Onomatopoeia (Sound-imitation)
Words coined by this type of word-bilding are made by imitating different kinds of sounds that may be produced by animals, birds, insects, human beings and inanimate objects.
It is of some interest that sounds produced by the same kind of animal are frequently represented by quite different sound groups in different languages. For instance, English dogs bark (cf. the R. ). The English cock cries cock-a-doodle-doo (cf. the R. ---).
Reduplication
In reduplication new words are made by doubling a stem, either without any phonetic changes as in bye-bye (coll, 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.
Stylistically speaking, most words made by reduplication represent informal groups: colloquialisms and slang. E.g. walkie-talkie (a portable radio), riff-raff (the dregs of society , ), chi-chi (slang for chic () as in chi-chi girl)).
Back-Formation (Reversion)
The earliest examples of this type of word-building are the verb to beg that was made from the French borrowing beggar, to burgle from burglar, to cobble from cobbler. In all these cases the verb was made from the noun by subtracting what was mistakenly associated with the English suffix - er. The pattern of the type to work worker was firmly established in the subconscious of English-speaking people at the time when these formations appeared, and it was taken for granted that any noun denoting profession or occupation is certain to have a corresponding verb of the same root. So, in the case of the verbs to beg, to burgle, to cobble ( ) the process was reversed: instead of the noun made from a verb by affixation (as in painter 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.
Answer these questions.
1. What is understood by composition? What do we call words made by this type of word-building?
2. Into what groups and subgroups can compounds be subdivided structurally? Illustrate your answer with examples.
3. Which types of composition are productive in Modern English?
4. What are the interrelationships between the meaning of a compound word and the meanings of its constituent parts?
5. What are the criteria for distinguishing between a compound and a word-combination?
6. What are the italicized elements in the words given below? What makes them different from affixes? from stems?
states man, water proof, cat- like.
7. What are the two processes of making shortenings? Explain the productivity of this way of word-building and stylistic characteristics of shortened words. Give examples.
8. What minor processes of word-building do you know? Describe them and illustrate your answer with examples.
Vocabulary
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ambiguous
arbitrary
back-formation, reversion
blend
cohesion
contribute
correlation
enigmatic
homogeneous
hyphenated ,
misleading
onomatopoeia ,
overabundance
preserve
reduplication
gradational reduplication
semi-affixes
subconscious
subtraction
trace ,
Lecture 8
What is Meaning?
(pp. 129-142)
Meaning.
2. Semantics.
3. Polysemy.
Two levels of analysis.
5. Types of semantic components.
6. Meaning and context.
7. Different meanings and different usages.
- Meaning
The very function of the word as a unit of communication is made possible by its possessing a meaning. Therefore, among the words various characteristics, meaning is the most important. Meaning can be described as a component of the word through which a concept is communicated, in this way endowing the word with the ability of denoting real objects, qualities, actions and abstract notions. The relationships between referent (object etc. denoted by the word), concept and word are represented by the triangle:
Thought or Reference
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By the symbol here is meant the word; thought or reference is concept. The dotted line suggests that there is no immediate relation between word and referent: it is established only through the concept.
2. The branch of linguistics which specializes in the study of meaning iscalled semantics.
The modern approach to semantics is based on the assumption that the inner form of the word (i.e. its meaning) presents a structure which is called the semantic structure of the word.
Polysemy
The semantic structure of the word does not necessarily stand for one concept. It is known that most words convey several concepts and thus possess the corresponding number of meanings. A word having several meanings is called polysemantic, and the ability of words to have more than one meaning is described by the term polysemy.
Two questions may arise in connection with polysemy:
1. Is polysemy an anomaly or a general rule in English vocabulary?
2. Is polysemy an advantage or a disadvantage so far as the process of communication is concerned?
Polysemy is certainly not an anomaly. Most English words are polysemantic. It should be noted that the wealth of expressive resources of a language largely depends on the degree to which polysemy has developed in the language. If each word is found to be capable of conveying at least two concepts instead of one, the expressive potential of the whole vocabulary increases twofold. Hence, a well-developed polysemy is not a drawback but a great advantage in a language.
On the other hand, it should be pointed out that the number of sound combinations that human speech organs can produce is limited. Therefore at a certain stage of language development the production of new words by morphological means becomes limited, and polysemy becomes increasingly important in providing the means for enriching the vocabulary. From this it should be clear that the process of enriching the vocabulary does not consist merely in adding new words to it, but, also, in the constant development of polysemy.
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The complicated processes of polysemy development involve both the appearance of new meanings and the loss of old ones. Yet, the general tendency with English vocabulary at the modern stage of its history is to increase the total number of its meanings and in this way to provide for a quantitative and qualitative growth of the languages expressive resources.
Two levels of analysis
When analysing the semantic structure of a polysemantic word, it is necessary to distinguish between two levels of analysis.
a) On the first level, the semantic structure of a word is treated as a system of meanings. For example, the semantic structure of the noun fire could be presented as following (see also the scheme p.133):
II An instance of destructive burning: a forest fire.
Fire, n → I Flame → III Burning material in a fireplace: A camp fire.
IV The shooting of guns, etc: to open (cease) fire.
V Strong feeling, passion: a speech lacking fire.
The above suggests that meaning I (flame) holds a kind of dominance over the other meanings conveying the concept in the most general way whereas meanings II V are associated with special circumstances.
Meaning I (generally referred to as the main meaning) presents the centre of the semantic structure of the word holding it together. It is mainly through meaning I that meanings II V (they are called secondary meanings) can be associated with one another.
b) Yet, it is not in every polysemantic word that such a centre can be found. Some semantic structures are arranged on a different principle. In the following list of meanings of the adjectve dull one can hardly find a generalized meaning covering and holding together the rest of the semantic structure (see also p. 134):
Dull, adj
I. Uninteresting, monotonous, boring; e.g. a dull book, a dull film.
II. Slow in understanding, stupid; e.g. a dull student.
III. Not clear or bright; e.g. dull () weather, dull day.
IV. Not loud or distinct; e.g. a dull () sound.
V. Not sharp; e.g. a dull knife.
Yet, one distinctly feels that there is something that all these meanings have in common, and that is the implication of deficiency, be it of colour (m. III), wits (m. II), interest (m. I), sharpness (m. V). The implication of insufficient quality, of something lacking, can be clearly distinguished in each separate meaning.
The scheme of the semantic structure of dull shows that the centre holding together the complex semantic structure of this word is not one of the meanings but a certain component that can be singled out within each separate meaning. This brings us to the second level of analysis of the semantic structure of a word. The semantic structure of the word is divisible not only at the level of different meanings but, also, at a deeper level.
Each separate meaning seems to be subject to structural analysis in which it may be represented as sets of semantic components. In terms of componential analysis, one of the modern methods of semantic research, the meaning of a word is defined as a set of elements of meaning which are not part of the vocabulary of the language itself, but rather theoretical elements.
Therefore, the semantic structure of a word should be investigated at both these levels: a) of different meanings, b) of semantic components within each separate meaning. For a monosemantic word (i.e. a word with one meaning) the first level is excluded.
