Word Meaning

Word Meaning
Approaches to word meaning
Meaning and Notion (понятие)
Types of word meaning
Types of morpheme meaning
Motivation

Each word has two aspects:
the outer aspect
( its sound form)
cat
the inner aspect
(its meaning)
long-legged, fury animal with sharp teeth
and claws

Sound and meaning do not always constitute a constant unit even in the same language
EX a temple
a part of a human head
a large church

Semantics (Semasiology)
Is a branch of lexicology which studies the
meaning of words and word equivalents

Approaches to Word Meaning
The Referential (analytical) approach
The Functional (contextual) approach
Operational (information-oriented) approach

The Referential (analytical) approach
formulates the essence of meaning by establishing the interdependence between words and things or concepts they denote
distinguishes between three components closely connected with meaning:
the sound-form of the linguistic sign,
the concept
the actual referent

Basic Triangle
concept (thought, reference) – the thought of the object that singles out its essential features
referent – object denoted by the word, part of reality
sound-form (symbol, sign) – linguistic sign
concept – flower
sound-form referent
[rәuz]

In what way does meaning correlate with
each element of the triangle ?
In what relation does meaning stand to
each of them?

Meaning and Sound-form
are not identical
different
EX. dove - [dΛv] English sound-forms
[golub’] Russian BUT
[taube] German
the same meaning

Meaning and Sound-form
nearly identical sound-forms have different meanings in different languages
EX. [kot] Russian – a male cat
[kot] English – a small bed for a child
identical sound-forms have different meanings (‘homonyms)
EX. knight [nait]
night [nait]

Meaning and Sound-form
even considerable changes in sound-form do not affect the meaning
EX Old English lufian [luvian] – love [l Λ v]

Meaning and Concept
concept is a category of human cognition
concept is abstract and reflects the most common and typical features of different objects and phenomena in the world
meanings of words are different in different languages

Meaning and Concept
identical concepts may have different semantic structures in different languages
EX. concept “a building for human habitation” –
English Russian
HOUSE ДОМ
+ in Russian ДОМ
“fixed residence of family or household”
In English HOME

Meaning and Referent
one and the same object (referent) may be denoted by more than one word of a different meaning
cat
pussy
animal
tiger

Meaning
is not identical with any of the three points of the triangle –
the sound form,
the concept
the referent
BUT
is closely connected with them.

Functional Approach
studies the functions of a word in speech
meaning of a word is studied through relations of it with other linguistic units
EX. to move (we move, move a chair)
movement (movement of smth, slow movement)
The distriution ( the position of the word in relation to
others) of the verb to move and a noun movement is
different as they belong to different classes of words and
their meanings are different

Operational approach
is centered on defining meaning through its role in
the process of communication
EX John came at 6
Beside the direct meaning the sentence may imply that:
He was late
He failed to keep his promise
He was punctual as usual
He came but he didn’t want to
The implication depends on the concrete situation

Lexical Meaning and Notion
Notion denotes the reflection in the mind of real objects
Notion is a unit of thinking
Lexical meaning is the realization of a notion by means of a definite language system
Word is a language unit

Lexical Meaning and Notion
Notions are international especially with the nations of the same cultural level
Meanings are nationally limited
EX GO (E) ---- ИДТИ(R)
“To move”
BUT !!!
To GO by bus (E)
ЕХАТЬ (R)
EX Man -мужчина, человек
Она – хороший человек (R)
She is a good person (E)

Types of Meaning

Grammatical Meaning
component of meaning recurrent in identical sets of individual forms of different words
EX. girls, winters, toys, tables –
grammatical meaning of plurality
asked, thought, walked –
meaning of past tense

Lexico-grammatical meaning
(part –of- speech meaning)
is revealed in the classification of lexical items into:
major word classes (N, V, Adj, Adv)
minor ones (artc, prep, conj)
words of one lexico-grammatical class have the same paradigm

Lexical Meaning
is the meaning proper to the given linguistic unit in all its forms and distributions
EX . Go – goes - went
lexical meaning – process of movement

PRACTICE
Group the words into 3 column according to the grammatical, lexical or part-of –speech meaning
Boy’s, nearest, at, beautiful,
think, man, drift, wrote,
tremendous, ship’s, the most beautiful,
table, near, for, went, friend’s,
handsome, thinking, boy,
nearer, thought, boys,
lamp, go, during.

Grammatical
The case of nouns: boy’s, ship’s, friend’s
The degree of comparison of adj: nearest, the most beautiful
The tense of verbs: wrote, went, thought
Lexical
Think, thinking, thought
Went, go
Boy’s, boy, boys
Nearest, near, nearer
At, for, during (“time”)
Beautiful, the most beautiful
Part-of-speech
Nouns---verbs---adj----prep

Aspects of Lexical meaning
The denotational aspect
The connotational aspect
The pragmatic aspect

Denotational Meaning
“denote” – to be a sign of, stand as a symbol for”
establishes the correlation between the name and the object
makes communication possible
EX booklet
“a small thin book that gives info about smth”

PRACTICE
Explain denotational meaning
A lion-hunter
To have a heart like a lion
To feel like a lion
To roar like a lion
To be thrown to the lions
The lion’s share
To put your head in lion’s mouth

