What is the name for the rules that govern the meaning of words and sentences group of answer choices?

1. The nature of language is characterized by the following features.
   1. Language is symbolic; words are symbols and have no inherent meanings.
   2. Language is rule-governed, as illustrated by the following rules.
      1. Phonological rules govern how sounds are combined to form words.
      2. Syntactic rules govern the way symbols can be arranged.
      3. Semantic rules help us understand the meaning of individual words.
      4. Pragmatic rules tell us what uses and interpretations of a message are appropriate in a given context, and the coordinated management of meaning (CMM) theory suggests that pragmatic rules are used to create and interpret messages.
   3. Language is subjective; people attach different meanings to the same message.
   4. Language and worldview can be understood by the theory linguistic relativism, which states that a culture is shaped and reflected by the language its members speak. The best known declaration of linguistic relativism is the Sapir–Whorf Hypothesis, which states that concepts do not exist if the words for them do not exist.
2. Language can have a strong effect on our perceptions and how we regard one another.
   1. Names are a reflection of ethnic identity and an indicator of status.
   2. Speech can also be a way of building and demonstrating solidarity with others, known as affiliation.
      1. Convergence is the process of adapting one's speech style to match that of others with whom the communicator wants to identify.
      2. Divergence is the strategy of speaking in a way that emphasizes differences between communicators and others.
   3. There are a number of language patterns that add to or detract from a speaker's power to influence others.
   4. Sexism and racism can affect the self-concepts of women and men.
      1. Sexist language uses words, phrases, and expressions that unnecessarily differentiate between female and male.
      2. Racist language reflects a worldview that classifies members of one racial group as superior and others as inferior.
3. Language can shape the way we perceive and understand the world, but potential problems can arise out of language as well.
   1. The goal of language is not always clarity, and vagueness serves useful purposes.
      1. Ambiguous language consists of words and phrases that have more than one commonly accepted definition, which can cause problems and can also be useful at the same time.
      2. Abstraction can be used at a high level to generalize about similarities between several objects, people, ideas, or events and can be thought of as being on an abstraction ladder.
      3. A euphemism is an innocuous term substituted for a blunt one and is typically used to soften the impact of information that might be unpleasant.
      4. Relative language gains meaning by comparison and is vague because the relative word is not linked to a more measurable term.
      5. Static evaluation is a description or evaluation that contains the word "is," which makes the mistaken assumption that people or things are consistent and unchanging.
   2. Language reflects the speaker's willingness to take responsibility for his or her beliefs, feelings, and actions.
      1. "It" statements replace the personal pronoun "I" with "it," which avoids responsibility for ownership of a message.
      2. A "but" statement has the effect of canceling the thought that precedes it.
      3. "I" language is a way of accepting responsibility, while "You" language expresses judgment of another person, and "We" language implies joint concern and responsibility for both the speaker and receiver.
   3. Disruptive language occurs when there is understanding but conflict still occurs.
      1. Fact–opinion confusion occurs when factual statements can be verified as true or false, while opinion statements are based on the speaker's beliefs and can never be proven or disproven.
      2. Fact–inference confusion may occur when inferential statements are conclusions arrived at from interpretation of events; arguments often arise when we label our inferences as facts.
      3. Evaluative/Emotive language seems to describe something but in reality announces the speaker's attitude toward it.
4. There are similarities and differences in the way females and males use language.
   1. There are two approaches that represent different sides in the gender and language debate.
      1. Significant differences have been identified by social scientists who have acknowledged that there are some fundamental differences in the way men and women behave socially, and some acknowledge significant differences in the way women and men use language.
      2. The minor differences argument is belied by research that shows that when differences exist, they are often small and are matters of degree and not kind.
   2. When accounting for gender differences, occupation, gender role, and power trump sex differences.

In linguistics, "syntax" refers to the rules that govern the ways in which words combine to form phrases, clauses, and sentences. The term "syntax" comes from the Greek, meaning "arrange together." The term is also used to mean the study of the syntactic properties of a language. In computer contexts, the term refers to the proper ordering of symbols and codes so that the computer can understand what instructions are telling it to do.

• Syntax is the proper order of words in a phrase or sentence.
• Syntax is a tool used in writing proper grammatical sentences.
• Native speakers of a language learn correct syntax without realizing it.
• The complexity of a writer's or speaker's sentences creates a formal or informal level of diction that is presented to its audience. 

Syntax is one of the major components of grammar. It's the concept that enables people to know how to start a question with a question word ("What is that?"), or that adjectives generally come before the nouns they describe ("green chair"), subjects often come before verbs in non-question sentences ("She jogged"), prepositional phrases start with prepositions ("to the store"), helping verbs come before main verbs ("can go" or "will do"), and so on.

For native speakers, using correct syntax is something that comes naturally, as word order is learned as soon as an infant starts absorbing the language. Native speakers can tell something isn't said quite right because it "sounds weird," even if they can't detail the exact grammar rule that makes something sound "off" to the ear. 

