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Методические рекомендации
по выполнению контрольных работ по лексикологии английского
языка
Для успешного выполнения контрольной работы необходимо:
1. Ознакомиться с вопросами к зачету или экзамену.
2. Изучить рекомендуемую литературу.
3. Внимательно прочитать тестовое задание и определить его тип:
а) если тип задания «множественный выбор», то необходимо выбрать
верный ответ их четырех или более вариантов ответов. Отметьте правильный
выбор и проверьте его правильность. Помните о том, что в некоторых
заданиях может быть несколько правильных ответов.
б) если тип задания «перекрестный выбор», то следует подобрать пары
из двух блоков по тем или иным признакам, указанным в задании.
в) если это задание со свободно конструируемым ответом, то
необходимо внимательно изучить материал по теме раздела, в которой
включено данное задание. Обратить особое внимание на основные понятия
темы.
г) если это задание на установление правильной последовательности,
то следует упорядочить варианты ответов согласно признаку, указанному в
задании.
4. Обратить внимание на примеры, так как некоторые задания
контрольной работы являются практическими.
Задания контрольной работы могут выполняться в свободной
последовательности. При возникновении затруднений следует обратиться к
рекомендуемой литературе и еще раз изучить материал.
Методические рекомендации
по организации самостоятельной работы студентов
Дисциплина «Лексикология» преподается на английском языке.
Дисциплина «Лексикология» занимает одно из центральных мест в
программе подготовки учителя иностранного языка. Общая теория слова
служит основой для изучения морфологических единиц языка, а также
обеспечивает преемственность и переход в научном исследовании к
явлениям других языковых уровней.
Специфика курса определяется тем, что он предназначен для студентов
изучающих английский язык как иностранный. Студентам важно не только
понять общие принципы организации лексики, но и развить навыки анализа
языкового материала, приобрести умение правильно выбирать и употреблять
слова в прагматических ситуациях. Теоретические аспекты лексикологии
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помогают разобраться в многообразии единиц, формирующих словарный
запас языка, и оценить значимость каждого элемента
в речевом
функционировании.
Дисциплина «Лексикология» имеет тесные связи с другими
дисциплинами, изучаемыми в рамках образовательной программы
подготовки учителя иностранного. Она опирается на такие дисциплины, как
практический курс иностранного языка и языкознание и является основой
для углубленного изучения дисциплин по перспективным направлениям
изучаемого иностранного языка, подготовки студентов к Итоговой
государственной аттестации.
Компетентностные задачи, решаемые в процессе освоения разделов
дисциплины «Лексикология», предполагают широкое использование
традиционных и современных форм, методов и технологий обучения,
направленных на развитие творческого мышления, овладение методами
анализа информации, выявления проблемных областей и нахождения
оптимальных вариантов решения, выработку навыков критического
оценивания различных точек зрения, четкого изложения и отстаивания
собственной позиции в устной и письменной форме, приобретение опыта
работы в команде, стимулирование к организации систематической и
самостоятельной работы по дисциплине, самоанализ, самоконтроль и
самооценку.
Программой дисциплины предусмотрено чтение лекций и проведение
лабораторных занятий. Лекционные занятия направлены на формирование
глубоких, систематизированных знаний лексикологии по разделам
дисциплины. На лабораторных занятиях формируются умения применять
полученные знания в конкретных ситуациях.
Лекционный курс основывается на сочетании классических
образовательных технологий с элементами проблемного обучения. Часть
лекционных занятий проводится с использованием информационных
технологий (презентаций Power Point).
На лабораторных занятиях применяются как традиционные, так и
современные образовательные технологии. При подготовке к лабораторным
занятиям студентам рекомендуется ознакомиться с тематикой предстоящего
занятия, повторить содержание лекций по соответствующим темам,
ознакомиться с рекомендуемой учебной литературой, выполнить задания и
упражнения, которые были заданы на предыдущем лабораторном занятии.
Theme: Lexicology as a Branch of Linguistics
I. Questions for the discussion:
1. The vocabulary of a language as an object of Lexicology.
2. The main approaches to language study.
3. Branches of Lexicology.
4. The word as a basic unit of the language.
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5. The connection of Lexicology with other branches of Linguistics.
6. The basic problems of the course of English Lexicology.
II. Practical assignments:
Analyse the following definitions of Lexicology:
1. Lexicology is a branch of Linguistics.
2. Lexicology is a branch of Linguistics as well as Phonetics, Grammar,
Stylistics and some others.
3. Lexicology is a linguistic discipline whose task is a systemic description
of the vocabulary of the language in respect to its origin, development and current
use.
4. Lexicology is one of the branches of science dealing with the vocabulary
of the language and the properties of words as the main units of language.
5. Lexicology is a branch of Linguistics that presents a wide area of
knowledge within which there distinguished General Lexicology and Special
Lexicology, Historical Lexicology and Descriptive Lexicology, Comparative
Lexicology, Contrastive Lexicology, Applied Lexicology.
6. Lexicology is a branch of Linguistics with two principle approaches to the
study of language material, namely the synchronic and the diachronic.
7. Lexicology is a term composed of two Greek morphemes: “lexis”
denoting “word”, “phrase” and “logos” denoting “learning, a department of
knowledge”.
Complete the following sentences:
1. The general study of words and vocabulary, irrespective of the specific
features of any particular language is …
2. The Lexicology of a particular language (e.g. English, Russian, etc.), i.e.
the study and description of its words and vocabulary is …
3. Lexicology which deals with the origin of various words and their historic
change in the course of language development throughout time is …
4. Lexicology which concerns the investigation of the vocabulary of a given
language at a given stage of its development is …
5. The approach which is concerned with the vocabulary of a language as it
exists at a given time is …
6. The approach which deals with the changes and the development of
vocabulary in the course of time is …
7. Lexicology which studies closely related languages from the point of view
of relationships between language families is …
8. A new type of studies, aimed at establishing facts of typological
similarities and differences between both related and unrelated languages is …
9. Lexicology which covers terminology, lexicography, translation,
linguodidactics and pragmatics of speech is …
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10. Lexicology which aims at giving a systematic description of the wordstock of Modern English is …
Semasiology: Semantic Structure of English Word
I. Questions for the discussion:
1. Results of semantic change (restriction of meaning, extension of meaning,
amelioration of meaning, deterioration of meaning).
2. Polysemy as the ability of a word to possess several meanings.
3. Approaches to the phenomenon of polysemy. Types of meanings of
polysemantic words.
4. Homonymy. Types of homonyms.
5. Homonymy. Sources of homonymy.
6. Polysemy and homonymy: criteria of differentiation.
II. Practical assignments:
Read the words’ stories and identify the results of their semantic development.
The results are: a) generalization; b) specialization; c) amelioration; d)
pejoration:
1. The noun picture used to refer only to a representation made with paint.
Today it can be a photograph or a representation made with charcoal, pencil or any
other means.
2. The adjective nice – from the Latin nescius for “ignorant” – at various
times before the current definition became established meant “foolish”, then
“foolishly precise”, then “pedantically precise”, then “precise in a good way” and
then its current definition.
3. Worm was a term for any crawling creature, including snakes.
4. From 1550 to 1675 silly was very extensively used in the sense
“deserving pity and compassion, helpless”. It is a derivative of the Middle English
seely, from the German selig, meaning “happy, blissful, blessed, holy” as well as
“punctual, observant of season”.
5. The earliest recorded meaning of the word pipe was “a musical wind
instrument”. Nowadays it can denote any hollow oblong cylindrical body.
6. Radiator was used for anything that radiated heat or light before it was
applied specifically to steam heat or a vehicle and an aircraft.
7. Consider blackguard. In the lord’s retinue of the Middle Ages served
among others the guard of iron pots and other kitchen utensils, black with soot.
From the immoral features attributed to these servants by their masters comes the
present scornful meaning of the word blackguard – “a scoundrel”.
8. Revolutionary, once associated in the capitalist mind with an undesirable
overthrowing of the status quo, is now widely used by advertisers as a signal of
desirable novelty.
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9. The word saloon originally referred to any large hall in a public place.
The sense “a public bar” developed by 1841.
10. Lewd started out denoting those who were lay people as opposed to
clergy. Since the clergy were educated and the lay people, by and by, were not, it
then came to denote those who were ignorant, and from there – to obscene, clearly
with worse connotations.
11. The verb kidnap has come into wide use in the meaning “to take a child
away illegally and usually by force, in order to demand especially money for their
safe return”. Now it implies any person, not only a child.
12. Crafty, now a disparaging term, originally was a word of praise.
13. Target originally meant “a small round shield” but now it means
“anything that is fired at” and figuratively “any result aimed at”.
14. The word lean no longer brings to mind emaciation but athleticism and
good looks.
15. Voyage in earlier English meant “a journey”, as does the French voyage,
but is now restricted mostly to journeys by sea.
16. The word hussy means today “an ill-behaved woman, a jade, a flirt”. Yet
in Middle English, it denoted a perfectly reputable woman (a housewife).
17. Butcher dates from the 13th century as a term denoting the person who
prepared and cut up any kind of meat. Previously it referred to a specialist in goat’s
meat, often salted because it was tough – this fact indicates how low the
consumption of beef had been in the Middle Ages.
18. The adjective shrewd formerly meant “malicious, wicked; cunning,
deceitful”. Then it came to mean “sharp-witted; having practical common sense”.
Read the longer and more detailed stories of the word’ semantic development
and say to what main result it led in each case:
1. Centuries ago, King Edward I of England decreed that gold and silver
needed to be tested and approved by master craftsmen before it could be sold.
Artisans would send finished metal goods to Goldsmith's Hall in London to be
checked, and if those items met the quality standards of the craft-masters there,
they would be marked with a special seal of approval. At first, people used
hallmark to name that mark of excellence from Goldsmith’s Hall, but over the
years the word has come to name any sign of outstanding talent, creativity, or
excellence.
2. In Old English, sibb occurs as a noun meaning “kinship” and as an
adjective meaning “related by blood or kinship”. A modern descendant of sibb is
sibling “one of two or more persons who have the same parents”. By the 11th
century, a compound had been formed from the noun sibb prefixed by god, the
ancestor of the Modern English god. A godsibb, therefore, was a person spiritually
related to another, specifically by being a sponsor at baptism. Today we would call
such a person godmother or godfather, using god in the same way. By the 14th
century, the d had begun to disappear in both pronunciation and spelling, and
godsibb developed into gossib and then gossip, the form which is used today. The
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meaning, too, had begun to change, and the sense of gossip as “a close friend or
comrade” developed alongside the sense of “a godparent”. From there it was only a
short step to the gossip of today, a person no longer necessarily friend, relative, or
sponsor, but someone filled with irresistible titbits of rumour.
3. In various Middle English texts, one finds a fish, an ant, or a fox called
der, the Middle English ancestor of the word deer. In its Old English form deor,
this word referred to any animal, including members of the deer family, and
continued to do so in Middle English, although it also acquired the meaning
“deer”. By the end of the Middle English period, around 1500, the first sense had
all but disappeared. It is interesting to note that when Shakespeare uses the
expression mice and rats, and such small deer for Edgar's diet in King Lear,
probably written in 1605, one is not sure whether deer has the first or the second
meaning.
4. In 1923, a play called R.U.R. opened in London and New York. As well
as having a successful run, the play made a lasting contribution to vocabulary by
introducing the word robot into English. The author, Karel Capek, coined robot
from the Czech robota, meaning “forced labour”. In R.U.R. (which stands for
Rossum’s Universal Robots in the English translation) mechanical men originally
designed to perform manual labour become so sophisticated that some advanced
models develop the capacity to feel and hate, and eventually they destroy mankind.
Robot caught on quickly on both sides of the Atlantic, and within a very few years
it was being used to denote not only “a complex machine that looks somewhat
human” but also “a person who has been dehumanized through the necessity of
performing mechanical, mindless tasks in a highly industrialized society”. Today
robot is also used widely in both scientific and nonscientific circles as a term for
“any automatic apparatus or device that performs functions ordinarily ascribed to
human beings or operates with what appears to be almost human intelligence”.
