The english word as a structure

1. the English word as a structure

THE ENGLISH WORD
AS A STRUCTURE

2. Theory of oppositions

THEORY OF OPPOSITIONS
• N.S. Trubetzkoy’s theory;
• first used in phonology, proved fruitful for other branches of linguistics as well.
A lexical opposition is asemantically relevant relationship of partial difference between two
partially similar words.
# Each of the tens of thousands of lexical units constituting the vocabulary possesses a
certain number of characteristic features variously combined and making each separate
word into a special sign different from all other words.

3. lexical distinctive feature

LEXICAL DISTINCTIVE FEATURE
• features capable of distinguishing a word in morphological form or meaning
from an otherwise similar word or variant;
Distinctive features and oppositions take different specific manifestations on
different linguistic levels:
in phonology,
morphology,
lexicology.
We deal with lexical distinctive features and lexical oppositions.

4. doubt : : doubtful

DOUBT : : DOUBTFUL
the distinctive features are morphological:
doubt is a root word and a noun,
doubtful is a derived adjective.
The features that the two contrasted words possess in common form the basis of a
lexical opposition.
(the basis in the opposition doubt :: doubtful is the common root -doubt-).

5. lexical group

LEXICAL GROUP
• a subset of the vocabulary all the elements of which possess a
particular feature forming the basis of the opposition.

6.

• man :: boy
• boy :: lad
• the distinctive feature is the
semantic component of age.
• the distinctive feature is that
of stylistic colouring of the
second member.

7. State the basis of the oppositions and the distinctive features:

• windy :: windless
• bull :: cow
• cow :: calf
• piggie :: piglet

8. word: definition

WORD:
DEFINITION
Within the scope of linguistics the word has been defined:
syntactically,
semantically,
phonologically,
by combining various approaches.

9. word: definition

WORD:
DEFINITION
H. Sweet: “the minimum sentence”.
L. Bloomfield: “a minimum free form”.
E. Sapir: “one of the smallest completely satisfying bits
of isolated ‘meaning’, into which the sentence resolves
itself”.

10. word: definition

WORD:
DEFINITION
the smallest significant unit of a given language capable of
functioning alone and characterised by positional mobility within
a sentence, morphological uninterruptability and semantic
integrity.
The word is the fundamental unit of language. It is a dialectical
unity of form and content.

11. Untangle the words in the sentence:

BUMFUZZLEDWHIPPERSNAPPERSIN
SALOPETTESANDNOOBFINIFUGAL
BIBLIOKEPTSFARTLEKEVERYWHENATTHE
GARDYLOOOFCONJUBILANTS

12. https://parade.com/1195613/marynliles/funny-words/

HTTPS://PARADE.COM/1195613/MARYNLILES/FUNNYWORDS/

13. Ferdinand de Saussure

FERDINAND DE SAUSSURE
• a word is a linguistic sign;
• the relationship shown by a solid
line concerns linguistics and the
sign is not a unity of form and
meaning as we understand it now,
but only sound form.

14. the semantic triangle

THE SEMANTIC TRIANGLE

15. Represent the semantic triangle of the following words (if we agree that they are words ):

Represent the semantic triangle of the following words
(if we agree that they are words ):
• cbpcbd;
• wahala;
• yesn’t;
• geg.