英语词汇学名词解释

英语词汇学笔记之“名词解释篇”

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

meaning and syntactic funtion.

2. Morpheme --- A morpheme is the minimal significant element in the composition

of words.

3. Free morphemes or Content morphemes (Free root) --- They are morphemes

that may constitute words by themselves : cat, walk.

4. Bound Morphemes or Grammatical morphemes --- They are morphemes that

must appear with at least one other morpheme, either bound or free : Catts, walk+ing.

5. Bound root --- A bound root is that part of the word that carries the fundamental

meaning just like a free root. Unlike a free root, it is a bound form and has to combine

with other morphemes to make words. Take -dict- for example: it conveys the

meaning of "say or speak" as a Latin root, but not as a word. With the prefix

pre-(=before) we obtain the verb predict meaning "tell beforehand".

6. Affixes --- Affixes are forms that are attached to words or word elements to modify

meaning or funtion.

7. Inflectional morphemes or Inflectional affixes --- Affixes attaches to the end of

words to indicate grammatical relationships are inflectional ,thus known as

inflectional morphemes.

There is the regular plural suffix -s(-es) which is added to nouns such as machines,

desks.

8. Derivational morphemes or Derivational affixes --- Derivational affixes are

affixes added to other morphemes to create new words.

9. Prefixes --- Prefixes are affixes that come before the word, such as, pre+war.

10. Suffixes --- suffixes are affixes that come after the word, for instance, blood+y.

Derivational morphemes/ derivational affixes --- A process of forming new words

by the addition of a word element. Such as prefix, suffix, combing form to an already

existing word.

Prefixation ---- is the formation of new words by adding prefix or combing form to

the base. (It modify the lexical meaning of the base)

Suffixation--- is the formation of a new word by adding a suffix or combing form to

the base and usually changing the word-class of the base. Such as boy. Boyish (noun-

adjective)

11. Root --- A root is the basic form of a word which cannot be further analysed

without total loss of identity.

12. Opaque Words--Words that are formed by one content morpheme only and

cannot be analysed into parts are called opaque words, such as axe, glove.

13. Transparent Words--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).

14. Morphs--Morphemes are abstract units, which are realized in speech by discrete

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

15. Allomorps--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/.

16. Derivation or Affixation--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.

17. Prefixation--Prefixation is the formation of new words by adding prefixes to

stems.

18. Suffixation--Suffixation is the formation of new words by adding suffixes to

stems.

19. Compounding（Compositon）--Compounding is a process of word-formation by

which two independent words are put together to make one word. E.g. hen-packed;

short-sighted.

20. Conversion--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.

21. Back-formation-- is a process of word-formation by which a word is created by

the deletion of a supposed affix. E.g. editor entered the language before edit.

22. Abbreviation ( shortening )-- is a process of word-formation by which the

syllables of words are abbreviated or shortened.

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

IV. Blends.

I. Clipped words--are those created by clipping part of a word, leaving only a piece

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

II. Initialisms--are words formed from the initial letters of words and pronounced as

letters. E.g. IMF/ai em ef/=International Monetary Fund.

III. Acronyms--are words formed from the initial letters of word and pronounced as

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

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

smoke+fog=smog.

24. Polysemy--The same word may have two or more different meanings. This is

known as "polysemy". The word "flight", for example, may mean "passing through