Longman Dictionary of

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neurolinguistics
neurolinguistics n neurolinguistic adj
the study of the function the BRAIN performs in language learning and language
use. Neurolinguistics includes research into how the structure of
the brain influences language learning, how and in which parts of the
brain language is stored (see MEMORY), and how damage to the brain
affects the ability to use language (see APHASIA).
neuter adj
see GENDER 2
neutralization n
when a contrast that is normally made in a language is not marked, this
is called neutralization. For example, in PHONOLOGY, the high tense vowel
of bean (/biNn/) and the lax vowel of bin (/bIn/) are normally in contrast
(they are PHONEMEs), but there is no contrast between these vowels before
a velar nasal, as in the suffix –ing. In MORPHOLOGY, English normally contrasts
singular and plural forms of nouns (e.g. cat, cats), but in a few cases
(e.g. fish, sheep) this contrast is neutralized.
New Rhetoric n
in the teaching of composition, an approach advocated by a group of
genre theorists and researchers particularly in the US that argue for a
redefinition of traditional notions of rhetoric to focus on the social, cultural,
political and ideological assumptions and underpinnings that
underlie the formal features of texts. In the analysis of texts a new rhetoric
approach focuses on the social and ideological realities that underlie
the regularities of texts, and employs ethnographic methods to identify
the relations between texts and contexts.
node n
(in GENERATIVE GRAMMAR) each position in a tree diagram where lines
(“branches”) meet. At each node is a symbol for a GRAMMATICAL CAT-
EGORY 2 .
For example, in the tree diagram for a noun phrase, the child:
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NP
Det N
the child