Modern linguistics is different from traditional grammar.

Phonology

Sociolinguistics is the study of language in relation to society.

Pragmatics

Modern linguistics is mostly prescriptive, but sometimes descriptive.

General linguistics is generally the study of language as a whole.

In the study of linguistics, hypotheses formed should be based on language facts and checked against the observed facts.

Social changes can often bring about language changes.

General linguistics, which relates itself to the research of other areas, studies the basic concepts, theories, descriptions, models and methods applicable in any linguistic study.

D（）is one of the design features of human language which refers to the phenomenon that language consists of two levels: a lower level of meaningless individual sounds and a higher level of meaningful units.