Varieties of words.

Date: 2015-10-07; view: 1167.

Two approaches to language study.

There are two principle approaches in linguistic science to the study of language material : synchronic & diachronic . With regard to Special lexicology the synchronic approach is concerned with the vocabulary of a language as it exists at a given time . It's Special Descriptive lexicology that deals with the vocabulary & vocabulary units of a particular language at a certain time .

The diachronic approach in terms of Special lexicology deals with the changes & the development of vocabulary in the coarse of time . It is Special Historical lexicology that deals with the evaluation of the vocabulary units of a language as the time goes by .

The two approaches shouldn't be set one against the other . In fact, they are interconnected & interrelated because every linguistic structure & system exists in a state of constant development so that the synchronic state of a language system is a result of a long process of linguistic evaluation , of its historical development .

Closely connected with the Historical lexicology is Contrastive & Comparative lexicology whose aims are to study the correlation between the vocabularies of two or more languages & find out the correspondences between the vocabulary units of the languages under comparison .

Lexicology studies various lexical units . They are : morphemes , words , variable word-groups & phraseological units . We proceed from the assumption that the word is the basic unit of the language system , the largest on morphological & the smallest on syntactic plane of linguistic analyses . The word is a structural & semantic entity within the language system. The word as well as any linguistic sign is a two-faced unit possessing both form & content or , to be more exact , sound-form & meaning, e. g. boy – бой.

When used in actual speech the word undergoes certain modification & functions in one of its forms . The system showing a word in all its word-forms is called a paradigm . The lexical meaning of a word is the same throughout the paradigm . The grammatical meaning varies from one form to another . Therefore when we speak on any word as used in actual speech we

use the term “word” conventionally because what is manifested in the utterances is not a word as a whole but one of its forms which is identified as belonging to the definite paradigm . Words as a whole are to be found in the dictionary (showing the paradigm n – noun , v – verb ,etc).

Besides the grammatical forms of words there are lexical varieties which are called variants” of words .Words seldom possess only one meaning , but used in speech each word reveals only that meaning which is required.

e. g. to learn at school to make a dress

to learn about smth. /smbd. to make smbd. do smth.

These are lexico-semantic variants .

There are also phonetic & morphological variants .

e. g. “often” can be pronounced in two ways, though the sound-form is slightly changed , the meaning remains unchangeable . We can build the forms of the word “to dream” in different ways :

to dream – dreamt – dreamt

dreamed–dreamed

These are morphological variants . The meaning is the same but the model is different .

Like words-forms variants of words are identified in the process of communication as making up one & the same word . Thus , within the language system the word exists as a system & unity of all its forms & variants .

Methods of investigation . Contrastive analysis .

Contrastive linguists attempt to find out similarities & differences in both related & non-related languages . Contrastive analysis grew as the result of the practical demands of a language-teaching methodology , where it was empirically shown that the errors which are made by foreign language students can be often traced back to the differences in structure between

the target language & the language of the learner . This naturally implies the necessity of a detailed comparison of the structure of a native & a target language . This procedure has been named contrastive analysis .

People proceed from the assumption that the categories elements on the semantic as well as on the syntactic & other levels are valid for both languages .

e. g. Linking verbs can be found in English , French , German , Russian ,etc. Linking verbs having the meaning of “change & become” are differently represented in each of the languages. In English , for instance , “ become, come , grow , fall , run , turn “ ; in Russian –“ становиться “ are used. The task is to find out which semantic & syntactic features characterize the English set of linking verbs , the Russian linking verb & how they can be compared , how the English word-groups “ grow thin , get angry , fall ill “ correspond to Russian “похудеть, pассердиться , заболеть “.

Contrastive analysis is applied to reveal the features of sameness & difference in the lexical

meaning & the semantic structure of correlated words in different languages. Language learning

cannot be just a matter of substitution a new set of labels for the familiar ones of the mother tongue .It should be born in mind that though the objective reality exists outside human beings & irrespective of the language they speak , every language classifies reality in its own way by means of vocabulary units .

Statistical analysis .

Statistical techniques have been successfully applied in the analysis of various linguistic phenomena . Different structural types of words , affixes , the vocabularies of great writers & poets & even in the study of some problems of Historical Lexicology . Statistical regularities can be observed only if the phenomena under analysis are sufficiently numerous . Thus , the first requirement of any statistic investigation is the size of the sample

Immediate constituents analysis .

