COURSE CODE: GSE 221
GRAMMAR
(A) Direct
and Indirect Speech
Meaning of direct and indirect speech: Direct speech refers
to the exact, original words of a speaker. The words are those actually used by
the speaker, which have not been changed. Example: Bukola Said, “I am very
happy about your success”.
Indirect Speech: When someone reports direct speech, he
tells another person what someone else said or what he, himself said. In this
case, all the actual words of the direct speech are not used. Some
modifications occur. It is called indirect speech or reported speech.
Example:
Bukola said that she was very happy about my success.
Main
points to remember.
1. Direct
speech should be placed between the inverted commas and begins with a capital
letter.
Example:
Amaka said, “ I want to study medicine”
2. No
inverted commas and comma are used in indirect speech. Example Amaka said that
she wanted to study medicine.
3. The
tense of the reporting is not changed
4. A
conjunction is used after the reporting verb in indirect speech. Example she
told me that she would assist me.
5. Tense/pronouns/words
indicating nearness of time and position are changed. Example Bukola said to
me, “I waited for you here today”
Bukola told me that she waited for me there that day.
Reported
speech must be in line with the modified time and place as thus:
Direct speech indirect speech
This That
These those
Now then
Ago before
Last night the previous night
The
night before
Next day the following day
The
day after
Today that day
Tonight that night
Yesterday the
previous day
The
day before
Tomorrow the
next day
The following day
The day after
The day after tomorrow the day after the next day
or in two days
Next week the
following week
Just then
Here there
Thus so
PRONOUNS IN INDIRECT SPEECH
1. Pronouns
of the first person are changed into the pronouns of the subject of the
reported speech.
2. Pronouns
of the second person are changed into the pronouns of the object of the
reporting verb
3. Pronouns
of third person remain unchanged.
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Direct speech
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Indirect speech
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Masculine
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Feminine
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Plural
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I
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He
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She
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They
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You
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He
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She
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They
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You
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Him
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Her
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Them
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Your
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His
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Her
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Their
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Me
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Him
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Her
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Them
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My
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His
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Her
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Their
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Myself
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Himself
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Herself
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Themselves
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We
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None
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None
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They
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Us
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None
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None
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Them
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Our
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None
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None
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Their
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B. AMBIGUITY
Ambiguity is anything that can be understood in more
than one way. Something that has double, multiple or dubious significance. It
is something that is vague. As a linguistic concept, ambiguity refers to a
lexical item or grammatical unit with more than one possible meaning or
interpretation. It can also be referred to the state of a word or an expression
being difficult to understand, owing to many sense to it.
Ambiguity in language and communication result in a
word or an expression having more than one possible meaning, interpretation or
explanation. Sometimes a language user fails to communicate his/her meaning
effectively because of ambiguity.
KINGS OF AMBIGUITY
There are five kinds of ambiguity; namely
phonological, morphological, structural, lexical and semantic ambiguity.
1. Phonological Ambiguity: Some words in
English have the same sounds or pronunciation as others, but different
meanings. Those words are technically called homophones. In speech, they
present problems of aural-oral discrimination because what the listener hears
may not be what the speaker means. Exdependant and dependent have exactly the
same sound and even the same stress pattern.
2. Morphological
Ambiguity: In the formation of words affixes are attached to roof words.
Affixes can be in the form of prefixes and suffixes. These grammatical forms
can give rise to ambiguity, when for instance, a prefix that has the same
spelling and sound can mean differently when affixed to different words. A
typical example is the prefix un-which can function as a negative and
reversative prefix respectively.
In words such as unripe, unexpected,
undecided, unattractive etc. The prefix Un = is negative – meaning the opposite
or not”
Unripe mean not ripe
Unexpected means not expected
Unattractive means not attractive
The same prefix un-in words such as undress, unzip,
unwrap, unwind are reservative, meaning to reverse or undo the action described
by the verb.
3. Structural Ambiguity: This kind of
ambiguity concerns some phrases constructed or structured in a way that more
than one meaning can result from them. Consider the following sentences.
