LEXICOLOGY

Introduction

The course of lexicology is a component part of the theoretical course of Modern English.

The term 'lexicology' is made up of two morphemes taken from the Greek language: "lexis" - "word, phrase", hence "lexicos" -having to do with words, and 'logos' - a department of knowledge, science (learning). Thus, the tern lexicology is generally defined as а science of words_, the science of the vocabulary of the given language.

In order to make an all-round study of a language we subdivide the theoretical course into several branches (parts): phonetics, grammar, lexicology, stylistics. All these are closely connected with one another, in fact, they are interrelated and influence one another. The various branches of liguistics approach the study of the word from different angles:

Phonetics studies the outer form of the word, _its sound form, it

сconcentrates on investigation of the system of speech sounds existing at a specific period. When lexicology studies word-building, that is the formation of new words, it sometimes comes across facts which prove that phonetic means are employed in the coining of new words, e.g. A verb is formed from a noun by a mere change of stess -'increase - to in'crease, or a change of a root vowel or consonant -use /ju:s, ju:2/, blood - bleed.Thus lexicology and phonetics come into close contact.

Grammar is the study of word forms (morphology) and word groups combined in sentences (syntax). Grammatical means are also used in the language for forming new words. E.g. the suffix of plurality -s is used to not only to form the plural form but also new words with new meanings: color colors a) pi. Red, blue, yellow are со1оrs; b) the flag of a ship or an infantry

carrot - carrots: a) pi. a plant with an orange-red, long root used as a vegetable b) red hair In cases like these we speak about lexicalization of a grammar form,

i.e. a grammar means becomes a lexical means used to form new words. Thus Grammar and Lexicology come into contact too.

Lexicology is closely connected with stylistics. Stylistics studies different styles of of human speech, lexicology studies the vocabulary of these styles. E.g., ‘My father is not at home’ - is a sen­tence in a literary style. ‘Dad is out’ expresses the same idea, but in the colloquial style: ^‘dad^’ and ‘to be out’ are colloquia­lisms.

The history of the language is a component of all branches of linguistics, because many facts and phenomena of present-day language may be understood and explained only with the help of historical analysis. E.g. the History of the language reveals the connection between words which we usually do not connect: shy-sky, dish-disc, canal- channel. It explains why such words as machine and garage have the stress not on the first syllable as is customary with the English words, but on the second syllable, and why the word garage contains the sound/з/ which is not typical of the English language. The History of the English language deals with the origin of words, traces their development, their etymology, shows the growth and development of the vocabulary beginning with the Old English period. E.g., silly in OE had the meaning of ‘good, innocent'

Lexicology as a branch of linguistics has its own aims and methods of research. Lexicology has for its basic aim the sys­tematic description and study of the vocabulary of the language at a given stage in history. English lexicology aims at giving a systematic description of the English vocabulary. The term vocabulary is used to denote the system formed by the sum total of all words and word equivalents that the language possesses. Historical lexicology studies the origin, growth and changes of the English vocabulary. The historic approach to the English vocabulary employs the diachronic method of study (Gr. dia – through, chronos - time). The descriptive approach to the English vocabulary employs the synchronic method of study (Gk. syn - together, chronos –time). Descriptive lexicology studies the vocabulary of the English language at its modern stage of development.

The diachronic and synchronic methods may be used separately or simultaneously when necessary. E.g., the noun 'beggar' is understood in Modern English as derived from the verb 'to beg' by means of suffix -ar (variant of -er). On analogy with the words 'singer, reader', yet, the diachronic method reveals that the word was not formed in English but was borrowed from French. After being assimilated in English it was compared with English words and and the root 'beg' was singled out and used as a verb. In other words, it was the verb that was formed from the noun, and not the other way round. Lexicology studies words. The word is the basic unit of the vocabulary. The term ‘word' denotes the basic unit of a given language resulting from the association of a given meaning with a given sound form and of a given grammatical employment.

Words are used not independently, but in groups, which often are more or less stable: e.g. to smile- to give a smile, to walk-to take a walk. Such word groups are called set expressions. Some of them act as one member of a sentence: a first night, red tape. Such expressions are called word equivalents. Thus we can say that lexicology studies not only words but also word equivalents.

Lexicology also studies morphemes. A morpheme is the smallest possible meaningful part of the word. It cannot be divided into smaller parts, otherwise it would disintegrate into sounds. Morphemes do not exist in isolation, they function together with other morphemes in the word. There are different types of morphemes: root morphemes, possessing a certain lexical meaning, others, preceding or following the root morpheme, are called derivational morphemes (prefixes and suffixes).E.g. uneatable - un - prefix, eat - root, -able - suffix.

Thus the object of Lexicology is words, word equivalents and morphemes.

Lexicology as a theoretical course includes the following prob­lems: The general characteristics of the English vocabulary and its variants, the development of meaning, word building, the classifi­cation of words in Modern English, lexicography.

