Republic of the Philippines

STATE UNIVERSITY OF NORTHERN NEGROS

COLLEGE OF NURSING AND ALLIED HEALTH SCIENCES
SUNN Main Campus
Sagay City, Negros Occidental
Philippines 6122

First Year
1st Semester 2024 – 2025
Midterm Examination - Intro to Linguistics

Name: ____________________________ Date: ___________________________

I. Multiple Choice
Write the letter of the correct answer in the given blank before each number.

______1. What was the possible result in 1476 when William Caxton brought the printing press to England.
a. Library became bigger. c. Changes in words came about.
b. There was a widespread of reading resources. d. Standardization of spelling and grammar.

______2. With the great vowel shift during the early modern English, vowel sound became shorter. Which of the following
words were the mostly likely to be sounded during the time?
a. fleet, might, great c. bin, pen, tint
b. bowl, coil, bail d. pint, grind, bride

______3. The work of William Shakespeare came about in the late phase of Early Modern English. Which of the following was
not published during that time?
a. sonnets c. Merchant of Venice
b. Romeo and Juliet d. Little Women

______4. In the Early and the late Modern English, there was a vast change in vocabulary. One of the two reasons that caused
this vocabulary development was that the British Empire had a huge exploration and conquest. What was possible
result of this to vocabulary development.
a. Plenty of dictionary spread throughout the world due to the conquest of Britain to other world.
b. For about a quarter part of the earth’s surface was explored, Britain had brought with them new ideas including
language to their native land.
c. Britain colonized the quarter part of the world, thus it was able expand its resources.
d. Britain loved its own native language.

______5. Ferdinand de Saussure first started the theory that language is interdependent and that the words in it functions as a
whole. Which linguistic activity supports this idea of self-contained system through interdependency?
a. Noun functioning as a subject, object, subject complement or object of the preposition.
b. The sole function of the verb is to determine the action or the information about the subject.
c. In context cluing, each word contributes to the meaning of the word.
d. The structures in each paragraph have to follow the mechanics.

______6. The child has nothing in his brain at birth. It is a blank slate no rules for processing data. So it has to be filled in like an
empty pail. As the child grows his experiences will be filled by the knowledge and learnings s/he encounters. Who his
the proponent of Tabula Raza?
a. Vygotsky c. Locke
b. Plato d. de Saussure

______7. The theory that Lev Vygotsky pointed out that each child needs to be assisted in their learnings. Through the more
informed people or highly equipped environment, the child will be able to gain knowledge and learnings. For the child
can not process things on her own.
a. constructivism c. acculturation model
b. scaffolding d. monitoring model
______8. He believes in the universality of language. That what ever language there is, language has commonly the grammar
rules and structures. Whose theory is this?
a. John Searle b. Paul Grice c. Chomsky d. Krashen

______9. Krashen believed that learners can acquire language when exposed to comprehensible input. Which do you think can a
learner be in this situation?
a. Learner A is doing things by himself so it takes time. c. Learner B is spoon fed by his supporters around.
b. Learner C is very dependent on his tutors. d. Learner D does classroom activities using clear
instructions and gets the concepts through them.

______10. How can we describe the language acquisition device?

a. A hypothetical tool that helps children quickly learn and understand language
b. A section of the brain labeled 'language acquisition device'
c. A device you plug into children's heads to teach them a language
d. A toy that teaches children how to speak

______11. Who developed the language acquisition device?

a. Noam Chomsky
b. Choam Nomsky
c. Chuck Norris
d. Chuck Numsky

_____12. Acculturation is a process in which an individual adopts, acquires and adjusts to a new cultural environment as a result
of being placed into a new culture, or when another culture is brought to someone. Which of this is an example of
acculturation?
a. Filipinos transferring to another neighboring c. An American lad talking with a neighbor
b. Spanish student migrated to America d. none of the given

______13. What theory did the language acquisition device evolve into?
a. Universal Grammar
b. The Grammy Awards
c. Universal Language Acquisition
d. Dr. Chomsky's Guide to Speaking Good

______14. It is a theory that claims that language is an innate fundamental part of the human genetic make-up and that
language acquisition occurs as a natural part of the human experience.
a. nativist b. behaviorism c. acculturation d. Mentor model

______15. A theory that states about utterance or statement is a matter of performing illocutionary acts with certain intentions
according to the constitutive rules.
a. constructivism c. acculturation model
b. scaffolding d. Speech acts

______16 Which one is an implicational language universals?

a. Subjects tend strongly to precede objects. c. All languages have vowels and consonants.
b. If a language has voiced fricatives, it also has unvoiced fricatives, d. lexical semantics deals with meaning of words
but not necessarily the other way round

_____17. Linguistic anthropologists are interested in the study of language ideology because
a. they are interested in the rules of language.
b. knowing the universal grammar of language provides insight into the human mind.
c. linguistic competence is essential.
d. these ideologies become markers of struggles between social groups.
e. All of the above.

