting observation with regard to the speech sounds

produced during the babbling period:

A child, during the babbling period, can accumulate articulations which are

never found within a single language or even a group of languages

consonants of any place of articulation, palatalised and rounded

consonants, sibilants, affricates, clicks, complex vowels, diphthongs, etc...

the child then loses nearly all of his ability to produce sounds in passing over

You will find a chart of the IPA symbols that I used to transcribe the speech sounds in this

piece of work in appendix 1.

Cruttenden states that the age for the onset of babbling is three months

(Cruttenden 1979: 2f.). However, the majority of works call the first phase "cooing phase" (i.e.

back vowels with lip rounding are frequent) and claim that babbling does not start until

approximately six months of life (cf. e.g. Lenneberg 1967: 128; Ingram 1989: 108).

Sound class

Sounds uttered in

discomfort

Sounds uttered in comfort

I. Vowels

(i) Onset: immediately after

birth

(ii) Limited mainly to

sounds

@, `, D,

(iii) Often nasalised

(i) Onset: when the

discomfort cries have already

begun to appear

(ii) a wider range, muss less

well defined in quality

(iii) very rarely nasalised

II. Early

consonants

The semi-consonant

appears early, followed by

g, k, and M

The back consonants

F, w, f,

j, q

III. Later

consonants

The front consonants,

almost exclusively nasal:

The front consonants, both

nasal and oral:

l, m, o, a, s,

- 7 -

from the pre-language stage to the first acquisition of words... It is easy to

understand that those articulations which are lacking in the language of the

child's environment easily disappear from his inventory. But it is striking that

... many other sounds which are common both to the child's babbling and to

the adult language of his environment are in the same way disposed of ...

Indeed, the child is generally successful in recovering these sounds only

after long effort, sometimes only after several years. This is the case, e.g.

with palatal consonants, sibilants and liquids (Jakobson 1972: 21f.).

The back consonants are produced as early as the cooing stage (between

two and three months of age), and with the onset of the babbling stage at

approximately six months, both consonant-like units and vowels are produced in a

"timing

relationship

that

conforms

mature

language

restrictions"

(Ingram 1989: 108). The child starts off with reduplicated babbling and single-

consonant babbling ( [

a@], and reduplicated: [a@a@]), and it is only about five to six

months after the onset of babbling that the child shows variegated babbling (i.e. the

sequences of vowels and consonants differ, e.g. [

@cT] ). He can also produce

utterances that sound like an adult sentence with regard to intonation and stress

but do not contain any recognisable words.

I.2.4

Prosodics

osodics

As indicated just above, it has been assumed that children master basic

intonation patterns before they can produce two- or even one-word utterances.

Surely, they make use of pitch patterns when first trying to express meanings, but

the underlying reason for it may be mimicry rather than meaningful usage: many

infants are "excellent mimics of pitch patterns", and they start to mimic at the age

of eight months (Cruttenden 1979: 6). Thus, they might show correct production of

the different forms but at the same time be ignorant of the different functions.

Somewhat later, at the one-word stage, however, different intonations may be used

to indicate different sentence functions, e.g. questions, imperatives and

statements. In a lecture David Crystal gave the example of his child usually using

[

c@c@] with three different intonations and functions (question, statement,

demand) on his return home: first, with a rising intonation meaning "is that you,

Daddy?", then with a slightly falling intonation meaning "yes, it's you, Daddy", and

then with a slightly rising intonation "pick me up, Daddy". This anecdote illustrates

nicely how children can express different meanings with the same word, simply by

using different intonation patterns.

- 8 -

I.2.5

Early Word Compre

Early Word Comprehension and Production

hension and Production

Infants can perceive and produce speech sounds, but it is only at the period

of single-word utterances that they recognize the linguistic implications of speech,

i.e. they perceive and produce meaningful utterances (Ingram 1989: 83f.). At

around one year of age, the child first begins to respond meaningfully to words. It is

also at that period of time that he perceives and recognises the linguistic input as

words. Since it takes him several months still until he produces meaningful

utterances himself, it follows that comprehension precedes production. Ingram

concluded from Benedict's study on early word comprehension and production

(study conducted in 1979; cf. Ingram 1989: 141ff.) that "(i) the rate of

comprehension is the same as or greater than that for production; and (ii) that the

gap between the two varies greatly, with a norm of approximately 100 words

understood at the time of the first words produced" (Ingram 1989: 143).

