The theoretical course of English

There are certain structural features which enable us to identity some words as borrowings and even to determine the source language. We have already established that the initial sk usually indicates Scandinavian origin. You can also recognize words or Latin and French origin by certain suffixes, prefixes of endings. The two tables below will help you in this.

1. Latin Affixes.

The suffix -ion The suffix -tion The suffix -ate The suffix- ute The remnant suffix - ct The remnant suffix - d(e)	Communion, legion, opinion, session, union. Relation, resolution, starvation, temptation, etc. Appreciate, create, congratulate, etc. Attribute, contribute, constitute, distribute, etc. Act, conduct, collect, connect, etc. Applaud, divide, exclude, include, etc.
The prefix dis- The suffix --able The suffix -ate (it) The suffix -ant The suffix -ent The suffix -or The suffix -al The suffix -ar	Disable, distract, disown, disagree, etc. Detestable, enable, etc. Accurate, desperate, graduate, etc. Arrogant, constant, important, etc. Absent, convenient, decent, evident, etc Major, minor, junior, senior, etc. Cordial, filial, fraternal, maternal, etc. Lunar, solar, familiar, etc.

II. French Affixes.

The suffix -ance The suffix -ence The suffix -ment The suffix -age The suffix -ess The suffix -ous The prefix -en	Arrogance, endurance, hindrance, etc. Consequence, intelligence, patience, etc. Appointment, development, experiment, etc, Courage, marriage, passage, village, etc. Tigress, lioness, actress, adventuress, etc Curious, dangerous, joyous, serious, etc. Enable, endear, enact, enfold, enslave, etc.

-70 percent anomaly is

Modem scholars estimate the percentage of borrowed words, in the English vocabulary at 65 which is an exceptionally high figure: one would certainly expect the native element to prevail. This explained by the country's eventful history and by its many international contacts.

LECTURE 4

Word-building

Structurally words are divided into smaller units (morphemes). Morphemes are not free forms, but constituents of words, yet they have their own meanings. All morphemes are subdivided into 2 large classes: roots and affixes. The affixes fall into prefixes (reread, mispronounced, enrich, etc.) and suffixes (teacher, dictate, beautiful, interesting, etc).

Words which consist of a root and an affix (or several affixes) are called derived words or derivatives and are produced by the process of word-building known as affixation, (or derivation).

Derived words are extremely numerous in the English vocabulary. Successfully competing with this structural type is the so-called root word which has only-a root morpheme in its structure. This type is widely represented by great number of words belonging to the original English stock or to earlier borrowings (house, room, book, work, port, street, table, etc.), and, in Modern English, has been greatly enlarged by the type of word-building called conversion (e. g. to hand, v. formed from the noun hand; to can, v. from can, n.; to pale, v. from pale, adj.; a find, n. from to find, v.; etc.).

Another wide-spread word-structure is a compound word consisting of two or more stems (e, g. dining-room, bluebell, mother-in-law, good-for-nothing). Words of this structural type are produced by the word-building process called composition.

The somewhat odd-looking words like flu, pram, lab, M. P, V-day, H-bomb are called shortenings, contractions or curtailed words and are produced by the way of world-building called shortening (contraction). The four types (root words, derived words, compounds, shortenings) represent the main structural types of Modern English words, and conversion, derivation and composition the most productive ways of word-building.

From the etymological point of view affixes are classified into the same two large groups as words; native and borrowed.

Some Native Suffixes

Noun-forming
-er -ness -jng -dom	Worker, miner, teacher, painter, etc. Coldness, loneliness, loveliness, etc. Feeling, meaning, singing, reading, etc. Freedom, wisdom, kingdom, etc.

-hood -ship -th -------------------------- *-- * --	Childhood, manhood, motherhood, etc. |Friendship, companionship, mastership, etc. Length, breadth, health, truth, etc
-ful -less -y Adjective-forming -ish -ly -en -some	Careful, joyful, wonderful, senseless, etc. Careless, sleepless, cloudless, senseless, etc. Cozy, tidy, merry, snowy, showy, etc. English, Spanish, reddish, childish, etc. Lonely, lovely, ugly, likely, lordly, etc. Wooden, woollen, silken, golden, etc. Handsome, quarrelsome, tiresome, etc
Verb-forming -en	Widen, redden, darken, sadden, etc.
Adverb-forming -ly	Warmly, hardly, simply, carefully, coldly

Borrowed affixes, especially of Romance origin are numerous in the English vocabulary (lect. 3).

Affixes can also be classified into productive and non-productive types. By productive affixes we mean the ones, which take part in deriving, new words in this particular period of language development. The best way to identify productive affixes is to look for them among neologisms and so-called nonce-words, i. e. words coined and used only for this particular occasion.

"I don't like Sunday evenings: 1feel so Mon-duylsh". (Mondayish is certainly a nonce-word.).

One should not confuse the productivity of affixes with their frequency of occurrence. There are quite a number of high-frequency affixes which, nevertheless, are no longer used in word-derivation (e. g. the adjective-forming native suffixes -fill, -ly ; the adjective-form ing suffixes of Latin origin -ant, - ent, -a! which are quite frequent).

