Linguist May Have Different Perspective in this Beginning of Year

[caption caption="The writer is a linguistics lecturer, researcher, citizen journalist, and blogger attracted on social, discourse, lexicography, and grammar. Systemic functional grammar/linguistics is highly on his focus."][/caption]

 

The first day of the year has been announced. It is caused by the changing of year. It means, we are now opening and writing new pages of our own diaries. So, we should make our notes awesome. Agree?

As a linguist, I have particular view on this beginning. It may happen to other linguists. Why? Because we keep trying to stand on professionalism.

January

This is the first month of year. January is frequently referred as adjunct explaining time reference. Ideationally, it is part of circumstance. It is circumstance of location: time. Look at this clause,

We celebrate early days on January.

This circumstance, in this case, happens when there is  preposition. Then, the combination creates prepositional phrase (e.g. on January) as the way of indicating the type of circumstance. As the result, the way for referring time is not from its word class, but it is supported by preposition. So, what is the word "January" classified?

In fact, January is a noun. According to dictionary, the lexicon is labeled such thing. It affects its position as constituent in language unit. As it reflects noun, January can be subject or complement.

January is the first month of year >> the first month is January

It is January

I like January.

Three clauses above are the examples. The first clause shows it is able to reverse. It reflects relational process in transitivity. It's relational: identification process.

Unlike the first, the second clause is relational: attributive process which cannot be reversed. The third shows mental process when involving sense as reflected in the word "like".

Janus

Etymologically, the word "January" is derived from old French "Janvier" expressed in early 12th century. It ran its development when the word was said "Ieneuer" in the late of 13 century from Old North French "Genever". Its root was from Roman Empire. It was Janus, the first Roman month and sacred as the beginning of the year.

It has been declared as the first month of Gregorian calendar which is commonly used by most people in the world. How do we pronounce it?

The word “January” is pronounced by four consonant and vowel phones. Completely, it is pronounced /ˈdʒæn.jʊe  .ri/ . The consonants are [dʒ], [n], [j], and [r]. The vowels are [æ], [ʊ], [e], and [i]. Double vowel sound appears on [ʊe] making it called as diphthong. The pronunciation is divided into three pitches and the stress with highest sound range is felt on the first than others. The similarity shows that every pitch has consonant and vowel sounds.

 That’s all I have. There will be more if we want to explore.

Your presence on this site is not useless.

Although this work is really.. and extremely SIMPLE, you will realize that :

THIS MONTH, WE HAVE LEARNT THREE POINTS: TRANSITIVITY (on Functional Grammar), LEXICOGRAPHY (with etymology), and PRONUNCIATION.

Right, they are all in this JANUARY!  I hope you excited :D :D

 

Note: the phonetic symbol [e] in this article is actually pronounced like saying the first sound of the words "early" and "accept". This website may not support IPA transcription. It effects the inability of transcribing the suitable sound.