The first sound sequences used to express meaning can be divided into

three phonetic types: (i) reduplications or partial reduplications, e.g. [

c!c] and

[

m!m]; (ii) single consonant-vowel syllables, e.g. [!f] and [!cN9], and (iii)

sequences without a vowel, e.g. [

!Ry9] and [!cYr9] (Cruttenden 1979: 11). Some

expressions are indubitably related to words in the adult language, others are of

onomatopoeic nature, and the source of some other expressions is unknown

(cf. Cruttenden 1979: chapter 1.5). It goes without saying that the child will

eventually cease to use the latter because the input for those expressions is

missing unless of course these words are added to the family's "special"

vocabulary. Furthermore, the meanings the child wants to express (in addition to

the basic lexical meanings of words) are for the most part "of the interpersonal

kind, e.g. indicating, or demanding, or expressive" (Cruttenden 1979: 13). Since the

first words usually do not show any similarities to the corresponding words in the

adult language, we might want to call them expressions rather than words.

By the end of the one-word stage (approximately 18 months) the child has

acquired a receptive vocabulary of some 200 words, and a productive vocabulary of

roughly fifty words. The child is able to perceive and identify differences "between

words which are marked by differences between single segments, although this

ability appears to emerge only gradually" (Ingram 1989: 342). Also, the infant is

able to perceive more phonemes than he can produce: the production of phonemes

- 9 -

is still limited to a basic set, mostly nasal and oral stops as well as the vowel /

@/,

and probably /

h/ and /t/ (cf. table 2: The first stage of phonological development).

There is still much babbling going on, and the child shows "no attempt at

communicating information and no frustration for not being understood"

(Lenneberg 1967: 129). For reasons of space I will not go into subsequent lexical

development, so please see e.g. Lenneberg (1967: 130) and Bloom (1993: 188ff.)

for details.

I.3

Phonology

I will take a closer look at phonological acquisition as it is highly relevant to

my research. Usually, /

l/, /o/ and/or /c/ in combination with /@/ will make up the

sound sequences of the first expressions; as a result the sequences /

l@/ or

l@l@/, /o@/ or /o@o@/, and /c@/ or /c@c@/ belong to the first "words". This is

probably the reason why children call their parents mama and papa or daddy

c@c@/) in many (not even closely related) languages (cf. French maman and

papa, Russian and , German Mama and Papa, Welsh mwmi and dada,

etc.). The parents are the people who spend the most time with their child and take

his first "words" as a form of address, and in the course of time these utterances

have become established as proper names for mothers and fathers.

- 10 -

Jakobson's theory about the first stage of phonological development can be

summarised as such (table adapted from 1941/68 Child language, aphasia, and

phonological universals p. 47ff.):

Table 2: The first stage of phonological development

It is a common misconception that "difficult sounds" are acquired rather late

because they are hard to produce. As mentioned above, a lot of these "difficult

sounds" are produced at the babbling stage already, and will still be produced when

one-word utterances start but only in "meaningless" vocalisations. The intentional

production of these sounds starts rather late. They may not be as phonologically

important as other sounds which are acquired earlier. Take for example the dental

fricatives // and /

C/, which are acquired as late as four to six years of age: it is a

rather common procedure in children, even in adults (depending on regional and

social varieties), to replace them with the dental plosives /

s/ and /d/, or with the

labio-dental fricatives /

e/ and /u/ (please see table 3 below for age of acquisition

of the relevant speech sound). These sounds simply function as allophones of the

Substages

1. The acquisition of Vs and Cs develops from a basic CV syllable

which contains a forward articulated stop, and a wide vowel; it

may appear singly, e.g. "

o@" or reduplicated, e.g. "o@o@"

2. The appearance of the first consonantal opposition, nasal vs.

oral, e.g. "

o@o@", "l@l@"

3. The appearance of the second consonantal opposition, labial

vs. dental, e.g. "

o@o@" vs. "s@s@", "l@l@" vs. "m@m@"

4. The appearance of the first vocalic opposition, narrow vs. wide

vowel, e.g. "

o@o@" vs. "odod"

5. The appearance of the second vocalic opposition, either:

(a) splitting of narrow vowel into front vs. back, e.g. "

o@o@" vs.

ohoh" vs. "otot"

(b) splitting of narrow vowel into a more open vs. narrow

opposition, e.g. "

o@o@" vs. "ohoh" vs. "odod"

Minimal consonant system

l m

o s

Minimal vowel system

h t (or) h

@ d

- 11 -

relevant dental fricative in this case. The important point here is that "the primary

factor behind the appearance of a sound in the child's early system appears to be

its importance in the phonological system which underlies the words that the child

hears" (Ingram 1989: 218f.). It would make sense, though, to assume that the

sounds with the highest functional loads are also the ones that are easier to

produce.

