Main types of English dictionaries.

Lecture 1. Main types of English dictionaries.

ENCYCLOPAEDIC AND LINGUISTIC DICTIONARIES. The choice of words: thing-books vs wordbooks;

all words of the language vs words of designative character (names for substances, diseases, animals,

institutions, terms of science, biographical data). The information about a word in an entry: spelling,

pronunciation, meaning, examples of use vs extensive extralinguistic information. Cf the entries for CAT:

CAT (family Felidae), any of a group of carnivorous mammals that includes the true cats—lion, tiger,

jaguar, leopard, puma, and domestic cat—and the cheetah (see photograph). Cats typically have soft fur,

often strikingly patterned. See also domestic cat. The history of the cat family can be traced through the

fossil record to the Late Eocene Epoch (43.6 to 36.6 million… (Encyclopaedia Britannica)

cat [kæt] 1. small , domestic, fur-covered animal often kept as a pet, to catch mice, etc. (=wild cat) any

animal of the group that includes tigers, lions, panthers and leopards. bell the cat see bell (2). Let the

cat out of the bag see bag (1). Like a cat on hot bricks, very nervous or jumpy… (A.S. Hornby. Oxford

Advanced Learner’s Dictionary of current English).

Most well-known encyclopaedias: The Encyclopaedia Britannica (in 24 vos.); Encyclopaedia Britannica

Macropaedia and Micropaedia. The Encyclopaedia Americana (in 30 vols); Collier’s Encyclopaedia (in 24

vols)(for teachers and students); Chamber’s encyclopaedia (familry type reference book); Everyman’s

Encyclopaedia (for all-round use).

Specialized encyclopaedias : The Oxford Companion to English Literature, the Oxford Companion to

Theatre, Cassell’s Encyclopaedia of World Literature, etc.

Overlapping of information: the word origin in encyclopaedic dictionaries; the encyclopaedic definitions in

linguistic dictionaries; encyclopaedic parts (appendici) in linguistic dictionaries, e.g. geographical names,

names and dates of birth and life of famous people.

American dictionaries tend to be encyclopaedic; British dictionaries tend to exclude the extralinguistic

information from the entries.

•

TYPES OF LINGUISTIC DICTIONARIES. Criteria for classification:

a. The nature of word lists: general (unrestricted) and restricted dictionaries.

b. The kind of information: explanatory, translation, pronouncing , etymological, ideographic

dictionaries, etc.

c. The language in which the information is given: Monolingual vs bilingual dictionaries.

c. The prospective user, e.g. advanced learners of English; children, students, etc.

Example: A.P.Cowie, R. Mackin. Oxford dictionary of Current Idiomatic English. Vol.1. Verbs

with prepositions and particles. Oxford University Press, 1975.

1. Explanatory dictionaries. Deal with the form, usage and meaning of lexical units. Synchronic

vs diachronic presentation of word meanings: from basic to derived vs from historically earlier

to those that appeared later, e.g. table ‘a piece of furniture’ / ‘a slab of stone’.

Diachronic: NED (The New English Dictionary on Historical Principles); SOD (The Shorter

Oxford Dictionary on Historical Principles)

Synchronic: COD (the Concise Oxford Dictionary of Current English); Webster dictionaries;

Collins COBUILD English Language Dictionary (COBUILD – Collins Birmingham University

International Language Database)

2 Translation dictionaries. The New English-Russian Dictionary. (In 3 vols.) Ed. By

E.M.Mednikova & Ju.D.Apresjan. (250 000 words; V.K.Muller. English-Russian Dictionary. 53

000 words; A.M.Taube, A.V.Litvinova, A.D.Miller, R.S.Daglish. Russian-English Dictionary.

(34 000 words); English-Russian Dictionary ed. Under general direction of A.I.Smirnitsky; A

Phrase and Sentence Dictionary of Spoken Russian. Russian-English- English-Russian. N.Y.:

Dover Publications. E.g. любопытный curious. Ишь какой любопытный, всюду свой нос

сует. He’s so damned curious, he sticks his nose in everywhere. Odd. Это любопытное

совпадение. It’s an odd coincidence.

3 Specialized dictionaries.

a. Phraseological dictionaries. Dictionaries published abroad contain all sorts of

“anomalies”: idioms, colloquial word groups, proverbs. An Anglo-Russian Phraseological

Dictionary by A.V.Koonin.

b. Pharasal verbs dictionaries. Longman Dictionary of Phrasal verbs.

c. New Words dictionaries. The Barnhart Dictionary of New English (1st ed. L. 1973).

d. Slang dictionaries. Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English by E.Partridge; The

Dictionary of American Slang by H.Wentworth and S.B.Flexner.

e. Usage dictionaries : give advice to native learners about what is right and what is wrong.

Dictionary of Usage and Abusage by E.Partridge: the difference between words, e.g. daily vs

diurnal; restrictions on the usage of certain words, e.g. responsible should be restricted to

human beings; the meaning of “difficult” words, e.g. vicinage ‘neighbourhood’; words easily

confused, e.g. venal and venial ; the use of certain constructions, e.g. split infinitive , etc.

f. Frequency dictionaries: to make lists of words suitable as the basis for teaching English to

foreign learners. M. West’s General Service List.

g. Pronouncing dictionaries: record variants of contemporary pronunciation. English

Pronouncing Dictionary by Daniel Jones.

h. Etymological dictionaries: The word’s primary meaning; the immediate source of borrowing

and its origin. Etymological English Dictionary by W.W.Skeat.

i. Ideographic dictionaries. P.M. Roget’s Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases.

