User:John Stephenson/Contributions

John Stephenson

• My recent Citizendium edits - look here to see what I've been working on (or just see if I know what I'm talking about). I am mostly responsible for the original information on many of the Linguistics Workgroup pages, and have also been trying to get linguists and departments to link to Linguistics.
• My user subpages.

Articles I've created

Linguistics

Syllable: Unit of organisation in phonology that divides speech sounds or sign language movements into groups to which phonological rules may apply. [e]  Mora: Unit of phonology which organises sequences of segments such as [h] and [o] into larger units (e.g. ほ ho in Japanese) which are subject to phonological rules, such as influencing which syllable in a word is stressed (as in English), or how long a syllable is relative to others (as in Japanese). [e]  Word (language): A unit of language, often regarded as 'minimally distinctive' and used to build larger structures such as phrases; languages vary in how distinctive word units are and how much they may be modified. [e]  Vowel: Speech sound with relatively unhindered airflow; different vowels are articulated mainly through tongue movements at the palatal and velar regions of the mouth, and are usually voiced (i.e. involve vocal fold movement). [e]  Consonant: Unit of language, defined in phonetics as a speech sound that involves full or partial 'closure' of the mouth, and in phonology as a segment that cannot occupy the nucleus or 'peak' of a syllable. [e]  Voicing (linguistics): Either the physical production of vibration by the vocal folds as part of articulation, or the potential phonological distinction this allows, i.e. the distinct difference between units such as [b] and [p] in many languages. [e]  The Sound Pattern of English: A landmark work on the rules of English phonology by Noam Chomsky and Morris Halle, which importantly rejected the phoneme as a true phonological unit; subsequently built upon by other analyses that recognised the syllable and other units of prosodic organisation. [e]  Language acquisition: The study of how language comes to users of first and second languages. [e]  Second language acquisition: Process by which people learn a second language in addition to their native language(s), where the language to be learned is often referred to as the 'target language'. [e]  Language attrition: The loss of a first or second language or a portion of that language by individuals. [e]  Semantics (linguistics): The subfield of the study of language which focuses on meaning. [e]  Dialect: Regional or social variety of a language distinguished by pronunciation, grammar, or vocabulary, especially a variety of speech differing from the standard literary language or speech pattern of the culture in which it exists. [e]  Language planning: In sociolinguistics, the name for any political attempt to change the status of a language in some way or develop new ways of using it, e.g. a government devising laws to promote a language, or scholars producing an official dictionary; the former is status planning (changing the political recognition of a language), the latter corpus planning (changing the way a language is used). [e]  Multilingualism: The state of knowing two or more languages, either in individuals or whole speech communities. [e]  Official language: one given political recognition in a region, usually a state, and typically used in politics and law. [e]  Lingua franca: Any language used for widespread communication between groups who do not share a native language or where native speakers are typically in the minority; name from 'Lingua Franca', a pidgin once used around the Mediterranean. [e]  Critical period: Limited time in which an event can occur, usually resulting in some kind of transformation. [e]  Critical period hypothesis: Hypothesis which claims that there is an ideal 'window' of time to acquire language in a linguistically rich environment, after which this is no longer possible. [e]  Monitor theory: Hypotheses developed by the linguist Stephen Krashen to explain and predict the process of second language acquisition. [e]  Comprehension approach: several methodologies of language learning that emphasise understanding of language rather than speaking. [e]  British Association for Applied Linguistics: academic society for professional applied linguists, language teachers and other interested parties, based in the United Kingdom. [e]  LESLLA: (LESLLA) forum for research into the development of second language acquisition skills by adult immigrants with little or no formal education. [e]  Sue Savage-Rumbaugh: (b. 1946) American primatologist most famous for her work with two bonobos, Kanzi and Panbanisha, investigating their apparent use of language via lexigrams and computer-based keyboards. [e] sourced from Wikipedia, but much originally mine  Contact language: any language which is created through contact between two or more existing languages; may occur when people who share no native language need to communicate, or when a language of one group becomes used for wider communication. [e]  Creole (language): Native language, such as Haitian Creole, which under most definitions originated as a pidgin (a rudimentary language without native speakers, created by at least two groups of speakers as a contact language. i.e. to allow immediate communication) but became as complex as any other language through being acquired by children as a first language. [e]  Historical linguistics: The study of how languages change over time, and linguistic patterns within that change. [e]  Comparative linguistics: (also known as comparative philology) A branch of historical linguistics that uses a number of methods of comparing languages to establish their historical relatedness. [e]  Writing system: A set of signs used to represent a language, such as an alphabet, or a set of rules used to write a language, such as conventions of spelling and punctuation. [e]  Orthography: Art or study of correct spelling and grammar according to established usage. [e]  Romansh language: Romance language spoken in the Graubünden canton of eastern Switzerland; one of the official languages of the country, with about 35,000 speakers. [e] Grammar: Please do not use this term in your topic list, because there is no single article for it. Please substitute a more precise term. See Grammar (disambiguation) for a list of available, more precise, topics. Please add a new usage if needed.  Sign language: A system of language in which expressions are conveyed using body movements rather than the human voice. [e]  Japanese language: (日本語 Nihongo), Japonic language spoken mostly in Japan; Japonic family's linguistic relationship to other tongues yet to be established, though Japanese may be related to Korean; written in a combination of Chinese-derived characters (漢字 kanji) and native hiragana (ひらがな) and katakana (カタカナ) scripts; about 125,000,000 native speakers worldwide. [e]  Mandarin language: (traditional Chinese 官話, simplified 官话; pinyin Guānhuà) Sino-Tibetan language, the standard form of which constitutes 'Standard Chinese'; world's largest language by speakers, with approximately 900,000,000 users. [e]  Chinese characters: (simplified Chinese 汉字; traditional Chinese: 漢字) are symbols used to write varieties of Chinese and - in modified form - other languages; world's oldest writing system in continuous use. [e]  Welsh language: A Brythonic Celtic language spoken mainly in Wales and Patagonia, Argentina. [e]  Jamaican Creole: Several varieties of a full language spoken in Jamaica that developed from a pidgin and remained in some contact with English, created as a conseqence of enslaved speakers of many African languages requiring a means to communicate; also known as Patois. [e]  Hawaiian Creole: Creole language (created through children acquiring a pidgin as their first language and thereby making it complex) popularly known as Hawaiian 'Pidgin', with vocabulary largely from English; spoken in the U.S. state of Hawaii, it replaced an earlier pidgin based on the Hawaiian language. [e]  Pidgin Hawaiian: Extinct pidgin language spoken in Hawaii, which drew most of its vocabulary from Hawaiian; spoken mainly by immigrants to Hawaii, and died out in the early twentieth century. [e]  Noun class: System which categorises and marks the nouns of a language according to their meaning, form or pronunciation; commonly known as 'grammatical gender', but many languages have several noun classes. [e]  Romance languages: Branch of the Indo-European language family, originally spoken in southern, eastern and western Europe and descended from Vulgar Latin, the language of the Ancient Romans; includes modern Spanish, Portuguese, French, Italian and Romanian. [e]  Written language: The communication and representation of a language by means of a writing system. [e]  Claude Lévi-Strauss: French anthropologist who developed structural anthropology as a method of understanding human society and culture. [e]  Nativism (psychology): theory that certain traits of a species emerge from a mind that is already prepared for its environment, e.g. the language ability is not learned but 'acquired' due to innate processes. [e] Linguistics template

English  English language: A West Germanic language widely spoken in the United Kingdom, its territories and dependencies, Commonwealth countries and former colonial outposts of the British Empire; has developed the status of a global language. [e]  British English: Any of the spoken and written variants of the English language originating in the United Kingdom; widely used around the world, especially in current and former countries of the Commonwealth of Nations. [e]  American English: Any of the spoken and written variants of the English language originating in the United States of America; widely used around the world. [e]  Canadian English: Any of the dialects of English, standard or not, that are used in Canada. [e] Varieties of English: Add brief definition or description New material  Creolistics: Add brief definition or description  Martha Young-Scholten: Add brief definition or description  Fossilization (language acquisition): Add brief definition or description  Cranberry word: Add brief definition or description  Languages of the United States of America: Add brief definition or description language acquisition template

Politics

Parliament of the United Kingdom: Add brief definition or description  Government of the United Kingdom: Add brief definition or description Speaker of the House of Commons: Add brief definition or description  Member of Parliament (UK): Add brief definition or description Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs: Add brief definition or description  Members' Lobby: Add brief definition or description  Tony Blair: Add brief definition or description  Gordon Brown: Add brief definition or description  Alistair Darling: Add brief definition or description  David Miliband: Add brief definition or description  Leader of the Opposition (UK): Add brief definition or description  Labour Party (UK): Add brief definition or description  David Cameron: Add brief definition or description  William Hague: Add brief definition or description

Capital (city): Add brief definition or description  Mahmoud Ahmadinejad: Add brief definition or description  Sarah Palin: Add brief definition or description Politics of Pakistan: Add brief definition or description  Gaza Strip: Add brief definition or description 2008-2009 Gaza conflict: Add brief definition or description  Obama administration: Add brief definition or description  Politics of Japan: Add brief definition or description  Yukio Hatoyama: Add brief definition or description  Kunio Hatoyama: Add brief definition or description New material  Pseudostate: Add brief definition or description Association of Electoral Administrators: Add brief definition or description  Republic of China (1912-1949): Add brief definition or description

Culture

Japan  Kanji: Add brief definition or description Shingo: Add brief definition or description  Himeji Castle: Add brief definition or description  Koshi-byo (Nagasaki): Add brief definition or description  Koshi-byo: Add brief definition or description  Whaling: Add brief definition or description  Whale meat: Add brief definition or description  Sushi: Add brief definition or description  Hiroshima (city): Add brief definition or description  Nagasaki (city): Add brief definition or description  Ju-on: Add brief definition or description  Arudou Debito: Add brief definition or description  C.W. Nicol: Add brief definition or description  2009 Japanese cash handout: Add brief definition or description  Japanese dolls: Add brief definition or description  Bullet train (Japan): Add brief definition or description Japan template I have also started articles on Japan's islands, regions and prefectures, e.g. Honshu, Kansai and Mie. There are some maps I've uploaded.

