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第一章词的概述ExercisesanswerChapter1Ⅵ.Allthewordsbelongtothenativestock.Ⅴ1.fromDanish2.fromFrench3.fromGerman4.fromLatin5.fromItalian6.fromSpanish7.fromArabic8.fromChinese9.fromRussian10.fromGreek英语参考资料Chapter1AGeneralSurveyofaWordⅠ.DefinitionofawordAristotledefinedawordasthesmallestsignificantunitofspeech-adefinitionwhichheldswayuntilrecently.Modernmethodsofanalysishavediscoveredsemanticunitsbelowthewordlevel.Anewtermisthereforeneededtodenotethesmallestsignificantelementofspeech;incontemporarylinguistictheoryitisknownasamorpheme.Bloomfielddistinguishesbetweentwotypesoflinguisticforms:freeformsandboundforms.Freeformscanstandbythemselvesandsometimesactasacompleteutterancewhereasboundformscannot.Forexample,thewordnicelycontainsthefreeformnice,andtheboundform-ly.Theformercanoccurasanindependentunitandevenasasentence(Whatabouttheotherfilm?-Nice).Butthesuffix-lycannotstandbyitself,tosaynothingofactingasacompleteutterance.AccordingtoBloomfield,awordisaminimalfreeform.Lexicologydealsbydefinitionwithwordsandwordformingmorphemes,thatistosay,withsignificantunits.Itfollowsthattheseelementsmustbeinvestigatedintheirformandintheirmeaning.Therefore,fromthelexicologicalpointofview,awordisacombinationofform(phonological)andmeaning(lexicalandgrammatical).Inaddition,awordactsasastructuralunitofasentence.Ⅱ.SoundandmeaningTheNaturalistshavearguedthattheoriginoflanguageliesinonomatopoeia,thatpeoplebegantalkingbycreatingiconicsignstoimitatethesoundsheardaroundtheminnature.Theymaintainthatthereisanaturalconnectionbetweensoundandmeaning.TheConventionalists,ontheotherhand,holdthattherelationsbetweensoundandmeaningareconventionalandarbitrary.Factshaveprovedthisargumenttobevalid.Wordsthatconveythesamemeaninghavedifferentphonologicalformsindifferentlanguages-forexample,Englishmeat/mi:t/,Chineseròu.Alternatively,thesamephonologicalformsmayconveydifferentmeanings-forexample,sight,site,cite.Ⅲ.MeaningandconceptMeaningiscloselyrelatedtoaconcept.Aconceptisthebaseofthemeaningofaword.Awordisusedtolabelaconcept.Itactsasthesymbolforthatconcept.Theconceptisabstractedfromtheperson,thing,relationship,idea,event,andsoon,thatwearethinkingabout.Wecallthisthereferent.Thewordlabelstheconcept,whichisabstractedfromthereferent;theworddenotesthereferent,butdoesnotlabelit.Thisapproachtomeaningcanbediagrammedasfollows:word-concept-referentTheformulashowsthatthewordreferstothereferentthroughaconcept.Aconceptisanabstractionfromthingsofthesamekind.Whensomeonesayschairtoyou,howdoyouknowitisachair?Itissimplybecauseitshowscertaincharacteristicssharedbyalltheobjectsyoucallchairs.Youhaveabstractedthesecharacteristicsfromyourexperienceofchairs,andfromwhatyouhavelearnedaboutchairs.Fromthisitcanbededucedthataconceptreferstosomethingingeneral,butnotsomethinginparticular.Aword,however,canrefertoboth,asisshowninthefollowingtwosentences:...somehavebeguntorealizethattheautomobileisamixedblessing.Theautomobilewasstalledinasnowstorm.Thewordautomobileinthefirstsentencereferstosomethingingeneralwhereasthewordinthesecondsentencereferstoaspecificone.Therearetwoaspectstothemeaningofaword:denotationandconnotation.Theprocessbywhichthewordreferstothereferentiscalleddenotation.Forexample,thedenotationofdogiscaninequadruped.Thedenotativemeaningofawordusuallyreferstothedictionarydefinitionofaword.Asopposedtodenotation,connotationreferstotheemotionalaspectofaword.Forexample,theconnotationofdogmightincludefriend,helper,competition,etc.Ⅳ.LexicalitemandvocabularyAunitofvocabularyisgenerallyreferredtoasalexicalitem.Acompleteinventoryofthelexicalitemsofalanguageconstitutesthatlanguage'sdictionary.InNewHorizonsinLinguistics,JohnLyonspointsoutthatLexicalitemsareoftenreferredto,loosely,aswords.Thetermvocabularyusuallyreferstoacompleteinventoryofthewordsinalanguage.Butitmayalsorefertothewordsandphrasesusedinthevariantsofalanguage,suchasdialect,register,terminology,etc.Thevocabularycanbedividedintoactivevocabularyandpassivevocabulary:theformerreferstolexicalitemswhichapersonuses;thelattertowordswhichheunderstands.TheEnglishvocabularyischaracterizedbyamixtureofnativewordsandborrowedwords.MostofthenativewordsareofAnglo-Saxonorigin.TheyformthebasicwordstockoftheEnglishlanguage.Inthenativestockwefindwordsdenotingthecommonestthingsnecessaryforlife,naturalphenomena,divisionsoftheyear,partsofthebody,animals,foodstuffs,trees,fruits,humanactivityandotherwordsdenotingthemostindispensablethings.Thenativestockalsoincludesauxiliaryandmodalverbs,pronouns,mostnumerals,prepositionsandconjunctions.Thoughsmallinnumber,thesewordsplaynosmallpartinlinguisticperformanceandcommunication.Borrowedwords,usuallyknownasloan-words,refertolinguisticformstakenoverbyonelanguageordialectfromanother.TheEnglishvocabularyhasreplenisheditselfbycontinuallytakingoverwordsfromotherlanguagesoverthecenturies.TheadoptionofforeignwordsintotheEnglishlanguagebeganevenbeforetheEnglishcametoEngland.TheGermanicpeople,ofwhichtheAnglesandSaxonsformedapart,hadlongbeforethiseventbeenincontactwiththecivilizationofRome.WordsofLatinorigindenotingobjectsbelong