Some Productive Affixes

Noun-forming suffixes	-or, -ing, -ness, -ism, -ist, -ance
Adjective-forming suffixes	-y, -ish, -ed, -able, -less
Adverb-forming suffix	-ly
Verb-forming suffixes	-ize/-ise, -ate
Prefixes	un-, re-, dis-

Some Non-Productive Affixes

Noun-farming suffixes	-th, -hood
Adjective-forming suffixes	-ly, -some, -en, -ous, -ful
Verb-forming suffix	-en

Semantics of Affixes

Meanings of affixes are specific and considerably differ from those of root morphemes. Affixes have widely generalized meanings and refer the concept conveyed by the whole word to a certain category, The adjective-forming suffix -ful has the meaning of "full of ", "characterized by" (beautiful, careful) whereas -ish may often imply insufficiency of quality (greenish - green, but not quite; youngish - not quite young but looking it).

Conversion

Is sometimes referred to as an affixless way of word-building or even affixless derivation.

Conversion consists in making a new word from some' existing word by changing the category of a part of speech the morphemic shape of the original word remaining unchanged. Conversation is universally accepted as one of the major ways of enriching English vocabulary with new words. It is particularly English way of word-building. Its immense productivity is considerably encouraged by certain features of modern English: analytical structure, simple paradigms of English parts of speech, a great number of one-syllable words.

There are certain regularities in the group of verbs made from nouns some of the regular semantic associations are as indicated in the following list:

I. The noun is the name of a tool or implement, verb denotes an action performed by the tool: to hammer, to nail, to pin, to brush, to comb, to pencil.

II. The noun is the name of an animal, the verb denotes an action or aspect of behaviour considered typical of this animal: to dog, to wolf, to monkey, to ape, to fox, to rat. Yet, to fish does not mean "to behave like a fish" but "to try to catch fish". The same meaning of hunting activities is conveyed by the verb to whale and one of the meanings of to raC the other is "to turn informer, squeal" (si.).

III. The name of a part of the human body - an action performed by it: to hand, to leg (si.), to eye, to elbow, to shoulder, 10 nose, to mouth. However, to face does not imply doing something by or even with one's, face but turning it in a certain direction. To back means either "to move backwards" or, in the figurative sense, "to support somebody or something".

IV. The name of a profession or occupation - an activity typical of it: to nurse, to cook, to maul, to groom..

V. The name of jrplace- the process of occupying the place or of putting smth./smb. in it, (to room, k> house, to place, to table, to cage).

VI. The name of a container -- the act of putting smth. within the container {to can, to bottle, to pocket).

VII. The name of a meal - the process of taking it (to lunch, to supper).

Composition

This type of word-building, in which new words are produced by combining two or more stems, is one of the three most productive types in Modern English; the other' two are conversion and affixation.

There are at least three aspects of composition that present special interest.

At the first is the structural aspect. Compounds are not homogeneous in structure. Traditionally three types are distinguished: neutral, morphological syntactic.

I. In neutral compounds the process of compounding is realized without any clinking elements, by a mere juxtaposition of two stems, as in blackbird, shop-window, sunflower, bedroom, tallboy, etc. There ate three subtypes of neutral compounds depending on the structure of the constituent stems.

The examples above represent the subtype which may be described as simple neutral compounds: they consist of simple affixless stems.

Compounds which have affixes in their structure are called derived or derivational compounds. E. g. Absent-mindedness, blue-eyed, golden-haired, broad-shouldered, lady-killer, film-goer.

The Third subtype of neutral compounds is called contracted compounds. These words have a shortened (contracted) stem in their structure: TV-set (-program, -show, -canal, etc.), V-day (Victory day), G-man (Government man "FBI agent"), H-bag (handbag), T-shirt, etc.

II. Morphological compounds are few in number. This type is non-productive. It is represented by words in which two compounding stems are combined, by a linking vowel or consonant, e. g. Anglo-Saxon, Franko-Prussian, handiwork, handicraft, spokesman, statesman.

III. In syntactic compounds (the term is arbitrary) we once more find a feature of specifically English word-structure. These words are formed from segments of speech, preserving in their structure numerous traces of syntagmatic relations typical of speech: articles, prepositions, adverbs as in the nouns lily-of-the-va!ley, Jack-of-all-trades, mother-in-law, sit-at-home, go-between, get-together.

The last word (meaning "a detective story") was obviously coined from the ungrammatical variant of the word-group who (has) done it.

Focus of interest is the semantic aspect of words can the meaning of a compound word be regarded as the sum of its constituent meanings?

There are roughly 3 groups of compounds.

The suggested subdivision into three groups is based on the degree of semantic cohesion 'of the constituent parts,

a) The first group consists of non-idiomatic compounds: their meanings are the sum of their constituent meanings. Ex.: Classroom, bedroom, working-man, evening-gown, dining-room, sleeping-car, leading-loom, dancing-hall.

b) The shift of meaning becomes much more pronounced in the second group of examples. Blackboard, blackbird, football, lady-killer, pickpocket, good-for-nothing, lazybones, etc., where the meaning of the whole word can not be defined as the sum of the constituent meanings.

c) In the third group of compounds the process of deducing the meaning of the whole from those of the constituents is impossible: ladybirds not a bird, but an insect, tallboy not a boy but a piece of furniture, bluestocking, on the contrary, is a person whereas bluebottle may denote both a flower and an insect but never a bottle, man-of-war ("warship"), merry-go-round ("carousel"), mother-of-pearl ("irridescent substance forming the inner layer of certain shells") , horse-marine ("a person who is unsuitable for his job or position"), butter-fingers ("clumsy person; one who is apt to drop things"), wall-flower("a girl who is not invited to dance at a party"), whodunit ("detective story"). The last 2 groups are idiomatic compounds.

