词汇学名词解释 2

1、 英语词汇概述：（8%）

（1） 英语词汇的谱系关系及其历史发展：英语的谱系关系；英语的三个发展阶段。

（2） 英语词汇的构成：基本词汇与专用词汇；英语词汇中的本族词与外来词。

（3） 英语词汇的三大特点：数量大、来源广、变化多。

‘Indo-European’印欧语系

With Vikings’ invasion, many Scandinavian words at least 900 words of

Scandinavian origin have survived in modern English. Old English has a vocabulary

of about 50,000 to 60,000 words. It was a highly inflected language just like

modern German.

1

1. Word词--- A word is a minimal free form of a language that has a given

sound and meaning and syntactic function.

2．Vocabulary词汇 —— Vocabulary is most commonly used to refer to the

sum total of all the words of a language. It can also refer to all the words of a given

dialect， a given book， a given subject and all the words possessed by an

individual person as well as all the words current in a particular period of time in

history.

3. basic word stock 基本词汇is the foundation of the vocabulary accumulated

over centuries and forms the common core of the language. Though words of the

basic word stock constitute a small percentage of the English vocabulary, yet it is

the most important part of it. These words have obvious characteristics.

2

（1）All national character全民性. 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。They include words

relating to the following respects:

Natural phenomena/Human body and relations/Names of plants and

animals/Action, size, domain, state/Numerals, pronouns, prepositions,

conjunctions

（2）Stability稳定性. Words of the basic word stock have been in use for

centuries.

（3）Productivity 多产性. Words of the basic word stock are mostly root words

or monosyllabic words. They can each be used alone, and at the same time can

form new words with other roots and affixes.

（4）Polysemy多义性. Words belonging to the basic word stock often possess

more than one meaning because most of them have undertone semantic changes

in the course of use and become polysemous.

（5）Collocability搭配性. Many words of the basic word stock quite a number

of set expressions, idiomatic usages, proverbial sayings and the like.

ic words stock非基本词汇Words, void of the stated characteristics,

do not belong to the common core of the language. They include the following.

3

（1）Terminology术语consists of technical terms used in particular disciplines

and academic areas

（2）Jargon行话 refers to the specialized vocabularies by which members of

particular arts, sciences, trades and professions communicate among themselves

such as in business.

（3）Slang俚语belongs to the sub-standard language, a category that seems

to stand between the standard general words including informal ones available to

everyone and in-group words like cant, jargon, and argot, all of which are

associated with, or most available to, specific groups of the population. Slang is

created by changing or extending the meaning of existing words though some

slang words are new coinages altogether. Slang is colorful, blunt, expressive and

impressive.

（4）Argot黑话 generally refers to the jargon of criminals.

（5）Dialectal words方言词 are words used only by speakers of the dialect in

question.

（6） Archaisms 古语词are words or forms that were once in common use but

are now restricted only to specialized or limited use.

（7） Neologisms新词语 are newly-created words or expressions, or words

that have taken on new meanings.-。

4

t words 实义词denote clear notions and thus are known as notional

words. They include nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs and numerals, which denote

objects, phenomena, action, quality, state, degree, quantity.

onal words 功能词do not have notions of their own. Therefore, they

are also called empty words. As their chief function is to express the relation

between notions, the relation between words as well as between sentences, they

are known as form words. Prepositions, conjunctions, auxiliaries and articles

belong to this category.

words本地词——– are words brought to Britain in the 15 century by

the German tribes. Anglo-Saxon Words， are small in number, amounting to

roughly 50,000 to 60,000, but they form the mainstream of the basic word stock

and stand at the core of the language （1. neutral in style文体中性nt in use

使用频繁）

ed words借词——words taken over from foreign languages are

know as loan words, constituting 80 percent of the modern English vocabulary.

The English language has vast debts .

ns同化词—— are words borrowed early in the past and now are well

assimilated into the English language. Such as port from portus (L).‘Denizens’的

例子都要记：Port from portus (L), cup from cuppa (L),shift from skipta (ON), shirt

from skyrta (ON), change from changier (F), pork from porc (F).