Lexicology is very important for language students, as it gives a general view and idea of the English language, its vocabulary as a system. The course of Modern English Lexicology is of great pract­ical importance. It gives much valuable information concerning the English word-stock and the laws governing the formation and usage of English words. The course aims at summarizing the practical material already familiar to students from foreign language classes. The knowledge of students gained from the course of Lexicology will guide them in all their dealings with the English vocabulary and help them to apply this information to the practical problems of language teaching at school and translation.

ETYMOLOGICAL ANALYSIS OF THE ENGLISH VOCABULARY

Literature :

I.V.Arnold. The English Word. M., 1986. c. XIV, A Course in Modem English Lexicology, tt,, 1979, part VI. Readings in Modem English Lexicology. L.,1969. - Etymology:

Ch, Hockett, J.A, Sheard, O.Jesperaen. A.I,SBiimitsky, Lexicologia Angliyskogo Jazyka, M.,1956, c« VII, The Concise Oxford Dictionary. The Shorter Oxford Dictionary.

PLAN

1. Some basic terms.

2. Native word-stock,

3. Loan (borrowed) words:

a/ Kinds of borrowing, b/ Conditions, causes and ways of borrowing,

4. Etymological doublets.

5. Assimilation of loan-words,

6. International words.

Etymology is a branch of linguistics that deals with the origin and development of words, phrases, morphemes etc. An etymological survey of the English vocabulary may help us to get a better under­standing of the characteristic features of Modem English and the peculiarities of vocabulary units in present-day English,

The term * etymology* is derived from Greek morphemes 'etymos* - meaning ‘true’ and *logos* — science,

Etymology helps to trace a word or another form as far back as possible in its own language, and to its source in contemporary or earlier languages.

Thus we differentiate two terms - a source and origin of a unit. Source (of borrowing) is the language from which the word was taken into English (e.g., the source of ‘Soviet' is Russian, the source of ‘chair’ is French), Origin (of borrowing) is the language to which the word may be traced (e.g. the origin of 'chair’ is Greek - kathedra).

From the view point of etymological analysis there are two groups of words in Modern English - native and borrowed (loan words).

The term 'native’ is conventional, because by it we mean words whose origin cannot be traced to any other language, linguists have agreed to call 'native’ all the words which existed in English in the 7th century, because we can rely in this case on the earliest manuscripts in Old English,

Native English words come only to 30% of all the vocabulary units in Modern English, 70% are said to be borrowed from different languages, (But in speech we have quite the reverse picture -70% of all words used in speech are native, and only 30% are borrowed).

2. NATIVE WORD-STOCK.

The English language is a Germanic language of Indo-European family. So in the bulk of the native words we distinguish those of common Indo-European word-stock, of common Germanic word-stock and English proper.

Words of common Indo-European stock have cognates in other Indo-European languages - Latin, Greek, Russian, Sanskrit, etc, They present the oldest layer of the vocabulary. Among them we find terms of kinship, names of the most important objects and phenomena of nature, names of animals and birds, parts of human body, verbs denoting the primary actions, adjectives denoting concrete physical properties. E.g., mother - OE modor, L. mater, Russ. materi

father - OE faeder, L. pater, Gk. pjitar (f-p Grimm’ s law)

foot - L. ped .

fish - L. pisc

tree - OE treow , Gk. drus, Russ. drevo

red - L, rufus, Russ. rdet*, ruda

eat – L. edere. Russ. est* (edyat, edit*e)

Sit - Russ. sidet*

three - Gk. tri, Russ, tri

two - Lat, duo, Russ. dva

fire - Gk, pyro

A much bigger part of the native vocabulary is formed by words of common Germanic stock. They have parallels in German, Norwegian, Dutch, Icelandic etc,, but none in Russian, French, Latin, Greek.

Among these we can find summer, winter, rain, ice, house, room, life, rest, shirt, hat, shoe, bridge, etc.

Native words are characterized by the following features:

a) They are, as a rule, the most frequently used words,

b) Most of them are short (monosyllabic)

c) They are often polysemantic,

d) They are very active in word-building (form word families),

e) They enter a number of set expressions as component parts,

f) Most of them are neutral or standard colloquial.

E.g. HEART OE heorte, L. cor-dis, Gk. kardia

a) It belongs to the first 100 most frequently occurring words,

b) It consists of one morpheme (a root word),

c) The Advanced Learner's Dictionary of Current English by Hornby gives five meanings of this word: He had a heart attack, A man with a kind heart, in the heart of the forest; A queen of hearts. It is also used as a term of endearment,

d) Derived words: heart-ache, heart-beat, heart-break, heart-burn, hearty, heartily, heartless, heart-rending, wholehearted, kind-hearted, etc.

e) to lose one's heart to (to fall in love), to take smth to heart (be much affected by), to cry one's heart out (cry violently), to wear one's heart on one's sleeve (to show one's feelings too openly), to have one's heart in one's mouth (to be dismay), by heart (by or from memory), a heart-to-heart talk (plain speaking with nothing held back) etc,

f) It is neutral.