A WORD AS A LANGUAGE BASIC UNIT

Lexicology

# 1 THE SUBJECT MATTER OF LEXICOLOGY

A WORD AS A LANGUAGE BASIC UNIT

Lexicology from Greek word “lexis”- a word, a phrase, “logos” – science learning. Lexicology is a branch of linguistics, which studies the vocabulary of the language. Its basic task is to study the origin and the different properties of vocabulary of a language. Lexicology is concerned with words, set phrases, studies all kinds of semantic relations.

There are 5 types of lexicology:

General, Special, Historical, Descriptive, Comparative.

General lexicology – a part of linguistics which studies the general properties of words, the specific features of words of any particular language. It studies the peculiarities of words common to all languages.

Special lexicology – devotes its attention to the description, to the characteristic peculiarity in the given language. Moreover, deals with the words of a definite language. For instance, English lexicology.

Historical lexicology – studies the evolution development of any vocabulary. It discusses the origin of various words, their change and development. It investigates the linguistic and extra linguistic forces modifying their structural meaning and usage.

Descriptive lexicology – deal with the vocabulary of a given language at a given stage of its development. Descriptive lexicology of the English Language deals with the English word in its morphological and semantical structures investigating the interdependence between these two aspects.

Comparative lexicology – deals with the properties of the vocabulary of two or more languages.

A WORD AS A LANGUAGE BASIC UNIT

In word there are two types of meaning:

Grammatical and Lexical.

The Grammatical meaning is the formal meaning. Sometimes it happens that the word being only the expression of grammatical meaning at first, then becomes the basis of forming the new grammatically related meaning, fixes in this nominative function as a separate word and at last becomes separate form this nominative function as a separate word at last becomes separate from these grammatical forms and expresses only the Lexical meaning.

Exercise 1. Answer the following questions:

1. What is the origin of the word “lexicology”?

2. What does lexicology study?

3. What is the basic task of lexicology?

4. Name the types of lexicology.

5. Tell about general lexicology.

6. What is a special lexicology?

7. Speak on historical lexicology.

8. What does descriptive lexicology deal with?

9. What is comparative lexicology?

10. What is a word?

11. How many meanings does a word have?

12. What is a grammatical meaning of the word?

13. Give an example to a lexical meaning of the word.

14. Is lexicology an important part of linguistics? Why?

Exercise 2. Consult with a dictionary and write down 10 examples, to fulfill the task to find out the words, which express grammatical and lexical meaning of the word.

WORKSHEET

DICTIONARY WORK

In all exercises write down which dictionary you used for finding the answer.

1. About how many words are there in English?

a) at least 100,000 b) at least 300,000 c) at least 600,000

2. Find a few synonyms of the word old-fashioned.

Underline those with positive connotation.

3. What are the different ways of pronunciation of the word clerk, squirrel?

Which one is used mainly in American English?

4. What is the difference between the words aperitif, hors d’oeuvre, starter and appetizer?

5. What is the origin of these words? http://www.etymonline.com/

Madam

Alcohol

Ketchup

Window

Kilt

Monday

December

I

you

they

6. What does RSVP mean?

7. What is the meaning of these prefixes and suffixes? What happens if you add them to words? Can you supply examples?

Bi-

half-

semi-

pre-

sub-

-ess

-hood

-shi

8. How would you explain the following: