《英语词汇学》复习资料.docx

英语词汇学复习资料英语词汇学复习资料 Chapter 1 1. Word A word is a minimal free form of a language that has a given sound and meaning and syntactic function. 2. There is no logical relationship between sound and meaning as the symbolic connection between them is arbitrary and conventional. E.g. “woman” means Frau in German， Femme in French and Funv in Chinese. On the other hand， the same sound /rait/ can mean right， rite and write， though denoting different things， yet have the same sound. 3. The difference between sound and form result from 4 major factors. a）. the internal reason is English alphabet does not have a separate letter to represent each sound in the language. b）. Pronunciation has changed more rapidly than spelling c）. Influence of the work of scribes/printing freezes the spelling of words in 1500 d）. Borrowing of foreign language 4. Vocabulary Vocabulary is most commonly used to refer to the sum total of all the words of a language. It can also refer to all the words of a given dialect， a given book， a given subject and all the words possessed by an individual person as well as all the words current in a particular period of time in history. The general estimate of the present day English vocabulary is over 1 million words. 5.Classification of Wordsby use frequency， by notion， by origin 1）. Basic word stock the foundation of the vocabulary. 1. all national character natural phenomena most common things and phenomena of the human body and relations world around us names of plants and animals action， size， domain， state numerals， pronouns， prep. ，conj. 2. stability they donate the commonest thing necessary to life， they are like to remain unchanged. Only relative， some are undergoing some changes. But the change is slow. e.g. arrow， bow， chariot， knight past electricity， machine， car， plane now 3. productivity they are mostly root words or monosyllabic words， they can form new words with other roots and affixes. e.g. foot football， footage， footpath， footer 4. polysemy often possess more than one meaning. Become polysemous. e.g. take to move or carry from one place to another to remove 5. collocability quite a number of set expressions， idiomatic usages， proverbial saying and others e.g. heart a change of heart， a heart of gold Non-basic vocabulary 1. terminology technical terms photoscanning， hepatitis， indigestion， penicillin， algebra， trigonometry， calculus 2. jargon specialized vocabulary in certain professions. Bottom line， ballpark figures， bargaining chips， hold him back， hold him in， paranoid 3. slang substandard words often used in informal occasions dough and bread， grass and pot， beaver， smoky， bear， catch， holler， Roger， X-rays， Certain words are labeled slang because of their usage. 4. argot words used by sub-cultured groups can-opener， dip， persuader cant， jargon ， argot are associated with， or most available to， specific groups of the population. 5. dialectal words only by speakers of the dialect beauty， chook， cocky， station， auld， build， coo， hame， lough， bog 6. archaisms words no longer in common use or restricted in use. In older poems， legal document and religious writing or speech. 7. neologism newly created words with new meaning e.g. microelectronics， futurology， AIDS， internet， E-mail old meaning acquired new meaning e.g. mouse， monitor 2）. Content word denote clear notions. Functional word do not have notions of their own， express the relation between notions， words and sentences. a. Content words constitute the main body of the English vocabulary are numerous. Functional words are in a small number. b. Content words are growing. Functional words remain stable. c. Functional words do far more work of expression than content words. 3）. Native words are words brought to Britain in the 15 century by the German tribes. Ango-Saxon Words， 50，000-60，000 What is true of the basic word stock is also true of native world. More are 1. neutral in style 2. 2.frequent in use Borrowed words words taken over from foreign language. 80% According to the degree of assimilation and manner of borrowing， we can bring the loan words under 4 classes. 1.Denizens words borrowed early and now are well assimilated into English language. e.g. port from portus shift， change， shirt， pork cup from cuppa 2.Aliens retained their original pronunciation and spelling e.g. décor blitzkreeg emir， intermez， rowtow， bazaar， rajar， status quo 3.translation loans formed from the existing material in the English language but modeled on the patterns taken from another language. 