Language

Production
and Conversation

In linguistics, language production

is the production of spoken or
written language. It describes all of
the stages between having a
concept, and translating that
concept into linguistic form

Stages of Language
Production
Stages of Language Production: conceptualization,
formulation, articulation, self-monitoring

Conceptualization: a conceptual representation of

what to say
Encode message into linguistic form . Select words to
express concepts
Organize words syntactically to convey a message
Articulation: generate auditory/written/signed
sequence. Sound goes from speaker's mouth to
hearer's ear
Speech is decoded into linguistic form
Linguistic form is decoded into meaning

Message generation

Message-conceptual representtaion
independent of particular words
Take into account: level of
politeness, speech acts (question,
command, etc.)
Register (slang vs. Formal)
Reference
Listener knowledge

Word selection

Lexical access: Look up words in mental

dictionary. Pick word that you want to say, based
on semantic features. Overcome competition
from semantically similar words. Phonological
features come into play, too. Sentences get built
when words are selected. Gramatical encoding.
Adult english
Speaking vocabulary:........45.000-60.000 words
Speaking rate....................120-150 words/min
Selection error rate..........1 in 1000 words

Word organization

Apply syntactic and discourse rules

to determine a word sequence: e.g.
The glass is filled with water. vs.
Water fills the glass.
Function words
Inflectional morphemes
agreement

Word organization affetcs future

word organization in sentence
production

Syntactic priming:
The voice of a context sentence
affects how a picture is described:
Active voice/passive voice in the
context

Self-monitoring

Production is not a one-way transmission of

messages. Speakers and writers are quickly
capable of readjusting a message at the
stages of conceptualization, formulation, or
articulation, depending on where they noticed
the brakdown in production occured.
The fact that native speakers can monitor
and quickly correct mistakes in linguistic
output proves Chomskys claim that there is a
distinction between performance and
competence.

There are two main types of

research into speech production.
One type focuses on using the
analysis of speech errors.
The other looks at reaction-time data
from picture-naming latencies.

Research into production

Analysis of speech errors has found that not all are random, but rather
systematic and fall into several categories. Although speech production
is very fast, (2 words per second) the error rate of the utterances are
relatively rare (less than 1/1000) and those errors are categorized as
follows:
Anticipation: The word is in the speaker's mind and ready to be
spoken, but the speaker says it too quickly. This could be because the
speaker is planning and holding words in their mind. Reading
list>leading list
Preservation: The word retains characteristics of a word said
previously in a sentence:
Taddle Tennis instead of Paddle Tennis
Blending: More than one word is being considered and the two
intended items "blend" into a single item, perhaps implying the speaker
is waffling between a few word options.
The child is looking to be spaddled instead of spanked or paddled
Addition: adding of linguistics material, resulting in words like
implossible, blue bug>blue blug

Substitution: a whole word of related meaning is

replacing another. These errors can be far apart from
another, or target words, and are generally
grammatically consistent and accurate.

Malapropism: a lay term referring to the incorrect

substitution of words. It is a reference to a character
Mrs Malaprop from Sheridan's The Rivals.

at low speed it's too light (instead of heavy)

Makes no delusions to the past.

The pineapple of perfection.
I have interceded another letter from the fellow.

Spoonerism: switching the letters from words. For

example, the phrase slips of the tongue could
become tips of the slung.
You have missed my history lectures> You have
hissed my mistery lectures
You have wasted the whole term.>You have tasted
the whole worm.
The dear old queen.>The queer old dean.
Is the bean dizzy?

Reverend William A. Spooner

Why Speech Errors?

Freudian theory of production errors:
Errors represent unconscious beliefs or desires:
repressed thoughts of some kind.
Last night my grandmother (died !) lied.
Psycholinguistic Perspective:
Speech errors provide insights into the workings
of the
language system.
a (real !) meal mystery (anticipation)
he pulled a (tantrum !) pantrum (perseveration)

Its my pleasure to prevent,

er...present the next person on the
panel.
(infer that the speaker objects to the
person)

Disfluences

I ahve to remember to...um..leave a

note.
Filler: um, er, uh, etc.
Phoneme, word and phrase
repetition.

Syntactic Level Errors

Syntactic level errors are slips involving
whole words.
Syntactic Category Constraint: Slips
involve words from the same lexical
category.
(I loveverb to dance
!)- I danceverb to
loveverb
Exchange the (sun
!) -sky is in the
sky
Anticipation

verb

noun

noun

Morphemic Level Errors

Morphemic level errors involve an incorrect
association between a stem and an inflection.
Stranding Error: The inflection gets stranded in its
original correct position, whereas the intended
stem is moved.
Closed-class items tend to get stranded, whereas
open-class items tend to get moved.
(rules of word formation !) words of rule
formation.
She's already (packed two trunks !) trunked
two
packs.

Language Production:
Conversation

1.LISA: Hey Eva there's something I wanted to tell you

2.EVA: mhm
3.LISA: My brother is coming to town for a visit next
week
4.EVA: How nice
5. LISA: and you know, he broke up with that awful
Julie
*last* week
6.EVA: *how* very nice., when's he getting here?
7.LISA: next Monday
8.EVA: Want to go shopping and help me pick out
something really attractive before Monday?

Features of Conversation

Personnel: Participants in a
conversation
Speaker(s) and addressee(s)
Common Ground: Knowledge and
beliefs shared by the personnel
Assumptions about what the other(s)
know (s)/believe(s)

The Production of
Written Language
Three Phases of the Writing Process:
- Planning: Setting goals, formulating
and organizing ideas.
- Translating: Sentence generation.
- Reviewing: Evaluating and revising
the text.