Учебно-методический комплекс дисциплины

Aims:

.1. The lexicology is a part of linguistic dealing with the vocabulary of the language and the property of the words and word combinations. The term “lexicology” is composed of two great morphemes: “lexis” – which means “phrase” and “logos” – which denotes learning or department knowledge. The literal meaning of the lexicology is the science of the word. The term “vocabulary” denotes the system formed by a sound total of all the words and word equivalents that the language possesses. The term “word” denotes the basic unit of a particular meaning, of a particular group of sounds capable of a particular grammatical employment. A word is a semantic grammatical and phonological group of sounds. For example: in the word “girl” the group of sounds [g, i, r, l] is associated with the meaning “a female child up to the age 16-17”, also with other meanings and definite grammatical employment, that is “girl” is a personal noun, it has a genitive case and it has plural form. It also may be used in some syntactical functions, as subject, predicative and object. The general study of words and vocabulary is known as general lexicology. Special lexicology devotes its attention to description to all the characteristics peculiarities in the vocabulary of the given language or concrete language. It goes without saying that every special lexicology is based on the principals of general lexicology. A great deal has been written to provide a theoretical bases, on which the vocabularies of different languages can be compared and described. This relatively new branch is called contractive or comparative lexicology. The evolution of any vocabulary as well as single element forms the object of the historical lexicology of different words, their change, development, investigates the linguistic and extra linguistic forces modifying their development and structure, meaning and usage. Descriptive lexicology deals with the vocabulary of a given language at a given stage of its development. It studies the function of words and their specific structures. For example: it may contrast the word “child” with its derivatives “childhood”, “childish”. Descriptive lexicology also studies the English words and their morphological and semantic structures, determines their colorations between two these aspects.

The lexicology also studies all kinds of semantic grouping or semantic relations, such as synonymy, antonym, homonymy. There are two principal approaches in linguistics to the study of linguistic material, namely: synchronic (from Greek “syn” – “together”, “with” and “chronos” – “time”), diachronic (“dia” – “through”, “chronos” – “time”). The distinction between synchronic and diachronic was proposed by Swiss philologist Ferdinand de Saucier (1857 – 1913).

Language is a reality of thought and thought develops with development of society, so language and vocabulary must being studied in the light of social history. A word through its meaning rendering some notion is generalized reflection of reality. With extra linguistic forces influencing the development of words are considered in historical lexicology, etymology.

The theoretical value of lexicology becomes obvious if we realize that it forms the study of one of the three main aspects of language, i.e. its vocabulary, the other two being its grammar and sound system. The theory of meaning was originally developed within the limits philosophical science. The relationship between the name and the thing named has in the course of history constituted one of the key questions in Gnostic theories and therefore in the struggle of materialistic and idealistic trends. The idealistic point of view assumes that the earlier forms of words disclose their real correct meaning, and that originally language was created by some superior reason so that later changes of any kind are looked upon as distortions and corruptions.

The materialistic approach considers the origin, development and current use of words as depending upon the needs of social communication. The dialectics of its growth is determined by its interaction with the development of human practice and mind. In the light of V.I. Lenin’s theory of reflection we know that the meanings of words reflect objective reality. Words theory as names for thighs, actions, qualities, etc. and by their modification become better adapted to the needs of the speakers. This proves the fallacy of one of the characteristics trends in modern idealistic linguistics, the so-called Sappier- Whorf thesis according t which the linguistic system of one’s native language not only expresses one’s thoughts but also determines them. This view is incorrect, because our mind reflects the surrounding world not only through language but also directly.

Lexicology came into being to meet the demands of many different branches of applied linguistics, namely of lexicography, standardization of terminology, information retrieval, literary criticisms especially of foreign language teaching.

Its importance in training a would – be teacher of languages is of a quite special character and cannot be overestimated as it helps to stimulate a systematic approach to the facts of vocabulary and an organized comparison of the foreign and native language. It is particularly useful in building up the learner’s vocabulary by an effective selection, grouping and analysis of new words. New words are better remembered if they are given not at random but organized in thematic groups, words families, synonymy series, etc.

A good knowledge of the system of word – formation furnishes a tool helping the student to guess and retain in his memory the meaning of new words on the basis of their motivation and by comparing and contrasting them with the previously learned elements and patterns.

The knowledge, for instance, of the meaning of negative, reversative prefixes and patterns of derivation may be helpful in understanding new words. For example such words as immovable a, deforestation n and miscalculate v will be readily understood as ‘hat cannot be moved’, ‘clearing land from forests’ and ‘to calculate wrongly’.

A working knowledge and understanding of functional styles and stylistic synonyms is indispensable when literary texts are used as a basis for acquiring oral skills, for analytical reading, discussing fiction and translation.