A new parameter: The form of the dictionaries: ‘hard’ dictionaries and ‘soft’ (electronic) dictionaries, e.g.

Linguo, Multitran. Electronic encyclopaedias.

List of terms:

definition – словарное толкование;

designative [‘dezigneitiv ] номинативный

entry – словарная статья;

explanatory dictionary – толковый словарь

frequency - частотность

Lecture 2. Etymological survey of English vocabulary

1. Some important landmarks of British history

a) Celtiс tribes inhabiting Britain: Britons and Gaels. Languages: Welsh, Cornish (now extinct), Irish,

Scots, Manx .

b) the Roman conquest : 55-54 B.C. - Julius Caesar’s landings and short stays; 43 A.D. - permanent

conquest of Britain under the emperor Claudius.

c) the Anglo-Saxon conquest: mid-5th century - the invasion of Germanic tribes (Angles, Saxons and

Jutes):

The start of the history of the English language.

d) the Scandinavian conquest (the 8th - the 11th cent): the 8th cent. - first inraids; the 9th cent. -

occupation of the territory north of the Thames; 878 - King Alfred’s peace treaty and ‘Danish law’ (the

North-east of England)

e) the Norman conquest: 1066.

2. Some basic notions

a) Native: various interpretations of the term

- words of Anglo-Saxon origin brought by Germanic tribes

- and words of unknown origin (big, path)

- and words derived on the basis of the Anglo-Saxon stock. Where does eatable belong?

- all words existing in the English word-stock of the 7th cent.

b) Borrowed.

- synchronic and diachronic point of view: wine, cheap, pound vs alibi, memorandum, stratum.

-the source of borrowing and the origin of the borrowed word: table - Fr. source, Lat. origin; school - Lat.

source, Greek origin; ink - Fr. source, origin unknown.

3. Native (Anglo-Saxon) words.

25-30% of the English vocabulary, its basic syncategorematic words and most important semantic

groups:

- most of auxiliary and modal verbs (shall, will, should, must, can, may), pronouns (I, you, he, my, your,

his), numerals, conjunctions (and, as, but, till).

- notional words: parts of body (head, hand, arm, back),kinship terms (mother, father, son, wife), natural

phenomena (snow, rain, wibd, frost), planets (sun, moon, star), animals (horse, cow, sheep, cat), basic

physical qualities (old, young, hot, heavy, light, dark, white, long), basic physical actions (do, make, go,

come, see, hear, eat).

Highly polysemantic, derivationally active, rich combinability.

Exceptions: archaic words (lore, methinks, quoth); poetic (whilom, ere, welkin); historical terms (thane,

yeoman).

Monosemantic words: ax, ash, dale. Words with limited word-building capacity: hound - to hound.

4. Borrowings.

a) from Old Norse (Scandinavian). Personal pronouns: they, their, them; political terms: law, wrong;

everyday words: husband, sister, call, take, fellow, sky. In placenames by ‘village’: Kirksby, Whitby,

Derby; spot’, ‘hill’: ness ‘cape’ : Inverness, Caithness. In proper names son: Johnson

Which word came first? OE fisc/Scand. fiskr, treo/ trē, ic /ek ‘I’, bitan / bita ‘bite’ .

c) from French.

‘Thus came England under Normandy’s power. And the Normans could not speak any language but their

own, and spoke French as they did at home, and taught thier children so. So that noblemen of this land

who came from their blood stick to the same language, which they brought from home. For unless a man

speaks French people think low of him; but low men stick still to English and to their own language. I

believe there are in all the world no other countries which do not stick to their own language, except

England alone’.(Robert Gloucester, the chronicle of the 13th century).

Semantic groups:

-government, the court and the law: prince, baron, noble, govern, government, court, justice, judge.

-army and military life: war, army, battle, regiment, mail, castle, banner, harness, siege.

-religion and church: religion, saint, sermon, conscience, chapel, cloister.

-town professions: butcher, painter, tailor (vs OE words denoting country professions: miller, shoemaker,

shepherd, smith).

-art: art, colour, figure, image, column, ornament

-amusements: pleasure, leisure, ease.

-meals: dinner, supper, roast.

Non-specific: air, place, cover, river, large, change.

Latinized words: debt<Fr. dette (fr. Lat. debitum), perfect <Fr. parfait (fr. Lat. perfectum).

Derivatrional affixes:

Suffixes: -ance, -ence, -ment (ignorance, dependence, government); -ess (princess), -et (cabinet), -age

(courage, marriage), -ard (coward), -able (admirable).

Prefixes: dis- (disappoint, disagree); en- (encage, encompass).

Hybrids: bewilderment, goddess, shepherdess.

с)from Latin: the Renaissance (the 16th cent.). Abstract words having to do with science. Verbs in -ate:

aggravate, alleviate, abbreviate, exaggerate; verbs in -ute: constitute, attribute, contribute, pollute; adj. in

-ant: arrogant, reluctant, evident.

Etymological doublets:

-English-Scandinavian (skirt/shirt; scatter/shatter; road/ raid)

-English-French (frere>friar /brother fr. Lat. frater)

paternel>paternal/fatherly fr. Lat. paternus

Literature:

Смирницкий А.И. История английского языка. М., 1965. Гл. I (ч.1,2).

Lecture 3. Ways of replenishment Modern English vocabulary. A. Assimilation of Borrowings.

1. Changes in the vocabulary

a) disappearance: OE wunden-stefna 'a curved-stemmed ship'

b) ousting by borrowed words:Scand.take and die vs

OE niman and sweltan; Fr. army and place vs OE hēre and staθs.

c) words become obsolete, go to the periphery and are used in poetry only:

steed 'horse', slay 'to kill'.

d) new words appear constantly.OE vocabulary:30-40 thousand words; ModE vocabulary - 400-500

thousand words.