(a) The kite is set to fly
This may be interpretated as:
(i) the kite will fly on its own soon
(ii) somebody will fly the kite
(b) researching students can be interesting
This may be interpreted thus:
(i) Students who are engaged in research can
be interesting
(ii) To do research on students can be
interesting
Lexical
Ambiguity: When a single word has more than one meaning or sense, the result is
that confusion arises if the word is not used in a specific context. This is
because, used in isolation such a word can be interpretated in more than one
way. Two lexical items that can be sources of lexical ambiguity include:
(a) Homograph:
a word that is spelt the same as another word, but has a different meaning and
pronunciation Bow-to bend the head or body as sing of respect. Bow- a weapon
for short arrows.
(b) Homonym:
a word that has the same spelling and same pronunciation as another word but
has a different meaning from it. Many verbs and nouns in English are homonyms
as some have several meanings. Example
Row
(verb) to propel a boat, using oars.
Row
(noun) – a number of people or things arranged in a line, e.g a row of seats.
5. Semantic
Ambiguity: There is a sense in which all kinds of ambiguity are semantic.
The essence of discussing semantic ambiguity as a separate kind, therefore, is
to examine a situation where a single complete sentence can convey two or more
possible meanings leading to ambiguity. This could arise when there is a
misplaced determiner in a sentence, as in other situations.
Consider
the following sentences:
(a) I have not heard from him
This could be interpretated as:
(i)
he has not spoken
to me
(ii)
he has not
written to me
(iii)
he has not
replied to my message
(b) Mr. Okpara is not on seat
Could be interpretated thus;
(i)
Mr. Okpara is not
in the office
(ii)
He has not come
to work
(iii)
He has left his
seat
(iv)
He is not
prepared to attend to visitors
VOCABULARY
(a) Colloquial Expression: The term
colloquialism refers to an informal word or expression that is used mainly in
conversation. Such a word or an expression is not considered good for formal
speech or writing. Therefore any word or expression that does not conform to
the contemporary formal English usage is a colloquialism.
Colloquialism can be taken as
informal language, where informal refers to a spoken form or style of language
that has a simpler grammatical structure and simpler vocabulary that is colloquial
in nature or even slang. English is conversational, informal and interpersonal.
So to attain mutual intelligibility, formal patterns most often is abandon in
preference for informal speech, which a times make them more intelligible. The
result is that everyday conversations are held, using jargon, slang, cliché,
acronyms, vulgar language, abbreviations, contractions among other informal
speech pattern .
Jargon: these are words or
expressions used by a particular profession or group of people and which are
difficult for others to understand. Most jargon has Latin, Greek or French
origin, a factor that partly sets them from formal, conventional English words
and expressions.
Slang: Slang is very informal words
and expression common in spoken language, especially used by a particular group
of people eg. Children, criminals, soldiers etc. Slang is difficult to
understand by people outside the user-group. Sometimes, slang may be a word or
an expression that actually exists in English language but into which meaning
has been forced by the group. Examples: sorting (lecturer) Egunje, bush meat,
colonize a babe, shack etc.
Vulgar language: vulgar language
originally referred to rude, impolite language, likely to offend the person to
whom it is directed. Currently it refers to popular street language, language
of motor park- of touts and of desperate passengers, language of the market
place etc, all of which may be impolite, abusive and so on. The following
sentences contain vulgar language.
1.
You monkey!
2.
You are a
nonentity
3.
Fuck up! You
hopeless vagabond
4.
Get out here!
Idiot of no use
5.
Vamoose, you
bloody fool
Contractions:
Contractions as a linguistic term refers to short forms of words. Those forms are
found in informal speech. The under listed sentences contain contractions and
are informal:
1.
I’ll leave for
Lagos tomorrow
2.
We’ve waited for ages
for our stipends
3.
she won’t listen
to you if you’re not a born-again
ABBREVIATIONS AND ACRONYMS
Whereas
an abbreviation is a short form of a word or word groups, an acronym is a word
formed from the first letters of the words that make up the name of something.
Examples
of abbreviation are thus:
i.e
- that
is
e.g - for
examples
viz
- namely
etc - and
other things
etal - and
others
a.m
- before
noon
p.m - after
noon
NB - note
well
Prox
- next
month
Examples of acronyms
UNO - United
Nations Organization
NGOs - Non-
Governmental Organizations
E-mail - electronic
mail
FORMAL SPEECH PATTERN
Formal speech pattern is the official, non-personal
mode of communication in contra-distinction to the informal pattern which is
personal and unofficial. Unlike the informal pattern, the formal pattern has no
room for the emotional or sentimental expression that depicts the intimacy
between interlocutors. The formal speech pattern is straight forward, very
grammatical and rule conscious. It has no respect for waste of space and time
due to ornamentation, wordiness or superfluity that characterize informal
speech pattern.