5

ation-loans译借词——Translation-loans are words and expressions

formed form the existing material in the English language but modeled on the

patterns taken from another language, such as ‘ long time no see from

haojiumeijian (Ch)

11．Semantic-loans借义词——words of this category are not borrowed with

reference to the form ,But their meaning are borrowed , in other words, English has

borrowed a new meaning for an existing word in the language ,such as the word

dream ,which originally meant ’joy’ and ‘music ’, and its modern meaning

was borrowed later from the Norse.

异形– retained their original pronunciation and spelling. Such as

décor（F） blitzkreeg（G） emir， intermez， rowtow， bazaar， rajar， status

quo

2、 英语构词法：（27%）

（1） 英语单词的结构：自由语素与非自由语素；构词不达意成份，词根、词干、前

缀、后缀；。

（2） 构词法：词缀法、合成法、转成法、缩略法、逆成法、混成法、拟声法、元音

替换法、重音变换法、短语合成法、双词合成法、专有名词转成法。

me词素：A morpheme is the minimal significant element in the

composition of words.

6

2. Free morpheme自由语素: Free morphemes are the morphemes which are

independent units of meaning and can be used freely all by themselves or in

combination with other morphemes. For example: “help”, “table”, “room”

are all free morphemes.

morpheme黏着语素: Bound morphemes are the morphemes which

cannot be used independently but have to be combined with other morphemes

either free or bound, to form a word. For example: “-er”, “dis-“, “-less” are

all bound morphemes.

4. Bound root黏着词根：A bound root is often seen as part of a word; it can

never stand by itself although it bears clear, definite meaning; it must be combined

with another root or an affix to form a word. For example: the root

“geo-“combines with another root “-ology”, we get the word “geology”.

5. Affix词缀: morphemes manifesting various grammatical relations or

grammatical categories such as number, tense, degree and case. Affixes are of two

types: inflectional and derivational. Inflectional affixes manifest various

grammatical relations or grammatical categories, such as “-ing”, “-est”, while

derivational affixes are added to an existing form to create a word, such as “-ly”,

“dis-“, “un-“.

tional morpheme or affixes屈折语素或屈折词缀: the manifestation of

various grammatical relationships through the addition of inflectional affixes, such

as number, tense, degree and case.

7

7. Derivational morphemes or Derivational affixes派生语素或派生词缀：

Derivational affixes are affixes added to other morphemes to create new words.

8. Prefix前缀: Prefixes occur at the beginning of a word. Prefixes modify the

meaning of the stem, but they usually do not change the part of speech of the

original word.

9. Suffix后缀: Suffixes occur at the end of the stems; they modify the meaning

of the original word and in many cases change its part of speech.

10. Root词根： A root is the basic form of a word which cannot be further

analyzed without total loss of identity.

11. Derivation or Affixation派生法和词缀法：-Affixation is generally defined as

the formation of words by adding word-forming or derivational affixes to stems.

This process is also known as derivation.

12. Prefixation前缀法： is the formation of new words by adding prefixes to

stems.

13. Suffixation后缀法--Suffixation is the formation of new words by adding

suffixes to stems.

8

14. Compounding复合法：Compounding: : It is a process of combining two or

more than two words into one lexical unit. For example: sailboat, big-mouth,

three-year-old.

15. Conversion转换法：Conversion is the formation of new words by

converting words of one class to another class. This process of creating new words

without adding any affixes is also called zero-derivation. E.g. dry (a.)-->to dry.

16. Back-formation逆构词: It is a process by which new words are formed by

taking away the supposed suffix of an existing word. For example: typewrite

(typewriter), edit (editor)

17. Abbreviation缩写(shortening) ： is a shortened form of a word or phrase

which represents the complete form. For example: TV (television), Dr (doctor), hr

(hour), Jan (January)

Abbreviation includes four types: I. Clipped words II. Initialisms III. Acronyms

IV. Blends.

I. Clipped words省略词--are words created by clipping part of a word, leaving

only a piece of the old word. E.g. telephone-->phone, professional-->pro.

II. Initialisms首字母缩略—are words created by combining the initials of a

number of words. E.g. IMF/ai em ef/=International Monetary Fund.

9

III. Acronyms首字母缩略-- are words created by combining the initials of a

number of words.. E.g. NATO/'neito/=North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

initialism来的词没有办法像念单词那样读出来，譬如FBI,CIA,WTO,UK

而acronym来的词可以读出来，譬如APEC,AIDS，NATO

IV. Blends混合--are words that are combined by parts of other words. E.g.

smoke+fog=smog.

