Seminar 1

Lexicology as a Science. The Object of Lexicology The main lexicological units. Their similarity and distinctive functions

I.V. Arnold, The English Word, §1.4. Types of Lexical Units [pp. 18-21]:

Lexicological units

The term unit means one of the elements into which a whole may be divided or analyzed and which possesses the basic properties of this whole. The units of a vocabulary or lexical units are two-facet elements possessing form and meaning. The basic unit forming the bulk of the vocabulary is the word. Other units are a morpheme that is parts of words, into which words may be analyzed, and set expressions or groups of words into which words may be combined.

Words

Words are the central elements of language system, they face both ways: they are the biggest units of morphology and the smallest of syntax, and what is more, they embody the main structural properties and functions of the language. Words can be separated in an utterance by other such units and can be used in isolation. Unlike words, morphemes cannot be divided into smaller meaningful units and are functioning in speech only as constituent parts of words. Words are thought of as representing integer concept, feeling or action or as having a single referent. The meaning of morphemes is more abstract and more general than that of words and at the same time they are less autonomous.

Set expressions

Set expressions are word groups consisting of two or more words whose combination is integrated so that they are introduced in speech, so to say, ready-made as units with a specialized meaning of the whole that is not understood as a mere sum total of the meanings of the elements.

Ability to segment speech

In the spelling system of the language words are the smallest units of written discourse: they are marked off by solid spelling. The ability of an average speaker to segment any utterance into words is sustained by literacy. Yet it is a capacity only reinforced by education: it is well known that every speaker of any language is always able to break any utterance into words. The famous American linguist E. Sapir testified that even illiterate American Indians were perfectly capable of dictating to him — when asked to do so — texts in their own language "word by word". The segmentation of a word into morphemes, on the other hand, presents sometimes difficulties even for trained linguists.

Choice of the basic unit

Many authors devoted a good deal of space to discussing which of the two: the word or the morpheme is to be regarded as the basic unit. Many American linguists (Ch. Hockett or Z. Harris, for instance) segmented an utterance into morphemes ignoring words. Soviet lexicologists proceed from the assumption that it is the word that is the basic unit, especially as all branches of linguistic knowledge and all levels of language have the word as their focal point. A convincing argumentation and an exhaustive review of literature is offered by A. A. Ufimtseva (1980).

Fluid boundaries

If, however, we look now a little more closely into this problem, we shall see that the boundaries separating these three sets of units are sometimes fluid. Every living vocabulary is constantly changing adapting itself to the functions of communication in the changing world of those who use it. In this process the vocabulary changes not only quantitatively by creating new words from the already available corpus of morphemes and according to existing patterns but also qualitatively. In these qualitative changes new morphemic material and new word-building patterns come into being, and new names sometimes adapt features characteristic of other sets, those of groups of words, for instance.

Orthographic words

Orthographic words are written as a sequence of letters bounded by spaces on a page. Yet, there exist in the English vocabulary lexical units that are not identical with orthographic words but equivalent to them. Almost any part of speech contains units indivisible either syntactically or in terms of meaning, or both, but graphically divided. A good example is furnished by complex prepositions: along with, as far as, in spite of, except for, due to, by means of, for the sake of, etc.

Phrasal verbs

The same point may be illustrated by phrasal verbs, so numerous in English: bring up 'to educate', call on 'to visit', make up 'to apply cosmetics', 'to reconcile after a disagreement' and some other meanings, put off 'to postpone'. The semantic unity of these verbs is manifest in the possibility to substitute them by orthographically single-word verbs. Though formally broken up, they function like words and they are integrated semantically so that their meaning cannot be inferred from their constituent elements. The same is true about phrasal verbs consisting of the verbs give, make, take and some others used with a noun instead of its homonymous verb alone: give a smile, make a promise, take a walk (cf. to smile, to promise, to walk).

Compound words

Some further examples are furnished by compound nouns. Sometimes they are not joined by solid spelling or hyphenation but written separately, although in all other respects they do not differ from similar one-word nominations. By way of example let us take some terms for military ranks. The terms lieutenant-commander and lieutenant-colonel are hyphenated, whereas wing commander and flight lieutenant are written separately. Compare also such inconsistencies as all right and altogether, never mind and nevertheless.

All these are, if not words, then at least word equivalents because they are indivisible and fulfil the nominative, significative, communicative and pragmatic functions just as words do.

Formulaic sentences

It is worth while dwelling for a moment on formulaic sentences which tend to be ready-made and are characterized by semantic unity and indivisibility: All right, Allow me, Nothing doing, Never mind, How do you do, Quite the contrary. They are learned as unanalyzable wholes and can also be regarded as word equivalents.

Summary: Vocabulary as a field

To sum up: the vocabulary of a language is not homogeneous. If we view it as a kind of field, we shall see that its bulk, its central part is formed by lexical units possessing all the distinctive features of words, i.e. semantic, orthographic and morphological integrity as well as the capacity of being used in speech in isolation. The marginal elements of this field reveal only some of these features, and yet belong to this set too. Thus, phrasal verbs, complex prepositions, some compounds, phraseological units, formulaic expressions, etc. are divided in spelling but are in all other respects equivalent to words. Morphemes, on the other hand, a much smaller subset of the vocabulary, cannot be used as separate utterances and are less autonomous in other respects but otherwise also function as lexical items. The new term recently introduced in mathematics to describe sets with blurred boundaries seems expressive and worthy of use in characterizing a vocabulary — such sets are called fuzzy sets.

R.S Ginzburg, A Course in Modern English Lexicology, §4. Lexical Units, §5. Varieties of Words [pp. 9-11]:

Word is the basic unit

It was pointed out above that Lexicology studies various lexical units: morphemes, words, variable word-groups and phraseological units. We proceed from the assumption that the word is the basic unit of language system, the largest on the morphologic and the smallest on the syntactic plane of linguistic analysis. The word is a structural and semantic entity within the language system.

Distinction between words and phraseological units

It should be pointed out that there is another approach to the concept of the basic language unit. The criticism of this viewpoint cannot be discussed within the framework of the present study. Suffice it to say that here we consistently proceed from the concept of the word as the basic unit in all the branches of Lexicology. Both words and phraseological units are names for things, namely the names of actions, objects, qualities, etc. Unlike words proper, however, phraseological units are word- groups consisting of two or more words whose combination is integrated as a unit with a specialized meaning of the whole. To illustrate, the lexical or to be more exact the vocabulary units table, wall, taxi are words denoting various objects of the outer world; the vocabulary units black frost, red tape, a skeleton in the cupboard are phraseological units: each is a word- group with a specialized meaning of the whole, namely black frost is 'frost without snow or rime', red tape denotes bureaucratic methods, a skeleton in the cupboard refers to a fact of which a family is ashamed and which it tries to hide.

Problem of definition of a word

Although the ordinary speaker is acutely word-conscious and usually finds no difficulty either in isolating words from an utterance or in identifying them in the process of communication, the precise linguistic definition of a word is far from easy to state; no exhaustive definition of the word has yet been given by linguists.

Word is a two-facet unit

The word as well as any linguistic sign is a two-facet unit possessing both form and content or, to be more exact, soundform and meaning. Neither can exist without the other. For example, [θɪmbl] is a word within the framework of the English language primarily because it has the lexical meaning – ‘a small cap of metal, plastic, etc. worn on the finger in sewing’ (Russ. наперсток) and the grammatical meaning of the Common case, singular. In other languages it is not a word, but a meaningless sound-cluster.

When used in actual speech the word undergoes certain modification and functions in one of its forms.

Paradigm of a word

The system showing a word in all its word-forms is called its paradigm. The lexical meaning of a word is the same throughout the paradigm, i.e. all the word-forms of one and the same word are lexically identical. The grammatical meaning varies from one form to another (cf. to take, takes, took, taking or singer, singer's, singers, singers'). Therefore, when we speak of the word singer or the word take as used in actual utterances (cf., His brother is a well-known singer or I wonder who has taken my umbrella) we use the term word conventionally, because what is manifested in the speech event is not the word as a whole but one of its forms which is identified as belonging to one definite paradigm.

Two approaches to the word paradigm

Variants of words

There are two approaches to the paradigm: (a) as a system of forms of one word it reveals the differences and relationships between them; (b) in abstraction from concrete words it is treated as a pattern on which every word of one part of speech models its forms, thus serving to distinguish one part of speech from another. Cf. the noun paradigm – ( ), -'s, -s, -s' as distinct from that of the regular verb – ( ), -s, -ed₁, -ed₂, -ing, etc.

Besides the grammatical forms of words, i.e. word-forms, some scholars distinguish lexical varieties which they term variants of words. Distinction is made between two basic groups of variants of words.

Group One (lexico-semantic variants)

In actual speech a word or to be more exact a polysemantic word is used in one of its meanings. Such a word in one of its meanings is described as lexico-semantic variant. Thus Group One comprises lexico-semantic variants, i.e. polysemantic words in each of their meanings, as exemplified by the meaning of the verb to learn in word-groups like to learn at school, cf. to learn about (of) smth, etc.

Group Two (phonetic and morphological variants)

Group Two comprises phonetic and morphological variants. As examples of phonetic variants the pronouncing variants of the adverbs often and again can be given, cf. ['ᴐ:fn] and ['ᴐ:ftan], [ǝ'geɪn] and [ǝ'gen]. The two variant forms of the past indefinite tense of verbs like to learn illustrate morphological variants, cf. learned [-d] and learnt [-t]. Parallel formations of the geologic—geological, phonetic—phonetical type also enter the group of morphological variants.

Word as a unity of all its forms and variants

It may be easily observed that the most essential feature of variants of words of both groups is that a slight change in the morphemic or phonemic composition of a word is not connected with any modification of its meaning and, vice versa, a change in meaning is not followed by any structural changes, either morphemic or phonetic. Like word-forms variants of words are identified in the process of communication as making up one and the same word. Thus, within the language system the word exists as a system and unity of all its forms and variants.