The following joke rather vividly shows what happens if an idiomatic compound is misunderstood as non-idiomatic.

Patient They tell me, doctor, you are a perfect lady-killer.

Doctor: Oh, no, no! I assure you, my dear madam, I make no distinction between the sexes.

A further theoretical aspect of composition is the criteria for distinguishing between a compound and a word-combination.

1. In this case the graphic criterion of distinguishing between a word and a word-group is rather convincing,

2. The phonetic criterion for compounds may be treated as that of a single stress.

3. Morphological and syntactic criteria can also be applied to compound words in order to distinguish them from word-groups.

The word-group a lull boy each of the constituents is independently open to grammatical changes peculiar to its own category as a part of speech: They were the tallest boys in their form.

Between the constituent parts of the word-group other words can be inserted: a lull handsome boy. , The compound tallboy-and, in actual fact, any other compound - is not subject to such changes. The first component is grammatically invariable; the plural form ending is added to the whole unit: tallboys. No word can be inserted between the components, even with the compounds which have a traditional separate graphic form.

Shortening (Contraction)

This comparatively new way of word-building has achieved a high degree of productivity nowadays, especially in American English.

Shortenings (or contracted words) are produced in two different ways. The first is to make a new word from a syllable of the original word. The first may lose its beginning (as in phone made from telephone, fence from defence), its ending (as in hols from holidays, vac from vacation, pops from properties, ad from advertise-mentor both the beginning and ending.

The second way of shortening is to make a new word.

Letters of a word group: U. N. O. from the United Nations Organization, B. B. C. From the British Broadcasting Corporation.

Here are some more examples of informal shortenings. Movie (from moving-picture), gene (from gentleman), specs (from spectacles), circs (from circumstances, e. g. under the circs), I. 0. U. (a written acknowledgement of debt; made from I owe you), lib (from liberty, as in May 1 take the lib of saying something to you?), cert (from certainly, as in This enterprise is a cert if you have a bit of .capital), metrop (from metropoly, e. g. Paris is a gay metrop), exhibish (from exhibition), posish (from position).

Undergraduates' informal speech abounds in words of the type: exam, lab, prof, vac, hoi, co-ed(& girl student at a coeducational school or college).

Some of the Minor Types of Modem Word-Building

1. Sound-imitation. Wolds are made by imitating different kinds of sound: crow: cuckoo, etc.

2. Reduplication. New words are made by doubling a stem, either without any phonetic changes as in bye-bye (coil, for good-bye) or with a variation of the root-vowel 'or consonant as in ping-pong, chit-chat (this second type is "called gradational reduplication).

3. Back-Formation (Reversion).The earliest examples of this type of wold-building are the verb to beg that was made from the French, borrowing beggar, to burgle from burglar, to cobble from horn cobbler. In all these cases the verb was made from the noun by subtracting what was mistakenly associated with the English suffix -er. So, in the case of the verbs to beg, to burgle, to cobble the process was reversed: instead of a noun made from a verb by affixation (as in poorer from to paint), a verb was produced from a noun by subtraction. That is why this type of word-building received the name of back-formation or reversion.

Later examples of back-formation are to butle from butler, to baby-sit from baby-sitter, to force-land from forced landing, to blood-transfuse from blood-transfusion, to fingerprint from finger printings

THE PRINCIPLES OF CLASSIFICATION OF A VOCABULARY

The vocabulary or a language covers completely the whole reality of human experience, and thus becomes, a systems. In this general system we find smaller, less general systems, such as, for example, the-system of the concept «boy» in English and «мальчик» in Russian.

The principles of classification of a vocabulary are:

1) Part-of-speech classification, i. e. lexico-grammatical classification;

2) contextual classification;

3) logical classification;

1) Parts of speech pre special classes of words characterized by

a) common grammatical properties, i. e. grammatical shaping of the words, their syntactical functions, anrl

b) common lexical properties, 1. e. the general meaning of the whole class, which is manifested through the grammatical properties. Grammer singles out some general meaning and passes in on to lexics. To exemplify:

book- the name of an object

classification - the name of an action or the development of an action

(the) use -- the name of an action

Another subdivision in Verbs is that of transitive and intransitive verbs. Here again this division is not decisive. The meaning of the verb is historically devoid of transitiveness or intran-sitiveness. This is a secondary element superimposed upon the general meaning. For instance, the verb run was historically not transitive. In the course of the development of the language - it acquired that additional meaning: to run a company.

Other parts of speech are also very scantily subdivided. The noun is the only class of words with a more or less thoroughly defined subdivision.

2) Another semantic classification is the one which is connected with the combinability of words. There are words with a wide combinational capacity and those whose combinational capacity extremely limited. For instance, the adjectives good, bad, big, etc. combine with a great number of nouns.

