- •Lexicology as a linguistic discipline.
- •Lexicology as a brunch of linguistics. Types of Lexicology.
- •The connection of lexicology with other linguistic disciplines. Methods of lexicological research.
- •General problems of the theory of the Word.
- •1.Lexicology as a brunch of linguistics. Types of Lexicology.
- •The notion of the linguistic sign.
- •2.The connection of lexicology with other linguistic disciplines. Methods of lexicological research.
- •The Transformational Analysis
- •3. General problems of the theory of the word.
- •Lecture 2 Etymological characteristics of Modern English vocabulary
- •1. Native words in English.
- •2. Borrowings in English vocabulary. Classification of borrowings.
- •Classification of borrowings according to the language from which they were borrowed
- •French borrowings
- •Italian borrowings.
- •German borrowings.
- •Holland borrowings.
- •Russian borrowings.
- •3. Etymological doublets
- •Lecture 3 Morphological structure of English words. Wordbuilding
- •1. Morphological structure of English words.
- •2. Different ways of wordbuilding in English.
- •3. Productive ways of word-building in English.
- •Lecture 4 Semantic structure of English words. Semantic processes.
- •1. Semasiology. Word-meaning. Lexical and grammatical meaning.
- •2. Polysemy in Modern English, its role and sources. Homonymy, Synonymy. Antonyms in me.
- •3. Semantic processes. Change of meaning.
- •Lecture 5 homonymy and synonymy in modern english
- •1. Homonymy in English. The sources of homonymy
- •Sources of Homonymy
- •2. Classification of Homonyms
- •4. Classification of synonyms
- •Ideographic (which he defined as words conveying the same notion but differing in shades of meaning),
- •Lecture 6 english phraseology
- •1. Phraseological units in English.
- •2. Ways of forming phraseological units.
- •1. Phraseological units in English.
- •2. Ways of forming phraseological units. Their classification.
- •Lecture 7
- •1. The words of informal stylistic layer.
- •Informal Style
- •Colloquial Words
- •Dialect words
- •2. The formal layer of the English vocabulary.
- •Learned Words
- •3. Professionalisms.
- •4. Stylistically neutral layer of the English vocabulary.
- •5. Neologisms in English.
- •Lecture 8 English as the world language. Varieties of English.
- •1. Historical and economic background of widespreading English.
- •2. Some of the distinctive characteristics of american english
- •3. The language of Canada, Australia and New Zealand.
- •4. Some other varieties of English (English of India and Pakistan, African English)
- •2. Historical development of British and American Lexicography.
- •3. Classification of dictionaries
3. Professionalisms.
ProfessionalTenninology
Hundreds of thousands of words belong to special scientific, professional or trade terminological systems and are not used or even understood by people outside the particular speciality. Every field of modern activity has its specialized vocabulary. There is a special medical vocabulary, and similarly special terminologies for Psychology, Botany, Music, Linguistics, Teaching Methods and many others.
Term is a word or a word-group which is specifically employed by a particular branch of science, technology, trade or the arts to convey a notion peculiar to this particular activity. So, bilingual, interdental, labialization, palatalization, glottal stop, descending scale are terms of Theoretical Phonetics.
4. Stylistically neutral layer of the English vocabulary.
Basic Vocabulary
These words are stylistically neutral. Their stylistic neutrality makes it possible to use them in all kinds of situations, both formal and informal, in verbal and written communication. Basic vocabulary is used every day, everywhere and by everybody, regardless of profession, occupation, educational level, age group or geographical location. These are words without which no human communication would be possible as they denote objects and phenomena of everyday importance (e.g., house, bread, summer, winter, child, mother, green, difficult, to go, to stand, etc.).
Basic vocabulary words are the central group of the vocabulary, its historical foundation and living core. That is why words of this stratum show a considerably greater stability in comparison with words of other strata, especially informal.
Basic vocabulary words can be recognized not only by their stylistic neutrality, but also by entire lack of other connotations (i.e. attendant meanings). Their meanings are broad, general and directly convey the notion, without supplying any additional information.
For instance, the verb to walk means merely "to move from place to place on foot", whereas in the meanings of its synonyms to stride, to stroll, to trot, to stagger and others, some additional information is encoded as they each describe a different manner of walking, a different gait, tempo, purposefulness or lack of purpose and even length of paces. Compare the meanings of the aforementioned synonyms: to walk — to go or traverse on foot; to stride — to walk with long steps;
Thus, to walk, with its direct broad meaning, is a typical basic vocabulary word, and its synonyms, with their elaborate additional information encoded in their meanings, belong to the periphery of the vocabulary.
Basic vocabulary words and the stylistically marked strata of the vocabulary do not exist independently but are closely interrelated. Most stylistically marked words have their neutral counterparts in basic vocabulary. (Terms are an exception in this respeet). On.the Qiher-.hand, colloquialisms may have their counterparts among learned words, most slang has counterparts both among colloquialisms and learned words. Archaisms, naturally, have their modem equivalents, at least, in some of the other groups.
The table gives some examples of such synonyms belonging to different stylistic strata:
Basic Vocabulary |
Informal |
Formal |
begin |
start, get started |
commence |
continue |
go on, get on |
proceed |
end |
finish, be through, be over |
terminate |
child, baby |
kid, brat, beam (dial.) |
Infant,babe (poet.) |
In teaching a foreign language, basic vocabulary words constitute the first and absolutely essential part of students' functional and recognition vocabularies. They constitute the beginner's vocabulary. Yet, to restrict the student to basic vocabulary words would mean to deprive his speech of colour, expressive force and emotive shades, for, if basic vocabulary words are absolutely necessary, they also decidedly lack something: they are not at all the kind of words to tempt a writer or a poet. Actually, if the language had none other but basic vocabulary words, fiction would be hardly readable, and poetry simply nonexistent.
The following table sums up the description of the stylistic strata of the English vocabulary:
-
Stylistically-Neutral Words |
Stylistically-Marked Words |
|
Informal |
Formal |
|
Basic |
I. Colloquial words |
I. Learned words |
vocabulary |
A. literary, |
A. literary, |
|
B. familiar, |
B. words of sci- |
|
C. low. |
entific prose, |
|
II. Slang words. |
C. officialese, |
|
III. Dialect words |
D. modes of po- |
|
|
etic diction. |
|
- |
II. Archaic and ob- |
|
|
solete words. |
|
|
HI. Professional |
|
|
terminology. |