PRACTICE
A lion-hunter
A host that seeks out celebrities to impress guests
To have a heart like a lion
To have great courage
To feel like a lion
To be in the best of health
To roar like a lion
To shout very loudly
To be thrown to the lions
To be criticized strongly or treated badly
The lion’s share
Much more than one’s share
To put your head in lion’s mouth

Connotational Meaning
reflects the attitude of the speaker towards what he speaks about
it is optional – a word either has it or not
Connotation gives additional information and includes:
The emotive charge EX Daddy (for father)
Intensity EX to adore (for to love)
Imagery EX to wade through a book
“ to walk with an effort”

PRACTICE
Give possible interpretation of the sentences
She failed to buy it and felt a strange pang.
Don’t be afraid of that woman! It’s just barking!
He got up from his chair moving slowly, like an old man.
The girl went to her father and pulled his sleeve.
He was longing to begin to be generous.
She was a woman with shiny red hands and work-swollen finger knuckles.

PRACTICE
Give possible interpretation of the sentences
She failed to buy it and felt a strange pang.
(pain---dissatisfaction that makes her suffer)
Don’t be afraid of that woman! It’s just barking!
(make loud sharp sound----the behavior that implies that the person is frightened)
He got up from his chair moving slowly, like an old man.
(to go at slow speed---was suffering or was ill)
The girl went to her father and pulled his sleeve.
(to move smth towards oneself--- to try to attract smb’s attention)
He was longing to begin to be generous.
(to start doing--- hadn’t been generous before)
She was a woman with shiny red hands and work-swollen finger knuckles.
(colour--- a labourer involved into physical work ,constant contact with water)

The pragmatic aspect of lexical meaning
the situation in which the word is uttered,
the social circumstances (formal, informal, etc.),
social relationships between the interlocutors (polite, rough, etc.),
the type and purpose of communication (poetic, official, etc.)
EX horse (neutral)
steed (poetic)
nag (slang)
gee-gee (baby language)

PRACTICE
State what image underline the meaning
I heard what she said but it didn’t sink into my mind.
You should be ashamed of yourself, crawling to the director like that.
They seized on the idea.
Bill, chasing some skirt again?
I saw him dive into a small pub.
Why are you trying to pin the blame on me?
He only married her for her dough.

PRACTICE
State what image underline the meaning
I heard what she said but it didn’t sink into my mind.
(to understand completely)
You should be ashamed of yourself, crawling to the director like that.
(to behave humbly in order to win favour)
They seized on the idea.
(to be eager to take and use)
Bill, chasing some skirt again?
(a girl)
I saw him dive into a small pub.
(to enter suddenly)
Why are you trying to pin the blame on me?
(to blame smb unfairly)
He only married her for her dough.
(money)

Types of Morpheme Meaning
lexical
differential
functional
distributional

Lexical Meaning in Morphemes
root-morphemes that are homonymous to words possess lexical meaning
EX. boy – boyhood – boyish
affixes have lexical meaning of a more generalized character
EX. –er “agent, doer of an action”

Lexical Meaning in Morphemes
has denotational and connotational components
EX. –ly, -like, -ish –
denotational meaning of similiarity
womanly , womanish
connotational component –
-ly (positive evaluation), -ish (deragotary) женственный - женоподобный

Differential Meaning
a semantic component that serves to distinguish one word from all others containing identical morphemes
EX. cranberry, blackberry, gooseberry

Functional Meaning
found only in derivational affixes
a semantic component which serves to
refer the word to the certain part of speech
EX. just, adj. – justice, n.

Distributional Meaning
the meaning of the order and the arrangement of morphemes making up the word
found in words containing more than one morpheme
different arrangement of the same morphemes would make the word meaningless
EX. sing- + -er =singer,
-er + sing- = ?

Motivation
denotes the relationship between the phonetic or morphemic composition and structural pattern of the word on the one hand, and its meaning on the other
can be phonetical
morphological
semantic

Phonetical Motivation
when there is a certain similarity between the sounds that make up the word and those produced by animals, objects, etc.
EX. sizzle, boom, splash, cuckoo

Morphological Motivation
when there is a direct connection between the structure of a word and its meaning
EX. finger-ring – ring-finger,
A direct connection between the lexical meaning of the component morphemes
EX think –rethink “thinking again”

Semantic Motivation
based on co-existence of direct and figurative meanings of the same word
EX a watchdog –
”a dog kept for watching property”
a watchdog –
“a watchful human guardian” (semantic motivation)

PRACTICE

Analyze the meaning of the words.
Define the type of motivation
a) morphologically motivated
b) semantically motivated
Driver
Leg
Horse
Wall
Hand-made
Careless
piggish

Analyze the meaning of the words.
Define the type of motivation
a) morphologically motivated
b) semantically motivated
Driver
Someone who drives a vehicle
morphologically motivated
Leg
The part of a piece of furniture such as a table
semantically motivated
Horse
A piece of equipment shaped like a box, used in gymnastics
semantically motivated

Wall
Emotions or behavior preventing people from feeling close
semantically motivated
Hand-made
Made by hand, not machine
morphologically motivated
Careless
Not taking enough care
morphologically motivated
Piggish
Selfish
semantically motivated