2. Ways of enriching the ModE vocabulary:

a) vocabulary extension

b) semantic extension

A.Vocabulary extension: New vocabulary units may be a result of

a) productive (patterned) ways of word-formation

b) non-patterned ways of word-creation

c)borrowing from other languages

Borrowing is less productive both than in OE and ME and than other means of enriching the vocabulary. It

is active in terminology.

Non-true borrowings: words made up of morphemes of Greek and Latin origin, e.g. cyclotron,

telecommunication, telelecture, protein, penicillin, metalanguage, mataculture, paralinguistic,

parapsychology, videotaperecorder, videocassette.

True borrowing: Russ. dacha, bolshevik, pogrom, step', babushka. Germ.(of the WWII period): Blitzkrieg,

Wehrmacht, Luftwaffe .

Loan-translations: self-criticism (fr. Russian).

Assimilation of borrowed words

1. Types of changes

a) changes peculiar of borrowed words alone:

Greek pn, pt, ps > n, t, s, e.g. pneumatics, psychology, ptomain [‘toumein] vs Engl. condemn, stops, slept.

b) changes typical both of borrowed and native words, e.g. simplification of the inflectional system of OE

to three forms in ME - common case & possessive case sing. & plur.

2. Types of assimilation

a) phonetic assimilation

-change in sound-form:

Fr. long e>ei, e.g. communique, cafe

Germ. spits [ špits]>[spits]

- stress change: Fr. honn’eur – Engl. ’honor, rais’on>’reason, chauff’er – ‘chaffeur, cf. father, mother, etc.

b) grammatical assimilation:

Greek phenomenon – phenomena, parenthesis - parentheses.; Lat. addendum - addenda;

Two forms: Lat. vacuum - vacua, vacuums; It. virtuoso - virtuosi, virtuosos.

c) changes in morphological structure:

-divisible>indivisible: saunter (saunters, sauntered, sauntering)<Fr. s’aunter; It. -etto, -otta, -ello (ballot,

stiletto, umbrella)

.-suffix substitution: Lat. -us>-ous / -al., e.g. multifarious fr. Lat. maltifarius; historical, medical.

d) lexical assimilation:

- reduction of semantic structure: Fr.timber; Sp. cargo; cask .

- specialization of meaning, e.g. Fr. hangar ‘shed’ > Engl. ‘a shed for aeroplanes’

- generalization of meaning, e.g. It. umbrella ‘sunshade’ > Engl. ‘any protection’

- change of the order of meanings, e.g. fellow ‘comrade, companion’ -’man, boy’

- reinterpreting (folk etymology), e.g. surounder ‘overflow’> surround ‘to encircle’; Ofr estandard ‘banner’ >

Engl. standard ‘stable, oficially accepted’

3. Degree of assimilation

- easily recognizable words façade, Zeitgeist, ballet

- thoroughly assimilated pupil, master, etc.

- partially assimilated: phenomenon - pl. phenomena; graffito - graffiti; communi’que - communiques.

Factors of assimilation:

- period of borrowing, early vs late, e.g. chair< OFr cathedra; window < Scand. vindauga;

- frequency of use: turbine, clinic, exploitation, diplomat vs nobless, annui [a:n’wi] ‘apathy’, coup [ku:],

coup d’etat

-oral use vs written.

Manifestation of the degree of assimilation: the ability of the word to take part in the word-derivation.

Lecture 4. Ways of replenishment Modern English vocabulary. B. Semantic extension.

In the course of the historical development of language the word meaning is liable to change, e.g.

fond ‘foolish’, ‘foolishly credulous’ – ‘feeling strong affection to smth’; glad ‘bright, shining’ – ‘happy and

pleased about smth’.

Causes of semantic change:

a. extra-linguistic: car ‘a four-wheeled van’ (from Lat. carrus), now ‘a motor car’, ‘a railway carriage’

b. linguistic:

• ellipsis (the omission of one of the two words habitually used togetheraccompanied by the

transfer of its meaning to a remaining partner, e.g. to starve (OE steorfan)‘to die’ > ME sterven of

hunger 'to die of hunger'.

• discrimination of synonyms, e.g. OE steorfan and dēgan (fr. Sc. to die;

to starve ‘to die of

hunger’, to die ‘to stop to live’ land in OE ‘a solid part of the earth’s surface’ ; the territory of a

nation’; ME country (fr. French countree)

land ‘a solid part of the earth’s surface, country

‘the territory of a nation’.

• Analogy: synonymous words acquire the like meanings, e.g. verbs of getting hold with a hand

(catch, grasp, get) develop the meaning ‘to understand’

Nature of semantic change:

• Metaphor (similarity of meaning): associating two concepts, e.g. hand ‘a human organ’; ‘a pointer

on a clock’; cold ‘having low temperature’: cold hand; ‘unemotional’ : a cold glance; cool ‘having

temperature lower than the norm’; ‘unemotional’; term of positive evaluation.

• Metonymy (contiguity of meaning): tongue ‘an organ’, e.g. The doctor asked him to show his

tongue; ‘the language one speaks from birth’ , e.g. His mother tongue was French;

Results of semantic change:

• Changes in the denotational component of meaning

• Specialization (restriction) of meaning, e.g. hound ‘the dog of any breed’ > ‘the dog able to

chase’; Foul ‘any bird’> domestic bird.

