词汇学复习重点

词汇学复习重点1. jargon------ Jargon refers to the specialized vocabularies by which members of particular arts, sciences, trades and professions communicate among themselves such as in business.2. translation loans------ Translation loans are words and expressions formed from the existing material in the English language but modeled on the patterns taken from another language.3. Renaissance------ It is a European movement of learning ancient Greek and Roman classics.4. Allomorph------ one of the variants of the same morpheme5. inflectional affix------ an affix that indicates grammatical relationships6. acronyms------ the process of forming new words by joining the initial letters of names of social and political organizations special noun phrases and technical terms7. back-formation------ the method of creating words by removing the supposed suffixes8. polygsemy------ Polysemy means that one single word has two or more senses at the same time.9. morpheme------ It is a minimal meaningful unit of a language, or it is the smallest functioning unit in the composition of words.10. grammatical meaning------ that part of the meaning of the word indicates grammatical concept or relationships such as part of speech of words, singular and plural meaning of nouns, tense meaning of verbs and their inflectional forms.11. homonym------ Homonyms are words different in meaning but either identical both in sound and spelling or identical only in sound or spelling.12. reference------what a linguistic form refers to in the real word. It is the relationship between language and the world13. semantic field------ Semantic field is concerned with the vocabulary of a language as a system of interrelated lexical networks.14. motivation------ the connection between the linguistic symbol and its meaning.15. conceptual meaning------ the meaning given in the dictionary and forms the core of word-meaning.16. amelioration------ or elevation, a process by which words rise from humble beginnings to positions of importance.17. transfer------ a process whereby words which were used to designate one thing have changed to mean something else.1.Discuss the major characteristics of Basic word stock with examples.Basic word stock contains the following characteristics:All national character: Words of the basic word stock denote the most common things and phenomena of the world around us, which are indispensable to all the people who speak the language.Stability: As they denote the commonest things necessary to life, they are likely to remain unchanged. Stability, however, is only relative.Productivity: Words of the basic word stock are most root words or monosyllabic words; They can form new words with other roots and affixesPolysemy: Words belonging to the basic word stock often possess more than one meaning because most of them have undergone semantic changes in the course of use and become polysemous.Collocability: Many words of the basic word stock have strong collocability.2.What are the major modes of modern vocabulary expansion and give yourexamples.The major modes are creation, semantic change and borrowing.Creation refers to the formation of new words by using existing materials, namely roots, affixes, and other elements. Semantic change means an old form, which takes on a new meaning to meet the new , such as mouse and web. Borrowing has played a vital role in the development of vocabulary, particularly in earlier times. Borrowed words constitute merely six to seven percent of all new words. Creation:词根词缀构成新词semantic change: the word angel is an example. The word is the name of a spiritual being, now, it has a new meaning used to refer to a radar echo caused by something not visually discernible.Borrowing:From French language, English has taken such words as: auteur, black humor, limoFrom German language, English has taken such words as: humoresqueFrom Chinese language, English has taken such words as: Kung fu, wok 3.What are the inflectional affixes frequently used in English? Discuss themeaning each of them indicates.-(e)s— plural number-(e)s—third- person singular present tense-(e)d— past tense -ing— progressive aspect-er— comparative degree-est— superlative degree-'s— possessive case4.How compounds differ from free phrases? Give examples to dwell on this point. phonetic features. In compounds the word stress usually occurs on the first element whereas in noun phrases the second element is generally stressed if there 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. “a ′green room”is a compound, while “a green ′room”is a free phrase.semantic features. Compounds are different from free phrases in semantic unity. For example, “a green hand”is an “inexperienced person”.Grammatical features.A compound tends to play a single grammatical role in a sentence, for example verb, a noun or an adjective. “Bad-mouth”used as a verb can take the third person singular-s.5.Both back-formation and back-clipping are ways of making words by removingthe endings of words. Explain their differences.Back-formation is the method of creating words by removing the supposed suffixed. It is considered to be the opposite process of suffixation. For example, “loafer” may be assumed to d erive from the verb “loaf” on the analogy of known derivatives, such as “swimmer” from “swim” or “driver” from “drive”. By removing the supposed suffixes -er from “loafer”, a verb “loaf” is coined. Back-clipping is different. The deletion occurs at the end of word. Both the original long word and its short form remain in the same word class.6.What is the relationship between concept and meaning?Meaning and concept are closely connected but not identical. They are both related directly to referents and are notions of the words but belong to different categories. Concept, which is beyond language, is the result of human cognition, reflecting the objective world in the human mind. It is universal to all men alike regardless of culture, race, language and so on whereas meaning belongs to language, so is restricted to language use. A concept can have as many referring expressions as there are languages in the world . Even in the same language, the same concept can be expressed in different words.7.What is the relationship between grammatical meaning and lexical meaning? Grammatical meanings refer to that part of the meaning of the world which indicates grammatical concept or relationships such as part of speech of words, singular and plural meaning of nouns, tense meaning of verbs and their inflectional forms. Grammatical meaning of a word becomes important only when it is used in actual context. Different lexical items, which have different lexical meanings, may have the same grammatical meaning, on the other hand, the same word may have different grammatical meanings. Lexical meaning and grammatical meaning make up the word meaning. It is known that grammatical meaning surfaces only in use .But lexical meaning is constant in all the content words within or without context as it is related to the notion that a word conveys.8.What is the difference between homonyms and polysemants? How todifferentiate them?The difference between homonyms and polysemants lies in the fact that homonyms refer to different words which happen to share the same form and the latter is the one and same word which has several distinguishable meanings. One important criterion is to see their etymology. Homonyms are from different sources whereas a polysemant is from the same source which has acquired different meanings in the course of development. The second principle consideration is semantic relatedness. The various meanings of a polysemant are correlated and connected to one centralmeaning to a greater or lesser degree. On the other hand, meanings of different homonyms have nothing to do with one another. In dictionaries, a polysemant has its meaning all listed under one headwork while homonyms are listed as separate entries.9.Discuss some of the characteristics of antonyms.1) antonyms are classified on the basis of semantic opposition2) a word which has more than one meaning can have more than one antonym3) antonyms differ in semantic inclusion. Pairs of antonyms are seen as marked and unmarked terms respectively.4) contrary terms are gradable antonyms, differing in degree of intensity, so each has its own corresponding opposite.10.What are the causes of semantic changes? Illustrate your point. .There are many causes of semantic change. The main causes include extra-linguistic factors and linguistic factors. In extra-linguistic factors. There are historical reasons, class reasons, and psychological reasons. In linguistic factors, there are shortening of phrases, influx of borrowings and analogy.。