______18. In the nature-nurture debate as it applies to language acquisition, Chomsky emphasizes ______.
a. the ‘harmony and mutual dependence’ of nature and nurture
b. the fundamental antagonism of nature and nurture
c. the importance of nature over nurture
d. the importance of nurture over nature
_____19. Each word has its individual sounds and each minimal units of sound which refers to ____.
a. morpheme b. morphology c. syntax d. phoneme

______20. Which gives the description of semantics?

a. The study of the rules governing the meaning of word, its structure and origin.
b. The study of the rules governing sentence formation
c. The study of the rules governing word formation
d. The study of the rules governing the sounds that form words

______21. The statement which speaks about morphology?

a. The study of a linguistic unit
b. The study of phrases
c. The study of word formation and structure
d. The smallest meaningful unit of a word

______22. How many morphemes does the word transubstantiation contain?

a. 5 b. 2 c. 6 d. 3

______23. Which morpheme can stand alone? Word such as father, license, gentle etc.
a. Bound b. free c. derivational d. inflectional

______24. Which is not an example of derivational morphemes?

a. drink --> drinks c. Walk --> walker
b. determine --> determiner d. work --> worker

______25. He runs faster as he reaches the finish line. The underlined words are ____ morpheme
a. free b. bound c. derivational d. inflectional

______26. His determination is unfathomable. The underlined words are _____ morpheme.
a. derivational b. inflectional c. bound d. free

_____27. Which word in the following sentence is an adjective? Jason is wearing his yellow raincoat today.
a. Jason b. Wearing c. Yellow d. Raincoat

______28. Choose the answer that shows all of the adjectives in the sentence.
Old shops lined the narrow street.
a. shops, lined c. old, the, narrow
b. old, shows, the d. old, narrow

_____29. Degrees of comparisons is a grammatical category that applies to

a. verbs b. adjectives c. prepositions d. auxiliaries

_____30. Diehard is the ____________ movie I've ever seen.

a. most excited b. most exciting c. most excitable d. most excitingly

_____31. Which underlined word is used as determiner?

a. They left that for you to examine.
b. They don’t want to intervene in that issue for it will create more trouble.
c. They don’t want to include that in their bucket list.
d. They evade to talk about that.

_____32. Which of the following sentences demonstrates correct placement of use of modifiers?
a. Walking through the lane, the lost wallet was found by me.
b. While walking down the lane, I saw a lost wallet.
c. I lost the wallet walking down the lane.
d. The wallet walking down the lane was lost.
_____33. Systemic study of the production, transmission, and reception of speech sounds is
a. phonology b. syntax c. linguistics d. morphology

_____34. Choose the sentence that does NOT include a dangling modifier.
a. Being a sit-down comedian, it was hard to make ends meet.
b. Biking to class, the sun shined upon the student.
c. Having been used to clean the floor, Gregory was unwilling to use his toothbrush.
d. Devouring ample amounts of Cook-Out, the engineer felt

_____35. Which sentence has adjective clause modifier to the object of the transitive verb?
a. Sally chose the blue coat which was a gift from her mother.
b. Sally is a kind girl whom everyone likes most.
c. This is Sally whom everyone likes most.
d. She was with Sally whom everybody dislikes most.
______36. The tall guy wearing a blue jacket is my cousin. The underlined phrase is a modifier to the ____.
a. guy b. cousin c. tall d. jacket
______37. The building where Carter works is in Smyrna. The definite function of the underlined words is____.
a. Adjective c. Adjective Phrase
b. Adjective Clause d. Adverb Cause
______38. A person targeting a second language has difficulty in acquiring L2 (sec. language). This is due to the distance
between the speaker’s culture and the target culture. What theory is referred to ___.
a. acculturation b. scaffolding c. monitor model d. Behaviorism

______39. The formal structure of a language consisting of all linguistic observations about meaningful units of sounds and the
rules or principles of making phrases and sentences is called its
a. syntax b. phonology c. grammar d. morphology

_____40. Communicative competence is a term intended to convey

a. the fact that utterance that seem grammatically correct may, in fact, yield semantic nonsense.
b. the association of linguistic signals with social, cultural, and physical contexts of a given speech community.
c. the mastery of adult grammar by a speaker.
d. how adult speakers must not only follow grammatical rules but also choose their words and conversation topics in a
way that is appropriate to social roles and context.
____41. What branch of linguistics is referred here? The correct English word of this /ˈræðəʳ/is radar.
a. morphology b. phoneme c. phonology d. syntax

____42. The theory of implicature states that the statement to be performed is implied. It is up to the receiver to it through
performance which is directly expected by the speaker. This is somewhat similar to the illocutionary act of Searle. This
theory was proposed by ___.
a. Paul Grice b. John Austin c. Plato d. Piaget
_____43. The house with peeling paint is at the end of the street.
a. numerical Adjective c. Adjective Phrase
b. Adjective Clause d. delimiting

_____44. This thick sweater should keep me warm in the snow.

a. descriptive c. Adjective Phrase
b. Adjective Clause d. demonstrative

_____45. The CD that Thomas scratched will no longer play.

a. Adjective c. Adjective Phrase
b. Adjective Clause d. none of these
_____46. Upon the grassy plain of fair Bukidnon, contented cattle graze from its verdant hills which extend westside for others
to pasture. Of fair Bukidnon functions as an adjective in the sentence. What word does it modify?
a. plain b. grassy c. Bukidnon d. cattle

_____47. Contented cattle graze from its verdant hills which extend westside for others to pasture. The underlined words is___.
a. a. numerical Adjective c. Adjective Phrase
b. Adjective Clause d. delimiting
_____48. What is the infinitive phrase in this sentence? To surprise her family, Cate dressed up in a funny costume.
a. to surprise c. Cate dressed up
 b. in a funny costume d. to surprise her family
_____49. Which sentence contains an infinitive phrase?
a. Thomas hated to leave the party so soon. c. Thomas was going to a meeting.
b. Thomas went to a friend’s house. d. Thomas gave the cake to Kate.
______50. What is the function of the underlined infinitive phrase in the sentence?
The class officer to monitor garbage cans is the class vice president.
a. adjective b. adverb c. noun d. clause

G O O D L U C K!