The following table summarises the order of acquisition of phonemes and is

copied from Crystal (1987: 36).

Table 3: Postulated order of acquisition for single segments in syllable structure

Within a stage, the organisation of phones is based on phonetic, not on developmental

criteria.

Age Initial

Medial

Final

o a

j f

H T

z P

o a

2;0 s

vfi v

2;6

dH @T

s c

3;0 k

d ?

3;6 sR

S C

- 12 -

The above table will form the basis for assumptions made about the order of

acquisition of interjections based on phonological criteria; taking the phonological

development into account, it follows that some interjections will be produced later

than others simply because the child has not acquired the relevant speech sounds

yet. Consequently, the child might well be able to understand the meaning of the

interjection but will delay in producing it.

- 13 -

I.4

Grammatical Acquisition

Crystal outlines seven stages of grammatical acquisition. The following table

is copied from lecture notes that were based on chapter 2, pp.41-47 in Child

Language, Learning and Linguistics (1987).

Table 4: Grammatical acquisition

seven stages of grammatical acquisition

stage age

grammatical features

examples

1;0 - 1;6

single-element sentences; at

around 18 months of age

approx. 50 words can be

produced; intonation instead

of grammar

daddy;

there;

more;

1;6 - 2;0

two-element sentences; no

particular word order; noun

phrases

daddy go;

kick ball;

big car;

mummy bag

III

2;0 - 2;6

three-element sentences,

simple then expanded

daddy kick ball

my daddy do kick

that ball

2;6 - 3;0

four- or five-element

sentences, simple then

expanded; single clause

sentences

daddy kick ball

now;

me give mummy

book bus

3;0 - 3;6

complex sentence formation;

use of and, `cos, and other

conjunctions to glue

sentences together

Daddy gone in the

garden and - he

felled over - and -

and he hurt his

knee...

3;6 - 4;6

consolidation of grammatical

systems; lots of irregular

forms have not been learnt

yet

him bettern't not

catch them mouse

he'd better not

catch those mice

VII

4;6 - puberty

remaining structures, e.g.

sentence connectivity,

advanced comprehension,

prosodically nuanced

sentences

"complicated"

part of grammar

Actually, it was in

the shop I said I'd

see him.

- 14 -

I.5

Semantics

It is somewhat difficult to determine the exact development of semantics in

children. Especially in young children we face the problem that we cannot ask them

what a word or sentence means, so we have to come up with other ways of finding

out whether the child has already acquired the meaning of certain words and

sentences.

The first meaningful words are produced at about twelve months of age. The

term meaningful means here that the child wants to express something that he has

got in mind, and that there is a communicative purpose to the utterance. Children

will usually not produce meaningful utterances unless there is somebody or

something (a pet or toy, for instance) to "talk" to. Early vocabulary is usually marked

by overextension, e.g. the word cat might refer to any four-legged animal. Of course,

children will show huge variation in their use or non-use of the extension of word

meanings, but the primary perceptions of movement, shape, size, sound, taste and

texture seem to be the earliest features of meaning on which the identification of

words is based (Crystal 1988: 50f.). Also, semantic features that are more general

or more central to the meaning of a word will be acquired first (Crystal 1988: 51).

It is a misconception that vocabulary is learnt one word at a time: since

words are invariably employed in contexts, "the meaning of a word will be partly

dependent on the other words which accompany it in a sentence, as well as those

with which it is in contrast at any point within the sentence" (Crystal 1988: 51). The

child will also have to learn collocations, idioms and figures of speech, a process

which might not be completed in all its facets until well into the child's teens. Please

see Bloom (1993) for a detailed disquisition on semantic development.

I.6

Summary: Child Language Acquisition

Language acquisition basically starts as soon as the acoustic organ is

sufficiently developed, which is usually six months into the pregnancy. Language

acquisition is first limited to speech perception. Due to anatomic constraints the

child does not start producing adult-like speech sounds until about six months of

age. It is then that the so-called babbling period starts. The child does not yet have

the intention to produce meaningful utterances; rather, he plays with the sounds.

