MarkednessTheory语言学标记理论

1、Definition,By far there is no uniform definition According to Lakoff(1987:60),markedness is a term used by linguistics to describe a kind of prototype effectan asymmetry in a category, where one member or subcategory is taken to be somehow more basic than the other. Correspondingly, the unmarked mem

2、ber has the default value.,introduction,The notion of markedness was introduced into Prague School for evaluating the members of an oppositional pair as “marked” and “unmarked” A marked form is a non-basic or less natural form while an unmarked form is a basics, default form.horse/mare The concept o

3、f markedness involves asymmetricity the presence or absence of a property or feature.In general,where the contrast is neutralized(only one member of the pair can occur) the one which occurs is usually “unmarked” in that environment,examples,Introduction,Markedness originally developed from phonology

4、 The marlked and unmarked phenomenon only exist in oppositional pairs of phonemes not all the phonemes. When two phonemes are distinguished by the presence or absence of a single distinctive feature, one of them is said to be marked and the other unmarked for the feature in question. Eg./t/-/d/ /k/-

5、/g/ /b/-/p/ /s/-/z/.,Extension of Markedness Theory,(b)markedness theory in morphology The application of markedness theory in morphology is called formal mark(形式标记) First，the singular form of words is usually unmarked,while the plural form of words is marked.the regular English verb is marked for p

6、ast tense,unmarked in the present. Eg.tree/trees, box/boxes, jump/jumped Secondly, some complementary words such as prince/princess, actor/actress, words with suffix ess are marked while words without ness are unmarked,Extension of Markedness Theory,(c) markedness theory in lexicon Some words are un

7、marked and some are marked. Eg, he/she “he” is unmarked No one in his senses would do a thing like that. No one in her senses would do a thing like that. Eg.dog/bitch dog is unmarked,but “bitch” can only refer to female dogs Eg. high/low; old/young; good/bad,etc. How old are you? Not how young are y

8、ou？How high is the building?,Extension of Markedness Theory,(d)markedness theory in grammar Eg,do/does; visit/visited; go/going; tom/toms The former is unmarked (e)Markedness in syntax Eg I dislike this person. It is unmarked This person I dislike. It is marked, it refers to someone specific. Eg the

9、 flower is beautiful. How beautiful the flower is!,2. Development,Markedness theory was founded by two linguists N.Trubetzkoy and R.Jakobson of Prague School(1)Trubetzkoy and phonetic contrastIn the book principle of phonology, Trubetzkoy distinguished nine phonetic contrasts,He argues that there ar

10、e three kinds of opposition (a)privative opposition表缺对立，which refers to that it is the only one distinctive feature to distinguish A from B, if A has this feature, B not.eg, /b/vs./p/,/b/has the feature+aspirated (b)gradual opposition渐次对立，which mesas the opposition between some phonemes lies in the

11、different degree of the same feature.eg. /I/ /e/ / lies in the different degree of mouth-openness. (c)equipollent opposition均等对立，which means that the opposite phonetics have their distinctive features respectively.eg/p/-/t/-/k/ is that they are labial,alveolar and velar respectively.,2. Development,

12、(2)Jackobson and distinctive features In the book preliminaries to speech analysis, he listed 12 distinctive features,（3）Chomsky-the polishing stage of markedness theory,Chomsky published The Sound Pattern of English, he reapplied markedness theory to study phonological problems and polished the the

13、ory. In N. Chomskys Markedness Theory marked rules and unmarked ones are not absolute and clear-cut but relative.,（4）new stage of development,Markedness theory is expanded to many aspects both within and outside linguistic area. Within linguistics (A)markedness in semantics Lyons distinguishes three

14、 types of lexeme markings:formal markedness, distributional markedness and semantic markedness. He views that semantic markedness of a word is a matter of degree. Eg. “dog, cow, man”dog unmarked ,containing the meaning of”being male” and “being female” “cow”is weaker in degree,it can refer to all ki

15、nds of oxen in broad meaning. “man”is much weaker in degree,(b) Markedness in pragmatics,the code-choice study of markedness is a remarkable hallmark of the development of Markedness Theory in pragmatics. The code-choice is a means by which speakers harmonize the rights and responsibilities between

16、the speaker and the listener.there are three kinds of code choices:the choice of the unmarked code, the choice of the marked code and the choice of the tentative code.(zhu wanjin,1994) Eg, “how do you do” is a common greeting when the two strangers meet for the first time. But if one keeps silent wh

17、en he/she meets with another one for the first time, it will show a special meaning which is absolutely different from what “how do you dou?”implicates. in other words, the social greetings are often unmarked or meaningless in the communicative circumstances and they are just exchanges of convention

18、al greetings and have no meaning at all.,(c) Markedness in semiotics The meaning and content of marked sign is determined but the unmarked is fuzzy and uncertain. Eg. traffic signs are considered to be marked. “No parking” is marked, if there is no sign then it is unmarked, because we dont see the sign of “parking”,.(d) Markedness in social linguistics Markedness in social linguistics indicates specific social information such as gender, identity, career and so on. Eg nanny and many .,（e)Markedness Theory in cognitive linguistics,Cognitive linguistics explains that typical members or unma