• Generalization of meaning: camp ‘the place where troops are lodged in tents; > any

temporary quarters.’

• Changes in the connotational component (accompanying the changes in denotation):

• Pejorative development: boor ‘a villager’ > ‘a clumsy or ill-bred fellow’

• Ameliorative development: minister a servant > acivil servant of higher rank.

Semantic extension and numerical growth of the vocabulary.

Semantic extension and homonymy,cf.:

Shave 1. to cut hair from one’s face, very close to the skin, using a razor or shaver. When he had

shaved, he dressed and went down to the kitchen. …n.to reduce smth by a small amount. We could

shave prices a bit.

…(slang) to defeat, esp. by a small margin; to take advantage of.

Horse 1. An animal …N. (slang) heroine.

Words historically related can be apprehended as homonyms, e.g.:

• Flower 1. The part of the plant which is often brightly colored, grows on a stem…

Flour 1. A white or brown powder that is made by grinding wheat… used for making bread.

Etymologically they go back to OF flur, flour > ME flour ‘flower, the best part of anything.

Words unrelated can be apprehended as meanings of the same word:

• Ear 1.‘the ears of a person or an animal are two matching parts of their body, one on each side of

their head…’ (OE ēare,Lat auris) 4. The ears of a cereal plant such as wheat or barley are the

parts at the top of the stem, which contain the seeds or grains….’ (OE ēar, cf Lat acus, aceris).

weed ‘wild useless plant (OE wēod)

weeds ‘mourning garments worn by a widow’ (OE woed ‘garment’)

Polysemy, frequency and word structure, e.g. Heart (6), hearty (3), heartily (2), heartless, heartiness,

heartsick.

Polysemy and stylistic reference, e.g. break (35), demolish (2); face (10), countenance (1).

Polysemy, frequency and etymology.

Late borrowings (regime, bourgeoisie, genre) vs early borrowings. The difference between words in

synonymic groups: small, little, diminutive, petite, wee, tiny, minute, miniature, microscopic.

Polysemy of affixes: non- a)'negative' non-human; non-existence. b)'pretended','pseudo',e.g. non-book;

non-event.

Monosemantic words are usually terms, e.g.: hydrogen, molecule.

A polysemous word can have from five to one hundred meanings. Highly polysemous words: go (40

meanings), get, put, take – 30 meanings.

Polysemy from a diachronic point of view (Which meaning came first?)

table 1. A flat slab of stone or wood. (OE tabule)

Polysemy from a synchronic point of view (which meaning is the basic one?)

Hornby: table 1. a piece of furniture; 2. people seated at a table: a ~ of card-players; 3. food provided at a

~ : He keeps a good ~; 4. Plateau, level land; 5. List, orderly arrangement of facts: ~ of contents; 6. (in the

Bible) Flat slab of stone

Collins Cobuild: table 1. A piece of furniture; 2. A chart of facts and figures which are shown in rows 3. A

list of multiplication of numbers between one and and twelve: She knows her tables already.

Criteria of the comparative value of individual meanings.

a) frequency of their occurrence in speech: table 1 - 55% .

b) stylistic neutrality

hand 1. The part of the body which is at the end of your arm… -72%

7. Someone, usu. A man who does hard physical work: farm hands …- 2,8%

c) ability to explain other meanings

c)psychological salience

Order 1. n. Arrangement in sequence - 77%; 2. v. to request smth to be made for payment - 76%.

Cf Cobuild 1. In order to; 2.3 Smth that you are told to do; 3.1 arrangement in sequence

Systematic relationships between semantics and syntax (Works of Beth Levin, Sue Atkins, Malka

Rappaport):

bake

1. Every morning they baked their own baguettes and croissants; as we baked we talked a great deal

(The indefinite object alternation; cf other creation verbs: Mrs Babcock is embroidering a sampler).

2. Jennifer has baked a special cake for Alexander (the benefactive alternation; cf She boiled some tea

for me)

3. They baked unleavened bread from dough (The material/product alternation)

4. Bake it whole in the oven (the instrumental subject alternation)

5. Bake the pastry for ten minutes (the instructional imperative) alternation)

6.

Vocabulary:

alternation – зд. диатеза, трансформация

contiguity [,konti’gjuiti] смежность

diathesis [dai’æΘisis] диатеза

ellipsis [ i’lipsis] эллипсис, опущение ( какой-л. части текста или грамматической конструкции )

salience – значимость, букв. выпуклость

Lecture 5. Homonymy.

• The definition: Words identical in sound-form but different in meaning are called homonyms, e.g.

can ‘to be able’, ‘a tin container’ . In contrast to polysemy, homonymy is irregular and non-

predictable.

• Languages where short words abound have more homonyms than those where long words are

prevalent. The abundance of homonyms in Modern English can be accounted for by the

abundance of monosyllabic words in it.

Causes of homonymy:

a) divergence of word meanings

e.g.: Lat.flos, florem, OFr.flour, flor > ME flour 1.'flower' 2. 'the finest part of wheat'. In ModE flower and

flour are synchronycally unrelated.

staff 1. A strong stick or pole (жезл); staff 2. People who work somewhere (. Historically these meanings

were related through the custom to give staffs to military officers as a sign of their high rank. Officers

worked in staffs ‘headquarters’.