5. In earlier writings, one finds phrases such as a senile maturity of
judgment and green and vigorous senility, demonstrating that senile and senility
have not always been burdened with their current connotations. Even though senile
(first recorded in 1661) and senility (first recorded in 1778) initially had neutral
senses such as “pertaining to old age»(the sense of their Latin source – the
adjective senilis), it is possible that the mental decline that sometimes accompanies
old age eventually caused negative senses to predominate. Although recent medical
research has demonstrated that the memory and cognitive disorders once
designated by senility are often caused by various diseases rather than the aging
process itself, it seems unlikely that the word will regain its neutral senses.
Do the meanings given below belong to a) one and the same polysemous word or
b) homonymous words? Use several dictionaries to support your point of view:
1. SCHOOL
• a place of education for children
• a large group of one kind of fish
or certain other sea animals swimming
together
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2. BUG
3. RIFLE
4. BASS
5. SPLEEN
6. VAULT
7. TANK
• any small insect
• an apparatus for listening secretly
to other people’s conversations
• to make grooves (curved cuts)
inside the barrel of a gun so as to make
the bullets spin
• to search through and steal
everything valuable from (e.g. a desk,
drawers, handbag, etc.)
• (a man with) the lowest male
singing voice, below baritone
• a fresh-water or salt-water fish
that can be eaten
• a small organ near the upper end
of the stomach that controls the quality
of the blood supply and produces
certain blood cells
• violent
anger,
especially
expressed suddenly
• a roof or ceiling made out of a
number of arches, as in many churches
• a jump over something in one
movement using the hands or a pole to
gain more height
• a large container for storing liquid
or gas
• an enclosed heavily armed and
armoured vehicle that moves on two
endless metal belts
Say in which of the following items: a) the meanings of a polysemous word are
realized, b) the meanings of two homonyms are realized. Use several dictionaries
1. a tent pole – from pole to pole
2. a string of green beads round her neck – beads of sweat on her face
3. a good ear for music – an ear of wheat
4. three cracked ribs – the ribs of an umbrella
5. a slice of buttered toast – to propose a toast to the bride and groom
6. the bright beam of the car's headlights – “Raise High the Roof Beam,
Carpenters” (J.D. Salinger)
7. roast beef – My main beef is that it went on too long
8. the spring of a watch – in spring and in autumn
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Which linguistic phenomenon are these jokes based on: a) polysemy, b)
homonymy? Give your reasons for the choice made.
1) – My grandfather lived to be ninety and never used glasses.
– Well, lots of people prefer to drink from a bottle;
2) An ex-serviceman staying at one of the hotels in California wrote to his
friend: “I came up here for a change and rest. The waiters in this hotel take the
change and the proprietor takes the rest”.
3) – Why did they hang that picture?
– Perhaps because they couldn't find the artist.
4) – What are you reading? – asked the prison librarian.
– Nothing much, – replied the prisoner. – Just the usual escape literature.
5) – Your husband boasts he runs things in his family.
– He does – the lawn mower, the washing machine, the vacuum cleaner, the
baby carriage and the errands.
6) You know, somebody actually complimented me on my driving today.
They left a little note on the wind-screen; it said “Parking Fine”. So that was nice.
Find the homonyms which appeared due to the process of divergent meaning
development:
1. see (видеть) – sea (море)
2. flower (цветок) – flour (мука)
3. ball (мяч) – ball (бал)
4. tear (слеза) – tear (разрывать).
Find the homonyms which appeared due to the process of convergent sound
development:
1. love (n.) – love (v.)
2. finger (n.) – finger (v.)
3. paper (n.) – paper (v.)
4. lead (n.) (свинец) – lead (v.) (вести)
Theme: Word-structure. Morphological Structure
I. Questions for the discussion:
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1. A morpheme. Its definition, properties, types.
2. Semantic classification of morphemes.
3. Structural classification of morphemes.
4. Types of meaning in morphemes and morphemic types of words.
5. Segmentability of a word and its types.
6. Immediate and ultimate constituents. Morphemic analysis.
II. Practical assignments:
1. Analyse the following words morphologically:
ailment, air, beggarly, calculable, disturbance, drawback, elephantine,
eternity, expressionless, eyelet, fair-minded, fruitfulness, gossip, governmental,
indomitable, inflammability, intake, judicious, knowledge, memorize,
nourishment, overpowering, priggish, reconciliation, renowned, runner, speechless,
transgressor, unsystematic, workmanship
2. Retell the following a) in terms of word-formation vs. morphologic divisibility;
b) in terms of lexical morphemes vs. grammatical morphemes:
Words as things uttered split up into phonemes, but phonemes do not take
meaning into account. We do not play on the phonemes of a word as we play on
the keys of a piano, content with mere sound; when we utter a word we are
concerned with the transmission of meaning. We need an appropriate kind of
fission, then – one that is semantic, not phonemic. Will division into syllables do?
Obviously not, for syllables are mechanical and metrical, mere equal ticks of a
click or beats in a bar. If I divide (as for children’s reading primer) the word
“metrical” into “met-ri-cal”, I have learned nothing new about the word: these
three syllables are not functional as neutrons, protons, electrons are functional. But
if I divide the word as “metr-; -ic; -al”; I have done something rather different. I
have indicated that it is made of the root “metr-“, which refers to measurement and
is found in “metronome” and, in a different phonetic disguise, in “metre”,
“kilometer”, and the rest; “-ic”, which is an adjectival ending found also in “toxic”,
“psychic”, etc., but can sometimes indicate a noun, so that “metric” itself can be
used in a phrase like “Milton’s metric” with full noun status; “-al”, which is an
unambiguous adjectival ending, as in “festal”, “vernal”, “partial”. I have split
“metrical” into three contributory forms which (remembering that Greek morph –
means “form”) I can call morphemes.
Let us now take a phrase or sentence and attempt a more extended analysis.
This will do: “Jack’s father was eating his dinner very quickly”. Here I would
suggest the following fission: 1) “Jack”; 2) “-‘s”; 3) “father”; 4) “was”; 5) “eat”; 6)
“-ing”; 7) “hi-“; 8) “-s”; 9) “dinner”; 10) “very”; 11) “quick”; 12) “-ly” – making a
total of twelve morphemes. “Jack” can exist on its own, but the addition of -’s (a
morpheme denoting possession) turns a proper noun into an adjective. “Father”
cannot be reduced to smaller elements, for, though “-er” is an ending common to
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four nouns of family relationship, “fath-” on its own has no more meaning than
“moth-” or “broth-” or “sist-”. “Eat” can be an infinitive or imperative, but the
suffix “-ing” makes it into a present participle. “Hi-” signals an aspect of the
singular masculine personal pronoun, but it can have no real meaning until it is
completed by the objective ending “-m” or, as here, the “-s” denoting possession.
“Dinner” is indivisible, for “din” on its own belongs to a very different semantic
area... Finally, “quick” is an adjective; the morpheme “-ly” turns it into an adverb.
It will be seen from the above that morphemes fall into two classes. There
are those which cannot stand on their own but require to be combined with another
morpheme before they can mean anything – like “-’s”, “-ing”, “hi-”, “-ly”. We can
call these bound forms, or helper morphemes. The other morphemes are those
which can stand on their own, conveying a meaning and these can be called free
forms or semantemes (“meaning forms”).
(Anthony Burgess. Words)
3. Find in the text that follows words in which the root and the stem formally
coincide:
For the moment – but only for the moment – it will be safe to assume that
we all know what is meant by the word “word”. I may even consider that my
typing fingers know it, defining a word (in a whimsical conceit) as what comes
between two spaces. The Greeks saw the word as the minimal unit of speech; to
them, too, the atom was minimal unit of matter. Our own age has learnt to split the
atom and also the word. If atoms are divisible into protons, electrons and neutrons,
what are words divisible into?
(Ibid.)
4. Classify the following words according to what part of speech they belong to
and to their morphological structure:
writer, disappointment, break, wonderful, tree, book, unknown, notebook,
egg, go, handbook, re-write, high, cry, well-dressed, railroad, highly, black, effect,
morphologically, superman, blackness, chocolate, good, readable, student, rootword, effective, classification, compare, theatre-goer, strange, accordingly,
unpleasant, bookworm, classroom, highlight, blackboard, high-priced
5. Which unit does not belong to the set from the morphological point of view?
1. ringlet, leaflet, booklet, hamlet
2. cranberry, elderberry, waxberry
3. locket, pocket, hogget, lionet
4. telegraph, telephone, telethon, telegram
6. Analyse the morphological structure of the underlined words: identify the
number of morphemes and their types according to the semantic and the
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structural classifications of morphemes. Take into account such units as semiaffixes (semi-prefixes, semi-suffixes), pseudo-morphemes, unique roots,
combining forms.
Mоdel: Suddenly she felt anxious again (L. Fosburgh).
In the word anxious, there are 2 morphemes: anxi- is a root, a bound morpheme, ous is a suffix, a bound morpheme.
But anyone with the least flair for psychology can perceive at once that the exact
opposite was the truth (A. Christie).
There are two points of view concerning the word perceive:
1) there are two pseudo-morphemes – the prefix per- and the root -ceive;
2) there is only one root morpheme.
Healthy self-esteem should not be confused with self-centeredness (from the
Internet).
In the word self-centeredness, there are 4 morphemes: center- is a root, a free
morpheme, self- is a semi-prefix, -ed is a suffix, a bound morpheme, -ness is a
suffix, a bound morpheme.
1. To be natural is to be obvious, and to be obvious is to be inartistic (O.
Wilde).
2. A weak mind is like a microscope, which magnifies trifling things, but
cannot receive great ones (Earl of Chesterfield).
3. Before two o’clock they were on the march and set off in a northeasterly
direction... (C.S. Lewis).
4. “I suppose in a way I shall enjoy this,” the Marquis said, “but my disguise
must be foolproof." (B. Cartland).
5. Harris said he didn't think George ought to do anything that would have a
tendency to make him sleepier than he always was, as it might be dangerous (J.K.
Jerome).
6. But now, as part of his plan, he went out of his way to be cordial to such
people (A. Hailey).
7. “I know, Penelope,” he said ashamedly (L. Kennedy).
8. His health made him ill-fitted for hard labor (Random House Webster’s
Unabridged Dictionary).
9. And he would take the rule, and remeasure, and find that he wanted half
thirty-one and three-eighths inches from the corner and would try to do it in his
head, and go mad (J.K. Jerome).
10. ...I frequently shared with you my last pot of strawberry jam... (P.G.
Wodehouse).
11. She sounded uncharacteristically anxious (I. Shaw).
12. “Your history is perfect, like Desiree’s geography.” said I dryly (R.
Stout).
12
13. She simply sat there, semi-smiling at me (E. Segal).
14. The kiss was delicious (I. Shaw).
15. He completed the circuit of the pit without sighting his cousin and he
frowned and cursed the man’s unreliability under his breath (S. Fraser).
16. For a moment, the woman’s inquisitiveness had bothered me and I halfdecided to put her in a cab after dinner... (I. Shaw).
17. A newspaper was on the bed – a half-smoked cigar balanced against his
reading-lamp (K. Mansfield).
18. Many a man is bitterly disillusioned after marriage when he realizes that
his wife cannot solve a quadratic equation (S. Leacock).
19. He was out of the door, moving fast, but still preserving a statesmanlike
decorum (I. Shaw).
20. He had not yet taken the measure of this sire of his, who was as full of
unexpectedness as a girl at her first party (O. Henry).
21. I suppose a psychologist would say that she had a guilty passion for
Crale and therefore killed him (A. Christie).
Theme: Word-structure. Derivative Structure
I. Questions for the discussion:
1. Derivative structure and two basic classes of words. The basic elementary
units of the derivative structure.
2. Derivational bases:
a) derivational bases that coincide with morphological stems;
b) derivational bases that coincide with word-forms;
c) derivational bases that coincide with word-groups of different degrees
of stability.
