1、2012 词汇学复习资料The development of the English Vocabulary1. Indo-European Language Family The Indo-European Language Family is considered as one of the most important language families. It includes most languages of Europe, the Near East, and India. Those languages, which are believed to have originated
2、 from this language family and developed alone different lines, show various degrees of similarity to one another. They fall into eight principal groups, which can be grouped into an Eastern Set 东部诸语族: Balto-Slavic 波罗的-斯拉夫语, Indo-Iranian 印度伊朗语族 , Armenian 亚美尼亚语族 and Albanian阿尔巴尼亚语族; a Western Set: 西
3、部诸语族 Celtic 凯尔特语族, Italic 意大利语族, Hellenic 希腊语族, Germanic 日尔曼语族. All the languages in both sets shed some influence on English to a greater or lesser extent because each has lent words into the English vocabulary. Prussian 普鲁士语Lithuanian 立陶宛语Polish 波兰语Balto-Slavic 波罗的-斯拉夫语 Czech 捷克斯洛伐克语Bulgarian 保加利亚
4、语Slovenian 斯洛文尼亚语RussianAlbanian 阿尔巴尼亚 Persian 波斯语Hindi 北印度语Indo-Iranian 印度伊朗语系 Bengali 孟加拉语Romany，吉卜赛语Armenian 亚美尼亚语 PortugueseSpanishItalic 意大利语族 Italian Roumanian 罗马尼亚语FrenchIndo-European Language FamilyIrishCeltic 凯尔特语 BretonScottishNorwegian 挪威语Icelandic，冰岛语Danish 丹麦语Germanic Swedish 瑞典语日尔曼语言 E
5、nglishDutchFlemishGermanHellenic，古希腊语 - Greek1Chapter 1 A General Survey of A WordThe Definition of Word A word is(1) A minimal free form of a language; (2) a sound unity; (3) a unity of meaning; (4) a form that can function alone in a sentence. A word is a minimal free form that has a given sound a
6、nd meaning and syntactic function.A word is a smallest unit of a language.1. The development of English vocabularyThe history of English language can be divided into 3 periods:a/ Old English period (4491100) The former inhabitants, the Celtic, the Germanic tribes called Angles, Saxons and Jutes Angl
7、o-Saxon as Old English, Old English contains 50-60 thousand words, which consists of the basic word stock.b/ Middle English period (1100-1500)characterized by the strong influence of French following the Norman Conquest in 1066.The French loan words were found in law and governmental administration
8、(judge, justice)c/ Modern English period (1500-)the early stage of this period ( including the years between 1500-1700), the Renaissance brought great changes to the vocabulary. borrowing from Latin, Latin were now mostly connected with science and abstract ideas. Greek borrowings were mostly litera
9、ry, technical and scientific words2.Classification of English Words According to Different CriteriaA. By Origin: native words and loan (borrowed ) wordsIn English language, most native words in Modern English are monosyllabic. They form the great majority of the basic word stock of English language.
10、The fundamental features of the basic word stock are:1. National character; 2. Stability; 3. Word-forming ability; 4. Ability to form collocationsSince the great majority of the basic word stock are native words, they are naturally the ones used most frequently in everyday speech and writing.B. By l
11、evel of usage1. Common words ( P11 words connected with ordinary things or activities necessary to everyday life: “The repeated telephone calls only annoyed me but made my sister very angry.”)2. Literary words (P12 words are chiefly used in writing, formal speeches, e.g. Feeling fatigued, Tom retire
12、d early.): a. Archaic words; b. Poetical words See P13 3. Colloquial words: Words used mainly in spoken English, in conversation among friends and colleagues,e.g. “John was fired for petty thieving”4. Slang wordsC. By notion: function words and content ( P 17) function words are short words such as
13、determiners, conjunctions, prepositions, auxiliaries, and so on, they serve grammatical meaning2 Content words have lexical meaning, such as nouns, main verbs, adj and adv.e.g. The passerby was hit by the truck.Chapter 2Word-Structure and Word-Formation(1)1. The definition of morpheme1.1 What is the
14、 smallest meaningful linguistic unit of language?- morpheme What are words composed of? - Words are formed by morphemes. A word is the smallest unit that stands alone to communicate meaning.1.2 What are the Chinese equivalents of morpheme? 语素 词素 -形位 2.1 Morphemes may be classified into free and boun
15、d. Free morphemes, also called content morphemes, may constitute words by themselves. These morphemes have complete meanings in themselves and can be used as free grammatical units in sentences. So we may say that free morphemes are free roots.Bound morphemes = Bound root + affixes, known as grammat
16、ical morphemes, must appear with at least one other morpheme, either free or bound. Bound morphemes are chiefly found in derived words, e.g. recollection, idealistic, ex-prisoner2.2 Morphemes may also be classified into roots (or root morphemes) and affixes (or affixational morphemes). Task: (1) Rea
17、d the following words and find the root in each word.heart, hearten, dishearten, heartless, hearty, heartiness, sweetheart, heartbroken, kind-hearted, whole-heartedly.(2) What is your definition of root? A root is the part of the word-form which remains when all the affixes have been removed.(3) Is
18、a root necessarily a free morpheme? Why?2.2.1 Two types of roots- Free rootIn English, many roots are free morphemes, such as black in black, blackboard, blacksmith.- Bound rootHowever, there are quite a number of roots which cannot exist on their own and thus belong to the class of bound morphemes.
