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Lecture 7 (1 hour)
The English word as a structure
Plan: 1. The definition of the word
2. Phonetic, morphological and semantic motivation of words
The word is the basic unit of a language. Uniting meaning and form it is composed of one or more morphemes, each consisting of one or more spoken sounds. Morphemes are also meaningful units but they cannot be used independently, they are always parts of words whereas words can be used as a complete (e.g Listen!). The combination of morphemes within words are subject to certain linking conditions. When a derivational affix is added a new word is formed, thus, listen and listener are different words. In fulfilling different grammatical functions words may take functional affixes: listen and listened are different forms of the same word. Different forms of the same word can be also built analitically with the help of auxiliaries. E.g.: The world should listen then as I am listening now (Shelley).
When used in sentences together with other words they are syntactically organized.
The great Russian physiologist I.P.Pavlov (1849-1936) examined the word in connection with his studies of the second signal system and defined it as a universal signal that can substitute any other signal from the environment in evoking a response in a human organism.
The word has been syntactically defined as "the minimum sentence" by H. Sweet and much later by L. Bloomfield as a "minimum free form".
E. Sapir takes into consideration the syntactic and semantic aspects when he calls the word "one of the smallest completely satisfying bits of isolated 'meaning', into which the sentence the sentence resolves itself. Sapir also points the word's indivisibility: "It cannot be cut into without a disturbance of meaning, one or two other or both of the several parts remaining as a helpless waif (бездомность) on our hand". The essence of the indivisibility will be clear from a comparison of the article a and the prefix a- in a lion and alive. A lion is a word-group because we can separate its elements and insert other words between them: a living lion, a dead lion. Alive is a word: it is indivisible, i.e. structurally impermeable (непроницаемый): nothing can be inserted between its elements. The morpheme a- is not free, is not a word.
Ferdinand de Saussure implies a word as a linguistic sign.
The efforts of many eminent scholars such as V.V. Vinogradov, A. I. Smirnitsky, O.S. Akhmanova, M.D. Stepanova, A.A. Ufimtseva resulted in throwing light on the definition of a word as a basic unit of the language: "The word is the fundamental unit of language. It is a dialectical unity of form and content". Its content or meaning is not identical to notion, but it may reflect human notions, and in this sense may be considered as the form of their existance. Concepts fixed in the meaning of words are formed as generalized and approximately correct reflections of reality, therefore in signifying them words reflect in their content.
The acoustic aspect of the word serves to name objects of reality, not to reflect them. In this sense the word may be regarded as a sign.
Phonetic, morphological and semantic motivation of words (связь слова со значением и формой)- a speaker of a language creates new words because the vocabulary system possesses established associations of form and meaning.
The term motivation is used to denote the relationship existing between the phonemic or morphemic composition and structural pattern of the word on the one hand and its meaning on the other. There are three types of motivation: phonetic, morphological and semantic.
When there is a certain similarity between the sounds that make up the word and those referred to by the sense, the motivation is phonetical: bang, buzz, cuckoo, giggle, hiss, whistle etc. Here the sounds of a word are imitative of sounds in nature because what is referred to is a sound or at least, produces a characteristic sound (cuckoo)-echo-words. In English cuckoo, German Kuckuck, Russian кукушка.
Within the English vocabulary there are different words, all sound imitative, meaning "quick, foolish, indistinct talk": babble, chatter, gabble, prattle. Here echoic creations combine phonological and morphological motivation because they contain verbal suffixes - le and -er forming frequentative verbs. We see that one word combine different types of motivation.
The morphological motivation: the prefix ex- means 'former' when added to human nouns- ex-filmstar, ex-president, ex-wife. Alongside with these cases there is a more general use of ex-: in borrowed words it is unstressed and motivation is faded (expect, export etc).
The derived ( заимствованные слова. Получение или замена одного слова другим, близким по значению) word re-think is motivated in as much as its morphological structure suggests the idea of thinking again. These formations should be compared with older borrowings from Latin and French where re- is now unstressed, and the motivation faded. Compare re-cover 'cover again' and recover 'get better'. From the examples it is clear that motivation is the way in which a given meaning is represented in the word. It reflects the type of nomination process chosen by the creator of the new word.
Semantic motivation is based on the co-existence of direct and figurative meanings of the same word within the same synchronous system. Mouth denotes a part of the human face, and at the same time it can metaphorically apply to any opening or outlet: the mouth of a river, of a cave. Jacket is a short coat and also a protective cover for a book or an electric wire. In their direct meaning neither mouth nor jacket is motivated.