The adjective aquiline has a still more limited combinatory "valence". It is connected with appearance

only (and human appearance at that): aquiline nose.

3) Another type of classification is the logical classification, called so for want of a better term. Here we find the following subdivisions:

a) logical groups (hyponimic ), comprising the general and the particular, e. g. animal, dog, cat, etc,, plant tree, bush, grass.

b) synonymic groups (series), which can be further classified into groups-of stylistic synonyms (horse, steed; begin, commence), ideographic synonyms (house, building etc.) and expressive synonyms (big man and huge man differ not only ideographically, but also by our subjective approach to size and by the emotional coloring of the adjectives big and huge.)

c) arntonymic series (groups) are yet another subdivision of logical classification. Antonyms are words of opposite meanings, such as give - take, come - go, short - long. Antonyms should not be confused with correlative pairs, which arc related through one property only, as day - night, father-son, father - mother

d) Homonyms are words which are identical in sound and spelling or at least, in one of these aspects but different in their meaning.

bank n - 'a shore'

bank n - 'an institution for receiving, lending, exchanging and safeguarding money

ball n - 'any spherical body

ball n - 'a large dancing party'.

If synonyms and antonyms are regarded as the language expressive resourses, homonyms are not. In the process of communication they can lead to confusion and misunderstanding. Yet it is this very characteristic which makes them one of the most important sources of popular humour. The pun (KaiiaM6yp) is a joke based upon the play on words of similar form but different meanings {i.e. homonyms): - 'Waiter!'

-`Yes, sir'.

-'What's this?¹

- 'It's bean soup, sir.'

- 'Never mind what it has been. I want to know what it is now!'

'Bean' (n-бобы) and 'been¹ (past participle) of 'to be' are homonym, the same in sound but different in spelling. There are three groups of homonyms:

- which are the same in sound and spelling (homonyms proper - bank, ball, etc.).

- which are the same in sound but different in spelling (homophones - bean - been),

- which are the same in spelling but different in sound (homographs)

LECTURE 5

Meaning and its Types

Grammatical meaning. Lexical meaning. Part of speech meaning. Denotational and connotational meaning. Emotive charge and stylistic reference. Word meaning and meaning in morphemes.

Meaning is not homogeneous. It consists of some components, which are usually described as types of meaning. The main types to be found in words and word-forms are the grammatical and lexical meaning.

If we take different words (asked, formed, etc.) we shall see that they al! have something in common: the grammatical meaning of the tense. According to the functional approach grammatical meaning can be identified through its relations to other words in a sentence (by its distribution). Different words (likes, runs, etc.) have one and the same grammatical meaning because of their identical distribution (subject, adverb, object).

Besides grammatical meaning there exists another type of meaning, which is the same in different word-forms of one and the same word: to run (runs, ran, running, run). They have the identical semantic components (the process of moving), but different grammatical meaning.

Thus, by lexical meaning we understand the meaning proper (свойственный) to the given linguistic unit, which is the same in all its forms and distributions. Grammatical meaning isms meaning proper to sets of word-forms, common to all the words of a certain class. These two types of meaning cannot exist without each other, as both make up the word meaning.

According to part of speech meaning, the meaning of lexical units can be classified into two word classes: major: nouns, verbs, adverbs, adjectives; minor: articles, prepositions, conjunctions, particles.

Words of the first class have the lexical component of part of speech meaning. All the nouns have the meaning "thingness" or "substantiality" (предметность). All the verbs have the meaning "process" all the adjectives have the meaning "quality".

Words belonging to the second class differ from the words of major classes. The former (minor) class comprises closed set of units to which new units are never added and they are not numerous. The latter (major) class comprises open sets because new units are constantly added to them and they are endless in number.

The interconnection and interdependence of the lexical and grammatical meanings vary in different word classes, in different groups of words within the class. The lexical meaning of major word classes is more important than its grammatical meaning. In minor word classes the grammatical meaning is more important than the lexical meaning. But there are some words in the major word classes where grammatical meaning prevails and instead of "to be" we use "to turn, to get, to become + adj., to grow".

Semantic analysis.

The first function of the word as a unit of communication is realized through its meaning, that is why meaning (among other characteristics) is the most impotent one. The branch of linguistics which specialises in the study of meaning is called semantics.

The modem approach to semantics is based on the assumption (npeдположение) that the inner form of the word (its meaning) is a structure which is called the semantic structure (семантическая структура) of the word. The semantic structure doesn't present only one concept, on the contrary most of the words convey several concepts and have a corresponding number of meanings. A word with several meanings is calles polysemantic. A word with one meaning is calles monosemantic.

Most English words are polysemamic. The system of meanings of any polysemantic word develops

gradually, mostly over the centuries, as more and more new meanings (JICB -лексико-семантические варианты) either appear or the old meanings disappear.

When analysing the semantic structure of a polysemantic word it is necessary to distinguish between two levels of analysis: on the 1st level we analyse a system of meanings (i.e. a semantic structure of any polysemantic word; on the 2nd level we analyse a system of semantic components within one meaning (i.e. a semantic structure of one meaning - структура значения).