Babbling can be subdivided into single-syllable babbling and reduplicated babbling;

variegated babbling follows. The first sounds produced are usually stops and the

- 15 -

"optimal" vowel /

@/. These are combined to form syllables typical for babbling, e.g.

[

a@], [l@l@].

One-word utterances first occur at around 12 months of age, but babbling

still continues for quite a few months. The process of learning vocabulary starts at

around 12 months and basically never stops (in individuals with no speech or

language disorders). The child produces his first words around one year of age, and

two-word utterances follow about six months later.

At the age of approximately two years the utterances become more complex,

and about a year later the child is able to glue sentences together using and. The

basics of morphology will be acquired at the age of 3;6, and morphological

irregularities will follow in the year after. By the age of four the child should have

acquired all the phonemes of his mother tongue. A five year-old child will have

acquired all the segments of pronunciation proficiently, and master the basics of

prosody. He will also have acquired most of the grammar, morphology and syntax of

his mother tongue. Some features such as sophisticated sentence linking features

or the difference between the active and passive voice will not be acquired until

approximately seven or eight years of age.

- 16 -

To round off the section on child language acquisition, the following table

illustrates the correlation between language development and motor development.

Table 5: Language development compared with motor development

(Cruttenden 1979: xii)

Age

Age Motor d

Motor d

Motor development

evelopment

Language d

Language development

evelopment

0;3 Head self-supported

Babbling begins

(and continues to at

least 1;0)

0;6 Sits with assistance.

Bouncing

0;9 Crawling. Sitting without

support. Pulls to stand but

falls with bump

Babbling and intonation sound more

like human language

1;0 Walks when hands are held

First words

1;3 Walks unevenly. Crawls

upstairs

Lexical overgeneralisation (continues to

around 2;6)

1;6 Walks well. Crawls

downstairs (backwards)

1;9

Two-word sentences

2;0 Runs well. Walks up and

down stairs with only one

foot forward at a time

Three-word sentences

2;6 Sits on pedal cycle but

pushes with feet on ground

Vowel system complete for many

children. Sentences four words and

3;0 Rides pedal cycle. Walks

upstairs with alternating feet

Nominalisations

3;6

Consonantal system complete for many

children

4;0 Walks downstairs with

alternating feet

Syntax now generally correct although

limited

5;0 Runs up and down stairs

Some children still have consonantal

difficulties with (a) fricatives, (b)

consonantal-clusters, (c) /

- 17 -

II.

Part II

Part II.

. ---- Interjections

Interjections

II.

II.1

What Is an Interjection

What Is an Interjection? Approaches and Introduction

? Approaches and Introduction

"pars

orationis

siginificans

mentis

affectum

voce

incondite"

(Priscian cited in Ameka 1992a: 102)

"a part undeclynyd the which under a rude voice betokeneth some passyon

of the mynde" (Roger Bacon cited in Michael 1970: 81)

"an exclamatory insert used in speech to express emotion or attitude"

(Biber et al. 2005: 457)

"a word or sound thrown into the sentence to express some feeling of the

mind" (Crystal 1999: 206)

"une sorte de cri qu'on jette dans le discours pour exprimer un mouvement

de l'âme, un état de pensée, un ordre, un avertissement, un appel"

(Grevisse 1969: 1027)

The common denominator of all of the above definitions of interjections is

the emotive and the exclamatory aspect. These two characteristics of interjections

seem most striking. However, we shall see that there is more to an interjection than

the sudden expression of emotion or some state of mind.

Interjections belong to the category of inserts. This category includes words

that "do not form an integral part of a syntactic structure" (Biber et al. 1999: 56)

and often have an emotional or interactional meaning, such as, for instance,

greetings, farewells, attention signals, expletives, etc. Biber et al. use the term

interjection for "inserts which have an exclamatory function, expressive of the

speaker's emotion" (Biber et al. 1999: 1083).

Interjections are universal to all languages, yet, they have been rather

neglected in the past. Although they are usually considered marginal to language,

interjections play an important role in communication. Since they often show

unusual pronunciation patterns, it has also been debated whether they can be

considered as words at all (Biber et al. 1999: 56). These phonological deviancies

often support the view that interjections are marginal to language or even not part

of language proper (cf. Ehlich 1986: 26). Crystal called interjections "emotional" or

"functional noises" (Crystal 1999: 213ff.), which seems to reflect the attitude of

their being no actual words so to speak.