3. Derivational affixes.
4. Derivational patterns:
a) structural formulas;
b) structural patterns;
c) structural-semantic patterns.
II. Practical assignments:
1. Analyse the following words pointing out simplexes and derivatives:
hand, simplify, unknown, come, blue, friendliness, uneasy, anxious,
overestimate, theory, school-masterish, unmistakable, public, obviously, split,
discouraging, same, very, nothing, tree, ex-husband, changeability, give,
polymorphic, root, word, echo, classroom, day-dreamer, life.
13
2. Group derivational bases of the given words into three structural classes: a)
bases that coincide with morphological stems of different degrees of complexity;
b) bases that coincide with word-forms; c) bases that coincide with word-groups.
Model: colour-blindness, unwrapped, white-skinned
The derivational base of the word colour-blindness coincides with the compound
morphological stem colour-blindness which consists of one simple and one derived
stem (class a). The derivational base of the word unwrapped coincides with the
verbal word-form -wrapped – the past participle (class b). The derivational base
of the word white-skinned coincides with the word-group white skin (class c):
Illiterateness, water-skier, unprotected, brainstruster1, three-cornered, friendliness,
allrightnik, impossible, green-eyed, pains-taking, landlordism, absent-minded,
brainless, understandingly, weather-beaten, long-legged, broaden, heart-breaking,
freestyler, seemingly, livelihood, uninspiring, back-bencher, acceptability, dogoodism, laughingly, do-it-yourselfer, unimportance, one-sided, unnamed,
allatonceness, familiarity, whitefeathery, snow-covered, weekender, long-running,
idletalker.
3. Give structural formulas of the following words. Classify the words into: 1)
suffixal derivatives; 2) prefixal derivatives; 3) conversions; 4) compound words.
Model: blackness, table-cloth
1. The structural formula of the word “blackness” is a + -sf → N. The given word
is a suffixal derivative. The structural formula of the word “table-cloth” is n + n
→ N. “Table-cloth” is a compound word.
to paper, speechless, pen-holder, irreplaceable, nothingness, to winter, agelong, fearsomely, sharpen, wind-driven, independence, ex-housewife
4. Give structural patterns of the following words. State to what parts of speech
and lexical subsets affixes refer the given derivatives.
Model: threesome
The structural pattern of the word “threesome” is num + -some → N. The
derivational pattern signals a set of nouns with the lexical meaning of “a group
consisting of a certain number of people”.
1
Brains trust — (Brit.) a group of experts who give impromptu (not planned or prepared) answers to questions on topics of
general or current interest in front of an audience or on the radio.
14
yearly, engineer, diseased, completion, incurable, to ape, fair-haired,
customary, overtime, miscalculation.
5. Give structural-semantic patterns of the following words. Specify semantic
peculiarities of derivational bases and individual meanings of affixes of the
words under analysis.
Model: ex-president, ex-secretary, ex-journalist, ex-policeman
The structural-semantic pattern of the given words is ex- + n → N. In this
derivational pattern the nominal bases are confined to nouns denoting professions.
The prefix ex- combined with these bases possesses the meaning “former”.
1) Londoner, villager, New Yorker, towner;
2) tallish, thinnish, biggish, longish, lowish;
3) lungful, armful, mouthful, handful;
4) savagery, foolery, snobbery, roguery;
5) decency, complacency, obstinacy, hesitancy;
6) advocacy, accountancy, presidency, consultancy;
7) demist, defrost, deice, dewater, degas;
8) rapidly, slowly, gradually, quickly;
9) schoolmate, clubmate, flatmate, roommate;
10) joyful, delightful, hateful, cheerful, sorrowful.
6. Read the following text and find in it 3 – 5 structural patterns according to
which words (more than one) used in the text were built. Prove it giving
examples:
Spam (electronic)
Spam is the use of electronic messaging systems (including most broadcast
media, digital delivery systems) to send unsolicited bulk messages
indiscriminately. While the most widely recognized form of spam is e-mail spam,
the term is applied to similar abuses in other media: instant messaging spam,
Usenet newsgroup spam, Web search engine spam, spam in blogs, wiki spam,
online classified ads spam, mobile phone messaging spam, Internet forum spam,
junk fax transmissions, social networking spam, television advertising and file
sharing network spam.
Spamming remains economically viable because advertisers have no
operating costs beyond the management of their mailing lists, and it is difficult to
hold senders accountable for their mass mailings. Because the barrier to entry is so
low, spammers are numerous, and the volume of unsolicited mail has become very
high. In the year 2011, the estimated figure for spam messages is around seven
trillion. The costs, such as lost productivity and fraud, are borne by the public and
by Internet service providers, which have been forced to add extra capacity to cope
with the deluge. Spamming has been the subject of legislation in many
jurisdictions.
15
People who create electronic spam are called spammers.
(from Wikipedia)
7. Complete the following sentences:
1. The basic elementary units of the derivative structure of words …
2. The derivative and derivative relations make …
3. Though the derivative structure of the word is closely connected with …
4. According to the derivative structure all words …
5. The analysis of the derivative structure reveals the hierarchy of …
6. The morphological stem of simple words …
7. Structurally derivational bases …
8. Derivational bases differ from morphological stems …
9. The most characteristic feature of simple stems in Modern English …
10. Derivational bases that coincide with word-forms are represented …
11. The greater the degree of structural complexity of the base …
12. The repatterning may result in …
13. Derivational affixes possess …
14. The part-of-speech meaning stands out clearly …
15. Derivational affixes semantically …
16. The lexical meaning in derivational affixes …
17. There exist a specific group of morphemes whose derivational
function …
18. Neither bases nor affixes alone can predict …
19. Derivational patterns are studied with the help of …
20. Structural formulas specify only …
21. Structural patterns specify …
22. Structural-semantic patterns specify …
23. Patterns of derivative structures are usually represented …
24. Derivational patterns may represent …
25. Derivative structure of the word …
Theme: Word-formation
I. Questions for the discussion:
1. Word-formation as a process of creating new words from the material
available in the language.
2. Productivity as the likelihood of a morphological pattern being used or
comprehended in new word formation.
3. Main and minor types of word-formation.
3.1. Derivation as a principle type of word-formation.
3.1.1. Affixation. Productive and non-productive affixes. Classifications
of affixes.
3.1.2. Conversion. Main types of conversion.
16
3.2. Word-composition. Types of compound words. Correlation between
compounds and free phrases.
4. Minor types of word-formation.
4.1. Back-formation.
4.2. Sound interchange.
4.3. Distinctive stress.
4.4. Sound imitation.
4.5. Blending. Additive and restrictive blending. Expressive blending.
4.6. Shortening (clipping). Final, initial and medial clipping.
4.7. Acronymy.
II. Practical assignments:
1. Which unit is the odd one out in each of the following sets?:
Set I
1. noun-forming suffixes: -or, -ive, -hood, -ism
2. adjective-forming suffixes: -able, -less, -ous, -ty
3. verb-forming suffixes: -ize, -ify, -ful, -ise
Set II
1. suffixes denoting the agent of an action: -er, -or, -ist, -ment
2. suffixes denoting nationality: -tion, -ian, -ese, -ish
3. suffixes denoting diminutiveness: -ie, -kin, -ock, -ster
4. suffixes denoting feminine gender: -ess, -age, -ine, -ette
5. suffixes having derogatory meaning: -ard, -ster, -ist, -ton
Set III
1. suffixes of native origin: -ful, -less, -able, -dom, -ish, -ship
2. suffixes of Romanic origin: -ment, -en, -eer, -age, -ance
3. suffixes of Greek origin: -ist, -ism, -ite, -nik
Set IV
1. prefixes of negative meaning:in-, non-, en-, un2. prefixes denoting repetition or reversal action: re-, pre-, dis-, de3. prefixes denoting space: sub-, inter-, trans-, mis4. prefixes denoting time and order: im-, fore-, pre-, post2. Find the cases of conversion in the sentences:
1. He took the cup she offered him and sugared it (B. Neels).
2. It was impossible for them to calm her (S. Sheldon).
3. She might come and room with her (Th. Dreiser).
17
4. However everything in life has positive and negative consequences and it
is sometimes a mistake to only see the negative (the Internet).
5. Truth will out (Proverb).
6. Besides, liquor dulled the pain in his legs... (P. La Mure).
7. Since I was the only child in their charge they mothered me (A. Marshall).
8. Seddons was wearing his hospital whites (A. Hailey).
9. His beard was caked with ice (L. Fosburgh).
10. ...it was merely a polite nothing (J.R.R. Tolkien).
11. Renie narrowed her brown eyes at her cousin (M. Daheim).
12. George’s main purpose in shooting such a big beast had been to attract
wild lions to the kill (J. Adamson).
13. A city to Raggles was not merely a pile of bricks and mortar, peopled by
a certain number of inhabitants... (O. Henry).
14. “That’s rather a tricky point,” Landy said, wetting her lips (R. Dahl).
15. Penreddy’s face clouded (M. Daheim).
16. Chew each bite carefully (Random House Webster’s Unabridged
Dictionary).
17. Mr. Wodehouse’s idyllic world can never stale (E. Waugh).
18. Actually I’ve been toying with this idea (F.M. Stewart).
19. She finished before an hour was up, tidied her desk and put on her coat...
(B. Neels).
20. A woman that will be and stay by my side to go through the ups and
downs that this life throws at us (Internet).
21. ...I minored in history (J. Smith).
22. She wrinkled her forehead (N. Shute).
23. On March, 31 in 1889, the Eiffel Tower in Paris, France, opened to the
public (Bright Ideas Calendar).
24. Judith gave a single shake of her head (M. Daheim).
25. He himself bandaged the wound... (Ph. Carr).
26. ...Lerice even keeps an eye on their children, with all the competence of
a woman who has never had a child of her own, and she certainly doctors them all
– children and adults – like babies whenever they happen to be sick (N. Gordimer).
3. One of the underlined words in the following examples was made from the
other by means of conversion. Identify the direction of derivation. Use several
dictionaries to check the results:
1. We must have breakfast together more often (J. Smith). The Jacksons
were breakfasting (P.G. Wodehouse).
2. She kissed Joe on the lips. He returned the kiss (M. Daheim).
3. It almost blinded me (M. Allingham). The room was fairly dark, but he is
not exactly blind and he was pink and apologetic when at last I got over, there to
admit him (M. Allingham).
4. We had a long wait for the bus (S. Redman). If we wait any longer, we
may miss the train (S. Redman).
18
5. It was a lengthy conversation and, judging by the frown on his face when
he had finished and she had gone back to her office, an unsatisfactory one (B.
Neels). I picked it up and frowned at it, while Brad came trotting after me (J.
Smith).
6. The driver braked hard as the child ran onto the road in front of him
(Oxford Advanced Learner’s Encyclopedic Dictionary). She put on the brakes
quickly (S. Redman).
7. Judith sighed (M. Daheim). Tessa uttered a vexed sigh (M. Daheim).
8. ...he informed me, holding his glass to the candle (J. Smith). At that point,
a little impish fancy began to take a hold of me (R. Dahl).
9. Freddy tried to gain control of his mount, but the terrified horse continued
to shy (M. Daheim). She discovered to her surprise that she didn’t feel shy with
him (B. Neels).
10. Judith gave a shrug (M. Daheim). Gertrude shrugged, making her heavy
cardigan sweater bag even more than usual (M. Daheim).
11. A light glimmered at the end of the passage (Longman Dictionary of
Contemporary English). Now there came a glimmer of a red light before them
(J.R.R. Tolkien).
12. It was a tease, sweetheart (J. Archer). She looked up and met his eyes,
still teasing her a little (N. Shute).
13. He set to work to grill the steaks while Jennifer laid out the rest of the
meal on a clean cloth upon the grass in the shade of a gum tree (N. Shute). They
cooked the steaks and ate them hot from the grill, sitting on the warm grass in the
shade of the trees, looking out over the blue, misty lines of hills (N. Shute).