Let's analyse the semantic analysis on the first level, where the semantic structure of the word is treated as a system of meanings. The semantic structure of the noun 'fire' can be presented by the scheme:

Fire n. = 1. Flame (пламя = portion of burning gas)

2. instant of destructive burning: a forest fire

3. burning material in a stove: fireplace: a camp fire (Koстep)

4. shooting of guns: open/ceasefire

5. strong feeling, passion, enthusiasm: speech lacking fire

So the meaning 1 conveys the concept in the most general way whereas meanings 2-5 are associated with special circumstances, aspects of the same phenomenon. Meaning 1 is called the main meaning (ochobhoc 3Ha-H6Hne) and it presents the centre of the semantic structure of the word, holding it together. Meanings 2-5 are called secondary meanings (второстепенное значение).

If we take the word 'dull', its semantic structure looks differently:

Dull adj.=

1. Uninteresting, boring 2. Stupid 3. Not bright 4. Not loud 5. Not active 6. Seeing badly 7. Hearing badly	deficient in interest deficient in intellect deficient in colour deficient in sound deficient in activity deficient in eyesight deficient in hearing

The scheme shows that the centre holding together the semantic structure of the word is not one of the meanings, but a certain semantic component which can be singled out within one separate meaning.

Each separate meaning can also be structurally analysed, i.e. different sets of semantic components, comprising this meaning, can be found - denotational and connotational. Connotational components include emotive and evaluative, imaginable and intensifying, stylistic and pragmatic ones. Pragmatic components convey information on the "time and space", the participants and type of communication. Here are some examples of semantic components in the structure of the meaning: ape v =to imitate, behave like an ape (imaginable and evaluative component), MejBeflb = animal which likes honey and looks for it [мед + ведать] (денотативный компанент), wind n = air in rapid natural motion (intensifying component), prestige n = good reputation (evaluative component), order v = to give instructions to subordinates (pragmatic component).

So the semantic structure of a word can be investigated at two levels: 1) of different meanings, 2) of semantic components within each separate meaning. For a monosemantic word the first level is excluded. The older a word is the better developed is its semantic structure. The normal pattern of a word's semantic development is from monosemy to a simple semantic structure with two or three meanings, and further development to a more complex semantic structure.

A good and reliable key to the meaning of the word is context, i.e. the word's linear relationships with other words (combinability or collocability). But context is not the ultimate (окончательный) criterion for meanings and the contextual analysis should be used in combination with other criteria:

definitional, transformational, distributional analyses. Yet the contextual analysis remains one of the main investigative methods for determining the semantic structure of a word.

Causes of developing new meanings

The first group of causes is historical (or extra-linguistic): new notions and phenomena must be named. We know 3 ways for providing new names: 1) making new words, 2) borrowing foreign ones, 3) filling vocabulary gaps by applying old words to new objects or notions.

With the appearance of railways in England 'carriage' (vehicle drawn by horses) received a new meaning of "a railway car". The words 'stalls', 'box', 'pit', 'circle¹ had existed before the first theatres appeared in England. With their appearance the gaps in the vocabulary were filled with these words which developed new meanings:

'stalls'- napтep, 'box' - ложa, 'pit'- амфитеатр, 'circle' - бельэтаж.

New meanings can also be developed due to linguistic factors, when a complete change of meaning can be caused by the influence of other words, mostly synonyms: the word 'deer' in Old English denoted 'any beast'. In that meaning it collided with the borrowed word 'animal' and changed its meaning to a more concrete modern one - 'a certain type of beast - олень).

The process of developing a new meaning (or a change of meaning) is called transference (перенос значения). In any case of semantic change it is not the meaning but the word is being transferred from one referent onto another (e.g.: from a horse-drawn vehicle onto a railway car). The result of such a transference is the appearance of a new meaning.

Two types of transference are distinguished depending on two types of logical associations underlying the semantic process. In transference based on similarity (linguistic metaphor - сходство, подобие ), a new meaning appears as a result of associating two objects: 'neck' - part of a body - the neck of a bottle; 'branch' - subdivision of tree branch of science; 'star' - bright heavenly body - famous actor or actress -- football star.

The meanings formed through this type of transference are often found in the informal strata of the vocabulary: 'a red-headed boy' is sure to be nicknamed by his schoolmates 'carrot'. The slang meaning of words 'nut', 'onion' is ' head', of 'saucers' - 'eyes'.

In transference based on contiguity (linguistic metonymy -смежность) the association is based upon psychological links between different objects and phenomena. Old English 'sad' (satisfied with food) developed a connotation 'oversatisfied with food' and 'not happy, having physical discomfort'. The next shift of meaning was from 'physical discomfort' to 'spiritual discontent' and further to modern 'sorrowful'. By the 'foot' of a bed, the 'arms' of a chair we mean the place where the feet/arms rest when one lies/sits ib a bed/chair. By the 'leg of a table (chair, bed, etc)' we mean the part which serves as a support due to the original association with 'the leg of man or animal'.

Meanings produced through transference based on contiguity originate sometimes from geographical or proper names. 'China' (dishes made of porcelain) originated from the name of the country which was the birthplace of porcelain. 'Tweed' (coarse wool cloth) got its name from the river Tweed and 'cheviot' (fine wool cloth) - from the Cheviot hills in England. The name of a painter is transferred on his pictures: a Matisse = a painting by Matisse.

