Lexicology

Категория реферата: Топики по английскому языку
Теги реферата: контрольная работа класс, характер реферат
Добавил(а) на сайт: Шигаев.

Distributional analysis in its various forms is commonly used nowadays.
By the term “distribution” we understand the occurrence of a lexical unit relative to another lexical units of the same levels : words to words , morpheme to morphemes . In other words , by this term we understand the position which lexical unit occupies or may occupy in the text or in the flow of speech . It is observed that a certain component of the word- meaning is described when the word is identified distributionally . e. g. In the sentence

The boy__________ home .

the missing word is easily identified as a verb . It may be “came , ran , went , goes” , but not as an adverb or a noun , or an adjective .
Thus , we see that the component of meaning that is distributionally identified is actually the part-of-speech meaning . It is also observed that in a number of cases words have different lexical meanings in different distributional patterns . e. g. The verb “to treat” has different lexical meanings in “to treat smbd kindly” & “to treat smbd to ice-cream” .
The interdependence of distribution & meaning can be also observed at the level of word-groups . e. g. It is only the distribution of completely identical lexical units but arranged on the reverse that differentiates the meaning – water tap

& tap water .

Transformational analysis .

Transformational analysis in lexicological investigations may be defined as repatterning ( representing , reorganization ) of various distributional structures in order to discover difference or sameness of meaning of practically identical distributional patterns . As distributional patterns are in a number of cases polysemantic transformational procedures are of help not only in the analysis of semantic sameness / difference of the lexical units but also in the analysis of the factors that account for their polysemy . Word-groups of identical distributional structure when repatterned show that the semantic relations between words & consequently the meaning may be different .e. g. A pattern “possessive pronoun
”+”noun”(his car , his failure , his arrest, his kindness ). According to transformational analysis the meaning of each word-group may be represented as : he has a car , he failed , he was arrested , he is kind. In each of the cases different meaning is revealed : possession , action , passive action , quality .The rules of transformation are rather strict & shouldn’t be identified with paraphrasing in the usual sense of the term .There are many restrictions both on syntactic & lexical levels . These are :
Permutation – the repatterning on condition that the basic subordinative relationships between words & word-stems of the lexical units are not changed .e. g. “His work is excellent “ may be transformed into “ his excellent work , the excellence of his work , he works excellently “.In the example given the relationships between lexical units & the stems of the notional words are essentially the same .
Replacement – the substitution of a component of the distributional structure by a member of a certain strictly defined set of lexical units
.e. g. Replacement of a notional verb by an auxiliary or link verb (he will make a bad mistake & he will make a good teacher ). The sentences have identical distributional structure but only in the second one the verb “to make “ can be substituted by “ become “ or “ be “ . The fact of impossibility of identical transformations of distributionally identical structures is a formal proof of the difference in their meaning .

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

John is tall .
We add a word-group “ in Moscow “. We shall see that “ John is happy in
Moscow .” has meaning while the second one is senseless . That is accounted by the difference in the meaning of adjectives denoting inherent (tall) & non-inherent(happy) qualities .
Deletion – a procedure which shows whether one of the words semantically subordinated to the other . e. g. The word-group “red flowers” may be deleted & transformed into “flowers” without making the sentence senseless
: I like red flowers or I like flowers . The other word-group “red tape “ can’t be deleted & transformed either into “ I hate tape “ or “I hate red “ because in both transformed sentences the meaning of the phrase “red tape” means “bureaucracy” & it can’t be divided into two parts .

Componental analysis .

In this analysis linguists proceed from the assumption that the smallest units of meaning are sememes or semes . e. g. In the lexical item “woman” several sememes may be singled out , such as human , not an animal , female
, adult . The analysis of the word “girl” will show the following sememes : human , female , young . The last component of the two words differentiates them & makes impossible to mix up the words in the process of communication
. It is classical form of revealing the work of componental analysis to apply them to the so called closed systems of vocabulary , for example , colour terms . The analysis as a rule was formalized only as far as the symbolic representation of meaning components it is concerned with .Each sememe in the terms of colours acquires or is given a certain letter ( A ,
B , C , D … ) & the meaning of the terms may be given in a formalized form
. e. g. Red & scarlet will differ only in one component & that is intensity of colour & by the letter it may be illustrated as
A B C
A B C Under the letter C the intensity is meant .
The formalized representation of meaning helps to find out different semantic components which influence collocability of words (during the day but not during the stairs, down the stairs but not down the day ).
Componental analysis is practically always combined with transformational procedures or statistical analysis .The combination makes it possible to find out which of the meanings should be represented first of all in the dictionaries of different types & how the words should be combined in order to make your speech sensible .

Method of semantic differential .

A word has not only one meaning & even one word usually implies some additional information which differentiates one word from another . e. g. to like , to love , to adore , to warship . All the words denote positive feelings , characteristic of a human being . But each of them gives additional information on the so-called strength of feeling .
This is the connotational aspect which was singled out by the semantic differential – the method which was worked out by a group of American psycholinguists . Their technique requires the subjects to judge – a series of concepts with respect to a set of antonymic adjective scale . e. g. A horse can be : good – bad fast – slow strong – weak hard – soft happy – sad
The meaning of the divisions is that each of the quality may be gradated representing extremely good , very good , neither good nor bad ,slightly bad , extremely bad & these grades can be marked by a plus .And the horse may be very good , not bad , etc .
The revealed gradations showing some portion of quality helps to singled out such words which are usually referred to as neutral, expressive , archaic & new words proper – neologisms . All the methods of analysis are applied in one & the same sphere of investigation . If you are interested in meaning you shouldn’t pay much attention to the structure , if you are interested in collocation of words you shouldn’t pay much attention what parts of words represent the distributional structure . The combination of different methods of analysis helps to classify the vocabulary as a whole & each lexical unit taken separately . It should be said that practically no procedures function independently & separately from each other . It is only for study aims that we separate one procedure from another . In fact , being a two-faced unit a lexical item provides to be an indivisible unit of form & content . That is why you cannot investigate one side of the item paying no attention to the other one .

Semasiology . Lexical meaning & its aspects .

Semasiology (or semantics ) is a branch of linguistics which studies meaning . Semasiology is singled out as an independent branch of lexicology alongside word-formation , etymology , phraseology & lexicography . And at the same time it is often referred to as the central branch of lexicology .
The significance of semasiology may be accounted for by three main considerations :
1. Language is the basic human communication system aimed at ensuring the exchange of information between the communicants which implies that the semantic side forms the backbone of communication .
2. By definition lexicology deals with words , morpheme & word-groups .

All those linguistic units are two-faced entities having both form & meaning .
3. Semasiology underlines all other branches of lexicology . Meaning is the object of semasiological study .
However , at present there is no universally accepted definition of meaning or rather a definition reflecting all the basic characteristic features of meaning & being at the same time operational . Thus , linguists state that meaning is “one of the most ambiguous & most controversial terms in the theory of language “(Steven Ullman).Leech states that the majority of definitions turn out to be a dead end not only on practical but on logical grounds . Numerous statements on the complexity of the phenomenon of meaning are found on the Russian tradition as well by such linguists as
А.А.Потебня , И.А.Бодуэн де Куртене , Щерба , Виноградов , А.И. Смерницкий
& others .
However vague & inadequate , different definitions of meaning help to sum up the general characteristics of the notion comparing various approaches to the description of the content side of the language . There are three main categories of definitions which may be referred to as :
V analytical or referential definition of meaning
V functional or contextual definition of meaning
V operational or information-oriented definition of meaning

Analytical or referential definition of meaning.
They seek to find the essence of meaning establishing the interdependence between words of the objects or phenomena they denote . The best known analytical model of meaning is the so-called “basic triangle”.

Concept (or our thought)

Sound-form Word-object (referent)
They are connected directly that means that if we hear a sound-form a certain idea arises in our mind & the idea brings out a certain referent that exists in the reality . But the sound-form & the referent are connected indirectly because there are no objects or phenomena in the reality that predict a certain sound-form , that need to be named by a certain sequence of sounds . The strongest point in the approach is an attempt to link the notion of meaning with the process of naming the objects , processes or phenomena of concrete reality . The analytical definitions of meaning are usually criticized on the grounds that they cannot be applied to sentences . e. g. The sentence “ I like to read long novels “ does not express single notion , it represents composites of notions specifying the relations between them .
The referential definition of meaning can hardly be applied to semantic additions that come to the surface in the process of communication . e. g. “That’s very clever “ may mean different sorts of things including that it is not clever at all .
It has also been stated that the referential approach fails to account for that fact that one word may denote different objects & phenomena . That is the case of polysemy . On the other hand one & the same object may be denoted by different words & that is the case of synonymy .

Functional or contextual

Definitions of meaning.

Proceeding from the assumptions that the true meaning of a word is to be found by observing what a man does with it not what he says about it , the proponents of functional approach to meaning define it as the use of the word in the language . It has been suggested that the meaning of a word is revealed by substituting different contexts . e. g. The meaning of the word cat may be singled out of contexts:

____________ catch mice.

I bought fish for my _____. and similar sentences.
To get a better insight in to the semantics of a word it is necessary to analyze as many contexts in which it is realized as possible. The question arises – when to stop collecting different contexts & what amount of material is sufficient to make a reliable conclusion about the meaning of a word ? In practice a scholar is guided by intuition which amount to the previous knowledge of the notions the given word denotes. Besides , there are contexts which are so infrequent that they can hardly be registered & quite obviously they have never been met by the speakers of the given language. Nevertheless being presented with a context a native speaker proceeds not from a list of possible contexts but from something else. The functional approach to meaning is important because it emphasizes the fact that words are seldom if ever used in isolation & thus the meaning of a word is revealed only when it is realized in a context. But on the whole the functional approach may be described as a complimentary , additional to the referential one.

Operational definition

Of meaning.

Поделитесь этой записью или добавьте в закладки