14. He took a folded paper from his breast pocket, and began to spread it out
(N. Shute). She remembered the garden, scented with escallonia, and the lane that
led up onto the moor, and the view from the top, the spread of the bay, the brilliant
blue of the sea (R. Pilcher).
15. Judith chuckled back; Renie sipped her rye (M. Daheim). Just as Judith
was about to ask the bartender if he had a phone book handy, he uttered another
rich chuckle (M. Daheim).
4. Find the reduplicative compounds in the sentences. Determine their types:
a) a reduplicative compound proper, i.e. a compound which is formed by
the repetition of a stem;
b) an ablaut compound, i.e. a compound consisting of a basic free
morpheme (sometimes it is a pseudo-morpheme) which is repeated in the other
component with a different vowel, the typical changes being [i] – [ae], [i] – [o];
c) a rhyme compound, i.e. a compound consisting of two components
(most often pseudo-morphemes) which are joined to rhyme:
1. It will be a sharp lesson to him not to raise people’s hopes and shillyshally in this manner (P.G. Wodehouse).
2. And making a scene is a definite no-no (Cosmopolitan).
19
3. You know Mason’s book will be a mishmash of old magazine articles,
Eileen (J. Smith).
4. Skulls of deer, mice, squirrels, bear and even little itsy-bitsy things that
belonged to birds (L. Fosburgh).
5. The car was second-hand but there's nothing wrong with it and the paintwork is in tip-top condition (Internet).
6. ...and as he listened to the gay chit-chat of elegant women, or the
ponderous discourse of his political friends, he longed to be back among soldiers
with no ambition but to beat the Boche and no pleasure beyond waking each
morning to find oneself alive (P.P. Read).
7. He dreams of becoming rich and famous, but he lives in a never-never
land, I'm afraid (B. Lockett).
8. Two training planes piloted by air cadets collided in mid-air. The pilots
who had safely bailed out were interrogated about the accident.
“Why didn’t you take any evasive action to avoid hitting the other plane?”
“I did,” the first pilot explained, “I tried to zigzag.”
“And what?”
“But he was zigzagging, too, and zagged when I thought he was going to
zig.” (A joke).
9. He is rather conceited and a bit of a snob; the type we called hoity-toity
when we were children (the Internet).
10. The little house was very orderly and just big enough for all it
contained, though to some tastes the bric-a-brac in the parlour might seem excessive (U. Le Guin).
5. Find the clippings in the following contexts and identify their types:
a) an initial clipping;
b) a final clipping;
c) a medial clipping;
d) an initial and final clipping.
What are the words from which these clippings are formed?:
1. I got an “A minus” on the exam... (E. Segal).
2. They teach us vets all about animals’ souls (J. Herriot).
3. He had emptied the fridge, packed the food into a box, switched the fridge
off and left the door open (B. Vine).
4. Talking of the lab, we must send you for a blood test (A. Hailey).
5. Oh, my dear, I have a boy of fifteen. I’m a middle-aged gent. In another
two or three years I shall just be a fat old party (W.S. Maugham).
6. German immigrant Levi Strauss patented pants made of a sturdy, dark
blue material called serge de Nimes (fabric from Nimes, France) (Bright Ideas
Calendar).
7. Even before I got miserable marks in math and science they used to ask (J.
Smith).
20
8. So I did not say anything about the cracked lino, and the paintwork ail
chipped (M. Spark).
9. They’ve been on the phone for an hour (Oxford Advanced Learner’s
Encyclopedic Dictionary).
10. Next we heard a noise by the river and advancing carefully saw a hippo
cow and her calf feeding in the lush vegetation on the opposite bank П. Adamson).
11. Aref blew his whistle (E. Segal).
12. They had good jobs – Liz worked as a product development scientist –
and decided to postpone having children to concentrate on their careers (Cosmopolitan).
13. What makes you so sure I went to prep school? (E. Segal).
14. Jewish-American research scientist Dr. Jonas Salk developed the first
effective vaccine against polio during the 1950s (Bright Ideas Calendar).
15. He was an elegant old gentleman, as thin and tall as a trout rod, with
frazzled shirt-cuffs and specs on a black string (O. Henry).
16. It was the only labeled room in the condo (J. Grisham).
6. Find the blends (telescoped words) in the contexts. Determine what words (or,
rather, parts of words) these blends are built from:
1. The sky had a white glare and there was not much smog (R. Chandler).
2. I went back to the motel to phone Jenny (E. Segal).
3. So, before embarking on any major plastic surgery, discuss it carefully
with your doctor and consult Medicare and your health fund (New Idea).
4. Off duty, the self-confessed shopaholic declares she never wears one
designer head-to-toe. Instead, she mixes top labels and vintage couture with thriftshop finds (Cosmopolitan).
5. Ashley Patterson was on the gallows being hanged, when a policeman ran
up and said, “Wait a minute. She is supposed to be electrocuted.” (S. Sheldon).
6. Do you feel a pang of envy when you watch Friends, the hit sitcom in
which buddies live so closely and happily together? (Cosmopolitan).
7. Two new words have entered the fast-expanding vocabulary of mail-order
fashion. We can thank Kit, the cheap and cheerful fashion division of Great
Universal Stores, for “magalog” and “videolog”, natural offspring of the now
superseded catalogue and specialogue. The new Kit offering for this summer is
packaged as a glossy, full-colour 143-page fashion magazine, or magalog,
available at 7,000 newsagents, including major branches of W.H. Smith, for £1.50
(Daily Telegraph).
7. Find the abbreviations in the sentences and establish their types:
a) an alphabetic abbreviation;
b) an acronymic abbreviation.
Say which of them are graphical abbreviations:
21
1. “You’re frightfully B.B.C. in your language this afternoon, Albert,” said
Tuppence, with some exasperation (A. Christie).
2. And if you take that to mean that I think you’re all right – O.K., that’s
what I do think (J.M. Cain).
3. My cousin hadn’t met any of these people until they barged into her В &
В last week (M. Daheim).
4. In Nebraska barbers are breaking the law if they eat onions between the
hours of 7 a.m. and 7 p.m. (Life and Issues in the USA: Past and Present).
5. On the other side are the state of Maryland and the National Organization
for Women, even though their position would cost women money. “There’s an
important principle at stake,” explains Martha Davies of the NOW Legal Defense
and Education Fund. “Can women be treated differently as a class simply because
they are women?” (U.S. News & World Report).
6. I am an M.D., you know, and before I specialized I did a good deal of
general work in a hospital. The fact that I’m first and foremost a bacteriologist is
all to the good. It will be an admirable chance for research work (W.S. Maugham).
7. We overstretched ourselves slightly when we bought a run-down threebedroom house just outside London, but I was happy renovating it – DIY wasn’t
Mike’s thing (Cosmopolitan).
8. By shrewdly capitulating at the crucial moment – i.e., by pretending that I
suddenly wanted to – I got my book (E. Segal).
9. I hear the RSPCA had a man in court last week over a job like that (J.
Herriot).
10. Jenny at one time thought D.C. might be good... but I leaned toward
New York (E. Segal).
11. Yeah, but why is it I suddenly wish my name was Abigail Adams, or
Wendy WASP? (E. Segal).
12. As soon as she had been old enough, she had begun to help her mother
with the washing, in addition to attending the school; then her mother had died of
T.B. and her aunt had left the location with “another man” (D. Jacobson).
Etymology
I. Questions for the discussion:
1. Etymology as a branch of Linguistics dealing with the origin and history
of words. Reasons for borrowing words.
2. Words of native origin. Their semantic features, derivational potential and
classifications.
3. Borrowed words. Ways of borrowings words into a language. Types of
borrowings.
4. International words.
5. Assimilation of borrowings. Types of borrowed words according to the
degree of assimilation. Etymological doublets.
6. The influence of borrowings on the English vocabulary.
22
II. Practical assignments:
1. Subdivide the following words of native origin into: 1) words of IndoEuropean origin; 2) words of Common Germanic origin; 3) English words
proper. In case of difficulty consult the “Concise Oxford Dictionary of English
Etymology”:
Woman, blast (“gust of wind or air”), sister, glove, lady, tooth, always, slow,
green, know, daisy, sand, long, grass, flood, boy, seven, high, eat, sheriff, widow,
answer, life, lip, call, swine, small, bird, corn, silver, ten, day, lord, ship, we,
bench, sun, girl.
2. Write down in the space provided a letter, which indicates the language from
which the given words were borrowed:
a – Celtic
b – Latin
с – Scandinavian
d – French
e – Greek
f – Russian
g – Spanish
h – Italian
i – German
In case of difficulty consult the “Concise Oxford Dictionary of English
Etymology”:
Model: muzhik ... f
tobacoo ... g
stroll... i
cup ...
to cast ...
anemia ...
samovar ...
Avon ...
kindergarten ...
banana ...
law ...
government ...
violin ...
halt ...
fellow ...
London ...
promenade ...
umbrella ...
criterion ...
armada ...
Exe ...
cosmonaut ...
anger ...
motto ...
power ...
candle ...
mosquito ...
waltz ...
hormone ...
plant ...
verst ...
to take ...
nickel...
wall...
eponym ...
Kilbride ...
guerilla ...
poodle ...
lieutenant .
tornado ...
the Downs
kvass ...
bandit ...
interior ...
restaurant .
tundra ...
gondola ...
anamnesis
3. Match the translation borrowings on the left with the original phrases/words
on the right. State the origin of the latter:
23
Model: 11. under consideration – h) (Latin):
1. the moment of truth
2. word-combination
3. below one’s dignity
4. first dancer
5. that goes without saying
6. fellow-traveller
7. wonder child
8. vicious circle
9. famous case
10. collective farm
11. under consideration
a) infra dignitatem
b) Wunderkind
c) попутчик
d) el momento de la verdad
e) circulus vitiosus
f) колхоз
g) словосочетание
h) sub judice
i) cela va sans dire
j) cause célèbre
k) prima-ballerina
4. State the etymology of the given words. Write them out in three columns: a)
completely assimilated borrowings; b) partially assimilated borrowings; c)
unassimilated borrowings or barbarisms:
Torchère, wall, maharani, à la mode, datum, perestroika, gate, tête-à-tête,
want, chalet, ad hoc, sheikh, parlando, nucleus, parquet, matter, bagel, à la carte,
kettle, chauffeur, formula, pari-mutuel, shaman, finish, corps, alcazar, commedia
dell’arte, money, souvenir, bacillus, pas de deux, ill, spahi, stratum, nota bene,
spaghetti, ménage à trios, odd, memoir, parenthesis, hibakusha, padrona, incognito,
thesis, coup de maitre, tzatziki, sabotage, ad libitum, stimulus, Soyuz, alameda,
street, boulevard, criterion, déjà vu, torero, yin, Übermensch, macaroni, tzigane,
sensu lato, hypothesis, bagh, pousada, shiatsu, shapka.
5. Choose the correct translation for the underlined pseudointernational words:
Set I
1. He found them already eating marmalade (J. Galsworthy).
a) мармелад
b) варенье
2. For lunch... we could have biscuits, cold meat, bread and butter and jam...
(J.K. Jerome).
a) печенье, крекеры
b) бисквиты
3. A careful motorist strictly observes safety rules on the road.
a) автомобилист, водитель
b) моторист
24
4. She was taken to a clothes factory and became a good machinist.
а) машинистка
b) швея
5. Whisky-and-water was ordered, which was drunk upon the perron before
the house (W. Thackeray).
a) терраса, крыльцо
b) перрон
6. The chemist took a matrass from a shelf, poured in some fluid and corked
it.
a) матрас
b) колба, пробирка
7. No woman should ever be quite accurate about her age (O. Wilde).
a) аккуратная
b) точная
Set II
1. К чаю подали печенье и мармелад.
a) marmalade
b) candied fruit jelly
2. Пред диваном возвышался наполненный душистым шоколадом,
окруженный чашками, графинами с сиропом, бисквитами и булками, даже
цветами – огромный фарфоровый кофейник... (И.Тургенев).
a) biscuits
b) sponge-cakes
3. Кирилл начал с мотористов на теплоходе, но служба в армии сделала
его танкистом (А.Рыбаков).
a) motor-mechanic
b) motorist
4. Она не пошла работать машинисткой.
a) typist
b) machinist
5. Геннадий выбежал на перрон за шесть минут до отхода (В. Панова).
a) perron
b) platform
6. В витрине выставлены стулья, обитые черной клеенкой, куцая
цветастая тахта с толстыми валиками, белесый буфет и – дыбом –
пружинный матрац... (В.Панова).