3、 词的意义及其演变：（45%）

（1） 词的定义；词的词汇意义与语法意义；词义与概念；词的理据。]

（2） 词的多义性（单义词与多义词）。

（3） 词义演变的类型（辐射型；连锁型）

（4） 词义历史发展的倾向：词义的扩大；词义的缩小；词义的扬升；词义的贬降；

词义的转移。

（5） 词与词之间的语义关系：同义关系；反义关系；同形或同音异义关系；上下义

关系；语义场。

（6） 词义的类型：概念意义；内涵意义；风格意义；感情意义；联想意义；搭配意

义；主题意义。

10

（7） 词的比喻意义：隐喻、换喻。

1. Motivation理据--accounts for the connection between the linguistic

symbol and its meaning.

2. Onomatopoeic Motivation拟声理据--These words were created by

imitating the natural sounds or noises. For example, bang, ping-pang, crow by

cocks, etc.

3. Morphological Motivation形态学理据--Compounds and derived words are

multi-morphemic words and the meaning of many are the sum total of the

morphemes combined. For instance, airmail means to "mail by air", miniskirt is "a

small skirt".

4. Semantic Motivation语义理据--refers to the mental associations suggested

by the conceptual meaning of a word.

E.g. When we say the mouth of a river, we associate the opening part of the

river with the mouth of a human being or an animal.

5. Etymological Motivation词源理据--The history of the word explains the

meaning of the word.

6. Sense意义: Sense is concerned with the inherent meaning of the linguistic

form. It is the collection of all the features of the linguistic form; it is abstract and

11

de-contextualized.

7. Reference所指: Reference means what a linguistic form refers to in the real,

physical world; it deals with the relationship between the linguistic element and

the non-linguistic world of experience.

8. Concept概念: 1. 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.2. Concept, which is beyond language, is the

result of human cognition, reflecting the objective world in the human mind . 3.

Concept is universal to all men alike regardless of culture, race, language and so on.

4. a concept can have as many referring expressions as there are languages in the

world.

9. Conceptual meaning 概念意义: 1) Conceptual meaning (also known as

denotative meaning) is the meaning given in the dictionary and forms the core of

word-meaning. 2) Being constant and relatively stable, conceptual meaning forms

the basis for communication as the same word has the same conceptual meaning

to all the speakers of the same language

ative meaning联想意义:(一定要把它的四种分支答上)1) associative

meaning is the secondary meaning supplemented to the conceptual meaning.

2)It differs from the conceptual meaning in that it is open-ended and

indeterminated. 3) It is liable to the influence of such factors as culture , experience,

religion, geographical region, class background, education, etc. 4)Associative

12

meaning comprises four types : connotative, stylistic, affective, and collocative.

11. Morphs语素--Morphemes are abstract units, which are realized in speech

by discrete units known as morphs. They are actual spoken, minimal carriers of

meaning.

12. Allomorph语素变体--Some morphemes are realized by more than one

morph according to their position in a word. Such alternative morphs are known as

allomorphs. For instance, the morpheme of plurality {-s} has a number of

allomorphs in different sound context, e.g. in cats /s/, in bags /z/, in match /iz/.

13. Opaque Words隐性词--Words that are formed by one content morpheme

only and cannot be analyzed into parts are called opaque words, such as axe斧头,

glove手套.

14. Transparent Words透明词--Words that consist of more than one

morphemes and can be segmented into parts are called transparent words:

workable(work+able), door-man(door+man).

15. Polysemy一词多义--The same word may have two or more different

meanings. The word "flight", for example, may mean "passing through the air",

"power of flying", "air of journey", etc.

16. Homonyms--（同音异义，同形异义）: Homonymy refers to the phenomenon

that words having different meanings have the same form, i.e. , different words are

13

identical in sound or spelling, or in both.

17. Perfect Homonyms完全同形同音异义词--are words identical both in

sound and spelling, but different in meaning。

E.g. bear n. a large heavy animal;

bear v. to put up with

18. Homographs同形异义--are words identical only in spelling but different in

sound and meaning.

sow /s3u/ v. to scatter seeds

sow /sau/ n. female adult pig

19. Homophones同音异义--are words identical only in sound but different in

spelling and meaning. E.g.

dear /di3/ n. a loved person

deer /di3/ n. a kind of animal

20. Synonyms同义词-- refers to the sameness or close similarity of meaning.

Words that are close in meaning are called synonyms. E.g. maid / girl They are the

same meaning of "a young female".