Interjections are mainly used in spoken language (or in written language to

create the effect of orality) and are in fact employed quite frequently. It is their

frequency in usage and their importance with regard to communication that justifies

- 18 -

a detailed analysis of their various forms and functions. To date, attempts at

defining the term interjection have been rather unsuccessful: different linguists

have different opinions on what an interjection is and include words as interjections

that others do not. Therefore, the general definition of interjections, i.e. an

exclamation expressing emotion, is still fairly vague and in the course of this paper

we will take a closer look at the attempts that have been made to define and

classify interjections and will then try to agree on a sensible working definition of

this term for part III.

II.2

Brief Overview: History of the Study of Interjections

Latin and Greek grammarians already concerned themselves with

interjections. However, they did not show a particular interest in them and treated

them rather stepmotherly. The Greek grammarians simply summarised interjections

under adverbs of sighing (Ehlich 1986: 153), whereas the Latin grammarians

recognised them as a separate pars orationis and called them inter-iectio. This term

was based on the observation of their syntactic features, i.e. that they can be

"thrown" into or in between sentences (cf. Latin inter "between", and iacere

"throw"). With regard to the function of interjections it was soon assumed that they

serve to express the state of the soul (Latin animus), and this criterion was applied

to the finding and definition of other words as interjections. Also, they noticed that

interjections are articulated with voce incondita, i.e. the voice is in a way "out of

control". The Latin grammarians regarded interjections as a means of expressing

emotion but ignored the fact that the adfects animi is not restricted to emotional

states only (Ehlich 1986: 153).

With the development of new languages in Europe, the study of grammar

including that of interjections was of renewed interest. Grammarians from early

modern times emphasised the emotional aspect of interjections, their asemantic

nature and marginality to language, and their inferior status resulting from this

position (Ehlich 1986: 156).

Beauzée published a grammar in 1767 in which he treated the subject of

interjections rather extensively, quoting for the most part abbé Regnier and de

Brosses. This particular interest in interjections resulted from the study of the

origins of language and the supposition that interjections might have been some

- 19 -

sort of protolanguage: "l'interjection ... est peut-être la première voix articulée dont

les hommes se sont servis, ... [exprimant] la sensation du dedans, ... le cri de la

nature" (Beauzée 1767: 604). Ehlich also states that interjections expressing

emotions are of pre-linguistic nature: "Interjektionen als Gefühlsausdruck sind

elementare, urtümliche, genetisch frühe, ja präsprachliche Erscheinungen"

(Ehlich 1986: 186). It follows that interjections where then reinterpreted from a

genetic point of view. However, this opinion was not entertained in the long run, and

emphasis was put again on the emotional and expressive aspects of interjections.

Their holophrastic nature was finally given full credit in Tesnière's Éléments

de syntaxe structurale, where he dealt with interjections in the chapter on mots-

phrases (i.e. words that are equivalent to an entire sentence). A detailed description

of his insightful disquisition on interjections will be provided in chapter II.4.2.1.

With regard to British grammarians, Michael cites Roger Bacon (a

philosopher who lived in the 13

century) as one of the people who studied

interjections. He defined them as follows: "a part undeclynyd the which under a

rude voice betokeneth some passyon of the mynde" (Bacon cited in

Michael 1970: 81). In his famous Essay towards a Real Character and a

Philosophical Language, John Wilkins wrote a chapter on "Natural Grammar", in

which he also commented on interjections:

Those substitutive particles, which serve to supply the room of a sentence or

complex part of it, are titled Interjections. These are by some denyed to be

words, or any part of distinct speech, but only natural signs of our mental

notions, passions, expressed by such rude incondite sounds, several of

which are common with us to Brute Creatures. And as all Nations of men do

agree in these kind of natural passions, so likewise do they very much agree

in the signs or indications of their mirth, sorrow, love, hatred, &c.

(Wilkins 1688: 308).

In the above quotation Wilkins mentions that the linguisticality of interjections is

questioned "by some". This is an issue that is indeed still being discussed today.

Wilkins also divided interjections into three classes: (i) solitary (used when the

speaker is alone), (ii) passive ("the party speaks as suffering some mutation in

himself"), and (iii) social and active interjections (used in discourse)

(Wilkins 1688: 308; Ehlich 1986: 193).