Toast 1. a slice of bread made brown and crisp by cooking in high temperature; toast 2. a wish

pronounced while drinking alcohol . Historically related through the custom to put a piece of toasted bread

into a glass of wine.

b) convergent sound development, e.g. of native words: OE ic and eaze > ModE I and eye [ai];

The disappearance of the sound k before n, .g. knight –night, knot –not; the convergence of the ME ā, ai,

ei: fair – fare, pale – pail, wait – weight.

of borrowed words: Old Norse rās 'running' and OFr race 'ethnic group' - MOdE race 1 and race 2; Fr.

mèche ‘wick’ (фитиль), OE meche ‘partner’ > match 1‘спичка’, match 2 ‘a relationship, a partnership’ , as

in matchmaker.

c) the loss of inflections: OE lufu (n) and lufian (v)- ModE love; OE sunne and sunu – ModE sun

and son.

Types of Homonyms:

Full vs partial homonymy; Lexical vs lexical-grammatical vs grammatical homonymy; perfect homonyms

vs homographs and homophones.

1) Full vs partial homonymy. Do all forms of the words different in meaning coincide or not?

a) Full homonymy – the homonymy of words in all their forms (the homonymy of paradigms). Examples:

seal 1 'a sea animal' and seal 2 'a design printed on paper by means of a stamp'; mole 1 'an animal' and

mole 2 'an excrescence on the skin'.

b) Partial homonymy – the homonymy of SOME word forms, whereas the paradigms are not identical E.

g.: seal 1 and (to) seal 3 'to close tightly'.

Homoforms: know,no; knows,nose; knew, new; read,reed; read [red],red,etc.

Full homonymy is found within one part of speech, whereas partial homonymy is found within

different parts of speech. Exceptions: to lie (lay, lain)'to be in a horizontal or resting position' and to lie

(lied, lied)'to make an untrue statement'; words whose paradigm is constituted by just one form: four (a

numeral) - for (a preposition) - for 'because'.

2) Which parts of the words are different in meaning and identical in form? Lexical - lexico-

grammatical – grammatical homonymy:

a) Lexical homonymy: the lexical meanings of two words identical in form, i.e. the lexical meanings of the

roots, are different, e.g. mole 1 and mole 2.

b) Lexical-grammatical homonymy: both the meaning of the root morphemes and the meanings of

grammatical morphemes identical in form are different, e.g.race 1 (n) and race 3 (v); seam (n) and seem

(v) .

Lexical homonymy is found within one part of speech, whereas lexical-grammatical homonymy is

found between different parts of speech. Exceptions: found (Past of to find) and found (Present of 'to

begin the construction of smth’). abo

3)Grammatical homonymy, i.e. the homonymy of grammatical morphemes, in which English

abounds, e.g. the homonymy of the plural, Possessive Case sing. and plural: bears - bear's - bears'.

Homomorphemes: -ed (Past Simple and Past Participle), e.g. asked.

The two lines of classification (full-partial / lexical- lexical –grammatical- grammatical) are not mutually

exclusive, e.g. lie 1 – lie 2.

Peculiarities of lexical-grammatical homonymy:

a) no semantic relationship: seal 1 'a sea animal'- to seal 3 'to close tightly'

b) a close semantic relationship, in instances of conversion, e.g. seal 2 'a piece of wax or lead' –

to seal ; work - to work; father - to father, etc. However, the whole of the semantic structure of such words

is not alike., e.g. paper 1 ’substance manufactured from wood fibre’ – to paper ‘to paste on walls’, ‘to

cover with paper’. paper 2 ‘newspaper’ – v?; paper 3 ‘money’ – v???, etc.

Two groups of lexical-grammatical homonyms:

a) words identical in sound form but different in their lexical and grammatical meanings.

b) words identical in their sound form, different in their grammatical meaning and only partly different in

their lexical meaning.

Homographs: bow [bou] 'a piece of wood curved by a string and used for shooting arrows' - bow [bau] 'a

bend of the head or body'; tear [tia]'a drop of water coming from an eye' - tear [tea] 'to pull apart by force'.

Homophones: read [red] - red; sun - son; see - sea. In Engl. in contrast to Russ., two words ending one

in voiced, another in a voiceless consonant, are not homophones. Cf dock – dog and дог – док in Russ.

Perfect homonyms: case 1 'something that happened' - case 2 'a box, a container'.

Homonymy and polysemy: the demarcation line.

•

Diachronically, cases of sound convergence are treated as homonymy, because homonymous forms

can be traced to etymologically different words, cf race 1 and race 2. Cases of semantic divergence

are difficult to interpret, as it is not clear when all semantic ties between all meanings are broken.

Speakers may comprehend historically related meanings as unrelated, cf.: table 'a piece of furniture'

'a chart of facts and figures that are shown in rows across the page'; 'food'. They are related through

the meaning ‘board’:

This idea is supported by the polysemy of the word board:

table '

board

'food'

'a board'

Sometimes speakers comprehend historically unrelated meanings as related, cf.: ear 'an organ of

hearing' <from Lat. auris, OE eare> and ear 'a part of a plant' (ear of corn) <from Lat. acus,aceris, OE

ear>.

weeds 'wild useless plants' < OE weod

weeds 'widow's garments' < OE woed

•

Synchronically, the criterion for distinguishing between homonymy and polysemy is a semantic

relationship. If speakers comprehend various meanings as related, they are considered to be different

meanings of one and the same word.

Between different meanings of a polysemous word there often exists a stable relationship that can’t

be found between meanings of homonymous words.

Two meanings can be proved to be related if the relation is systematic, or regular, cf the relationship

board- food, board - chart. Other examples. a) 'part-whole':apricot 1 a tree; 2 a fruit of that tree); b) ‘an

animal - a person behaving like this animal’: pig 1. 2. a dirty, greedy or ill-mannered person; c) ‘an organ

of the human body – part of a certain thing’: foot (of a human being) – foot (of the hill); eye (of a living

creature) – eye (of a needle); horn (of a cow) – horn (a musical instrument), etc.

