ENGLISH LANGUAGE TERMINOLOGY

English Language Terminology

English language terms are defined in the first section below. The next section has definitions for English modifiers, verbs, other types and affixation. It is very fortunate that the two languages are so similar. Even though the definitions below are for English, nearly all of the terms have similar concepts in bahasa Indonesia as well. A major difference is that modifiers come after the words modified in Indonesian while they are placed before the nouns in English. Another difference is that bahasa Indonesia doesn't have Articles (no "a, an or the").

Antecedent = a word, phrase or clause that is replaced by a pronoun or other substitute in the same sentence or in another sentence.

example: In "Sam lost his hat and can't find it", "Sam" is the antecedent of "he" and "hat" is the antecedent of "it."

Articulation = facility with words; using language and speech easily and fluently.

Concept = a general notion or idea; a conception; an object of thought. An idea of something formed by mentally combining all its characteristics.

Dialect = a certain form or variation of a language retained by special groups which varies from the general standard for that language.

Grammar = the prescribed forms in language. The rules of language.

Inflection = modulation of the voice; change in pitch or tone of voice.

Intonation = the pattern or melody of pitch changes in speech, especially the pitch pattern of a sentence which distinguishes kinds of sentences.

Jargon = a special language pattern used by a particular group of people

Language = Any system of formalized words, symbols, signs, sounds, gestures or the like used as a means of communicating thought, mental concepts, emotion, etc.

Lingua franca = language that is widely used as a common means of communication among speakers of other languages.

Linguistics = the science and study of language, including phonetics, phonology, morphology, syntax and semantics.

Meaning = what is intended to be expressed or indicated in a communication. The mental image or concept that a sender tries to transfer to a receiver in communication.

Morpheme = any of the minimal grammatical units of a language that cannot be divided into smaller independent grammatical parts.

Morphology = the patterns of word formation in a particular language, including inflection, derivation, and composition.

Nomenclature = terminology; the system of terms peculiar to a particular science, art or subject.

Objective (objective case) = a case specialized for the use of a word as the object of a transitive verb or of a preposition.

Phonetics = the science and study of speech sounds and their production, transmission and reception.

Phonology = the study of the rules governing pronunciation and speech sounds in a language.

Possessive = pertaining to a case that indicates possession, ownership, origin, etc.

Pronunciation = the act or result of producing the sounds of speech, including articulation, stress and intonation. The conventional patterns of speech sounds for a language.

Semantics = the study of meanings of words, signs, sentences, etc.

Sense = a particular meaning of a word or phrase. A particular mental image or concept.

Stress = special effort in speech that creates emphasis by increasing relative loudness of a syllable or word.

Subjective (subjective case) = pertaining to the subject of a sentence.

Syllable = an uninterrupted segment of speech with a single sound resonance.

Syntactic = pertaining to syntax; regarding the rules for the formation of grammatical sentences in language.

Syntax = the rules for the formation of grammatical sentences in language. The study of the patterns of formation of sentences and phrases from words.

Term = a word or group of words that designates something, especially in a particular field.

Terminology = nomenclature; the system of terms peculiar to a particular field.

Vernacular = the natural informal speech patterns used by persons indigenous to a certain area.

Word = the unit of language that functions as the principal carrier of meaning. Words are usually separated by spaces in writing.

Subject = a syntactic unit that functions as one of the two main constituents of a simple sentence, the other being the predicate. A subject consists of a noun, noun phrase or noun substitute which often refers to the actor in the sentence or to the state of being expressed by the predicate.

Note: a sentence has two parts, the topic of the sentence is the subject and what is said about the subject is the predicate. The subject usually comes first and identifies the agent of the action and tells us who or what is doing something. The most frequent forms of the subject are nouns, pronouns and proper nouns (all called nominals). The predicate always has a verb which often has modifiers such as adverbs.

Predicate = a syntactic unit that functions as one of the two main constituents of a simple sentence, the other being the subject. A predicate consists of a verb and all the words governed by the verb or modifying it, the whole often expressing the action performed by the subject or the state of being of the subject.