The theory of Immediate Constituents was originally elaborated as an attempt to determine the ways in which lexical units are relevantly related to one another . It was discovered that combinations of units are usually structured into hierarchial sets of binary constructions .

e. g. In the word-group “ a black dress in severe style “ we do not relate the indefinite article “a” to adjective “black” , “black” to “dress” , “dress” to “in” , “in” to “severe” , “severe” to “style” .We set up a structure which may be represented as “a black dress” & “in

severe style”.

Thus , the fundamental aim of immediate constituents analysis is to segment a set of lexical units into two maximally independent sequences & these maximally independent sequences are called immediate constituents .

The further segmentation of immediate constituents results in ultimate constituents , which means that further segmentation is impossible for no meaning can be found .

e. g. The ultimate constituents of the phrase given are “a” ,”black” , “dress” , “ in” , “severe” , “style” .

This method of analysis is extremely fruitful in discovering the derivational structure of words .

Distributional analysis .

Distributional analysis in its various forms is commonly used nowadays. By the term distribution” we understand the occurrence of a lexical unit relative to another lexical units of the same levels: words to words , morpheme to morphemes . In other words , by this term we understand the position which lexical unit occupies or may occupy in the text or in the

flow of speech . It is observed that a certain component of the word-meaning is described when the word is identified distributionally .

e. g. In the sentence

The boy__________ home . the missing word is easily identified as a verb . It may be “came , ran , went , goes” , but not as an adverb or a noun , or an adjective .

Thus , we see that the component of meaning that is distributionally identified is actually the part-of-speech meaning . It is also observed that in a number of cases words have different lexical meanings in different distributional patterns .

Transformational analysis .

Transformational analysis in lexicological investigations may be defined as repatterning (representing , reorganization ) of various distributional structures in order to discover difference or sameness of meaning of practically identical distributional patterns . As distributional patterns are in a number of cases polysemantic transformational procedures are of help not only in the analysis of semantic sameness / difference of the lexical units but also in the analysis of the factors that account for their polysemy . Word-groups of identical distributional structure when repatterned show that the semantic relations between words & consequently the meaning may be different .e. g. A pattern “possessive pronoun

”+”noun”(his car , his failure , his arrest, his kindness ). According to transformational analysis the meaning of each word-group may be represented as : he has a car , he failed , he was arrested , he is kind. In each of the cases different meaning is revealed : possession , action , passive action , quality .The rules of transformation are rather strict & shouldn't be identified with paraphrasing in the usual sense of the term .There are many restrictions both on syntactic & lexical levels . These are :

Permutation – the repatterning on condition that the basic subordinative relationships between words & word-stems of the lexical units are not changed .e. g. “His work is excellent “ may be transformed into “ his excellent work , the excellence of his work , he works excellently “.In the example given the relationships between lexical units & the stems of the notional words are essentially the same .

Replacement – the substitution of a component of the distributional structure by a member of a certain strictly defined set of lexical units .e. g. Replacement of a notional verb by an auxiliary or link verb (he will make a bad mistake & he will make a good teacher ). The sentences have identical distributional structure but only in the second one the verb “to

make “ can be substituted by “ become “ or “ be “ . The fact of impossibility of identical transformations of distributionally identical structures is a formal proof of the difference in their meaning .

Addition ( or expansion ) may be illustrated by the application of the procedure of addition to the classification of adjectives into two groups-adjectives denoting inherent & non-inherent qualities .

e. g. John is happy .

John is tall .

We add a word-group “ in Moscow “. We shall see that “ John is happy in Moscow .” has meaning while the second one is senseless . That is accounted by the difference in the meaning of adjectives denoting inherent (tall) & non-inherent(happy) qualities .

Deletion – a procedure which shows whether one of the words semantically subordinated to the other . e. g. The word-group “red flowers” may be deleted & transformed into “flowers” without making the sentence senseless: I like red flowers or I like flowers . The other word-group “red tape “ can't be deleted & transformed either into “ I hate tape “ or “I hate red “

because in both transformed sentences the meaning of the phrase “red tape”

means “bureaucracy” & it can't be divided into two parts .

Componental analysis .

In this analysis linguists proceed from the assumption that the smallest units of meaning are sememes or semes . e. g. In the lexical item “woman” several sememes may be singled out , such as human , not an animal, female, adult . The analysis of the word “girl” will show the following sememes :human , female , young . The last component of the two words differentiates them & makes impossible to mix up the words in the process of communication. It is classical form of revealing the work of componental analysis to apply them to the so called closed systems of vocabulary, for example, colour terms .

Method of semantic differential .

A word has not only one meaning & even one word usually implies some additional information which differentiates one word from another .

e. g. to like , to love , to adore , to warship . All the words denote positive feelings , characteristic of a human being . But each of them gives additional information on the so-called strength of feeling .

