Antrushina G.B. English Lexicology

The Object of Lexicology

(pp. 6 – 11)

1. What is lexicology?

2. The structure of the word.

3. The main problems of lexicology.

4. Phraseology.

5. Vocabulary as a system.

What’s in a name? that which we call a rose

By any other name would smell as sweet…

(W. Shakespeare. Romeo and Juliet)

Что в имени твоём? То, что зовём мы розой, -

И под другим названьем сохраняло б

Свой сладкий запах!

(перевод Щепкиной-Куперник)

1. What is lexicology?

These famous lines reflect one of the fundamental problems of linguistic research: what is in a name, in a word? Is there any direct connection between a word and the object it represents? Could a rose have been called by “any other name” as Juliet says?

These and similar questions are answered by lexicological research. Lexicology, a branch of linguistics, is the study of words.

“Lexicology (from Gr lexis ‘word’ and logos ‘learning’) is the part of linguistics dealing with the vocabulary of a language and the properties of words as the main units of language. The term vocabulary is used to denote the system formed by the sum total of all the words that the language possesses.

The term word denotes the basic unit of a given language resulting from the association of a particular meaning with a particular group of sounds capable of a particular grammatical employment. A word therefore is simultaneously a semantic, grammatical and phonological unit.”

(I. Arnold, Lexicology, p.9)

We do not know much about the origin of language and, consequently, of the origin of words. We know almost nothing about the mechanism by which a speaker’s mental process is converted into sound groups called “words”, nor about the reverse process whereby a listener’s brain converts the acoustic phenomena into concepts and ideas, thus establishing a two-way process of communication.

We know very little about the nature of relations between the word and the referent (i.e. object, phenomenon, quality, action, etc. denoted by the word). If we assume that there is a direct relation between the word and the referent it gives rise to another question: how should we explain the fact that the same referent is designated by quite different sound groups in different languages.

We do know by now that there is nothing accidental about the vocabulary of the language (the total sum of its words); that each word is a small unit within a vast, efficient and perfectly balanced system.

What do we know about the nature of the word?

First, we know that the word is a unit of speech which serves the purposes of human communication. Thus, the word can be defined as a unit of communication.

Secondly, the word can be perceived as the total of the sounds which comprise it.

Third, the word, viewed structurally, possesses several characteristics.

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