Assalam o Alaikum.. Hopefully, the presentation will be helpful regarding semantics and to understand components of human speech..!!

5. Verbal
communication
Verbal communication is the use of sounds and
language to convey the message or for giving
information.
Non-verbal
Communication
Non-Verbal communication refers to the
communication through signs, body language and
gestures. It is informative but not always
communicative.
What are signals:
Signals are sounds OR gesture that have a natural
or self-evident meaning. Signals are transmitted in
In the Vocal Auditory Channel or not.

6. • Human speech is the combination of verbal
and non-verbal signals, while speaking the
words human also use gestures and pauses
that determine the meaning of speech and
convey the message appropriately.
• Verbal signaling consists of words and
linguistic units of sounds and speech organs
take a prominent position among the
production and transmission of signals.
Relationship between verbal and non-verbal signaling/
communication

7. • Non-Verbal signaling
It consists of two-layered phenomena that consist of :
• Vocal signals
• Non-vocal signals
The signals that are produced through the vocal tract
and are used for communication and giving
information.
Kinds of vocal signals
Vocal Reflexes
Voice set(quality)

8. • All vocal signals that are not linguistics are called vocal
reflexes( ~ reflex is an action or movement of the body that
happens automatically as a result to something).
Examples: sneezing , coughing , snoring
Vocal reflexes
Characteristics Physiologically determined
External to language
Operate independently of
language

9. • introduce noise into the
channel.
During speech
• intentionally to communicate.
• e.g. “cough” to catch
someone’s attention Or warn
someone
Use by Individual
or in cultural
convention

10. A fixed vocal background for an individual’s speech is called voice
quality.
Voice Set (Quality)
Characteristics
 Known as extra-linguistics
 Cultural and physiological
component
Function:
Necessary attendant to speaking.
Expressive and social function because determines:
identity of a speaker.
Self-presentation (information about him/her)

11. Non-vocal signal
Non-vocal signals includes body language(facial expression, eye
movement, hand movement, nodding the head etc.) that covey the
silent message in regards to spoken language. Such as:
Eye contact, Sign of OK
• Usually it is:
• Known as extra-linguistics
• Cultural and physiological component

12. Verbal and non verbal components of
Utterances/speech/communication.
1. Prosodic
features
2.Paralinguistic features
 Stress
 Intonation
 Eye movement
 Facial expression
 Hand and Body
Movement

13. Intonation and stress are the principle prosodic
features that operates in English utterance. They are:
Prosodic features:
• because they are overlying on
the string of forms (e.g.
consonant ,vowel ) and essential
part of verbal signals
verbal
component
• because they do not use to
identify the word-forms by which
the utterance or speech is
composed.
Non-
verbal
component

14. Stress:
• Stress may be determined by:
• Grammatical function of utterance. (e.g. noun, verb, adjective)
• By the attitude of a speaker.
For example, in the answer of the question:
“ have you seen Mary?”
“I haven't seen Marry.”( seen is stressed)
It means that “ Although I haven't seen Mary but I have a news of
her.” but if
“I haven't seen Marry.” (Marry is stressed)
It means that “I haven't seen Marry , I have seen someone else”

15.  Stress may serve to distinguish one word form from another. For
example the noun” produce” distinguishes from the verb “ produce” on the
bases of stress that the former carries stress on first syllable and the later
on second syllable.
 Stress serves to distinguish derivationally related verbs and nouns in the
spoken language. e.g. amaze= amazement, refuse= refusal
 Stress serves to distinguish inflectionally (~distinct forms of the same
lexeme) related forms. For example in Spanish canto( I sing) vs canto
(he/she sings)
 Stress serves to distinguish morphologically unrelated lexemes. For
example differ vs defer and die vs dye
Stress as a verbal component of utterance/vocal signal:

16. It differentiate the words in spoken language and changes the meaning by
differences of pitch that one word is pronounced with high tone and one from low
tone.
Example:
In Chinese, different lexemes are separated by the tone not by contrasting
consonant and vowels as in English.
In many west African languages inflectional forms of same lexeme are kept apart
by the tone as compare to English where it does by the use of particular suffix.
Function:
Commonly referred to Tone- language
Integral part of the verbal component (bolinger,
1972)
It can be determined:
 By the grammatical structure of the utterance.
 By the attitude of a speaker. For example
ironical, surprised, sad.
Intonation

17. Paralinguistic features OR paralinguistic phenomena
• The term “paralinguistic” means the communication through
Paralanguage (~ the use of manner of speaking to communicate particular
meaning).
• Basically, it is a non-verbal phenomena but it covers some features of
verbal signals.
It includes:
 Non prosodic vocal phenomena (pith, loudness, duration, frequency)
 non-vocal phenomena (gestures, facial expressions, eye movement hand
movement etc.,) .

18. It plays a supporting role in speech and verbal
communication to clear the meaning.
Determine the structure of the meaning of
utterance.
Adjust the development of a conversation and
the interpersonal relation.
Function of Non
vocal phenomena

19. • Abercrombie said:
“We speak with our vocal organs, but we converse with our
entire bodies.”
So the paralinguistic features both vocal or non-vocal are an
essential part of all normal language behavior( communication).
• It occurs alongside spoken language, interact with it and
produce with it a total system of communication.
• The conversational use of spoken language cannot be
properly understood unless appropriate paralinguistic elements
are taken into account.
Paralinguistic features and spoken language

20. If the specific
paralinguistic cues
are omitted:
o The participant get
confused and nervous.
o Conversation may lose the
flow and become less
coherent.
o Conversation is restrained.