19、 For example, ceive in receive, conceive, perceive, deceive; mit in permit, commit, submit; tain in retain, contain, maintain; cur in recur, occur, incur, etc. these roots cannot be used to form new words.2.2.2 Two types of affixesAffix is a collective term for the type of formative (构词成分) that can
20、be used only when added to another morpheme.- Inflectional affixes (or inflectional morphemes) serve to expressthe following meanings: (1) plurality: e.g. -s in chairs, pens; -es in boxes, tomatoes; en in oxen.(2) the genitive case: e.g. s in boys, childrens.(3) the verbal endings: for example,a. -(
21、e)s in words like eats, teaches shows the third personsingular present tense. b. -ing in words like eating, teaching shows the present participle or gerund.c. -(e)d in words like worked, saved shows the past tense or past participle.(4) the comparative and superlative degrees: e.g. -er in words like
22、 smaller, harder; -est in words like smallest, hardest.- Derivational affixes (or derivational morphemes) can be further divided into prefixes and suffixes.3 (1) Prefixes are affixes before the root, e.g: unjust, rewrite. As a rule, most prefixes modify the meaning of roots, but not their parts of s
23、peech.task: list some prefixes that can modify the parts of speech.- en-(em-) as in words like embody, enrich- be- as in words like befriend, belittle- a- as in words like asleep, aside (2) Suffixes are affixes after the root, e.g.: darkness, worker. By the addition of the suffix,the word is usually
24、 changed from one part of speech into another, e.g. liberation, modernize.2.3 Relationship between the two classifications of morphemesMorphemeIt is the minimal meaningful unit of language. Or it is the smallest functioning unit in the composition of words.a) Bound morphemes are morphemes which alon
25、e can be used as words.What is an allomorph?An allomorph is one of the variants of the same morpheme. 语素/形位变体是同一个语素的不同形式。 A morpheme may take various shapes or forms.3.5 Morpheme and Word-formation In word-formation, morphemes are labeled root, stem, base and affix.在构词法中, 语素被分为词根、词干、词基和词缀。 Two types
26、 of affixes:Inflectional affixes and Derivational affixes 屈折词缀和派生词缀 Inflectional affixes function as grammatical markers. 表示词的语法意义的是屈折词缀。-s ,-es ,ing,-er ,or -(e)d,estDerivational affixes or derivational morphemes They can be further divided into prefixes and suffixes.(1) Prefixes are affixes before
27、 the root. e.g.， unjust, rewrite.As a rule, most prefixes modify the meaning of roots, but not their parts of speech.(2) Suffixes are affixes after the rootBy the addition of the suffix, the word is usually changed from one part of speech into another, e.g. liberation, modernize.Root, stem, base 词根、
28、词干、词基A root is that part of a word form that remains when all inflectional and derivational affixes have been removed. 词根是所有屈折词缀和派生词缀被去掉后所剩余的那部分。 A stem is that part of the word-form which remains when all inflectional affixes have been removed. 词干是所有屈折词缀被去掉后所剩余的那部分。 A base refers to a form to which
29、 affixes of any kind (both derivational and inflectional) can be added. It can be a root or a stem.morphemefree morpheme bound morphemeBound root inflectional affixes derivational affixesprefixessuffixes4 词基是任何一种词缀都可加在上面的形式。 词根是所有屈折词缀和派生词缀被去掉后所剩余的那部分。 词干是所有屈折词缀被去掉后所剩余的那部分。 词基是任何一种词缀都可加在上面的形式。 它与词根有区
30、别，因为它是可以从派生角度进行分析的形式，在上面可以加上派生词缀。但是词根则不容许做进一步的分析。词基与词干也是不同的，因为派生词缀和屈折词缀都可以加在词基上，而只有屈折词缀可以加在词干上。Task: Analyse the word in terms of root, stem and base.undesirable (n.): 不是词根（可再分解） ；是词干（可以加屈折词缀，如名词复数 -s） ，也是词基。free morpheme (自由形位) Morpheme: bound root (粘附词根)(形位) bound morpheme（粘附形位） inflectional affix
31、（屈折词缀）affix prefix （前缀）（词缀） derivational affix （派生词缀） suffix （后缀）1. Affixation (derivation) 词缀法Affixation is generally defined as the formation of words by adding word-forming or derivational affixes to stems. This process is also known as derivation, for new words created in this way are derived fr
32、om old forms. According to the positions that affixes occupy in words, affixation falls into two subclasses; prefixation and suffixation.Prefixation: Prefix do not generally change the word-class of the stem but only modify its meaning. However, present-day English finds an increasing number of clas
33、s-changing prefixes. e. g. asleep a (a- + v), encourage V (en- + n), unearth V (un- + n), de-oil V (de- + n), postwar a (post- + n), intercollege a (inter- + n) and others. These make up only an insignificant number in the huge contemporary vocabulary The majority of prefixes are characterized by th