14

21. Absolute (Complete, Perfect) Synonyms绝对同义词--are words which are

identical in meaning in all its aspects, i.e. both in grammatical meaning and lexical

meaning, including conceptual and associative meanings. For instance,

composition / compounding They have the perfect same meaning in Lexicology.

22. Relative (near,partial) synonyms相对同义词--are similar or nearly the

same in denotation ,but embrace different shades of meaning or different degrees

of a given quality.

Take stagger/reel/totter for example. Stagger implies unsteady movement

characterized by a loss of balance and failure to maintain a fixed course. E.g.

stagger under a heavy load; Reel suggests a swaying or lurching so as to appear on

the verge of falling. E.g. The drunken man reeled down the hall; Totter indicates the

uncertain, faltering steps of a feeble old person or of an infant learning to walk.

23. Sources of Synonyms同义词来源

I. Borrowing借词: Native (ask)--French (question)--Latin (interrogate)

II. Dialects and regional English方言词: railway (BrE)--railroad (AmE)

III. Figurative『a. 比喻的，象征的』 and euphemistic 『a.委婉的』use of words:

occupation--walk of life (fig.)

lie--distort the fact (euph.)

15

IV. Coincidence with idiomatic expressions习语:

win--gain the upper hand

hesitate--be in two minds

24. Discrimination of Synonyms辨析同义词

I. Difference in denotation外延的差异: differ in the range and intensity of

meaning.

E.g. extend--increase--expand (range)

want--wish--desire (intensity)

II. Difference in connotation内涵的差异: differ in the stylistic and emotive

colouring. E.g.

ask (neutral); beg (colloquial); request (formal)

III. Difference in application应用的差异: in usage. E.g.

empty box ; vacant seat

25. Antonymy反义关系--is concerned with semantic opposition.

16

26. Antonyms反义词--are words which are opposite in meaning.

27. Types of Antonyms反义词的种类

I. Contradictory terms矛盾反义词: mutually opposed; true oppositeness of

meaning; no possibility between them; E.g. alive--dead; present--absent

II. Contrary terms相反词: gradable

E.g. rich--(well-to-do)--poor;

hot--(warm,cool)--cold

III. Relative terms相对反义词: relational oppositeness

E.g. parent--child; husband--wife; sell--buy

IV. Semantic incompatibles语义不兼容: contrastingness.

E.g. north,south,east,west;

spring,summer,autumn,winter.

28. Hyponymy下义关系-- Hyponymy refers to the sense relation between a

more general, more inclusive word and a more specific word. The word which is

more general is called a superordinate（上坐标词）, and the more specific words are

17

called its hyponyms. (Hyponyms of the same superordinate are co-hyponyms to

each other.) e.g. superordinate: animal, hyponyms: dog, cat, lion, tiger.

29. Extension of meaning 广义(generalization) refers to the process in which

the meaning of a word becomes more general or inclusive than its historically

earlier denotation. For example, the word “holiday” was originally used to mean

a day of religious significance because it was a “holy day”. Today everyone

enjoys a holiday, whether he or she is religious or not.

30. Narrowing of meaning狭义(specialization)-- refers to the process in

which the meaning of a word becomes less general or inclusive than its historically

earlier meaning. For example, the word “liquor” in contemporary English is an

alcoholic drink, but it was once synonymous with “liquid”, be it alcoholic or not.

31. Elevation or amelioration改善--refers to the process by which words rise

from humble beginnings to positions of importance.

E.g. Marshal and constable meant a "keeper of horses", but now have risen to

a "high-ranking army officer" and "policeman" respectively.

32. Degradation or pejoration of meaning降格--It is a process whereby

words of good origin fall into ill reputation or non-affective words come to be

used in derogatory sense.

E.g. A wench was a "country girl" and now means "prostitute".

18

33. Metaphor『n.隐喻』--is a figure of speech containing an implied

comparison, in which a word or phase ordinarily and primarily used of one thing is

applied to another.