Formality or informality of speech is determined by
there essential factors; namely the decoder (audience) subject matter (topic of
discuses) and environment (setting)
Audience: The audiences are the people who listen to speech.
If the gathering is formal, as in a courtroom, a board meeting, in a conference
etc, the audience calls for formal speech. But if it is a gathering of a family
a group of people in a market place etc the choice of speech is informal.
Therefore audience influence choice of speech medium and words too.
Subject Matter: The subject
matter, topic or area of discourse influences the choice of words and the
speech pattern. At a seminar, a lecture, workshop, a symposium, a conference, formal
meeting etc. speakers choose formal words and expressions appropriate to their
topics, as in informal discuses such as midnight tales, where a mother and her
children sit round the fire to listen to folktales, among other traditional
oral forms.
Environment: The environment or setting also influences choice of
speech mode. In a formal environment such as lecture theatres, courtrooms,
legislative chambers, conference halls, press centre or campaign grounds,
speakers resort to very formal speech patterns, using appropriate diction to
persuade the audience. In an informal environment such as motor parks, bus
stops, market places etc, the speaker is likely to use informal speech
patterns.
The important thing is that words
chosen should be relevant to the audience’s taste, appropriate to the subject
mater of discourse and mindful of the setting whether it is physical or
spatiotemporal.
REGISTERS
Meaning of Register
Registers refer to words or vocabulary associated with
certain field of human endeavour. The language registers of particular field or
disciplines are their trade mark, they are the specialized words or expression
used in discuses in those fields or profession. For instance a member of the
discipline of law is expected not only to be well acquainted with the language
of law and justice, but also to use, those specialized words aptly in
communication, especially with his colleagues in the law profession.
As language register words that
literally mean other things in general English have different meanings. They
acquire technical sense or meanings. Therefore the need for knowledge of
language registers is very important.
CRITICAL ANALYSIS AND APPRECIATION
This is a technique of reading in which the reader
becomes fully involved in the text. He is not only looking for information or
trying to grasp the main ideas of the text for simplification for less informed
readers or audience, but also penetrating the intentions, the heart-beat of its
creator making a constructive assessment of the material.
According to Chukwuma and
Otagburuagu, “Critical reading is concerned with weighing up the writer’s total
argument, assessing it for its strengths and weaknesses and making connections
between it and related ideas.
The critical reader is faced with
the task of totally unraveling the meaning believed the writer’s ideas, even
discovering the intentions underlying certain linguistic and literary technique
applied by the writer or the character or appraising the situations and
episode.
Main points to note in critical analysis
and appreciation
i.
The writer’s
choice of words in relation to situations, audience etc.
ii.
The kinds and
types of sentences used by the writer and their functions and effects on overall
meaning in a text.
iii.
Levels of
language deployment formal or informal and reasons for such.
iv.
The reasons for
such
v.
The background of
the writer which may provide a due to the content or form of his writing
vi.
The need to sift
facts from opinions of either the author or his characters.
vii.
Other vital
stylistic techniques that help to make the work critical analysis and
appreciation.
NARRATIVE WRITING
A narrative writing is one in which
the writer tells or relates (narrate) a story or a tale. It may involved giving
account of an incident or event in which somebody was involved to an audience
that has not experienced it or to people who were not there when it took place.
In narrative writing it is always a
good idea to present events or episodes in chronological or sequential order.
This will make the writing clear and straight forward, thus preventing mix-up
in the story being presented.
TENSE OF VERB TO BE USED
An important element in narrative writing is the tense.
It is important to decide from the start what type of tense one is going to
use. More often that not many people mix up their tenses. The present is
usually mixed with the past. This is wrong. Usually the tense of the verbs in
narrative writing is simple past tense.
Guidelines on narrative writing in the
life of a person
(a)
Date and place of
birth of the person, parentage and family
(b)
The person’s
early life and education
(c)
His or her
profession and how he has fared
(d)
Service to his
community and humanity in general.