25
a) mattress
b) matrass
7. Это был молодой инженер,
корректный... (Д. Мамин-Сибиряк).
a) accurate
b) thorough
аккуратный,
выдержанный
и
6. In the given sentences find etymological doublets. State their origin.
Model: I spent the afternoon reading under the shade of an umbrella.
The trees cast long, scary shadows in the evening light.
The etymological doublets are the words “shade” and” shadow”. They are of
Germanic origin”.
1. We tried to calm her, but she just screeched more loudly.
The audience shrieked with laughter.
2. He always stays in the best hotels.
He spent a week in hospital with food poisoning.
3. For birth rates in the 1990s, see the chart on page 247.
She sent me a lovely card on my birthday.
4. The Editor reserves the right to abridge readers’ letters.
This book is an abbreviated version of the earlier work.
5. This is advice for those who wish to save great sorrow and travail.
I have a job which involves quite a lot of travel.
6. Anne stayed close enough to catch the child if he fell.
The band have often been chased down the street by enthusiastic fans.
7. I didn’t know that his grandfather was a chieftain of the clan.
She was captain of the Olympic swimming team.
Theme: Word-groups and Phraseological Units
I. Questions for the discussion:
1. Word-group as a unit of language. Lexical and grammatical valency.
Cliché as a stereotyped expression.
2. Structure and classifications of word-groups.
26
3. Types of meaning of word-groups.
4. Motivation in word-groups.
5. Free word-groups and phraseological units.
6. Classifications of phraseological units:
a) classification of phraseological units according to the way they are
formed;
b) semantic classification of phraseological units;
c) structural classification of phraseological units;
d) syntactical (functional) classification of phraseological units;
e) contextual classification of phraseological units.
7. Sources of phraseological units.
8. Proverbs, sayings and quotations.
II. Practical assignments:
1. Analyse the lexical valency of the polysemantic words to run and to charge.
Translate the sentences into Russian:
to run
1. The horse runs. 2. The film runs for two hours. 3. The water runs. 4. The
tap runs. 5. His nose runs. 6. The motor runs. 7. The wine ran over the floor. 8.
The whole argument runs on this point. 9. She ran the water into the bath-tub. 10.
He ran his business well. 11. The icecream is beginning to run.
to charge
1. He charged the man ten cents for the pencil. 2. He charged the battery. 3.
He charged them to do their duty. 4. He charged these goods to the man’s account.
5. The soldiers charged the enemy. 6. I don't want to charge my memory with
trifles. 7. The judge charged him with the crime.
2. Translate the sentences into Russian paying special attention to the
grammatical valency of the italicized words. State the difference in the
grammatical valency of the corresponding words in the Russian and English
languages:
Mоdel: If you’re not sure of the answers, say so.
Если ты не уверен в ответах, так и скажи.
Russian: быть уверенным в чем-л. – English: to be sure of something.
1. He firmly believes that she is innocent of the crime.
2. I explained the situation to the bank manager and he arranged a loan.
3. Several children in the class cannot speak English.
4. Did the newspapers really affect the outcome of the election?
5. Robson strongly objected to the terms of the contract.
6. I first encountered him when studying at Cambridge.
27
7. A 23-year-old woman was found guilty of murder in the Central Court
today.
8. Her family strongly disapproved of her behaviour.
9. Don’t bother him with your complaints.
10. I’ll stay here and wait for Mike.
3. Read the passage below. Write out combinations of words distributing them
among the following groups: a) predicative; b) non-predicative. In the nonpredicative group single out coordinative word-combinations:
She was silent. Vaguely, as when you are studying a foreign language and
read a page which at first you can make nothing of, till a word or a sentence gives
you a clue; and on a sudden a suspicion, as it were, of the sense flashes across your
troubled wits, vaguely she gained an inkling into the working of Walter's mind. It
was like a dark and ominous landscape seen by a flash of lightning and in a
moment hidden again by the night. She shuddered at what she saw (from The
Painted Veil, XXVI by W. S. Maugham).
4. Taking into account the criterion of distribution, from the passage given in
task 3, write out: 1) endocentric; 2) exocentric word-combinations. What
subgroups of endocentric word-combinations can be singled out?
Model: “to study a language”. The word-combination to study a language is
endocentric. According to its central member, i.e. the verb to study, this wordcombination is verbal.
5. Arrange the word-groups according to the degree of their motivation, starting
with the highest:
1) gay bird, beautiful bird, blackbird;
2) cold wind, cold feet, cold war, cold hands;
3) light hand, light burden, light supper, light artillery;
4) blue funk (страх), blue skirt, blue stocking, blue fox;
5) big cheese, delicious cheese, white cheese, Swiss cheese;
6) wicked tongue, smoked tongue, coated tongue;
7) big boy, big house, big money, big talk;
8) angry tone, high tone, mental tone.
6. Classify the italicized phraseological units into: 1) phraseological fusions; 2)
phraseological unities; 3) phraseological collocations. Contexts will help you to
understand the meaning of phraseological units. In case of difficulty consult a
dictionary:
28
Model: to spill the beans. The phraseological unit “to spill the beans” means “to
give away information, deliberately or unintentionally”. It is a phraseological
fusion (group 1).
1. You can’t keep a secret – you see no reason why you shouldn’t spill the
beans.
2. “It's hard on Robert, of course,” Ned went on; he was trying to ignore the
red herring and get on with the story.
3. Well, let’s admit there were mistakes on both sides; we’ll bury the past
and try to make a fresh start.
4. He produced a huge silver case containing what looked at first sight like
small cheap cigars.
5. But other than dining out, which I like, I’m a home bird. I’m not one for a
big social whirl.
6. The boy is quite impossible. From now on I wash my hands of him.
7. “Can I go with you to this party?” “We shall only be talking business.
You wouldn’t be interested.”
8. Billy’s been such a good boy, Mrs. Smith – never once got out of bed and
took his medicine like a lamb.
9. I ran to my father, waving the magazine and shouting. “This is my home,
look.” Dad fairly blew his top. He told me not to be silly; that it was a building
called a temple, in a country called Egypt and that I had never been there.
10. To say you lead a busy life is not an answer to whether you take enough
exercise.
11. In the face of stiff competition from rival firms we had to fight fire with
fire and slash our prices.
12. The grey colour is in fashion in this season.
13. I’ve been working my fingers to the bone to get the dress ready in time
for the wedding.
14. I don’t believe he is a man to commit murder.
15. I’ll be hanging up my boots next year. I think I deserve a rest after
running the business for thirty years.
7. Rearrange the following groups of words correctly to form sentences or
expressions:
Model: to shed (cast) on light something
to shed (cast) on light something – to shed (cast) light on something
1) to lead a dog and life cat
2) wool eyes tried they over the pull to my
3) with liberties she always took him
4) a have they children way with
5) gave a talking a the mother good child the
6) declared his at last love to the he girl
29
7) makes herself much of always she
8) to do half (halves) by things
9) dirty in linen public one’s to wash
10) to take mouth somebody’s out the words of
11) for something granted to take
12) to be somebody hard on
8. Analyse the meaning of the given phraseological units. Group them into: 1)
native; 2) borrowed phraseological units. State the sources of their origin. If in
doubt consult dictionaries:
Mоdel: the be-all and end-all of – “the main purpose of, all that matters in the
life”
The phraseological unit the be-all and end-all of is of native English origin, as it is
from W.Shakespeare’s “Macbeth”.
1) to hang up one’'s boot – “retire”;
2) to bury the hatchet – “to come to friendly or peaceful terms with
somebody else, usually in arguments, disagreements”;
3) a sacred cow – “somebody/something that is greatly respected and
revered, especially by a particular nation or group, so that attack or criticism is not
tolerated”;
4) a whipping boy – “a person who is blamed or punished for the faults or
incompetence of others”;
5) an ugly duckling – “a plain, unprepossessing child born less attractive
than his brothers and sisters who later surpasses them, grows into a beautiful
person”;
6) of the same leaven/batch –“about persons who have very much in
common, who are very similar in their way of life, behaviour, views, etc.”;
7) the law of the jungle – “self-preservation, the survival of the strongest, or
more unscrupulous”;
8) an apple of discord – “(somebody or something that is) a cause of dispute,
argument or rivalry”;
9) to hide one’s head in the sand – “willfully to close one’s eyes to danger,
to refuse to face reality”;
10) a blue stocking – “an intellectual or literary woman”;
11) the hot seat – “the position of a person who carries full responsibility for
something, including facing criticism or being answerable for decisions or
actions”;
12) a drop in the bucket/ocean – “something of inconsiderable value,
importance, especially as compared with something larger in total or in kind”;
13) pig in the middle – “a person, or a group in a helpless position between,
or made use of by, others”;
14) blue blood – “a person of noble birth”;
15) a blue coat – “a student at a charity school”;
30
16) to die with one’s boots on – “to die while still at work”;
17) to fiddle while Rome burns – “behave frivolously in a situation that calls
for concern or corrective action”;
18) penny wise and pound foolish – “careful and economical in small
matters while being wasteful or extravagant in large ones”;
19) the iron curtain – “the notional barrier between people, nations,
countries, etc. leading to the political, economical, etc. isolation”;
20) the Russian soul – “a vague, unfulfilled yearning for a better, spiritual
life which would bring consolation and relief to the suffering masses”;
21) to run the gauntlet – “to submit to a punishing ordeal”.
Theme: The Stylistic Differentiation of the English Vocabulary
I. Questions for the discussion:
1. The total number of words and their types from the point of view of their
usage. The varieties of English: territorial, social, stylistic.
2. Stylistically marked layers: neutral words, literary and colloquial
vocabularies. Special and common vocabularies. Standard English vocabulary.
3. Literary vocabulary.
3.1. Terms and terminological systems.
3.2. Archaic and poetic words.
3.3. Barbarisms and foreignisms.
4. Colloquial vocabulary.
4.1. Professionalisms.
4.2. Slang and jargon, vulgarisms.
4.3. Dialectal words.
5. The English vocabulary as an adaptive system. Neologisms.
6. Emotionally coloured and emotionally neutral vocabulary.
II. Practical assignments:
1. Point out stylistic differences within the groups of synonyms:
face – visage – mug – deadpan;
nose – snout – beak – nasal cavity;
I think – I gather – I presume – I take it – I guess it – me thinks;
boy – youth – lad – young male person – youngster – teenager;
lass – girl – maiden – wench – young female person;
nonsense – absurdity – rot – trash;
legs – pins – lower extremities;
Silence, please! – Stop talking! – Shut your trap!
friend – comrade – pal – buddy – acquaintance;
Hurry up! – Move on! – Hasten your step!
31
2. Match the formal phrases in the boxes on the right with the informal phrases
on the left:
1.
Everybody must…
2.
In our daily lives we experience
the influence of …
3. We simply/just order goods
from…
4. Let us consider…
5. It’s high time we all did the right
thing.
6. We can’t see and touch the goods.
7. When we download songs we
cheat their authors of income.
8. We, Chinese, do things our own
way.
9. I love/ I like/ prefer…
10. We face a huge danger of being
cheated…
11 You may ask…
12
13
Students have their own styles of
learning…
We can do many things…
A
B
C
D
E
F
G
H
I
J
Goods can be ordered directly
from...
Goods cannot be seen or touched...
It is essential/crucial/vital that all
parties...
Students learn in different ways...
Downloading songs infringes on
the interests of their authors.