This is the connotational aspect which was singled out by the semantic differential – the method which was worked out by a group of American psycholinguists . Their technique requires the subjects to judge – a series of concepts with respect to a set of antonymic adjective scale .

e. g. A horse can be :

good – bad

fast – slow

strong – weak

hard – soft

happy – sad

The meaning of the divisions is that each of the quality may be gradated representing extremely good , very good , neither good nor bad ,slightly bad , extremely bad & these grades can be marked by a plus .And the horse may be very good , not bad , etc .

The revealed gradations showing some portion of quality helps to singled out such words which are usually referred to as neutral, expressive , archaic & new words proper – neologisms . All the methods of analysis are

applied in

Semasiology . Lexical meaning & its aspects .

Semasiology (or semantics ) is a branch of linguistics which studies meaning . Semasiology is singled out as an independent branch of lexicology alongside word-formation , etymology , phraseology & lexicography . And at the same time it is often referred to as the central branch of lexicology .

The significance of semasiology may be accounted for by three main considerations :

1. Language is the basic human communication system aimed at ensuring the exchange of information between the communicants which implies that the semantic side forms the backbone of communication .

2. By definition lexicology deals with words , morpheme & word-groups.All those linguistic units are two-faced entities having both form & meaning .

3. Semasiology underlines all other branches of lexicology . Meaning is the object of semasiological study .

However , at present there is no universally accepted definition of meaning or rather a definition reflecting all the basic characteristic features of meaning & being at the same time operational . Thus , linguists state that meaning is “one of the most ambiguous & most controversial terms in the theory of language “(Steven Ullman).Leech states that the majority of definitions turn out to be a dead end not only on practical but on logical grounds. Numerous statements on the complexity of the phenomenon of meaning are found on the Russian tradition as well by such linguists as А.А.Потебня , И.А.Бодуэн де Куртене , Щерба , Виноградов , А.И. Смiрницький & others .

However vague & inadequate , different definitions of meaning help to sum up the general characteristics of the notion comparing various approaches to the description of the content side of the language . There are three main categories of definitions which may be referred to as :

V analytical or referential definition of meaning

V functional or contextual definition of meaning

V operational or information-oriented definition of meaning

The best known analytical model of meaning is the so-called “basic triangle”.

Concept (or our thought)

Sound-form Word-object (referent)

They are connected directly that means that if we hear a sound-form a certain idea arises in our mind & the idea brings out a certain referent that exists in the reality . But the sound-form & the referent are connected indirectly because there are no objects or phenomena in the reality that predict a certain sound-form , that need to be named by a certain sequence of sounds . The strongest point in the approach is an attempt to link the notion of meaning with the process of naming the objects , processes or phenomena of concrete reality.

It has also been stated that the referential approach fails to account for that fact that one word may denote different objects & phenomena . That is the case of polysemy . On the other hand one & the same object may be denoted by different words & that is the case of synonymy .

Functional or contextual Proceeding from the assumptions that the true meaning of a word is to be found by observing what a man does with it not what he says about it , the

proponents of functional approach to meaning define it as the use of the word in the language . It has been suggested that the meaning of a word is revealed by substituting different contexts .

e. g. The meaning of the word cat may be singled out of contexts:

____________ catch mice.

I bought fish for my _____.

and similar sentences.

To get a better insight in to the semantics of a word it is necessary to analyze as many contexts in which it is realized as possible. The question arises – when to stop collecting different contexts & what amount of material is sufficient to make a reliable conclusion about the meaning of a word ? In practice a scholar is guided by intuition which amount to the

previous knowledge of the notions the given word denotes. Besides , there are contexts which are so infrequent that they can hardly be registered & quite obviously they have never been met by the speakers of the given language. Nevertheless being presented with a context a native speaker proceeds not from a list of possible contexts but from something else. The

functional approach to meaning is important because it emphasizes the fact that words are seldom if ever used in isolation & thus the meaning of a word is revealed only when it is realized in a context

Operational definition In this frame-work meaning is defined as information conveyed from the speaker to the listener in the process of communication. The definition is applicable both to words & sentences & thus overcomes one of the drawbacks of the referential approach. The problem is that it is more applicable to sentences than to words & even as such fails to draw a clear distinguishing line between the direct sense (that is meaning) & implication (that is additional information).

e. g. Thus the sentence “John came at 6 o'clock” besides the direct meaning may imply that John was 2 hours late, that he was punctual as usual , that it was a surprise for John to come , that he came earlier, that he was not expected at all & many others.

In each case the implication would depend on the concrete situation of communication.