Criteria for distinguishing homonymous words: spelling, e.g. pair – pear; context, e.g. Boxing Day

(26th of December) – a boxing match, a boxing champion.

•

The use of homonyms in fiction. Overlapping of homonyms in one context (their coexistence ) is

the basis for word play, in particular the puns.

Oscar Wilde.'The Importance of Being Earnest'

The advertisement in the metro: Mind the GAP! (gap ‘some space between the train and the

platform); Gap – a big department store in London.

Vocabulary

Divergence – дивергенция, расхождение

convergent – конвергенция, сближение

conversion - конверсия

'a piece of furniture'

?

?

'food’ ’a chart’

'a piece of furniture'

Lecture 6. THE STRUCTURE OF THE ENGLISH WORD AND THE ENGLISH WORD-FORMATION.

General notions

a. The relationship between the word structure and word derivation: the segmentation of existing words

vs the formation of new words

I. The morphological structure of English words

a. Divisibility: segmentable vs non-segmentable words.

(1) agree-ment, fear-less, quick-ly, door-handle

(2) house, girl, woman, husband

The smallest indivisible two-facet language units into which the word can be segmented are called

morphemes. Two-facet means possessing both sound-form and meaning. In the word morphemes can

be represented by different sound–shapes, e.g. please , pleasing , pleasure, pleasant. Different

representations of a given morpheme are called allomorphs.

b.

Principles of segmentation and the notion of proportion:

Each element into which the word is segmented should combine with at least two different elements

retaining its meaning

reader ac | reading ad

writer bc | writing bd

Compare:

hamlet ‘a village’, ‘a small village’ | ham ‘salted and smoked smoked meat’

ringlet ‘a small ring’

| ring finger ‘the finger on which the ring is worn’

streamlet ‘a small stream’

| streamline ‘the line of liquid flow ‘

b. Transparency of a morphemic structure:

(1) Words with a trasparent morphemic structure because each of their component morphemes can be

encountered within other words, e.g. : agreement - agree-able, predic-a-ment, This type of

segmentability is called complete

(2) Words, the structure of which is not transparent.

a.-for semantic reasons

retain:

retain ac | receive ad

contain bc | conceive bd

The proportion (the basis for segmentability is observed), but what is the meaning of the components?

Is re- the same as in reread? What is -tain and -ceive?

Bloomfield called this type of morphemic segmentability conditional, because the segments do not rise

to the status of morphs for purely semantic reasons. The segments are called pseudo- or quasi- morphs.

Other linguists consider these words non-segmentable.

b. words the component morphemes of which seldom or never occur in other words. -streamlet, ringlet,

leaflet, hamlet. Let- is a diminutive suffix. The denotational meaning of stream-, ring- leaf- is clear. What is

the denotational meaning of ham- if hamlet is a ‘small village’? Ham ‘smoked meat’ is a homonym of

ham- in hamlet. Ham- is a unique morpheme.

-locket, pocket, lionet, cellaret, hogget. –et is a diminutive suffix. Lion-, cellar, lock and hog occur in other

words, e.g. lioness, callarage, lock, hog, hogish. And pock-? Such morphemes as pock- and ham- are

called unique. These words are nonsegmentable or have defective segmentability.

To which type do gooseberry, cranberry, strawberry belong?

c. Classification of morphemes

a) from the semantic point of view: root-morphemes and non-root morphemes.

Root-morphemes are the lexical centers of the word. Each root-morpheme possesses an individual

lexical meaning shared by no other morpheme of the language. Root-morphemes are isolated as

common parts of the words constituting a word cluster, e.g. play, player, playing, playful. Root

morphemes do not possess the part-of-speech meaning.

Non-root morphemes: inflectional and affixational. Inflectional morphemes carry only grammatical

meaning and are relevant for the formation of word-forms. Affixational morphemes are relevant for

building various parts of stems and carry the most general lexical meaning + the part-of-speech meaning,

e.g. reader: -er ‘the action doer’ , ‘noun’.

b) Morphemic status of segments: free, bound and semi-bound (or semi-free) morphemes.

Free morphemes are those that coincide with the word stem or a word-form, e.g. friend- in friendship.

Usu. free morphemes are root-morphemes.

Bound morphemes occur only as a constituent part of a word, i.e. various affixes, e.g. -y: friendly, -ness:

whiteness, pre- : preview, un- , dis-, etc. A root-morpheme Barbar is a bound morpheme because it it is

found within adjectives (barbarian, barbarous only).

Semi-bound morphemes occur both as affixes and as stems, e.g. well- : sleep well vs well-known; half

past six - half-eaten.

A problem: What is the status of morphemes of Greek and Latin origin that combine in words telephone,

telegraph,telescope, microscope, etc.? They have a definite lexical meaning: tele ‘far’, graph ‘to write’,

scope ‘seeing’. Tele- may be a prefix, whereas -graph may be a root morpheme. Phonograph,

seismograph, autograph… is –graph a suffix? They never occur independently, so they are bound root-

morphemes.

What is the status of -man in postman, fisherman, gentleman vs man-made, man-servant? How id it

related to the noun man?

The difference in pronunciation: [‘fiſ m n] (the reduced vowel corresponds to a reduced semantic value);

The difference in meaning: in chairman -man is a human agent of any sex, synonymous to –er., cf

Madam Chairman, but man [m n]in cabman, postman still is semantically related to man [mæn] in man-

servant and to athe semantic opposition between man and woman.

