1. Phonetics and Phonology: This focuses on the sounds of language.
* Phonetics studies the physical production and perception of speech sounds.
* Phonology investigates how sounds are organized and function within a language.
2. Morphology and Syntax: This concerns the structure of words and sentences.
* Morphology analyzes the internal structure of words and how they are formed.
* Syntax studies the rules governing how words are combined into phrases and sentences.
3. Semantics and Pragmatics: This deals with meaning and language use.
* Semantics studies the meaning of words and sentences.
* Pragmatics explores how context and social factors influence the interpretation of language.
These three categories are often considered the core of linguistic study, but other areas like sociolinguistics (language in society), psycholinguistics (language and the mind), historical linguistics (language change over time), and computational linguistics (language and computers) are also important branches of the field.