Daily life is influenced by...
The current situation requires
action from all citizens...
Personally, I favour...
L
It is important to consider...
Chinese people tend to do things in
a certain way.
Many things can be done/are
possible...
There is a serious risk of fraud...
M
One may ask...
K
3. Match the items on the right to the items on the left:
1. take forty winks
2. chew the fat
3. live from hand to mouth
4. hang one’s head
5. turn up one’s nose
6. play with fire
7. swing the lead
8. blaze the trail
9. act the goat
10. come a cropper
A fail or to fall to earth
B behave foolishly
C tempt serious trouble
D lead the way
E scorn deliberately
F sleep
G avoid work purposely
H argue
I live in hardship
J feel ashamed
4. Answer the following questions connected with linguistic and literary
terminology:
1. An old, imaginary story that serves to explain things about the world is
called a(n) . . .
32
2. When the audience understands the consequences but the character does
not this is known as . . .
3. The opponent of the main character in a story is called his/her . . .
4. A category into which a literary work falls as determined by its style or
form is known as its . . .
5. The author’s attitude toward the subject and the reader is known as
his/her. . .
6. The perspective established by an author is known as the . . .
7. A poem of mourning (weeping over the loss of a loved one who has died)
is called a(n) . . .
8. The emotional overtones that words carry beyond their dictionary
definitions (for instance, the word “home” has many overtones of warmth, safety
and security) are called . . .
9. A bold exaggeration used for either serious or comic effect is known as . .
10. A repetition of an initial consonant sound in a series of words near each
other, as in Shakespeare’s Sonnet XXX “When to the sessions of sweet silent
thought . . ” is called a(n) . . .
11. A word’s primary – or dictionary meaning is called its . . .
12. A story of one’s own life is called a(n) . . .
13. The author’s choice of words is known as that author’s . . .
14. Words that call up sensations (pictures, sounds smells) used to convey
feelings are known as . . .
15. A 14-line poem in iambic pentameter is known as a(n). . .
16. A figure of speech in which nonhuman things are given human
characteristics (for instance, when Juliet says “Come, Gentle blackbrow’d Night”
is known as . . .
17. A regular recurrence of rhythm or stresses in a stream of sound (in
poetry, for instance) is known as. . .
18. Any collection of literary pieces by various authors is a(n) . . .
19. Any made-up (invented) story is known as. . .
20. The main character in a work of fiction is called a(n) . . .
21. A reference, in a work of literature, to a person, place, event, or literary
passage is called a(n) . . .
22. A literary work in which the style of another author is closely imitated is
known as. . .
5. Pick out the archaic words from the words given below and comment on their
usage and meaning:
Do, dost, does, you, thee, ye, thou, horse, though, albeit, also, eke, spring,
vernal, said, quoth, told, maiden, girl, perhaps, ere, before.
Consult a dictionary and substitute modern forms and words for:
Hath, dost, thee, didst, wight, ye, whilom, sooth, yon, rhymeth, sate.
33
Give modern English equivalents of the words. Translate them into Russian:
Bade, spouce, dire, aught, quoth, kine, swain, courser, ire, charger, thy, thine, troth,
hath, whit.
6. Examine an extract from Dreiser’s “Financier” and point out
professionalisms. Why didn’t the author use terms instead of professional
words?:
Frank soon picked up all the technicalities of the situation. A bull, he
learned, was one who bought in anticipation of a higher price to come; and if he
was loaded up with a line of stocks he was said to be long. He sold to realize his
profit, or if his margins were exhausted he was wiped out. A bear was one who
sold stocks which most frequently he did not have, in anticipation of a lower price
at which he could buy and satisfy his previous sales…
7. There are usually many slang words for those aspects of life that we talk about
most. For example, here is a list of slang words for “money” or “relax”:
Cash
Loot
Bucks
Bread
Dough
Wad
Folding stuff (paper money)
Shrapnel (change)
Readies
Chill out
Take a break
Come up for air
Take a breather
Take five
Take time out
Mellow out
Hang loose
Cool it
Flake out
Can you think some more words of the both notions?
8. Read the following jargonisms which belong to the sphere of computer and
Internet. Explain what they mean:
Avy, wiki, IP, IMHO (imho), host, ROFL (rofl) (= ROTFL (rotfl)), html,
cookies, lol, browse, OYO (oyo), btw, http, header, CMB (cmb), LMD (lmd),
apod, dialer, gif, jpeg, peeps, OMG (omg), automagically, NP (np), AFK (afk),
annoyware, ASL (asl, a/s/l), puter, zombie, die horribly, eye candy, nastygram.
9. Comment on the word-building means used in the following neologisms.
Translate them into Russian:
34
Disadvantaged, gogglebox, deterrent, redundancy, landslide, rethinking,
denuclearize, reflation, parolee, filmnik, detainee, no-goodnik, pray-in, sitters-in,
showmanship, brinkmanship, outdoorsman, to front-page, the foodie, the go-ahead,
sci-fi, Reagangate, Monicagate, to snow-ball, to deglamorize, mini-cruize,
foodoholic, brown-bagger.
10. Translate the word-combinations and compound neologisms. Use them in
sentences of your own:
Character assassination, double standard, paper-back book, brain tank,
communication gap, job-hopper, Shockwave, shuttle democracy, marginal man,
fall-out, sweet heart contract, nine-to-fiver, Gay liberation, doublespeak, spaghettiwestern, runaways.
Theme: Territorial (Regional) and Social Differentiation of the English
Language
I. Questions for the discussion:
1. Language as a flexible system. Regional and social varieties of the
English language.
2. Variants of English in the United Kingdom.
3. Variants of English outside the British Isles.
4. Local dialects in Great Britain
5. Local dialects in the USA.
6. Social variation of the English Language.
II. Practical assignments:
1. Match the italicized Scottish English words from the sentences with the
corresponding Standard English words given in the box:
Model: She devoted her (anam) to helping others.
The corresponding Standard English word to the Scottish English word
“anam” is “life”: She devoted her life to helping others.
knot, conversation, packet, hole, journey, life, window, stone, knowledge, dignity,
coffee
1. I’ve heard you visited several European countries last summer. Did you
like your turus?
2. Why did you throw a artan at the dog? It could bite you.
3. Ann faced the news of the catastrophe with onoir.
4. Can you tie a snaim in the end of my thread?
5. Don’t open the uinneag. You can catch a cold.
35
6. Do you take sugar in your uilm?
7. A pasgan of brochures arrived in the post.
8. The teacher’s comments are designed to help improve your fios and
understanding.
9. Later in the evening, the caig turned to politics.
10. Workers dug a 30-foot toll in the ground.
11. She devoted her anam to helping others.
2. Replace the italicized Irish words with Standard English words from the box:
Model: Will you sit on the tolg, please, and wait for Peter coming.
The Irish word “tolg” can be replaced by the Standard English word
“sofa”: Will you sit on the sofa, please, and wait for Peter coming.
noise, basket, choice, thorn, distress (hardship), sofa, rag, while, friend, wall, steam
1. I’ll have to stop for a minute – I must have a dealg in my foot.
2. Wait till you see the gal off the kettle and then wet (pour boiling water on)
the tea.
3. There is always some cruatan or other in that family – what is it with
them?
4. There was a trup outside the door.
5. I haven’t seen him for a tamall.
6. He drove straight through the falla with the new car last night.
7. Where did you find that old balcais!
8. Get me a scib of turf for the fire.
9. Helga is a close cara of mine.
10. These people have the togha of whether to buy a house or rent one.
11. Will you sit on the tolg, please, and wait for Peter coming.
3. In the given sentences find words which are characteristic of American
English. State whether they belong to the group of: a) historical Americanisms;
b) proper Americanisms; c) specifically American borrowings:
Modell: The truck pulled up near where two men were already standing by the
edge of a deep canyon.
The word truck belongs to the group of proper Americanisms (b), while the
word canyon is a specifically American borrowing (c).
1. Do you want to take the elevator or use the stairs?
2. We haven’t heard from him since last fall.
3. John has made his own pirogue and now wants to show it to his friends.
4. If I am late I’ll call you from a telephone booth.
5. I guess I’ll never be able to explain what has happened between us.
6. I am very tired. I’d like to sleep in the hammock in the garden.
36
7. He stayed at home caring for his sick wife.
8. He left the faucets running and the bath overflowed.
9. Have you ever seen a tomahawk used by North American Indians in war
and hunting?
10. We went to the museum by subway.
11. The truck pulled up near where two men were already standing by the
edge of a deep canyon.
4. Distribute the words from the given series into three groups: a) words used in
American English; b) words used in British English; c) words used in Australian
English:
1) lollies – candy – sweets;
2) form – grade – year;
3) subway/metro – railway station – underground;
4) the cinema – the movies – the pictures;
5) letterbox – postbox – mailbox;
6) sneakers – trainers – runners;
7) sidewalk – footpath – pavement.
5. Study the meanings of the given words. State which of these words are used in
Canadian English (1), Australian English (2), New Zealand English (3), South
African English (4), Indian English (5) – five words in each group. In case of
difficulty consult the “New Oxford Dictionary of English”:
Modell: “bobsy-die” – “a great deal of fuss and trouble”
The word “bobsy-die” is used in New Zealand English (group 3).
1) schoolie – “a school pupil’;
2) draegerman – “a member of a crew trained for underground rescue
work”;
3) bahadur – “a brave man; an honorable title, originally given to officers”;
4) waka – “a traditional Maori canoe”;
5) backveld – “remote country districts, especially when considered to be
unsophisticated or conservative”;
6) drongo – “a stupid or incompetent person”;
7) yatra – “a procession or pilgrimage, especially one with a religious
purpose”;
8) bobsy-die – “a great deal of fuss and trouble”;
9) voorskot – “advance payment”;
10) bobskate – “an adjustable skate for a child, consisting of two sections of
double runners”;
11) aroha – “love, affection”;
12) achcha – “okay, all right”;
37
13) bodgie – “a youth, especially of the 1950s, analogous to the British
Teddy boy”;
14) izzat – “honour, reputation, or prestige”;
15) parkade – “a multi-storey car park”;
16) ambo – “ambulance officer”;
17) indaba – “a conference between members of native peoples”;
18) haka – “a Maori ceremonial war dance involving chanting, an imitation
of which is performed by rugby teams before a match”;
19) riding – “a political constituency/an electoral district”;
20) karanga – “a Maori ritual chant of welcome”;
21) chaprasi – “a person carrying out junior office duties, especially one
who carries messages”;
22) fundi – “an expert in a particular area”;
23) firie – “a firefighter”;
24) reeve – “the president of a village or town council”;
25) wors –“sausage”.
6. Analyze the meanings of the given words. Define: a) words/wordcombinations that have no equivalents in American English (Briticisms); b)
words/word-combinations that have no equivalents in British English
(Americanisms). In case of difficulty consult the “New Oxford Dictionary of
English”:
Model: “congressman” – “a male member of the Congress”.
The word “congressman” has no equivalents in British English (group b).
1) parish council – “the administrative body in a civil parish”;
2) congressman – “a male member of the Congress”;
3) privy purse – “an allowance from the public revenue for the monarch’s
private expenses”;
4) holiday season – “the period of time from Thanksgiving until New Year,
including such religious and secular festivals as Christmas, Hanukkah, and
Kwanzaa”;
5) Secret Service – “a branch of the Treasury Department dealing with
counterfeiting and providing protection for the President”;
6) the woolsack – “the position of Lord Chancellor”;
7) Ivy League – “a group of long-established universities having high
academic and social prestige”;
8) junior college – “a college offering courses for two years beyond high
school, either as a complete training or in preparation for completion at a senior
college”;
9) county council – “the elected governing body of an administrative
county”;
10) barrio – “the Spanish-speaking quarter of a town or city”;
38
11) grammar school – “a state secondary school to which pupils are
admitted on the basis of ability (Since 1965 most have been absorbed into the
comprehensive school system)”;
12) foreign secretary – “the government minister who heads the Foreign and
Commonwealth Office”;
13) electoral college – “a body of people who formally cast votes for the
election of the President and Vice-President”;
14) school inspector – “an official who reports on teaching standards in
schools on behalf of Ofsted (Office for Standards in Education)”;
15) green card – “a permit allowing a foreign national to live and work
permanently in the given country”;
16) pub – “a building where alcohol may be bought and drunk during fixed
hours”;
17) Groundhog Day – “2 February, when the groundhog is said to come out
of his hole at the end of hibernation. If the animal sees its shadow – i.e. if the
weather is sunny – it is said to portend six weeks more of winter weather”;
18) back bench – “any of the benches behind the front benches on either side
of the House of Commons, occupied by Members of Parliament who do not hold
office in the government or opposition”.