At the turn of the 19

century, Wundt was the first one to divide interjections

into primary and secondary ones (cf. chapter II.3), a suggestion which was picked

up again by Ameka. Only recently linguists have been properly concerned with

- 20 -

interjections: as you can see in the list of references, the nineties saw the

considerable rise of interest in interjections which has increased up to the present

day. One of the reasons for this is that nowadays spoken language is also taken into

account, whereas in the past written language was predominantly of interest, as it

was considered superior to spoken language. As Beauzée put it frankly and

straightforwardly:

...l'énonciation claire de la pensée est le principal objet de l'art... ; le langage

du coeur est sans art, parce qu'il est naturel... Or il n'est pas utile au

grammairien de [faire des remarques] sur les usages des Interjections et la

distinction de leurs différences spécifiques (Beauzée 1767: 619).

With the rise of interest in interjections questions regarding their function,

form, usage and meaning, etc. have been addressed and replied to at great length.

Nevertheless, there is still an issue which has been rather neglected up until today:

the acquisition of interjections. I shall return to and discuss this question in chapter

II.6 and part III. of this paper. I will now move on to the illustration of the properties

of interjections which, in combination with part I., will form the basis for the study in

part III.

II.3

Primary and Secondary Interjections

Wundt (1912) was the first one to distinguish between primary and

secondary interjections:

Die primären Interjektionen umfassen die "ursprünglichsten" Interjektionen,

die "den Charakter von Naturlauten ursprünglich bewahrt haben". Bei den

sekundären Interjektionen handelt es sich um Gefühlsäußerungen, "die in

andere sprachliche Formen eingekleidet werden" (Wundt cited in

Kowal and O'Donnell 2004b: 86).

In Interjections: the Universal yet Neglected Part of Speech Ameka provides us with

useful parameters for this distinction:

Those words ... are primary interjections that ... are not used otherwise...

Primary interjections are little words or non-words which in terms of their

distribution can constitute an utterance by themselves and do not normally

enter into construction with other word classes, for example, Ouch!, ... Oops!,

etc. They could be used as co-utterances with other units... Primary

interjections tend to be phonologically and morphologically anomalous.

(Ameka 1992a: 105).

- 21 -

Secondary interjections, on the contrary, are "those words which have an

independent semantic value but which can be used conventionally as utterances by

themselves to express a mental attitude or state" (Ameka 1992a: 111), such as for

example Help!, Careful!, Oh my God!, etc.

Reisigl redefined the terms primary and secondary with regard to

interjections to eliminate Wundt's connotation of primary equalling "primitive":

Primär ist nicht gleichzusetzen mit primitiv im Sinne von vorsprachlich, wie

es Wundt noch getan hat, sondern meint "gleich schon, von Anfang an so

und nicht anders verwendet", während sekundär "erst an zweiter Stelle, erst

nachträglich

so,

nämlich

als

Interjektion,

verwendet"

bedeutet

(Reisigl 1999: 15).

In the subsequent chapters I will focus on primary interjections and give only

a rough sketch of secondary interjections, because only the former are relevant to

my study. In chapter II.4 I will take a closer look at the characteristics of

interjections in general before I go on to analyse specific interjections of the English

language. However, I will already refer to specific English interjections when

discussing interjectional features. Thus, if you only have a very basic knowledge of

English interjections, you might want to read chapter II.5 first and then go back to

this section.

II.4

Features of Interjections

Interjections are universal to all languages but they are language-specific, i.e.

they have to be learnt. Yet, their features are more or less the same and will be

illustrated in the ensuing chapter.

II.4.1

Why Are There Similar Interjections

Why Are There Similar Interjections a

across Different Languages?

cross Different Languages?

When we compare interjections for, say, disgust or pain, we notice that there

are certain similarities: for instance German pfui, English phew, Russian , Polish

fu, Welsh whiw, or German au, aua and autsch, English ow and ouch, French aïe,

Russian . What then is the reason for this phenomenon? Surely, there are

interjections which are completely different across languages, such as, for example,

German igitt, Russian , English yuck and French berk, but how can we

account for the fact that there are striking similarities, too?

Details

Seiten
Erscheinungsform: Originalausgabe
Jahr: 2008
ISBN (eBook): 9783836624817
DOI: 10.3239/9783836624817
Dateigröße: 1.5 MB
Sprache: Englisch
Institution / Hochschule: Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz – Philosophie / Pädagogik
Erscheinungsdatum: 2009 (Januar)
Note: 1,7
Schlagworte: interjektion spracherwerb kindheit

Autor

Ulrike Stange (Autor:in)

The Acquisition of Interjections in Early Childhood

Zusammenfassung

Leseprobe

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Details

Autor

Ulrike Stange (Autor:in)