But *She is a gentleman. –man can be classified as a semi-bound (or semi-free) morpheme.

Procedure of morphemic analysis. In the analysis into Immediate constituents at each stage the word

is segmented into two components it immediately breaks into until one comes to the two constituents

unable of further divisibility. Examples: readable, readability, friendliness, friendly-looking.

Morphemic types of words:

Monomorphic (root-words): dog, small, pen.

Polymorphic: monoradical (one-root) words: having one root- and one or more affixal morphemes: radical

prefixal: out-do, reenter

pleasurable, possibility, sufferer, etc.; polyradical (having more than one root): bookstand, safety-pin.

II. Derivational word structure.

The morphological analysis does not reveal how the words are constructed. . The process of deriving a

word on the basis of another word is called word formation.The basic word and derived word are related,

and all together they constitute a word-formation cluster.

E.g. the morphological and the derivational structure of unmanly, discouragement.

The nature, type and arrangement of the immediate constituents of a word (Ics) are its derivational

structure.

Basic units of the derivational structure: derivational affixes, derivational bases, derivational patterns.

Derivational word classes: Simple (non-derived words, simplexes) vs derivatives (complexes) (82%);

Classes of derivatives: derived words vs compounds (15%).

a. Historical changeability of word-structure

The process of simplification: husband - OE hus-bond-a.

Change of the type of a morpheme, e.g. a root-morpheme>an affixational morpheme, e.g. friendship: OE

freondscipe, a compound; Other former root-morphemes:

-hood, -dom, -like.

b. Word-formation. Derivation vs word-composition (compounding). Affixation and conversion. Productive

vs non-productive ways of word-forming. Productive means and ways easily derive new words. Non-

productiove do not derive new words/

(12) house - to house [hauz], full - to fill, to lie - to lay

(13) collarless appearance, a lungful of smoke

Productive and active ways of word-forming

(14) -ful (beautiful, hopeful, useful) vs -er (interrupter, breakfaster)

Synchronic and diachronic approach to word-formation

(15) beggar - to beg, editor - to edit.

Assignments for the seminar:

Explain the difference between productive and active affixes.

What is the morphological and the derivational structure of the words: refreshment, disillusionment,

overlooker, overproduction.

3. Pick out the words with the prefix pre-: prepay, prepare, prefer, prepossess, prevail, preside, president,

prevail, pretend, preview, previous.

4. Which morphemes are called bound?

5. What is the difference in meaning between the words perspiration and sweat? Inquisitive and nosy?

Beverage and drink? How to account for it?

1.

2.

Lecture 7. WORD FORMATION: AFFIXATION. PREFIXATION.

Types of word formation: word derivation and word composition.

Affixation.

Derived words:

- words of zero degree of derivation, e.g. yellow, dress, haste,devote, atom etc.;

-words of one degree of derivation, e.g.: yellowish, undress, hasty, devote, atomic, etc.

-words, of the second degree of derivation, e.g. atomical, hastily, devotion, etc.

Suffixal derivatives and prefixal derivatives, e.g. unjust (un+just) justify (just+ify); non-smoker,

prearrangement.

Morphemic vs derivational analysis: reappearance, unreasonable -prefixal-suffixal derivatives or prefixal

derivatives (un+reasonable; re+appearance). Cf. discouragement (discourage+ment).

Functions with respect to part of speech derivation: noun- and adjective-forming / verb-forming.

PREFIXATION vs word-composition and compounding.

The status of over- and under- in overdo, overturn, underestimate, underate etc. Cf. income, onlooker,

outcome, etc.;

afternoon, afterglow, afterthought, aftergrowthin Chamber’s dictionary..

Classification: bound (dis-, re-, anti-); semibound, e.g. out-, under-, over-, self- , etc (cf. out of the house,

under the bridge, over the bridge, self-esteem, , self-support, etc.).

verbs - 42,5% of prefixal derivatives; adjectives -33,5%.

Verbs: to engulf, to understand, recreate.

Adjectives: oversensitive, predetermined, bilingual.

Nouns: Ex-president, antifascist, disbelief.

Convertive prefixes: in be-, en- (and its variant em-) de-, etc.: begulf, embronze, encage, debase, etc..

Prefixes of native origin:be-, mis-, un-, under- , over-; of foreign origin: dis- , en- (em-), inter-, re-, non-,

ex-, anti-, extra-, ultra-

According to the type of the base they are added to:

a) deverbal: rewrite, overturn, return, etc.

b)denominal: ex-president, antifascist, disbelief.

c)deadjectival: antistatic, improbable, underestimated.

Mono- and polysemantic prefixes, e.g. out- 'to do better than somebody': to outdo, outclass, outfox,

outgrow, outlive, outnumber somebody; ‘to surpass the person in a certain well-known quality’ to out-

Herod Herod (Shakespeare) ‘to be more cruel than the ruler of Judea Herod"; ‘to stop to exist by breaking

physical borders’: to outbreak, to outburst, etc.; ‘to show the shape of smth’: to outline.

in-: negative: hospitable - inhospitable; causative: to flame - to inflame.

The generic denotational meaning:

negative prefixes: un-, non-,in-, dis-, a- , e.g. ungrateful, unemployment, non-politician, non-scientific,

disloyal, asymmetry. It illegal, irrational, improbable.

reversative, or privative: un-, de-, dis: untie, decentralize, disambiguate, etc.

pejorative: as mis-, mal-, pseudo-, e.g. miscalculate, maltreat, pseudoart.

of time and order: fore-, pre-, post-,ex-: foretell, preposition, pre-war, postposition, postclassical, ex-

champion.

prefixes of repetition: re-, e.g. reiterative, recreate;

locative prefixes: super-, sub-, inter-, trans-, e.g.: superstructure, submarine, interlinguistics,

transnational, transatlantic.