Stylistics from different angle studies many problems of lexicology. These are problems of meaning, synonymy, connotation – the problem of semantic change of words.

A close connection between lexicology and grammar is conditioned by the inseparable ties between the objects of their investigation. the ties between lexicology and grammar are particularly strong in the sphere of word – building as lexicology before has been considered as a part of grammar, later it had become as separate pattern of linguistics.

Recommended literature:

1. Antrushina Modern English Lexicology - M.,1999

2. Arnold I.V. The English Word - M.,1986

3. Ginzburg Modern English Lexicology – M.,1979

4. Koonin A. English Lexicology - M.,1978

5. Смирницкий А.И. Лексикология английского языка - M.,1977

6. Харитончик З.А. Лексикология английского языка - M.,1987
2.2 Word as a basic unit of the language

1. Types of lexicological units.

2. The definition of the word.

3. Phonetic, morphemic, semantic motivation of words.

Aims:

Morpheme – word – set expression.

Words are the central elements of the language system. They are the biggest of morphology and smallest of syntax. They embody the main structural properties and the functions of the language. Words can be separated in an utterance by other units and can be used in isolation. Unlike words, morphemes cannot be divided into smaller meaningful feeling or action. The meaning of morphemes is more abstract, more general than that of words.

Set expressions are word groups consisting of two or more words, whose combinations is integrated, so that they are introduced as readymade units with the specialized meaning of the whole.

Th. Hobbs (1588-1671) one of the great philosophies reviewed materialistic approach to a formal problem of nomination when that “Words are not mere sounds, but names of matter”. Three centuries later the great Russian physiologist Pavlov I. V. examined the word in the connection with the studies of the second signal system. One of the latest developments of the science and engineering is machine. It also deals with words and requires the definition to them within the scope the linguistics. The word has been defined syntactically, semantically, phonologically and by combining different approaches. The word has been defined syntactically as “the minimum sentence” by Sweet and later by L. Bloomfield as “ a minimum free form”. L. Sappier takes into consideration the syntactic and semantic aspects when he calls the word “one of the smallest completely satisfying bits of isolated meaning into which the sentence resolves itself”. He also points out one more important characteristics of a word – its indivisibility. The essence of indivisibility will be clear in forming comparison of an article “a”, “or” and prefix “a”. In the words “a lion – alive”: “a lion” – is a word group, because it can be divided into elements and we can insert some elements between them. Ex: “a beautiful lion”. “alive” is a word, because it is indivisible, because nothing can be inserted, because the morpheme “a” is not free, it is not a word.

J. Lyos points out that the word should be discussed in terms of two criteria: positional movelety and uninterruptibility.

Ex: The – boy – s – walk – ed – slow – ly – up – the – hill.

Slow – ly – the – boy – s – walk – ed – up – the – hill.

We can change word order, but we can’t “s – boy, ed – walk”.

The efforts of many eminent scholars Vinogradov, Smirnitsky, Ahmanove resulted in throwing light on the problem of the word as a basic unit of the language and they achieved definite results. The eminent French linguist A. Mallet combines the semantic, phonological and grammatical criteria and gives the following definition: “The word is defined by the association of the particular meaning with the particular group of sounds of a particular grammatical employment”. This definition doesn’t permit us to distinguish words from phonemes, because not only “a child”, but also “a pretty child” are combination of sound with particular meaning. But we can except this definition with some modification adding that the word is the smallest significant unit of a given language capable functioning a known and characterized by the positional movelity within a sentence.

3. The term “motivation” is used to denote the relationship existing between the phonemic and morphemic composition and structural pattern on the word on the one hand and its meaning on the other. There are three types of motivation in English: phonemic, morphemic, semantic.

When there is a certain similarity between the sounds that make up a word and those refer to by the sense, the motivation is phonemic. Ex: “bang, buzz, cuckoo, giggle, hiss, purr”, here the sounds of words are imitative of sounds in nature. Although they exist a certain arbitrary element on the resulting phonemes, one can see this type of motivation is determined by the phonological system of each language as shown by the difference of echo words for the same concept in different languages.

Ex: cuckoo – in English, kuckuck – in German, кукушка – in Russian, кокек – in Kazah. Words denoting noises produced by animals are most play sound imitative. In English they only phonetically, though nouns and verbs are exactly the same. In Russian motivation combines phonetic and morphemic motivation.

Ex: bark, moo, purr.

The morphological motivation may be quite regular. Thus the prefix –ex means “former”. When added to human nouns ‘expresident”, there is a general use of prefix –“ex” is unstressed and motivation is fated. Ex: “expect”, “export”.