34、eir non-class-changing nature. Their chief function is to change the meaning of the stems.Suffixation: Suffixes have only a small semantic role; their primary function is to change the grammatical function of stems. They mainly change the word class. Therefore, we shall group suffixes on a grammatic
35、al basis into four groups.2. compoundingCompounding, also called composition, is the formation of new words by joining two or more stems. Words formed in this way are called compounds. So a compound is a lexical unit consisting of more than one stem and functioning both grammatically and semanticall
36、y as a single word (Quirk et al 1985). Silkworm 蚕 and hone-ybee 蜜蜂 are compounds; so are tear gas 催泪 and easy chair 安乐椅 . These examples show that compounds can be written solid (silkworm), hyphenated(honey-bee) and open (tear gas and easy chair) As open compounds are the same in form as free phrase
37、s, what is the dividing line between them?2.1 Characteristics of CompoundsCompounds differ from free phrases in the following three aspects.1. Phonetic features In compounds the word stress usually occurs on the first element whereas in 5noun phrases the second element is generally stressed if there
38、 is only one stress In cases of two stresses, the compound has the primary stress on the first element and the secondary stress, if any, on the second whereas the opposite is true of free phrases, e.g.Compound Free phrasea hot1house 温房, 暖房,干燥室 a hot housea black horse a black horsea green room a gre
39、en roomBut these stress patterns of compounds are not absolute. Sometimes, the primary stress may also fall on the second element as in ash-blonde 灰银 and , bottle- green 深绿色的 as well as in combining-form compounds, socio-lin guistic, psycho-a nalysis. Therefore, this is not always reliable.2. Semant
40、ic features Compounds are different from free phrases in semantic unity. Every compound should express a single idea just as one word. For instance, a green hand is an inexperienced person, not a hand that is green in colour; red meat refers to beef or lamb rather than any meat that is red in colour
41、; hot dog is by no means a dog that is hot, but a typical American sausage in between two pieces of bread. The meanings of such examples cannot be easily inferred from the two components of the compounds.Nevertheless, a lot of compounds are transparent, that is the meaning can be inferred from the s
42、eparate elements of compounds. Consider the following random examples: disaster- related, flower pot, washing machine, dumb show 哑剧, scarlet fever 猩红热 and many others. But the two elements are inseparable and the change of the element would result in the loss of the original identity.3. Grammatical
43、features A compound tends to play a single grammatical role in a sentence, for example, a verb, a noun, or an adjective. Bad-mouth used as a verb can take the third person singular -s and the past tense marker -ed, e. g. He bad-mouthed me. 苛刻批评 (Bolinger and Sears 1981) Compound nouns show their plu
44、ral forms by taking inflectional -s at the end, e.g. new-borns, three-year-olds, will-o -the-wisps, major generals. 少将 Of course, there are exceptions such as brothers-in-law, lookers-on . In spite of this their single grammatical role is apparent.In adjective-noun compounds, the adjective element c
45、annot take inflectional suffixes, for example:Compound Free phrasefine art 美术 finer art 美艺术red tape 官样文章 reddest tape 最红带子hot line hotter line 线路, 航线3. ConversionConversion is the formation of new words by converting words of one class to another class. This is a method of turning words of one part
46、of speech to those of a different part of speech. These words are new only in a grammatical sense. Since the words do not change in morphological structure but in function, this process is also known as functional shift. Look at the word round in the following sentences:4a He was knocked out in the
47、first round. 4b Round the number off to the nearest tenth. 4c The neighbours gathered round our barbecue. 4d The moon was bright and round.4e People came from all the country round.(from Lodwig baa-baa does not mean 咩咩- Primary Onomatopoeia 基本理据It means the imitation of sound by sound. Here the soun
48、d is truly an “ echo to the meaning”.e.g. cats - mew; miaowdogs- bow-wow; woof-woofsheep- baa-baa pigeons- coocow - moo ducks - quark- Secondary Onomatopoeia 次要理据It means that certain sounds and sound-sequences are associated with certain senses in an expressive relationship.e.g. ding-dongtick-tockgiggle-gaggleb) Morphological Motivation 形态理据Compounds and derived words are multimorphemic words and the meanings of many are the sum total of the morphemes combined. So if one knows the meaning of each morpheme, namely affix or stem, one can figure out the meaning of