Stylistic reference: neutral (un- , re-, over-, under); literary-bookish (pseudo-, uni- super-, ultra-).

Productivity: highly productive (re-), productive de- (to undo what has been done, reverse an action or a

process: decentralize, desegregate)

Questions to the seminar

1. What is the origin of English prefixes?

2. What is the relationship between prefixes and root morphemes?

3. Which prefixes are productive and which are non-productive ?

4. Synonymy of prefixes.

5. In a book on Russian word-formation it is said that the function of prefixes is to give a new

shade of meaning to words without changing their part-of-speech characteristics, e.g. ехать - приехать

- подъехать, etc. Does the same hold for English?

6. Why do some linguists include prefixation into such means of word-formation as

compounding?

7. Do prefixes in the following words have the same meaning or different?

a)unwilling, untie, unbearable, unbind, unbend.

b)displease, disclose, disobey, disaffectation.

c) belittle, befriend, behead.

8. Pick out words with the prefix pre-: prepay, prepare, prefer, prepossess, prevail, preside,

president, prevail, pretend, preview, previous.

9. Pick out the prefixed words; state the meaning of a prefix:

Undoubtedly one of Mr. Parker Pyne’s assets was his sympathetic manner. It was Mr. Pyne’s task to

pave the way for the necessary disclosures. Mr. Wade, he deduced at once, was the inarticulate type.

Suppose your wife discovers that you are looking forward to regaining your freedom as much as she is?

The grounds of Lorrimer Court were lovely in the afternoon sunshine. Her figure was ungainly, and the

heavy fur coat she wore did not disguise the fact. Mrs Gardner re-entered the room with a bowl soup on a

tray. Mrs. Abner Rymer, widow of Abner Rymer, the “button shank” king was removed yesterday to a

private home for mental cases. “No,” said Mr. Parker Pyne,

“there you misjudge me”. A grand figure of a peasant woman, outlined against the setting sun.

(A.Christie)

10. What is the morphological and the derivational structure of the following words:

predeterminably; inaccessibilitty, refreshment, regretful, disillusionment, overlooker, overproduction.

Lecture 8. SUFFIXATION.

Functions: a) to transfer a word into a different part of speech, e.g. to read – readable, bright – brightness,

visual – visualize;

b) to transfer a word into a different semantic group e.g : brother - brotherhood, fellow - fellowship, etc.

Compound suffixes – chains of suffixes occurring in derived words: -ably = -able+-ly (profitably,

unreasonably); -ically= -ic+-al+-ly (musically); -ation=-ate+-ion (liberation, emigration).

Compound suffixes acquiring a new quality are coalescent suffixes or a group suffix.

Cf translation (translate + -ion), fascination (fascinate + - ion), adaptation (adapt + -ation [ei n] ). –ation is

a composite suffix (-ate + -ion) functioning as a single unit, so adaptation is a first-degree derivative.

Other examples: damnation (from damn), condemnation (from condemn), formation (from form).

Morphological changes due to combining the derivational morpheme with the base:

a) sound change: actor - actress, tiger - tigress ; liable - liability, possible - possibility.

b) Stress change:courage - courageous, investigate - investigation; employ - employee, government –

governmental, picture – picturesque.

Classification:

• with respect to the part of speech suffixes form:

a)noun-forming suffixes -er, -dom, -ness, -ation: writer, wisdom, cleanness, pagination.

b)adjective suffixes, -able, -less, -ful, -ic, -ous: likable, hopeless, fruitful, geographic, mountainous.

c) verb-suffixes, e.g. -en, -fy, -ize: to darken , exemplify, advertize.

d) adverb-suffixes, e.g. -ly, -ward: easily, westward

• according to the base suffixes are added to: deverbal: -er, -ment, -able; denominal:-less, -ish, -ful;

deadjectival: -en, -ish, -ness.

• according to the generic denotational sense:

a) the agent of an action: -er, -ant: speaker, participant.

b) appurtenance: -an, -ian, -ese,: Arabian, Elizabethan, Russian, Japanese.

c) collectivity: -dom, ery: freedom, peasantry.

d) diminutiveness: -ie, -let, -ling,: birdie, ringlet, wolfling.

• according to their stylistic reference: neutral (-er, -able); non-neutral (-oid , e.g. romboid ), -aceous ,

e.g. flirtatious.

• according to their meaning structure: mono- and polysemantic suffixes.

Polysemy of suffixes: –er and –y.

Cf a) a professional: a hunter, a baker b) a performer of an action at a given moment: a packer, chooser,

giver c) a device, a means: blotter , stain-remover, eraser .

Cf a) a bony fish, a stony ground; b)a rainy day , a cloudy sky; c) bushy beard, inky darkness.

Homonymy of suffixes: -ly: a lovely day; isn't it lovely; a friendly smile; his words sounded friendly. –en:

strengthen; golden, wooden. –ish: bluish, yellowish; girlish behaviour,a boyish voice .

Productivity. Dead vs living suffixes. -d (dead, seed); -lock (wedlock), -t (height, flight). Dead suffixes

are no longer felt as component parts of the words.

Living suffixes are easily singled out: -ate -dom, -en, -er, -ful, -ify, -ish,-ism, -less -ship, e.g.

Living suffixes : productive vs non-productive. -er, -ish, -less vs -dom, -ship, -ful, -en, -ify, -ate. On the