4. Types of Meaning

Lexical meaning possesses denotational and connotational components. As was mentioned above one of the functions of words is to denote things, concepts and so on. Users of a language cannot have any knowledge of the objects or phenomena of the real world around them unless this knowledge is embodied in words which have essentially the same meaning for all speakers of that language. This is the denotational meaning, i.e. that component of the lexical meaning which makes communication possible. The second component of the lexical meaning is the connotational component, i.e. the emotive charge and the stylistic value of the word. It may be negative, positive, neutral, common, poetic, archaic, terms, slang, vulgar words. Words contain an element of emotive evaluation as part of the connotational meaning; e.g. synonyms large, big, tremendous and like, love, adore have the difference in the emotive charge. The emotive charge of the words tremendous, and adore is heavier than that of the words large and like. This does not depend on the “feeling” of the individual speaker but is true for all speakers of English. The colloquial words daddy, mammy are more emotional than the neutral father, mother.

Words differ not only in their emotive charge but also in their stylistic reference. Stylistically words can be roughly subdivided into literary, neutral and colloquial layers. The greater part of the literary layer of Modern English vocabulary are words of general use, possessing no specific stylistic reference and known as neutral words. Against the background of neutral words we can distinguish two major subgroups — standard colloquial words and literary or bookish words. This may be best illustrated by comparing words almost identical in their denotational meaning, e. g., “parent — father — dad”. In comparison with the word father which is stylistically neutral, dad stands out as colloquial and parent is felt as bookish.

Specific subgroups may be singled out such as 1) terms or scientific words, e. g., renaissance, genocide, teletype; 2) poetic words and archaisms, e.g., whilome — “formerly”, aught — “anything”, ere — “before”, albeit —“although”, fare — “walk”, nay — “no”; 3) barbarisms and foreign words, e.g., bon mot — “a clever or witty saying’, apropos, faux pas, bouquet.

The colloquial words may be subdivided into: 1) slang, i.e. words which are often regarded as a violation of the norms of Standard English, e.g. governor for “father”, missus for “wife”, a gag for “a joke”; 2) professionalisms, i.e. words used in narrow groups bound by the same occupation, e.g., lab for “laboratory”, hypo for “hypodermic syringe”, a buster for “a bomb”; 3) jargonisms, i.e. words marked by their use within a particular social group and bearing a secret and cryptic character, e.g. a sucker — “a person who is easily deceived”, a squiffer — “a concertina”; 4) vulgarisms, i.e. coarse words that are not generally used in public, e.g. bloody, hell, damn, shut up; 5) dialectical words, e.g. lass, kirk (шотл.).

SEMINAR 2

KEY TERMS

meaning semantics

referent concept

denotation connotation

lexical unit motivation

neutral words archaisms

morpheme unit of communication

TOPICS FOR DISCUSSION AND EXERCISES

1. Semantics as the branch of lexicology. Its aims and tasks.

2. The word and its characteristics.

3. The morpheme as the smallest meaningful language unit.

4. Word and meaning.

5. Lexical meaning and notion.

6. Three types of motivation.

7. Different approaches to meaning. Denotational and connotational meanings of a word.

1. Find out the difference in the denotational meaning of the words: appreciate, value, cherish.

2. Find out the difference in the connotational meaning of the words: beautiful, beauteous.

3. Comment on the connotations the following expressions convey: an ugly duckling, the Troyan horse, crocodile tears, a swan song, Achilles’ heel.

Test

1. Linguists try to explain the word-meaning through:

a) semantic triangle

b) definition of a word

c) grammatical forms

d) pronunciation

2. Morpheme is:

a) the main unit of lexical system

b) the smallest language unit which can stand alone as a complete

utterance

c) the smallest meaningful language unit

d) a group of words that exists in the language as a ready-made unit

3. Archaisms are words which:

a) ousted some new words

b) are no longer used in everyday speech

c) are used to express unimportance

d) are used instead of new meanings

4. Instead of the term “word” can be used the term

a) utterance

b) meaning

c) lexeme

d) morpheme

5. There are 2 types of word meaning in words:

a) grammatical and lexical

b) lexical and functional

c) grammatical and connotational

d) denotational and distinctive

6. Semantics is the study of

a) grammar

b) word meanings

c) phonetics

d) styles