Broadening (or generalisation) of meaning

The verb 'arrive' (French borrowing) began its life as 'to land, to come to shore'. In Modem English it has widened its combinability and developed the general meaning 'to come'. It's interesting to trace the history of 'girl'. In Middle English it had the meaning of 'a small child of either sex', then the word developed into the meaning of a small child of the female sex', so that the range of meaning was narrowed. In its further semantic development the word gradually broadened its meaning: 1) it meant not only 'a female child', but also 'a young unmarried woman', and later 'any young woman' and now 'any woman, even not young'.

Narrowing of meaning

Boy: 'any young person of the male sex' > 'servant of the male sex'. Meat: ' any food' > 'a certain food product'. Deer: 'any beast' > 'a certain kind of beast'.

Degradation of meaning

Gossip, god parent' > 'one who talks scandal, speaks ill of people'. Villain: 'farm servant, serf (крепостной) > 'vile person (злодей).

Semantically speaking the second meaning developed a negative evaluative component (connotation), which was absent in the first meaning.

Elevation of meaning Fond:

'foolish' > 'loving, affectionate'. Nice: 'foolish' > 'fine, good'. Knight: 'manservant' > 'noble, courageous man'.

Semantically speaking the second meaning developed a positive evaluative component (connotation), whereas the first meaning had a negative evaluative component.

Marshal: 'manservant attending horses' > 'the highest rank in the army'.

Lord: 'master of the house, head of the family' > 'baronet' (aristocratic title).

Lady: 'mistress of the house, married woman' > 'wife or daughter of baroner'.

Semantically speaking the second meaning developed a positive evaluative pragmatic component (connotation), which was absent in the first meaning.

LECTURE 6

Phraseology. Lexicography. American English

Phraseology: word-groups with transferred meanings.

Phraseological units, or idioms, represent the most expressive part of the language's vocabulary, because amusing sketches of the nation's customs, traditions and prejudices, recollections of its past history, fairy-tales are collected here. In modern linguistic there is a certain confusion about the terminology connected with these word-groups. The term "phraseological unit" ("фразеологическая единица") was introduced by academician V.V. Vinogradov. The theory of English phraseology was also worked out by our scientists. Western scholars prefer the term "idioms". There are some other terms used to denote this phenomenon: set-expressions, set-phi ses, fixed word-groups.

It's rather difficult to differenciate between a set-expression and a free word-group. The terms given above show that the basic criteria of differenciation stability of the lexical components and grammatical structure. Phraseological units (ph.u.) are habitually defined as non-motivated word-groups, that cannot be freely made up in speech but are reproduced as ready-made units, they are not created at the very moment of speeking, unlike free word-groups which components can change according to the needs of speakers. Ex.: a blue flower (a free word-group) vs. a blue-stocking (a ph. u.).

The traditional and oldest principle of classification ph.u-s. is based on their original content ('thematic principle), i.e. particular sphere of human activity or natural phenomena. So L.Smith gives groups of idioms either used by sailors, hunters, etc. or associated with domestic and wild animals, agriculture, cooking, sports, arts, etc. Smith points out that ph.u-s associated with the sea and the life of seamen are especially numerous in English: to be all at sea (to be unable to understand), to sink or swim (to fail or succeed), in deep waters (in trouble or danger), in low water, on the rocks (in strained financial circumstances).

By origin the greatest number of ph.u. is connected with traditions and customs of England: to cut with a shilling (лишить наследства), night cup (a drink before going to sleep); the next source is Shakespeare's works : to give the devil his due (отдать должное), the green-eyed monster (ревность), smth. is wrong in the state of Danmark, etc.

Due to the structural principle, i.e. their semantic and grammatical inseparability phraseological units can be classified into nominal and communicative. This structural principle is based on the ability of a ph.u. to perform the same syntactical functions as words. To nominal belong substantive (noun), verbal , attributive and adverbial ph.u-s.

Substantive ph.u. denote 'thingness' and are used to denote everyday activities of people, their meaning can be easily deduced or be wholly idiomatic: dog's life, cat-and-dog life, call love, white lie, red tape (бюрократия), backnumber (ретроград, отсталый человек), babies in the wood (простаки, наивные люди), Fleet street (английская пресса), hot dogs (сосиски), a hearty oak (каменное сердце), mamma's darling (маменькин сынок). Some linguists admit some structural change in a ph.u.: 'the promised land' = ''the land of promise'.

Verbal ph.u. fulfil the functions of verbs in sentence: to smell the rat (чувствовать что-то недоброе), tо run for one's life (спасать жизнь), to talk through one's hat (мямлить).

Attribute ph.u. describe qualities of objects: high and mighty, safe and sound, brand new, etc. In this group the so called comparative word-groups are particularly expressive and amusing in their unexpected associations: (as) cool as a cucumber, (as) nervous as a cat, (as) weak as a kitten, (as) good as gold (usu. about children), (as) large as life, (as) slippery as an eel, (as) drunk as ah owl, (as) mad as a hare in March, etc.

