Formal linguistics

Formal linguistics studies language through explicit systems of rules and representations, including grammar, sound patterns, and meaning. It analyzes how these systems shape the structure and interpretation of expressions.

Phonology: The study of how speech sounds are organized and function within languages. It models sound patterns as structured systems rather than inventories of individual sounds.
Formal grammar: A precisely specified system of rules that defines a language or set of linguistic expressions. It makes the structural rules of a language explicit and testable.
Ferdinand de Saussure: A Swiss linguist whose work helped establish structural linguistics and the study of language as a system of signs. His account of language as a system of relations shaped structural approaches to linguistic form.
Usage-based linguistics: An approach that explains linguistic structure through language use, learning, and repeated patterns. It contrasts with accounts that prioritize abstract formal rules over usage and experience.
Natural language processing: The field that develops computational methods for processing and generating human language. Formal representations of grammar and meaning can inform computational language models.
Morphology: The study of the internal structure of words and how they are formed. Its rules describe how meaningful parts combine to form words.
Generative grammar: An approach that models linguistic knowledge as a system capable of generating grammatical expressions. It treats grammar as a formal system that characterizes speakers’ linguistic competence.
Leonard Bloomfield: An American linguist who helped establish structural linguistics in the United States. His descriptive methods made explicit analysis of linguistic patterns central to the field.
Functional linguistics: An approach that explains linguistic patterns partly through the communicative functions they serve. It emphasizes communicative pressures where formal analysis may focus on internal structural systems.
Computational linguistics: The study of language through computational models and methods. It turns formal descriptions into algorithms for analyzing linguistic data.

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