UK Scarborough Castle: Add brief definition or description Great Siege of Scarborough Castle: Add brief definition or description  Grand Hotel (Scarborough): Add brief definition or description  Bombardment of Scarborough, Whitby and Hartlepool: Add brief definition or description  English Civil War: Add brief definition or description  Yorkshire: Add brief definition or description  Bonfire Night: Add brief definition or description  Chips (food): Add brief definition or description  Cardiff: Add brief definition or description  Wales: Add brief definition or description  Glasgow: Add brief definition or description  Durham University: Add brief definition or description  The League of Gentlemen (television series): Add brief definition or description  The League of Gentlemen (writers and performers): Add brief definition or description  Police box: Add brief definition or description UK template Places  Africa: Add brief definition or description  Caribbean: Add brief definition or description  Germany: Add brief definition or description  Taiwan: Add brief definition or description  Tibet: Add brief definition or description  Paris: Add brief definition or description Boston: Add brief definition or description  Côte d'Ivoire: Add brief definition or description Other  Heart (symbol): Add brief definition or description

Science

Earth: Add brief definition or description  Mountain: Add brief definition or description  Enceladus: Add brief definition or description Pluto: Add brief definition or description  Penguin: Add brief definition or description  Giant Panda: Add brief definition or description  Chris Higgins: Add brief definition or description  Richard Dawkins: Add brief definition or description  Tooth: Add brief definition or description  Electronics: Add brief definition or description

New material  Volcanically active worlds: Add brief definition or description Reaction of penguins to aircraft: Add brief definition or description Penguins in the northern hemisphere: Add brief definition or description  Farming with raw sewage: Add brief definition or description

Other

Red Dwarf (science fiction series): Add brief definition or description  Blade Runner: Add brief definition or description Macbeth: Add brief definition or description Penguins in popular culture: Add brief definition or description  Academic degree: Add brief definition or description  Doctor Who: Add brief definition or description Doctor Who (1960s-1990s): Add brief definition or description Doctor Who (2000s-): Add brief definition or description  Dalek: Add brief definition or description  William Hartnell: Add brief definition or description  Patrick Troughton: Add brief definition or description  Jon Pertwee: Add brief definition or description  Tom Baker: Add brief definition or description  Peter Davison: Add brief definition or description  Colin Baker: Add brief definition or description Sylvester McCoy: Add brief definition or description  Paul McGann: Add brief definition or description

Christopher Eccleston: Add brief definition or description  David Tennant: Add brief definition or description  Matt Smith: Add brief definition or description  Castle: Add brief definition or description  Lonely Planet: Add brief definition or description  Ceuta and Melilla: Add brief definition or description  Michael Hayes: Add brief definition or description  Facebook: Add brief definition or description  Dr. No (film): Add brief definition or description  Michelle Yeoh: Add brief definition or description  Chow Yun-Fat: Add brief definition or description  Gong Li: Add brief definition or description  Danny Boyle: Add brief definition or description  Trainspotting (film): Add brief definition or description  Sunshine (2007 film): Add brief definition or description  Desert Island Discs: Add brief definition or description  Mensa International: Add brief definition or description  Windows XP: Add brief definition or description  Windows Vista: Add brief definition or description  Windows 7: Add brief definition or description  2012 Summer Olympics: Add brief definition or description  2016 Summer Olympics: Add brief definition or description  Chocolate: Add brief definition or description  Train (transport): Add brief definition or description

Imported from Wikipedia

Japanese English: Add brief definition or description renamed from the Wikipedia original  England: Add brief definition or description  Scarborough, North Yorkshire: Add brief definition or description  York: Add brief definition or description Naples: Add brief definition or description  Craig Charles: Add brief definition or description  Norman Lovett: Add brief definition or description  Danny John-Jules: Add brief definition or description  Red dwarf (star): Add brief definition or description

Culture of Japan: Add brief definition or description  Stephen Krashen: Add brief definition or description  Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh: Add brief definition or description  Cargo cult: Add brief definition or description  Colonialism: Add brief definition or description  Reading (process): Add brief definition or description  Prime Minister of the United Kingdom: Add brief definition or description  Douglas Adams: Add brief definition or description  Terry Nation: Add brief definition or description

Articles started by others

Articles which I intend to make a significant contribution to include linguistics, language, monitor theory, applied linguistics, phonology, phonetics, vocal cords, Elizabeth II, House of Commons, Japan, Japanese language and Singapore English. I rewrote the German language page, but don't intend to go back to it much. I also restarted the abortion article, and wrote most of the early versions of spoken language. I expanded dinosaurs. As for Japanese popular culture, I started that using bits written by other people and myself elsewhere.