Adverbial ph.u. perform the function of an adverb in a sentence and have firm stability: between the devil and the deep sea (меж двух огней), neither here nor there (ни к месту), by heart (наизусть), by hook or by crook (ни шитьем, так катаньем), in cold blood (хладнокровно).

Interjeclional ph.u.: my god! Goodnew gracious! Good heavens!

Communicative ph.u-s make sentence themselves. These are various sayings and proverbs. They mау bе classified according to the type of sentence they form: declarative (It's all Greek to me - китайская грамота). Queen Ann is dead - (это не новость), interrogative (Can the lapper change his spots? How do you do?), imperative -(Hold your horses - Осторожно на повороте).

Academician Vinogradov's classification is based on the degree of semantic cohesion (связность) betweeh the components of ph.u-s:

-phraseological combinations with a partially changed meaning which can be deduced: to take smth for granted to be good at smth, bosom friends, to have a bite, to stick to one's word, etc.;

- phraseological unities with a completely changed meaning which can be deduced from the meaning of the constituent parts: to catch at a straw, to lose one's head, to lose one's heart to smb, the last drop, etc.

- phraseological fusions with completely changed meaning which cannot be deduced from the meaning of the constituent parts (denominated units): to come a cropper ( ~ to come to disaster), at sixes and sevens (~ in confusion), to set one's cap at smb.(~ to try and attract a man), to show the white feather (~ to show one's cowardice).

The classificaiton of ph.u-s suggested by prof. A.Kunin is based on the combined structural-semantic principle and also considers the degree of stability of ph.u. Acc. to Kunin there are 4 classes of ph.u:

- nominative, including one meaningful word: well and good, wear and tear, as the crow flies, etc;

- nominative-communicative: to break the ice - the ice is broken;

- ph.u. which are neither nominative nor communicative and include interjectional word-groups;

- communicative ph.u. represented by proverbs and sayings.

Thus phraseological units differ from word-groups in the lack of motivation, structural stability, word-equivalent function, idiomaticity.

Lexicography

Types of dictionaries

Lexicography is the theory and practice of compiling dictionaries. A dictionary is a systematically arranged list of socialized linguistic forms, compiled from the speech habits of a given speech community and commented on by the author in such a way that reader understands the meaning of each separate form and is informed of the relevant facts, concerning the function of that form in the community. The functions of linguistic forms and their meanings are so diverse, that it is normal that there are various type of dictionaries. One of the most important principles of division among dictionaries is diachronic and synchronic.

Diachronic dictionaries are primarily concerned with the history and development of words in respect of their forms and meanings. Among them we can find etymological and historical dictionaries. Historical dictionaries focus their attention on the changes in the form and meaning of words within a period of time, for which there is historical evidence at hand. Etymological dictionaries focus their attention on the origin of words. They deal with prehistory of words. The prehistory often requires the origin of the word in other languages. 'Clinic' - [comes from Greek <'a bed'], 'Scene' - [comes from Greek < 'a tent']. In a historical dictionary the semantic developments are extremely important.

The purpose of synchronic dictionaries is to deal with the lexical stock of language oh a certain stage of historical development. The terms 'synchronic' and 'contemporary' are not equal, as 'contemporary' relates to the present day and 'synchronic' - to the present century.

The second division of dictionaries is into general and restricted. General dictionaries are based on the principle which is concerned with the national standard language. There are two types of general dictionaries: standard-descriptive and overall-descriptive.

Standard-descriptive dictionaries can be characterized as describing the standard national language used at the point of time, when the dictionary is being compiled, and it is expected to be used some time after its publication. This dictionary points to the norms of using words. It describes what is generally regular, normal and exercises on using the words. It does not describe dialectal forms, archaisms, origin of words. Overall-descriptive dictionaries include all the information about words. Such a dictionary will tend to register occasional applications (применение), author's words, technical words. It may be used while reading books of two or three centuries. Most frequently standard-descriptive and overall-descriptive dictionaries are combined in one publication.

Restricted .dictionaries are based on a variation of language: a Dictionary of Dialects,. a Dictionary of Slang, a Dictionary of Synonyms, a Dictionary of Phraseological Units, a Dictionary of Abbreviations, a Dictionary on Science, some author's dictionaries, a Dictionary of Foreign Words, etc.

Another principle on which dictionaries can be based is the number of languages represented in it: bi-lingual dictionary (англо-русский словарь). The main difficulty then is to coordinate the lexical units of one language to that of another.

American English

At the beginning of this century the American linguists worked out the idea that there is a separate American language. It is hardly so. It has neither its own grammar, nor vocabulary. Both British and American variants of English have chosen the same way of development. There are some differences in vocabulary, in pronunciation, in grammar which when summed up cannot serve a borderline between two languages. That's why there are two varieties of the same language.

The peculiarities of American pronunciation.

1. the polysyllabic words have 2 stresses: 'nece'ssary, 'dictio'nary, 'cere'mony, 'interesting, 'commen'tary, etc.