Recommended literature:

1. Antrushina Modern English Lexicology - M.,1999

2. Arnold I.V. The English Word - M.,1986

3. Ginzburg Modern English Lexicology – M.,1979

4. Koonin A. English Lexicology - M.,1978

5. Смирницкий А.И. Лексикология английского языка - M.,1977

6. Харитончик З.А. Лексикология английского языка - M.,1987

3 Semantic structure of the English word

1. The definition of lexical meaning of a word.

2. The lexical meaning of words.

3. Types of grammatical meanings of words:

a. denotative meaning (direct)

b. connotative meaning (figurative)

Aims:

If treated diachronically, semasiology studies the change in meaning which words undergo. Descriptive synchronic approach demands a study not of individual words but of semantic structures typical of the language studied, and of its general semantic system.

The main objects of semasiological study are follows: semantic development of words, its causes and classification, relevant distinctive features and types of lexical meaning,

Polysemy and semantic structure of words, semantic grouping and connections in the vocabulary system, i.e. synonyms, antonyms, terminological systems, etc.

An exact definition of any basic term is no easy task altogether. In the case of lexical meaning it becomes especially difficult due to the complexity of the process by which language and human mind serve to reflect outward reality and to adapt it to human needs.

The definition of lexical meaning has been attempted more than once in accordance with the main principles of different linguistic schools. The disciples of F. de Saussure consider meaning to be the relation between the object or notion named, and the name itself. Descriptive linguistics of the Bloomfieldian trend defines the meaning as the situation in which the word is uttered. Both ways of approach afford no possibility of a further investigation of semantic problems in strictly linguistic terms, and therefore, if taken as a basis for general linguistic theory, give no insight into the mechanism of meaning. Some of L. Bloomfield’s successors went so far as to exclude semasiology from linguistics on the ground that meaning could not be studied “objectively", and was not part of language but “an aspect of the use to which language is put”. This point of view was never generally accepted. The more general opinion is well revealed in R. Jakobson’s pun. He said: “Linguistics without meaning is meaningless". This crisis of semasiology has been over for some twenty years now, and the problem of meaning has provided material for a great number of books, articles and dissertations.

The definitions of meaning given by various authors, though different in detail, agree in the basic principle: they all point out that lexical meaning is the realisation of concept or emotion by means of a definite language system. The definition stresses that semantics studies only such meanings that can be expressed, that is concepts bound by signs.

It has also been repeatedly stated that the plane of content in speech reflects the whole of human consciousness, which comprises not only mental activity but emotions, volition, etc. as well. The mentalistic approach to meaning treating it only as a concept expressed by a word oversimplifies the problem because it takes into consideration only the referential function of words. Actually, however, all the pragmatic functions of language — communicative, emotive, evaluative, phatic, esthetic, etc., are also relevant and have to be accounted for in semasiology, because they show the attitude of the speaker to the thing spoken of, to his interlocutor and to the situation in which the act of communication takes place.

The complexity of the word meaning is manifold. The four most important types of semantic complexity may be roughly described as follows:

Firstly, every word combines lexical and grammatical meanings. E.g.: Father is a

personal noun.

Secondly, many words not only refer to some object but have an aura of associations expressing the attitude of the speaker. They have not only denotative but connotative meaning as well.

E. g.: Daddy is a colloquial term of endearment.

Thirdly, the denotational meaning is segmented into semantic components or semes.

E.g.: Father is a male parent.

Fourthly, a word may be polysemantic, that is it may have several meanings, all interconnected and forming its semantic structure.

E. g.: Father may mean: ‘male parent’, ‘an ancestor’, ‘a founder or leader’, ‘a priest’.

It will be useful to remind the reader that the grammatical meaning is defined as an expression in speech of relationships between words based on contrastive features of arrangements in which they occur. The grammatical meaning is more abstract and more generalised than the lexical meaning, it unites words into big groups such as parts of speech or lexica-grammatical classes. It is recurrent in identical sets of individual forms of different words. E. g. parents, books, intentions, whose common element is the grammatical meaning of plurality. The interrelation of lexics and grammar has already been touched upon in § 1.3. This being a book on lexicology and not on grammar, it is permissible not to go into more details though some words on lexica-grammatical meanings are necessary.

The lexica-grammatical meaning is the common denominator of all the meanings of words belonging to a lexica - grammatical class of words, it is the feature according to which they are grouped together. Words in which abstraction and generalisation are so great that they can be lexical representatives of lexica-grammatical meanings and substitute any word of their class are called generic terms. For example the word matter is a generic term for material nouns, the word group — for collective nouns, the word person — for personal nouns.

Words belonging to one lexica - grammatical class are characterised by a common system of forms in which the grammatical categories inherent in them are expressed. They are also substituted by the same prop-words and possess some characteristic formulas of semantic and morphological structure and a characteristic set of derivational affixes. See tables on word-formation in: R. Quirk et al., “A Grammar of Contemporary English”. The common features of semantic structure may be observed in their dictionary definitions: