[PDF] English Words and how the meaning of

View - Download English Words

Previous PDF

Next PDF

English Words

`The air is always thick with our verbal emissions. There are so many things we want to tell the world.

Some of them are important, some of them are not. But we talk anyway. A life without words would be a

horrendous privation.' (from the Introduction)

Words and language, keys to human identity, are fascinating subjects. The aim of this book is to arouse

curiosity about English words and about the nature of language in general, especially among students who

are not intending to specialise in linguistics. The book covers a wide range of topics, including the structure of words, the meaning of words, how

their spelling relates to pronunciation, how new words are manufactured or imported from other languages,

and how the meaning of words changes with the passage of time. It also investigates how the mind deals

with words by highlighting the amazing intellectual feat performed routinely when the right word is

retrieved from the mental dictionary during conversation. Words of all sorts are examinedÐfrom great

poetry, nonsense verse and journalism to advertising. It is demonstrated that in their very different ways

they are all worthy of serious study.

This textbook is an accessible descriptive introduction, suitable for students of English language and

communication, showing how the nature of words can be illuminated by insights from a broad range of areas

of linguistics and related subjects. Francis Katamba is Lecturer in Linguistics at Lancaster University. His publications include Morphology (1993) and Introduction to Phonology (1989).

English Words

Francis Katamba

London and New York

First published 1994

by Routledge

11 New Fetter Lane, London EC4P 4EE

This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2005.

ªTo purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge's collection of thousands of eBooks please go to

www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk.º

Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada

by Routledge

29 West 35th Street, New York, NY 10001

1994 Francis Katamba
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data

Katamba, Francis

English words/Francis Katamba

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references.

1. English languageÐLexicology. I. Title

PE1571.K38 1994

423.028±dc20 93±33393

ISBN 0-203-20528-6 Master e-book ISBN

ISBN 0-203-20531-6 (Adobe eReader Format)

ISBN 0-415-10467-X (hbk)

ISBN 0-415-10468-8 (pbk)