"It is syntax that gives the words the power to relate to each other in a sequence...to carry meaning—of whatever kind—as well as glow individually in just the right place"
(Burgess 1968)

English parts of speech often follow ordering patterns in sentences and clauses, such as compound sentences are joined by conjunctions (and, but, or) or that multiple adjectives modifying the same noun follow a particular order according to their class (such as number-size-color, as in "six small green chairs"). The rules of how to order words help the language parts make sense.

Sentences often start with a subject, followed by a predicate (or just a verb in the simplest sentences) and contain an object or a complement (or both), which shows, for example, what's being acted upon. Take the sentence "Beth slowly ran the race in wild, multicolored flip-flops." The sentence follows a subject-verb-object pattern ("Beth ran the race"). Adverbs and adjectives take their places in front of what they're modifying ("slowly ran"; "wild, multicolored flip-flops"). The object ("the race") follows the verb "ran", and the prepositional phrase ("in wild, multicolored flip-flops") starts with the preposition "in".

Diction refers to the style of writing or speaking that someone uses, brought about by their choice of words, whereas syntax is the order in which they're arranged in the spoken or written sentence. Something written using a very high level of diction, like a paper published in an academic journal or a lecture given in a college classroom, is written very formally. Speaking to friends or texting are informal, meaning they have a low level of diction.

"It is essential to understand that the differences exist not because spoken language is a degradation of written language but because any written language, whether English or Chinese, results from centuries of development and elaboration by a small number of users."Jim Miller
(Miller, 2008)

Formal written works or presentations would likely also have more complex sentences or industry-specific jargon. They are directed to a more narrow audience than something meant to be read or heard by the general public, where the audience members' backgrounds will be more diverse.

Precision in word choice is less exacting in informal contexts than formal ones, and grammar rules are more flexible in spoken language than in formal written language. Understandable English syntax is more flexible than most. 

"...the odd thing about English is that no matter how much you screw sequences word up, you understood, still, like Yoda, will be. Other languages don't work that way. French? Dieu! Misplace a single le or la and an idea vaporizes into a sonic puff. English is flexible: you can jam it into a Cuisinart for an hour, remove it, and meaning will still emerge.”
(Copeland, 2009)

Types of sentences and their syntax modes include simple sentences, compound sentences, complex sentences, and compound-complex sentences. Compound sentences are two simple sentences joined by a conjunction. Complex sentences have dependent clauses, and compound-complex sentences have both types included.

• Simple sentence: Subject-verb structure ("The girl ran.")
• Compound sentence: Subject-verb-object-conjunction-subject-verb structure ("The girl ran the marathon, and her cousin did, too.")
• Complex sentence: Dependent clause-subject-verb-object structure ("Although they were tired after the marathon, the cousins decided to go to a celebration at the park.")
• Compound-complex sentence: Four clauses, dependent and independent structures ("Although they weren't fond of crowds, this was different, they decided, because of the common goal that had brought everyone together.")

Syntax has changed some over the development of English through the centuries. "The proverb Whoever loved that loved not at first sight? indicates that English negatives could once be placed after main verbs" (Aitchison, 2001). And not all people speak English in exactly the same way. Social dialects learned by people with common backgrounds—such as a social class, profession, age group, or ethnic group—also may influence the speakers' syntax. Think of the differences between teenagers' slang and more fluid word order and grammar vs. research scientists' technical vocabulary and manner of speaking to each other. Social dialects are also called "social varieties." 

Following proper syntax doesn't guarantee that a sentence will have meaning, though. Linguist Noam Chomsky created the sentence "Colorless green ideas sleep furiously," which is syntactically and grammatically correct because it has the words in the correct order and verbs that agree with subjects, but it's still nonsense. With it, Chomsky showed that rules governing syntax are distinct from meanings that words convey.

The distinction between grammar and syntax has been somewhat disrupted by recent research in lexicogrammar, which takes the words into account in grammar rules: For example, some verbs (transitive ones, that perform an action on something) always take direct objects. A transitive (action) verb example:

• "She removed the index card from the old recipe box."

The verb is "removed" and the object is "index card." Another example includes a transitive phrasal verb:

• "Please look over my report before I turn it in."

"Look over" is the phrasal verb and "report" is the direct object. To be a complete thought, you need to include what's being looked over. Thus, it has to have a direct object.

• Aitchison, Jean. Language Change: Progress or Decay? Cambridge University, 2001.
• Burgess, Alan. Enderby Outside. Heinemann, 1968.
• Chomsky, Noam. The Logical Structure of Linguistic Theory. University of Chicago, 1985.
• Copeland, Douglas. Generation A: A Novel. Scribner, 2009.
• Miller, Jim. An Introduction to English Syntax. Edinburgh University, 2008.