21. Functions of the paralinguistic phenomena
Paralinguistic features modify our speech and also make our speech
affective on the basis of their following functions:
Modulation
Punctuation
Cultural function

22. •
“It’s not what he said but the way he said”
Modulation
Modulation of an utterance is the particular attitudinal coloring upon an
utterance to illustrate the speaker’s intention in what he is saying and his desire
to impress or convince the listener.
The tone of the speaker and the frequency of hearing and different body
movement in the speech determines the modulating function along with vocal
features because tone recognize the voice dynamic, tempo and continuity.
Example: a speaker will speak more loudly and in an unusual pitch when he is
exited or angry.

23. “
Punctuation of an utterance is “ the marking of boundaries”:
• At the beginning and end of an utterance.( for pause)
• At various point within the utterance.
Punctuation:
Functions
To segment the utterance
To manage the information
To take the listener’s permission for the utterance to
be continued.

24. Examples:
Nodding the Head:
• The non-vocal paralinguistic phenomena having both
modulating and punctuating function is “nodding the head” with
or without an utterance to show agreement or disagreement.
• The movement of head and hands and facial expression which
modulate and punctuate language utterance.
• Eye contact:
Eye contact reflect Interest in what the person is saying OR Paying
attention to what is being said Or Respect but on the other side eye
contact is considered disrespect, anger, aggression, sexual interest
and the lack of eye contact shows lying, discomfort etc.

25. Cultural function
Both vocal and non vocal
paralinguistic phenomena
differs from language to
language and also from
culture to culture.
For example, a Turkish or
Greek speaker throw he head
back rather than move it from
side to side for disagreement.

26. There are two concepts that are originated by Birdwhistell and
Hall with the connection of paralinguistic feature/non vocal
features and linguistic semantics that are:
Paralinguistic features and
linguistic semantics
Kinesics Proxemics
The investigation of signaling-
system making use of gestures and
other body movements.
The use of interpersonal space in
social interaction according to the
degree of intimacy and social
roles.

27. Semiotic function of paralinguistic
The semiotic functions fulfilled by paralinguistic signal (vocal or
non-vocal) exclusively expressive and social.
• For example:
During a conversation the speaker requires continual feed back
from the listener that is following him. Most of the feedback
consists in head-nods, grunts and eye movement.

28. :
The distinction between
prosodic and paralinguistic
features
It is impossible to distinguish between paralinguistic feature and
prosodic features in general phonetic terms.
Their function on semantics grounds differentiate them because prosodic
features are internal to language while paralinguistic features are
external to language.
Prosodic features include the grammatical function of the utterance as well
as the attitude of the speaker while paralinguistic feature only determine
by the attitude of the speaker.

29. Generalization about linguistic Semantics on the basis of
various (verbal and non verbal )components of
utterance/speech
First Generalization: ( classification
of the component in a signaling
system)
It would be agreed by linguists that Although all
the components( that we have discussed in
previous slides) are essential but:
the verbal component is more essential than the
non verbal component
prosodic features are more central than
paralinguistic features
Stress and intonation are more necessary than
the others like syllable.
Paralinguistic features are more important than
the voice set(quality).
Reason:
The reasons is that the
more specific to a
particular component is
the more highly structured
it is “grammatically” and
more specific to human
language by contrast with
other species’ signaling
system.

30. Second generalization: (semiotic
function of the components)
It has to do particularly with the semiotic function of the different
component of language. Verbal and non-verbal/ linguistic or non-
linguistic signals typically convey two kinds of semantic
information:
Verbal/linguistic= descriptive
No-verbal/ non-linguistics= social and expressive
It is very difficult to draw a distinction among these three
information , because verbal component can also be expressive
and non-verbal can also be descriptive. They are complimentary
rather than contrasting.

31. Example:
“He will do it by Tuesday.” it’s a purely predicative and
descriptive statement. Uttered with the suitable prosodic and
paralinguistic features it may be interpreted as a command or
request.
Reason:
It can’t be supposed that verbal components are always
descriptive.They may have expressive and connotative.
The choice of the words by speaker is more indicative of his
attitude towards what he is describing and what may have the
effect.

32. When there is a contradiction
between the semantic information
conveyed by the verbal part of an
utterance and the information
conveyed by associative non-
verbal( prosodic and
paralinguistic) features it is the
latter which determine the
utterance as a question rather than
a statement or as a command
rather then a question.
Third generalization:
(Contradiction)
Reason:
There is sometimes a conflict
between the information
signaled verbally and non-
verbal component. the
conflict may be due to the
contradiction of different
components transmitted in the
vocal auditory channel or
difference in modality.

33. To be sum up it can be said that:
• There is a well-knitted relationship among verbal and non
verbal/ prosodic and paralinguistic features because the
semantic meaning of speech is completed by the combination
of both.
• The verbal and non-verbal components always comes in mind
with the consideration of linguistic and non-linguistic
signaling system.
Conclusion

34. • `Without the consideration of non-verbal (vocal and non-
vocal) signals in the speech the speech would become flat.it is
like:
“human without heart”

35. signals
verbal
Non-
verbal
componen
ts
Paralingu
istic and
prosodic Verbal/ non
verbal
communic
ation
phrases
sentences
words
Vocal reflexes
verbal
Non-verbal
Voice-set
prosodic paralinguistic
stress
intonation
Facial
expressions
Body
movement
Loudness,
duration