7. Distribute the given words into two groups: a) words that are used in
American English; b) words that are used in British English. Pay special
attention to their meanings:
Model “bill” (for meal payment) – “a list of things eaten showing the total amount
that must be paid”
The word “bill” is used in British English.
1) tuxedo – “a man's dinner jacket”;
2) bill (for meal payment) – “a list of things eaten showing the total amount
that must be paid”;
3) pram – “a four-wheeled carriage for a baby, pushed by a person on foot”;
4) zip code – “a postal code consisting of five or nine digits”;
5) chemist – “a person who is authorized to dispense medicine drugs”;
6) vacation – “an extended period of recreation, especially one spent away
from home or in traveling”;
7) period – “a punctuation mark (.) used at the end of a sentence or an
abbreviation”;
8) tram – “a passenger vehicle powered by electricity conveyed by overhead
cables, and running on rails laid in a public road”;
9) apartment building – “a large building containing many apartments”;
10) dust-bin – “a container for houshold refuse, especially one kept outside”;
11) motorway – “a dual-carriageway road designed for fast traffic, with
relatively few places for joining or leaving”;
12) gasoline – “a liquid obtained especially from petroleum, used mainly for
producing power in the engines of cars, aircraft, etc.”;
39
13) trolley (for shopping) – “a low two-wheeled or four-wheeled cart or
vehicle, especially one pushed by hand”;
14) flashlight – “a small electric light carried in the hand to give light”;
15) car park – “an area or building where cars or other vehicles may be left
temporarily”.
English Lexicography
I. Questions for the discussion:
1. Lexicography as a branch of Lexicology.
2. The history of dictionary-making and modern trends in English
lexicography.
3. Classification of dictionaries: basic principles and main problems.
4. Main types of English dictionaries. Encyclopaedic and linguistic
dictionaries.
5. Classification of linguistic dictionaries.
5.1. General and restricted (specialized) dictionaries.
5.2. Monolingual and bilingual dictionaries.
5.3. Explanatory and translation dictionaries.
5.4. Specialized dictionaries.
6. Basic problems of dictionary-compiling.
7. Learner’s dictionaries and some problems of their compilation.
II. Practical assignments:
1. Bring explanatory and translation dictionaries. There should be at least two
explanatory and two translation dictionaries for the group.
2. Classify the given dictionaries into two groups: a) encyclopedic dictionaries;
b) linguistic dictionaries:
Model: The Concise Oxford Dictionary
The Concise Oxford Dictionary is a linguistic dictionary (group b).
NTC’s Dictionary of American Spelling
The Chambers Book of Facts
The Collins Dictionary of Allusions
The Longman Dictionary of the English Language
The Oxford Companion to English Literature
The Dictionary of Literary Terms
The Concise Oxford Dictionary
Brewer’s Dictionary of 20th-century Phrase and Fable
The Collins COBUILD Roget’s International Thesaurus
40
The Merriam-Webster’s Geographical Dictionary
The Cambridge Guide to Fiction in English
The Cambridge International Dictionary of Idioms
The Penguin Dictionary of English Grammar
The Cassell Companion to 20th-century Music
Random House Webster’s Dictionary of American Slang
3. State which type the given linguistic dictionaries refer to: general – restricted,
explanatory – specialized, monolingual – bilingual, diachronic – synchronic:
Model: The Longman Dictionary of Phrasal Verbs
The Longman Dictionary of Phrasal Verbs is a restricted, explanatory,
monolingual, synchronic word-book.
1) the Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology;
2) the Penguin Dictionary of English Idioms;
3) the New Oxford Dictionary of English; 4) the Modern English-Russian
Dictionary;
5) the Longman Dictionary of Phrasal Verbs;
6) the Longman Language Activator;
7) the English-Russian Dictionary of Linguistics and Semiotics;
8) the English Pronouncing Dictionary;
9) the Longman Business English Dictionary;
10) the New Oxford Thesaurus of English;
11) a Dictionary of Neologisms;
12) the BBI Combinatory Dictionary of English.
4. Choose any dictionary and describe the principles of the selection of lexical
units for inclusion in this dictionary:
Model: The Longman Idioms Dictionary
The Longman Idioms Dictionary aims at reflecting the wide range of idioms
that are being used in British and American English today. Using the Longman
Corpus Network, the Internet, the media, the editorial team has gathered
information about the newest idioms being used, as well as giving complete
coverage of idioms at the core of the language. In addition to many new idioms the
dictionary includes a range of the most frequently used idioms in the language. It
covers idioms with metaphoric meanings that are fairly easy to understand, such as
put your heads together (“work together in order to solve a problem”), to those that
are less obvious, like face the music (“to accept responsibility for your actions and
give people the chance to criticize you”). Many two-word phrases, like wild card,
are included, as are phrases with pragmatic uses, such as just like that. The
dictionary also includes many frequently used similes, such as like two peas in a
pod.
41
Be ready to hand in your paper. You should also supply your paper with a
xeroxed or printed copy of some dictionary pages which give an opportunity to
understand the principles you write about.
5. Analyze the nature of the information presented in the given entries. Classify
the learner’s dictionaries from which these entries were taken into: 1) those
giving equal attention to the word’s semantic characteristics and the way it is
used in speech; 2) those presenting different aspects of the vocabulary.
Model: freelance /'fri:la:ns $ 'frilæns/ adjective, adverb someone who is freelance
works for several different organizations: I’m a freelance writer. | I’m thinking of
going freelance.
According to the nature of the information presented in this entry the
learner’s dictionary from which it was taken can be referred to those giving equal
attention to the word’s semantic characteristics and the way it is used in speech
(group 1).
1)
despair n. 1. to overcome ~ 2. deep, sheer, total, utter ~ 3. the depths of ~ 4.
in ~ (in utter ~) 5. out of ~ (to do smth. out of ~ ).
2)
armaments /'a:mə.mənts/ US /'a:r-/ plural noun weapons or military
equipment: the country’s armaments programme
armament /'a:mə.mənt/ US /'a:r-/ noun [U] the process of increasing the
number and strength of a country’s weapons: As the country prepares for war,
more and more money is being spent on armament.
3)
initial adj. The initial move must be to get the board’s approval: first,
starting, beginning, opening, commencing, primary, introductory, incipient,
initiatory, inaugural, maiden; original germinal, primal. – Ant. last, ultimate,
ending, final, closing, concluding, terminal.
4)
-dom
1 A state or condition
PRODUCTIVE USE: -dom combines with nouns and adjectives to form
new nouns. Nouns formed in this way refer to the experience of whatever is
indicated by the original nouns and adjectives. For example, “freedom” is the state
of being free; “stardom” is the state or experience of being a star or celebrity.
Spelling: The noun formed from “wise” is “wisdom”.
In the world of today political freedom is still rare.
... the accumulated wisdom and knowledge of society.
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He had had long experience of outwitting officialdom.
Here are some examples of words with this meaning:
boredom
chiefdom
dukedom
earldom
freedom
gangsterdom
hippiedom
martyrdom
officialdom
princedom
stardom
wisdom
Note that “dukedom”, “earldom” and “princedom” all have two meanings
and are included in both sections of this entry.
2 A realm or territory
-dom also combines with titles or names to refer to the land that someone
controls. For example, a “kingdom” is the land or country that a king rules over;
“Christendom” is an old-fashioned word that refers to the countries and peoples
that are Christian and follow Christ's teachings.
The kingdom had shrunk, it had been reduced to a handful of villages. ...a
princedom by the sea.
Here is a list of words with this meaning:
Christendom
dukedom
earldom
kingdom
princedom
5)
dictation /dik'tei∫ən/ n 1 [U] when you say words for someone to write
down: There were no secretaries available to take dictation (=write down what
someone is saying). 2 [C] a piece of writing that a teacher reads out to test your
ability to hear and write the words correctly: / hate doing French dictations.
6)
deed /di:d/ noun [C] **
1 literary something that someone does 2 [usually plural] legal an official
document that gives details of a legal agreement, especially about who owns a
building or piece of land
sb’s good deed for the day humorous something good and helpful that
someone does.
Literature:
1. Антрушина Г.Б., Афанасьева О.В., Н.Н.Морозова. – 4-е изд.,
стереотип. – М.: Дрофа, 2004. – 288 с.
43
2. Арнольд И.В. Лексикология современного английского языка: учеб.
для ин-тов и фак. иностр. яз. – 3-е изд., перераб. и доп. – М.: Высш. шк., 1986.
– 295 с.
3. Бабич Г.Н. Lexicology: A Current Guide. Лексикология английского
языка: учеб. пособие. – 4-е изд. – М.: Флинта: наука, 2009. – 200 с.
4. Лексикология английского языка: учебник для ин-тов и фак. иностр.
яз. / Р.З.Гинзбург, С.С.Хидекель, Г.Ю.Князева, А.А.Санкин. – 2-е изд., испр.
и доп. – М.: Высш. шк., 1979. – 269 с.
5. Учебное пособие по английской лингвистической терминологии /
сост. И.М.Деева, Л.Х.Ишо, А.И.Литвиненко и др. – Горький: Изд-во
Горьковского гос. пед. ин-та иностр. языков, 1975. – 405 с.
Independent Study Projects
Choose a topic for independent study from the list. Be ready to present it
during the seminar and answer the questions:
1. Onomatopoeic and Sound-Symbolic Words
“It is intriguing to see how other languages hear certain sounds – and how
much better their onomatopoeic words often are. Dogs go oua-oua in France, bubu in Italy, mung-mung in Korea, wan-wan in Japan; a purring cat goes ron-ron
in France, schnurr in Germany; a bottle being emptied goes gloup-gloup in
China, tot-tot-to in Spain; a heartbeat is doogan-doogan in Korea, doki-doki in
Japan; bells go bimbam in Germany, dindan in Spain. The Spanish word for
whisper is susurrar. How could it be anything else?” (from Bryson B. Mother
Tongue. The English Language).
2. Semantic Relationships in Conversion
“The following anecdote shows that the intricacies of semantic associations
in words made by conversion may prove somewhat bewildering even for some
native speakers, especially for children.
‘Mother,’ said Johnny, ‘is it correct to say you ‘water a horse’ when he’s
thirsty?"
‘Yes, quite correct.’
‘Then,’ (picking up a saucer) ‘I’m going to milk the cat.’
The joke is based on the child’s mistaken association of two apparently
similar patterns: water, n – to water, v; milk, n – to milk, v. But it turns out that
the meanings of the two verbs arose from different associations: to water a horse
means ‘to give him water’, but to milk implies getting milk from an animal (e.g. to
44
milk a cow).” (from АнтрушинаГ.Б., Афанасьева O.B., Морозова Н.Н.
Лексикология английского языка).
3. “STONE WALL Problem”
“The so-called stone wall problem concerns the status of the complexes like
stone wall, cannon ball or rose garden. Noun premodifiers of other nouns often
become so closely fused together with what they modify that it is difficult to say
whether the result is a compound or a syntactical free phrase. Even if this difficulty
is solved and we agree that these are phrases and not words, the status of the first
element remains to be determined. Is it a noun used as an attribute or is it to be
treated as an adjective?” (from ArnoldIV. The English Word).