E.g. the teeth of a comb; blood bank; He has a heart of stone; The curtain of

night has fallen.

34. Metonymy『n.借代』--is the device in which we name something by one of

its attributes, as in crown for king, the White House for the President. The kettle is

boiling. (Kettle for water in the kettle)

35. Synecdoche『n.提喻法』--means using a part for a whole, an individual for

a class, a material for a thing or the reverse of any of these.

For example, bread for food, the army for a soldier.

He is a poor creature. --creature for man

36. Analogy『n.类似，相似』--is a process whereby words are created in

imitation of other words.

For example, telethon and talkathon are created on the model of marathon.

最后再给大家一个图表，清晰的表示出上面十几个概念的相互联系。

native words: __________________________________________________________

19

borrowed words: __________________________________________________

homographs: ___________________________________________________

homophones: ___________________________________________________

synonyms

4、 英语习语：（15%）

（1） 习语的定义。

（2） 英语习语的分类：从语义角度；从来源角度；从功能角度分类。

（3） 习语的运用。

27. Idiom习语--Strictly speaking, idioms are expressions that are not readily

understandable from their literal meanings of individual elements. For example, fly

off the handle (become excessively angry) and put up with (tolerate). In a broad

sense, idioms may include colloquialisms, catchphrases, slang

expressions ,proverbs,etc.

20

28. Characteristics of Idioms: 习语的特点

I. Long use

II. Unitary单一 meaning; semantic unity.

III. Syntactic frozenness; structural stability.

29. Figurative idioms比喻习语--are idioms that include metaphor隐喻. Strictly

speaking, they are true idioms. E.g. a dog in the manger.

30. Sources of Figurative idioms比喻习语的来源:

I. Colloquialisms白话俗语: big wheel (an influential or important person)

II. Literary expressions: to kill the fatted calf宰杀那头小肥牛（热情款待）

III. Slang俚语: in the soup(in serious trouble)

IV. Foreign idioms外来习语: sour grapes.

1. A Dictionary of the English Language by Sam Johnson was published in

______.

A. 1721. B. 1735. C. 1775. D. 1828.

21

2. The American Dictionary of the English language by Noah Webster was

published in ____.

A. 1775. B. 1785. C. 1800. D. 1828.

3. The four major modes of semantic change are _____.

A. extension, narrowing, elevation and degradation.

B. extension, generalization, elevation and degradation.

C. extension, narrowing, specialization and degradation.

D. extension, elevation, amelioration and degradation.

4. The use of one name for that of another associated with it is rhetorically

called _____.

A. synecdoche. B. metonymy. C. substitution. D.

metaphor.

5. Idioms adjectival in nature function as _____.

A. adjectives. B. attributes. C. modifiers. D. words.

6. Grammatical context refers to _____ in which a word is used.

22

A. vocabulary B. grammar C. semantic pattern D.

syntactic structure

7. In the idiom

in good feather

, we change

good

into

high

,

full

without

changing meaning.

This change of constituent is known as _____.

A. addition. B. replacement C. position-shifting

variation

8. The word

laconic

is _____.

A. onomatopoeically motivated. B. morphologically motivated.

C. semantically motivated. D. etymologically motivated.

9. CCELD is distinctive for its _____.

A. clear grammar codes. B. language notes.

C. usage notes. D. extra columns.

of the following words is NOT formed through clipping?

A. Dorm. B. motel. C. Gent. D. Zoo.

D.

23

English has a vocabulary of about _____ words.

A. 30,000 to 40,000 B. 50,000 to 60,000

C. 70,000 to 80,000 D. 80,000 to 90,000

12. _____ are bound morphemes because they cannot be used as separate

words.

A. Roots B. Stems C. Affixes D.

Compounds

13. Besides French words, English also absorbed as many as 2,500 words of

_____ in the Middle English period.

A. Dutch origin B. Danish origin C. Latin origin D. Greek

origin

14. A word is a symbol that _____.

A. is used by the same speech community.

B. represents something else in the world.

C. is both simple and complex in nature.

24

D. shows different ideas in different sounds.

15. Some words in the basic word stock are said to be stable because they

_____.

A. are complex words.

B. are technical words.

C. refer to the commonest things in life.

D. denote the most important concepts.

25