To

Janet,

Francis and Helen

Contents

Preface x

Acknowledgements xii

Abbreviations xiv

Key to symbols used xvi

1 Introduction 1

1.1 Why study words? 1

1.2 Overview of coming chapters 4

2 What is a word? 6

2.1 Introduction 6

2.2 Words are like liquorice allsorts 7

2.2.1 Word-forms 7

2.2.2 Words as vocabulary items 11

2.2.3 Grammatical words 15

2.3 Summary 17

Exercises 18

3 Close encounters of a morphemic kind 19

3.1 The quest for verbal atoms 19

3.2 Close morphological encounters: zooming in on morphemes 19

3.3 Morphemes and their disguises 22

3.3.1 Allomorphs: morph families 22

3.3.2 Contrast 25

3.4 Freedom and bondage 26

3.5 Sound symbolism: phonaesthemes and onomatopoeia 27

3.6 Verbal blueprints 28

3.6.1 Tiny words (isolating languages) 30

3.6.2 Get the glue (agglutinating languages) 31

3.6.3 Labyrinthine words (synthetic languages) 31

3.6.4 Verbal juggernauts (polysynthetic languages) 33

3.6.5 No thoroughbreds 33

3.7 Summary 35

Exercises 35

4 Building words 37

4.1 Words and jigsaws 37

4.2 Know the pieces of the jigsaw 37

4.2.1 Roots are the core 37

4.2.2 Affixes are for appending 38

4.3 The main types of word-building: inflection and derivation 40

4.4 Derivation: fabricating words 41

4.4.1 Affixation: prefixes and suffixes 42

4.4.2 Conversion 48

4.4.3 Compound parade 49

4.4.4 Wishy-washy words 54

4.5 Summary 55

Exercises 55

5 Masquerading allomorphs 57

5.1 The right mask 57

5.2 Phonologically conditioned allomorphs 57

5.2.1 Selecting underlying representations 61

5.2.2 Derivations 63

5.3 Phonology in the shade: lexical and grammatical conditioning 65

5.4 Madness without method: suppletion 66

5.5 Summary 66

Exercises 66

6 A lexicon with layers 69

vi

6.1 The nature of the lexicon 69

6.2 Morphological information in the lexicon 70

6.3 Syntactic information in the lexicon 70

6.4 Does it ring true (phonological information) 71

6.5 Rendezvous with lexical phonology and morphology 71

6.5.1 Neutral and non-neutral affixes 72

6.5.2 The lexicon is like a layered cake 73

6.6 Productivity, the time-warp and cranberries 77

6.7 Peeping beyond the lexicon 79

6.8 Summary 80

Exercises 80

7 Should English be spelt as she is spoke? 83

7.1 Writing systems 83

7.2 Is the English orthography mad? 84

7.2.1 The apparent madness in the English spelling system 85

7.2.2 There is a method in the madness: spelling rules and pronunciation 86

7.2.3 Is A for apple? Why vowel letters pinch like ill-fitting shoes 90

7.3 Morphological signposts in the spelling 94

7.4 Lexical signposting in the spelling 96

7.5 Spelling reform 96

7.6 Is speech degenerate writing? 99

Exercises 101

8 Word manufacture 103

8.1 The production line 103

8.2 Keeping tabs on idioms 106

8.3 Clitics 108

8.4 Summary 111

Exercises 111

9 Words galore 113

9.1 A verbal bonanza 113

vii

9.2 Jargon 113

9.3 Slang 114

9.4 Clichs and catch-phrases 115

9.5 A rose by any other name 119

9.5.1 Semantic widening 120

9.5.2 Semantic narrowing 121

9.5.3 Going up and down in the world 122

9.5.4 Loss account 122

9.5.5 Lexical revivals 124

9.5.6 Metaphors 124

9.6 Clipping 124

9.7 Acronyms and abbreviations 126

9.8 Fads and copycat formations 127

9.9 Back-formation 128

9.10 Blends 128

9.11 Euphemism 129

9.12 Summary 131

Exercises 131

10 A lexical mosaic: sources of English vocabulary 133

10.1 The nature of borrowing 133

10.1.1 Direct and indirect borrowing 133

10.1.2 Loanwords and loanshifts 134

10.1.3 Likely loans 135

10.1.4 Why borrow? 135

10.1.5 The grass is ever greener on the other side 138

10.1.6 Nativisation of loanwords 139

10.1.7 Effects of borrowing 142

10.2 Scandinavian loanwords 143

10.3 The French influence 144

10.3.1 The Norman French legacy 144

viii

10.3.2 French words in modern English 146

10.4 Words from other modern European languages 150

10.5 Loanwords from non-European languages 151

10.6 The Germanic inheritance 152

10.7 Summary 154

Exercises 154

11 The mental lexicon 157

11.1 A mind full of words 157

11.1.1 Types of lexical information 158

11.1.2 The organisation of the mental lexicon 160

11.1.3 To parse or not to parse 161

11.2 Modelling the mental lexicon 164

11.2.1 Understanding speech 164

11.2.2 Selective listening 166

11.2.3 Exploiting syntactic and semantic clues 167

11.3 The articulatory programme 169

11.3.1 Speech errors as evidence in favour of the articulatory programme 169

11.3.2 Two-stage models of lexical access in speech production 171

11.3.3 It's just on the tip of my tongue 174

11.3.4 Malapropisms 175

11.4 Aphasia 176

11.4.1 Broca's aphasia 176

11.4.2 Wernicke's aphasia 177

11.5 Freudian slips 178

11.6 The spreading activation model 179

11.7 Summary 180

Exercises 181

Glossary 183

References 190

Indexes 195

ix

Preface

This book developed out of a course on English words that I have taught at Lancaster over the last few

years. It is intended to arouse curiosity about English words and about language in general, especially

among students who are not intending to specialise in linguistics. Is it not strange that we spend so many of our waking hours talking and yet we know so little about words? Putting words under a microscope and peering at them seems to be a dead boring and absolutely unrewarding subject. Most people know more about sport, cars, computers, gardening, virtually aboutquotesdbs_dbs8.pdfusesText_14

[PDF] important english words with tamil meaning pdf

[PDF] important grammar rules

[PDF] important questions for class 9 maths with solutions

[PDF] important synonyms for competitive exams pdf

[PDF] important theory questions in c programming

[PDF] importation process flow chart philippines

[PDF] importer of record requirements

[PDF] importing cosmetics into uk

[PDF] importing hand sanitizer to uk

[PDF] importing into the united states: a guide for commercial importers

[PDF] impôt sur le revenu maroc

[PDF] impots gouv fr aide aux entreprises covid 19

[PDF] impots gouv fr micro entreprise

[PDF] impots.gouv.fr 2020 entreprise

[PDF] impots.gouv.fr aide aux entreprises