(e)
His or her
notable achievements.
(f)
Commendable
aspect of his life, worthy of emulation.
(g)
His or her death
(if dead) and the effect of this.
(h)
Conclusion-lessons
than be drawn from his or her life
Descriptive Writing: Descriptive writing is a writing that requires the
writer to describe things, places and person. The subject of description could
be an object, a person, a place an animal, a scene or an incident. The main
preoccupation here is to describe.
Points to note when embarking on a
descriptive writing.
(a)
the writer must
be a good observer
(b)
he must be quite
familiar with what he is describing
(c)
the recognition
of the audience to whom we are describing the place, scene, person, incident
etc.
(d)
the purpose of
writing is also another factor to note.
Formal letter writing
Formal letter: This is a letter that is written to
government offices, or departments, cooperation, business firms, public
organizations, institutions of learning and editor of newspapers, journals or
magazines. They include applications for jobs, letters of inquiry, request and
complaints. Formal letter is also referred to as official or business letter.
The relationship between the writer and receiver is strictly official.
Features of formal letters:
1.
Two addresses;
the address of the writer and the address of the receiver
2.
the date is
written on the next line below the address of the writer
3.
Reference number,
in certain cases the letter requires reference number.
4.
The salutation,
after the receiver’s address comes the salutation.
5.
the heading or
title, formal letter do have title or heading
6.
The body of the
letter, in formal letter we go straight to the main point of writing.
7.
Paragraphing, the normal paragraphing rules have to be
strictly observed.
8.
Language of the
letter; it is important to write as clearly as possible, simple, straight
forward and correct sentences.
9.
The subscription,
here the signature is appended and the full name of the writer will then
follow.
Informal letter: This is the type of letter that is written
to parents, friends, relatives and acquaintances in their private capacities.
In other words, the relationship in this type of letter is an informal one.
Features
1.
the address, that
is a single address
2.
the date
3.
the salutation
4.
the body of the
letter
5.
the subscription
Phonetics and phonology of English
The study of speech sounds is divided into two closely
related and overlapping sub disciplines-phonetics and phonology.
Phonetics is the study of language
sound production, the quality of sound produced in terms of phonetic environment
in which they occur and the perception of such sounds. Meanwhile there are
three branches.
1.
Articulatory
phonetics:- This is the study of language sound production (articulation)
2.
Auditory
phonetics, this branch is concerned with the perception of language sounds.
3.
Acoustic
phonetics, this deals with the qualities of language sounds acquire in t he
process of production.
Phonology on the other hand, is the study of the
patterning of language sounds. It is primarily concerned with the acceptable
sequence or arrangement of the speech sounds of a particular language.
Classification of English Sounds
There are forty-four sounds units in the English
languages these sound units are also called phonemes.
In transcription, letters of the
English alphabet and some conventional symbols are used to represent the sound
units. These symbols are union as phonetic symbols. The forty-four sounds of
English have been classified into vowels and consonants.
Listening
Listening is a major language skill. It is a practical
exercise involving the intentional hearing and understanding of speech sounds.
As one hears speech sounds, one attaches meaning to the sounds in its different
forms. Therefore listening also involves discrimination of sounds, especially
the sounds of different languages.
Types of Listening
Listening has two broad types; namely extensive and
intensive listening:
i.
Extensive
listening means listening to a wide rang of materials over a period of time.
The listener gets information, ideas or main points form the materials he
listens to. The piece of information or ideas a listener gets depends on his
purpose for listening.
ii.
Intensive
Listening: This concerns listening for details of specific materials or items.
Example, one listening to a particular lecture is doing an intensive listening.
The same applies to one who listens to news broadcast, an announcement etc.
Listening Defect
Listening
is defective when the listener fails to achieve the purpose for listening i.e.
when he fails to understand the ideas or information given in the materials he
listens to. So the causes of this failure are referred to as listening defects.
Some of the causes of this failure are briefly discussed below;
(a)
Lack of listening
Readiness: some listeners may be physically and intellectually ready to listen,
but emotionally ill-prepared to benefit from the materials they listen to. Tiredness, sickness, absence of motivation,
hearing problem etc, can be the cause.
(b)
Ambiguity:
Listening failure may be caused by ambiguous expression. The material may be
too vague to allow comprehension. This may be due diction, difficulty of
subject matter, poor delivery of speech, defect in audio devices (eg
microphone, radio, tapes).
(c)
Unconducive
Listening Atmosphere: This may occur due to the factors related to the
environment in which listening is talking place. The atmosphere may be noise,
the sitting arrangement may be poor and poor lightening and sound effect may
contribute to listening failures.
Speaking
Speaking involves the sue of speech sounds or the
sounds of a language to communicate meaningfully. The speaking and listening
exercise and the repetition or imitation of what is said is called oral drill.
READING
Various definitions have been given
about reading. But according to the new lexicon Webester’s dictionary of
English language, reading is defined as “to understand the meaning of symbols,
signs, gesture etc, by looking at them and assimilating them mentally”. A
learner’s ability to tell the difference between the printed symbol is the gateway
to his understanding of the symbols. Effective understanding of those symbols
shows that reading has taken place. Thus the aim of reading is to derive
meaning from printed symbols or page.
Two
types of reading are thus:
Intensive and extensive reading
i.
Intensive
reading: intensive reading places emphasis on improved reading skills with
corresponding understanding of a text.
ii.
Extensive
reading: These concerns reading many kinds of texts, ie wide variety of materials
are used over a period of time.
Meanwhile, there are two kinds of reading –
techniques, namely skimming and scanning.
Skimming implies quick reading for the main idea of a
text. The reader does not read everything in the text rather he strives to get
the general points or ideas contained in the text. He skims the text by taking
a purposeful look at the important elements.
Scanning as a technique of faster reading involves
quickly searching for specific pieces of information in a text. The reader is
only concerned in picking out certain items in a text. He is neither interested
in details nor general idea.
WRITING
Introduction
Writing as a language skills concerns shaping the
letters of the alphabet or knowledge of the right combination of letters to
realize meaningful codes-words or expressions. Writing could be said to be the
graphic representation of speech sounds of a language, using the alphabets of
that language.
PUNCTUATION MARKS AND ITS FUNCTIONS
Punctuation is a vital aspect of writing which writers
must not neglected. Because if a sentence or an essay is not well punctuated,
expression is usually very poor. And the meaning many likely be distorted.
Punctuation is done, using some
conventional marks or symbols called punctuation marks. Punctuation marks in
English are:
Punctuation Mark
or Symbol
i. Full stop (period) - .
ii. Question mark - ?
iii. Exclamation mark - !
iv. Comma - ,
v. Semicolon - ;
vi colon - :
vii hyphen - _
viii dash - ____
ix Ellipsis - …..
x Caret - Û¸
xi Apostrophe - Û¥
xii Quotation marks - “ “
xiii Parentheses - ( ) or {
}
(a) The
full stop. This indicates a long pause or a complete statement or the end of a
sentence.
(b) The
Questions marks end direct questions
(c) The
exclamation mark ends expression of sudden feeling of happiness, of anger, of
sorrow, or surprise etc.
(d) The
comma generally shows a slight pause in speech. It also separates a relative/
subordinator clause which comes before the main clause.
(e) The
semicolon is a lesser stop than the full stop.
(f) The
colon is used to introduce a list
(g) The hyphen
is used to form compound nouns. After certain prefixes. To form compound
adjective.
(h) The
dash is used to mark sudden change of thought before and after a phrase added
to a sentence.
(i) Ellipsis
are used to show that some words or expression are omitted from quoted or
paraphrased ideas.
(j) The
caret is used to show what is missing from a text. It is put in the gap where a
word or an expression is missing
(k) The
apostrophe is used to show the possessive case of nouns or indefinite pronouns.
(l) Quotation
marks generally show the beginning and end of a quotated word, expression or
passage.
(m) Parentheses
are also called brackets in British English. They are put round a word or group
of words which interrupts, explains or add to a sentence.
DRAMA
Drama is a genre of literature which
thrives in action rather than narration. Drama could be tragedy, comedy,
tragic-comedy, melodrama.
The major feature of drama is
action. Then the basic elements of drama are plot, characters, actions, act scenes
and setting other features of drama include cast, playwright, dramatist,
dramatis personae, tragic flaw etc.