1）. Word translated according to the meaning e.g. mother tough from lingua maternal black humor from humor noir long time no see， surplus value， master piece 2）. Words translated according to the sound e.g. kulak from kyrak lama from lama ketchup tea 4. Semantic loans their meaning are borrowed from another language e.g. stupid old dump new sassy dream old joy and peace pioneer old explorer/person doing pioneering work new a member of the young pioneer fresh old impertinent， sassy， cheeky Chapter 2 Indo-European language family Balto Slavic Indo-Iranian Italic Germanic Prussian Persian Portuguese Norwegian Lithuanian Hindi Spanish Icelandie Polish Italian Danish Bulgarian Roumanian Swedish Slovenian French English Russian German Albanian Armenian Celtic Hellenic Irish Greek Breton Scottish 2. History 1） Old English totally 50，000-60，000 words The 1st people known to inhabit England were Celts， the language was Celtic. The second language was the Latin of the Roman Legions. The Germanic tribes called angles， Saxons and Jutes and their language， Anglo-Saxon dominated and blotted out the Celtic. Now people refer to Anglo-Saxon as old English. At the end of 6th century， the introduction of Christianity has a great impact on the English vocabulary. The common practice was to create new words by combining two native words. In the 9th century， many Scandinavian words came into English. At least 900 words of Scandinavian are in modern English， our daily life and speech. 特点： highly inflected language complex endings or vowel changes 2） Middle English English， Latin， French Until 1066， although there were borrowings from Latin， the influence on English was mainly Germanic. But the Norman Conquest started a continual flow of French words into English. By the end of the 13th century， English gradually come back into public areas. Between 1250 and 150 about 9000 words of French origin come into English. 75% of them are till in use today. As many as 2500 words of Dutch origin come into English. 特点： fewer inflections leveled ending 3） Modern English early modern English late modern English The Renaissance， Latin and Greek were recognized as the languages of the Western worlds great literary heritage. The Industrial Revolution was in the mid-17 century. With the growth of colonization， British tentacles began a stretching out of to every corner of the globe， thus enabling English to absorb words from all major languages of the world. After World War II， many new words have been created to express new ideas， inventions and scientific achievements. More words are created by means of word-formation. thousands and thousands of new words have been entered to express new ideas inventions， and scientific achievements. more words are created by means of word-formation. in modern English， word endings were mostly lost with just a few exceptions English has evolved from a synthetic language to the present analytic language. science and technology terms make up about 45% of new words. words associated with life-style constitute of 24% and social and economic terms amount to over 10% . mention should be made of an opposite process of development i.e. old words falling out if use. 特点： ending are almost lost. 3. Three main sources new words 1.The rapid development of modern science and technology 2.Social， economic and political changes 3.The influence of other cultures and languages 4. Three modes of vocabulary development 1. Creation the formation of new words by using the existing materials， namely roots， affixes and other elements. 2. Semantic change - an old form which take on a new meaning to meet the new need. 3. Borrowing to take in words from other languages. 4. French 30%， Latin 8%， Japanese Italian 7%， Spanish 6%， German Greek 5%， Russian Yiddish 4% Chapter 3 1. Morpheme A morpheme is the smallest meaningful unit of a language. 2.Morph A morpheme must be realized by discrete units. These actual spoken minimal carriers of meaning are morphs. 3.Monomorphenic words morphemes are realized by single morphs. 4.AllomorphSome morphemes are realized by more than one morph according to their position. Such alternative morphs are allomorphemes. E.g. the morpheme of plurality has a number if allomorphemes in different sound context， e.g. in cats/s/， in bags/z/， in matches/iz/. 5. Free morphemes or Free root The morphemes have complete meaning and van be used as free grammatical units in sentences， e.g. cat， walk. They are identical with root words. morphemes which are independent of other morphemes are considered to be free. 6. Bound Morphemes The morphemes cannot occur as separate words. They are bound to other morphemes to form words， e.g. recollection collect free morpheme re-and ion are bound morphemes. Bound morphemes are found in derived words. 7. Bound root A bound root is that part of the word that carries the fundamental meaning just like a free root. Unlike a free root， it is a bound form and has to combine with other morphemes to make words. Take -dict- for example： it conveys the meaning of “say or speak” as a Latin root， but not as a word. With the prefix pre- we obtain the verb predict meaning “tell beforehand”。 Contradict “ speak against”。 Bound roots are either Latin or Greek. Although they are limited in number， their productive power is amazing. 8. Affixes Affixes are forms that are attached to words or word elements to modify meaning or function. Almost affixes are bound morphemes. 9. Inflectional morphemes or Inflectional affixes Affixes attaches to the end of words to indicate grammatical relationships are inflectional， thus known as inflectional morphemes. The number of inflectional affixes is small and stable. a. There is the regular plural suffix -s which is added to nouns such as machines， desks. b. Simple present for the third person singular. s c. The possessive case of nouns. s d. er and est to show comparative and superlative degree e. The past tense marker ed f. ing to form present participles or gerunds. 10. Derivational morphemes or Derivational affixes Derivational affixes are affixes added to other morphemes to create new words. 11. Prefixes Prefixes are affixes that come before the word， such as， pre+war， sub+sea 12. Suffixes suffixes are affixes that come after the word， for instance， blood+y. 13. Root A root is the basic form of a word， which cannot be further analyzed without total loss of identity. .e.g. “internationalists” removing inter-， -al-， -ist， -s， leaves the root nation. 14. Stem a form to which affixes of any kind can be added. E.g. “internationalists”， nation is a root and a stem as well. a stem may consist of a single root or two roots and a root plus a affix. a stem can be a root or a form bigger than a root. Chapter 4 The expansion of vocabulary in modern English depends chiefly on word-formation. Not all the words that are produced by applying the rules are acceptable. Rules only provide a constant set of models from which new words are created from day to day. Rules themselves are not fixed but undergo changes. affixation 30%-40% compounding 28%-30% conversion 26% shortening 8%-10% blending and others 1%-5% 1. Affixation the formation of words by adding word forming or derivational affixes to stems. According to their position， affixation falls into： prefixation and suffixation. 1）. Prefixation the formation of new words by adding prefixes to stems. It does not change the word-class of the stem but change its meaning. 1. Negative prefixes a- ， dis- ， in- ， non- ， un- un- are the most productive and can usually replace in- or dis- with adj. 2. Reversative prefixes de- ， dis- ， un- 3. Pejorative prefixes mal- ， mis- ， pseudo- 4. Prefixes of degree or size arch- ， extra-， hyper-， macro- ， micro- ， mini- ， out- ， over- ， sub- ， super- ， sur- ， ultra- ， under- 5. Prefixes of orientation and attitude anti- ， contra- ， counter-， pro- 6. Locative prefixes extra- ， fore- ， inter- ， intra- ， tele-， trans- 7. Prefixes of time and order ex- ， fore- ， pre-， re- 8. Number Prefixes bi-， multi- ， semi- ， tri- ， uni- 9. Miscellaneous prefixes auto-， neo- ， pan- ， vice- 2）. Suffixation Suffixation is the formation of new words by adding suffixes to stems. Change the grammatical function of stems . Suffixes can be grouped on a grammatical basis. Noun suffixes Denominal nouns a. Concrete -eer ， -er ， -ess ， -ette ， -let b. Abstract -age ， -dom ， -ery ， -ery ， -hood ， -ing ， - ism ， -ship Deverbal nouns a. Denoting people -ant ， -ee ， -ent ， -er b. Denoting action， result， process， state， ect. -age ， -al ， -ance ， -ation， -ence ， -ing ， -ment De-adjective nouns -ity ， -ness Nouns and adjectives suffixes -ese ， -an ， -ist Adjective suffixes Denominal suffixes -ed ， -ful ， -ish ， -less ， -like ， -ly ， -y -al ， -esque ， -ic ， -ous -ic and ical can be affixed to the stem in some cases， but differ in meaning. Historic historical Classic classical Comic comical Economic economical Electric electrical Deverbal suffixes -able ， -ive Adverb suffixes -ly ， -ward ， -wise Verb suffixes -ate， -en ， -fy ， -ize Nik most of them are considered slang. 2. Compounding Compounding is a process of word-formation by joining two or more stems. Compounds- a lexical unit consisting of more than one stem and functioning both grammatically and semantically as a single word. 三种形