2. The same words may have different pronunciation: advertisment ['advi'taizment], semalteneous ['saimel'tenies], etc.

3. The vowal peculiarities - a) the British [a:] before 's, , f, ns' is changed for [ ]: path [ ], after [ ], can't [ ], etc. b) British [ ] is replaced by [ ]: hot [ ], dog [ ], problem [ ], etc. c) British [ju:] corresponds to the American [u:] : student, stupid, accuse [u:], duty, d)the second element of the diphthongs [ei.ou] has a tendency to fade out: name [nem], boat [bot], home [hom], date [Jet].

4. The consonants peculiarities - a) the [r] is articulated in American English, b) [p,t,k] are very weak between the vowels in Br.E, but strong in American English: [p,t,k] > Am. E. [b,d,g], c) the process of dropping [t] in the words: I want to go [ai gou] twenty [tweni]. d) what, where, when - retain [h],

5) intonation of American English is steady, more monotonous;

Did it all happen yesterday? Am.E. [...__._.'] Br.E. [-_._.']

6) spelling .

Br.E. suffix "- our" > Am.E. "- or": labour > labor, humour > humor,

Br.E. suffix "- re " > "-er". Am.E.: theatre > theater, centre >center,

Br.E. prefix "en-" > Am.E "In-": enclose > inclose

In Am.E. dumb vowels often drop out:

Br.E. prologue > Am.E. prolog; Br.E. plough > Am.E. plow, neighbour > neighbor, harbour > harbor

Consonants drop out programme > program

In Br.E. suf. "-s" changes into "-z"; letter "c" changes into "s",

letter "d" changes into "t". Br.E. defence > Am.E. defense Br.E. washed > Am.E. washt offence > offence stopped > stopt retain "-d" : livd, dreamd

Grammar and syntax

1) "Will" is used for all persons, "Shall" is used to express obligation (have to)

2) Verbs of the type "dream", "burn", "learn", etc. keep to the regular type of past forms "dreamed", "burned", "learned", etc.

3) In colloquial American adverbs are losing their "-ly" suffix:

He went out slow. I felt awful sleepy.

4) Subjunctive Mood sticks to the synthetic forms in the Subordinate clauses:

He insisted that they be there in time. (He insisted that they should be there in time).

5) In colloquial American perfect forms are short of the verb "have": "I seen him. I done it". Sometimes "do" is used for "have" in colloquial American:"I done told him". "I got a book". The. Past Indefinite .Tense is often used instead of the Present Perfect Tense, especially in oral communication. An American is likely to say I saw this movie, where an Englishman will probably say I've seen this film .

6) "Help" is followed by "bare infinitive" (This tendency is marked in Br.E. as well) Let's go see him. She usually helps us work.

7) The choice of prepositions: "I live on the street" -... in the street".

8) The adj. "good" is used for "very": a good long time. They worked good and hard. I am good and tired

Word-formation

1) In Am.E. conversion is extremely popular for all types of phrases:

to category - a category, to frame up - a frame up (ложное судебное дело) husky-a husky

2) Affixation is more common:

"-ее" is more frequent: draftee - призывник " -nick" - a holdupnick (налетчик)

3) Abreviations, esp. in colloquial Am.:

VIP- a very important person, IOU - I owe you, DP-displaced person, GF - girl-friend, BF - boy-friend

Vocabulary of American English

It is, quite (rue that the vocabulary used by American speakers, has distinctive features of its own. More than that: there are whole groups оf words which belong to American vocabulary exclusively and constitute its specific feature. These words are called Americanisms.

The first group of such words may be described as historical Americanisms.

At the beginning of the 17th c. the first English migrants began arriving in America in search of new and better living conditions. It was then that English was first spoken, on American soil and it is but natural that it was spoken in its 17th-c. form. For instance, the noun fall was still used by the first migrants in its old meaning "autumn", the verb to guess in the old meaning "to think". The adjective sick in the meaning "ill, unwell". In American usage these words still retain their old meanings whereas in British English their meanings have changed.

These and Similar words, though the Americans and the English use them in different meanings, are nevertheless found both in American and in British vocabularies.

The second group of Americanisms includes words which one is not likely to discover in British vocabulary. They are specifically American, and we shall therefore call them proper Americanisms. The oldest of these were formed by the first migrants to the American continent and reflected to a great extent, their attempts to cope with their new environment.

It should be remembered that America was called "The New World" not only because the migrants severed all connections with their old life. America was for them a truly new world in which everything was strikingly and bewilderingly different from what it had been in the Old Country (as they Called England): the landscape, climate, trees and рlants, birds and animals.

Therefore, from the very first, they were faced with a serious lack of words in their vocabulary with which to describe all these new and strange things. Gradually such words were formed. Here are some of them. Backwoods ("wooded, uninhabited districts"), cold snap ("a sudden frost"), blue-grass ("a sort of grass peculiar to North America"), blue-jack ("a small American oak"), egg-plant ("a plant wilth edible fruit"), sweet potato, ("a plant with sweet edible roots"). redbud ("an American tree having small budlike pink flowers; the state tree of Oklahoma"), red cedar ('"an American coniferous tree with reddish fragrant wood"), cat-bird ("a small North-American bird whose call resembles the mewing of a cat"). cat-fish ("called so because of spines likened to a cat's claws"), bull-frog ("a huge frog producing sounds not unlike a bull's toar"), sun-fish ("a fish with a round flat golden body").

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