4. Reduplicative Compounds
“An interesting type of lexeme is one which contains two identical or very
similar constituents: a reduplicative. Items with identical spoken constituents,
such as goody-goody and din-din, are rare. What is normal is for a single
vowel or consonant to change between the first constituent and the second, such as
see-saw and walkie-talkie.
Reduplicatives are used in a variety of ways. Some simply imitate sounds:
ding-dong, bow-wow. Some suggest alternative movements: flip-flop, ping-pong.
Some are disparaging: dilly-dally, wishy-washy. And some intensify meaning:
teeny-weeny, tip-top. Reduplication is not a major means of creating lexemes in
English, but it is perhaps the most unusual one.” (from Crystal D. The Cambridge
Encyclopedia of the English Language).
5. Reanalysis and Folk Etymology
“Reanalysis is the origin of the prefix mini-... English has long had the two
words miniature and minimum, both derived from Latin; historically, these two
words are not related at all, and their resemblance in form is purely an accident.
But they both have meanings involving the sense of ‘very small’, and, around
1960, someone reanalysed them as though they both contained an element mini-,
meaning ‘very small’; this new morpheme was used to construct that pioneering
word miniskirt, and the rest is history.
Even more dramatic than reanalysis is folk etymology: restructuring a word
whose structure is opaque into something seemingly more transparent. A good
example is bridegroom. English once had a word guma, meaning ‘man’, and this
was compounded with bryd ‘bride’ to give brydguma – literally, ‘brideman’.
With time, however, the word guma dropped out of the language, and bridegoom
came to seem mysterious. As a result, the puzzling second element was altered to
groom (a groom was a servant, though today the word normally just means
45
somebody who looks after horses). We thus obtained bridegroom, in which the
second element is at least familiar, if not obviously very sensible. <...>” (from
Trask R.L. Historical Linguistics).
6. Eponyms
“One of the most entertaining chapters in the history of our vocabulary deals
with words from proper names. These are of every conceivable kind. Some are
mere nicknames, originating in slang or the humors of the hour, and perpetuated
either because they seem to fill a gap in the language or because they suggest allusions or anecdotes which it tickles our fancy to remember; others are serious
technical terms, coined in honor of an inventor or a discoverer. They may come
from history or from literature, indifferently. Sometimes their origin is obscure,
because the story or the incident to which they allude, though striking enough to
attract attention at the moment and thus to give rise to a new word or phrase, has
not proved of sufficient importance to be put on record.” (from Greenough J.B.,
Kittredge G.L. Words and Their Ways in English Speech).
7. Paronyms, Malapropisms, Spoonerisms
“The Englishmen admit that they have been misusing words since the
beginning of spoken language. But then a man appeared who gave this old error his
name, and we got spoonerism.
William Archibald Spooner (1844 – 1930) was an Anglican clergyman who
later became the dean at New College in Oxford. His students noticed a funny
weakness of their dean. When Spooner grew excited he often twisted around the
initial sounds of two or more words.
Once he wanted to say to the students: conquering kings, but pronounced
instead: kinkering congs. <...> Next time he intended to say: half-formed wish,
but it came out: half-warmed fish.
This so amused his students that they began calling such a linguistic
turnaround a spoonerism. They collected the masterpieces of their dean, such as
You have already tasted three worms here instead of wasted three terms here;
or a well-boiled icicle instead of a well-oiled bicycle; then tons of soil for songs
of toil; blushing crow for crushing blow.” (from Борисова A.M. Из истории
английских слов).
8. Euphemisms
“The effect of taboo can be very powerful. Several generations ago, the
simple anatomical terms leg and breast came to be regarded as highly indelicate in
American speech. The unacceptability of these words required euphemisms not
46
only for talking about the human body but even for talking about roast chicken and
Thanksgiving turkeys, with the result that Americans began to speak of dark meat
and white meat, as they still do today, even though leg and breast have more
recently lost their indelicate status. <...>” (from Trask R.L. Historical Linguistics).
9. Enantiosemy
“Contronyms, also known as antagonyms, autoantonyms or Janus words, are
words which, by some freak of language evolution, have two opposite meanings,
according to the context in which they occur. For example, with can mean
‘alongside’ in Come with me but ‘against’ or ‘in opposition to’ in Hannibal fought
with the Romans. A door that is bolted is secure, but a horse that has bolted has
taken off. If you wind up a meeting you finish it; if you wind up a watch you start
it. Is it any wonder that English is so difficult to learn?" (from Contronyms,
http://users.tinyonline.co.uk/gswithenbank/cntrnmys.htm ).
10. Sayings, Proverbs, Familiar Quotations, Cliches
“A proverb is a traditional saying which offers advice or presents a moral in
a short and pithy manner. Paradoxically, many phrases which are called proverbial
are not proverbs as we now understand the term. We might for instance refer to the
proverbial fly on the wall or say that something is as dead as the proverbial
dodo, although neither of these phrases alludes to a proverb. The confusion dates
from before the eighteenth century, when the term proverb also covered
metaphorical phrases, similes, and descriptive epithets, and was used far more
loosely than it is today. Nowadays we would normally expect a proverb to be cast
in the form of a sentence.” (from Simpson J. The Concise Oxford Dictionary of
Proverbs).
11. Terminological Subsystems of English Vocabulary
“It is sometimes suggested that the terminology, or ‘jargon’, of modern
linguistics is unnecessarily complex. This is a criticism which need not detain us
long. Every science has its own technical vocabulary: it is only because the layman
takes on trust the established sciences, and especially the ‘natural sciences’, that he
does not question their right to furnish themselves with special vocabularies. The
technical terms used by linguists arise in the course of their work and are easily
understood by those who approach the subject sympathetically and without
prejudice. It should not be forgotten that most of the terms which the non-linguist
employs to talk about language (word, syllable, letter, phrase, sentence, noun,
verb, etc.) originated as technical terms of traditional grammar and are no less
47
‘abstract’ in their reference than the more recent creations of linguists. <...>” (from
Lyons J. Introduction to Theoretical Linguistics).
12. Politically Correct Vocabulary
“People who object to the terms disabled and handicapped as being too
negative sometimes propose the substitution of challenged instead, as in referring
to persons with physical disabilities as physically challenged. While this
particular phrase is quite popular, it is sometimes taken to be condescending, and
similar usages such as mentally challenged have failed to win equal acceptance.
Indeed, the widespread parody of challenged in such expressions as electronically
challenged for ‘inept at using computers’ has effectively eliminated it as an allpurpose alternative to disabled or handicapped.” (from Bartleby. com).
List of Terms
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
absolute antonyms
absolute (total) synonyms
acronymy
active metaphor
affix
affixation
allomorph
amelioration (elevation) of
meaning
9. American English
10.americanism
11.anthropomorphic metaphor
12.antonymy
13.Applied Lexicology
14.archaic word proper
15.Australian English
16.assimilation of borrowings
17.back-formation (disaffixation)
18.barbarism
19.bilingual dictionary
20.blending
21.borrowed words
22.borrowing proper
23.bound morpheme
24.British English
25.Canadian English
26.canadianism
27.cant word
28.CD-ROM dictionnary
29.central (basic) meaning
30.cliché
31.Cockney
32.colloquial vocabulary
33.Comparative Lexicology
34.complete segmentability
35.complex (derivative)
36.compound proper
37.compound stem
38.Computational Lexicography
39.conditional segmentability
40.connotational meaning
41.contradictories
42.contraries
43.Contrastive Lexicology
44.conversion
45.coordinative compound
46.Corpus Lexicography
47.cultural connotation
48.dead metaphor
49.defective segmentability
50.denominal verbs
51.denotational meaning
52.derivational affix
53.derivational antonyms
48
54.derivational base
55.derivational compound
56.derivational pattern
57.derivation structure
58.derived stem
59.Descriptive Lexicology
60.deterioration (degradation) of
meaning
61.deverbal substantives
62.diachronic approach
63.diachronic dictionary
64.dialect
65.dialectal word
66.dictionary
67.dictionary of slang
68.differential meaning
69.direct borrowing
70.distinctive stress
71.distributional meaning
72.Ebonics
73.electronic dictionary
74.emotive connotation
75.encyclopaedic dictionary
76.endocentric word-groups
77.entry
78.Estuary English
79.etymological dictionary
80.etymological doublets
81.etymology
82.euphemism
83.evaluative connotation
84.exocentric word-groups
85.explanatory dictionary
86.expressive (intensifying)
connotation
87.extension of meaning
(broadening)
88.foreignism
89.free morpheme
90.full homonyms
91.functional approach
92.general dictionary
93.General Lexicology
94.generalization of meaning
95.grammatical homonyms
96.grammatical meaning
97.grammatical valency
98.heteronyms
99.Historical Lexicology
100. historical word
101. homographs
102. homonyms
103. homonyms proper
104. homonymy
105. homophones
106. hyperbole
107. hyperonym
108. hyponim
109. ideographic dictionary
110. ideographic synonyms
111. immediate constituents
112. incompatibles
113. Indian English
114. indirect borrowing
115. inflection
116. inner form
117. international words
118. Irish English
119. irony
120. jargonism
121. law of synonymic attraction
122. lexical homonyms
123. lexical meaning
124. lexical meaning of a wordgroup
125. lexical valency
126. lexical variant
127. lexically motivated wordgroups
128. lexically non-motivated wordgroups
129. lexico-grammatical
homonyms
130. Lexicography
131. Lexicology
132. lexico-semantic group
133. linguistic dictionary
134. literary vocabulary
135. litotes
136. marginal (minor) meaning
49
137. metaphor
138. metonymy
139. monolingual dictionary
140. monomorphic words
141. monoradical words
142. morpheme
143. morphemes proper (full
morphemes)
144. morphological compound
145. morphological motivation
146. motivation
147. native words
148. neologism
149. neutral compound
150. neutral vocabulary
151. new words dictionary
152. New Zealand English
153. non-predicative word-group
154. non-root morpheme
155. non-segmentable words
156. nonce-word
157. obsolescent word
158. obsolete word
159. on-line dictionary
160. origin of borrowing
161. paronyms
162. part-of-speech meaning
163. partial homonyms
164. phonetical motivation
165. phraseological collocation
166. phraseological dictionary
167. phraseological fusion
168. phraseological synonyms
169. phraseological unit (idiom)
170. phraseological unity
171. poetic word
172. polymorphic words
173. polyradical words
174. polysemy
175. pragmatic connotation
176. predicative word-group
177. prefix
178. prefixation
179. primary meaning
180. productivity
181. professionalism
182. pronouncing dictionary
183. proverb
184. pseudo-morphemes (quasimorphemes)
185. quotation
186. radiation of synonyms
187. reference book
188. referential approach
189. restricted dictionary
190. restriction of meaning
(narrowing)
191. reverse dictionary
192. root-morpheme
193. saying
194. Scottish English
195. secondary meaning
196. segmentable words
197. semantic borrowing
198. semantic change
199. semantic field
200. semantic motivation
201. semasiology
202. seme
203. semi-affixes
204. semi-bound morpheme
205. set phrase (set expression)
206. shortening (clipping)
207. simple stem
208. simplex
209. slang word
210. social dialect
211. sound imitation
(onomatopoeia)
212. sound interchange
213. source of borrowing
214. South African English
215. Special Lexicology
216. specialization of meaning
217. Standard English
218. standard English vocabulary
219. stem
220. structural formulas
221. structural meaning of a wordgroup
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222. structural patterns
223. stylistic connotation
224. stylistic synonyms
225. subordinative compound
226. suffix
227. suffixation
228. synchronic approach
229. synchronic dictionary
230. synonymic dominant
231. synonymic group (row)
232. synonyms
233. synonymy
234. syntactic compound
235. term
236. translation borrowing
237. translation dictionary
238. translator’s false friends
239. ultimate constituents
240. unique morphemes
241. usage dictionary
242. variant
243. variety
244. vocabulary
245. vulgarism
246. word
247. word equivalent
248. word-composition
249. word-derivation
250. word-formation
251. word-group
252. Yorkshire dialect
253. zero derivation
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52