Conversion. Basic Criteria of Semantic derivation.

CONVERSION. BASIC CRITERIA OF SEMANTIC DERIVATION.

Conversion, one of the principal ways of forming words in Modern English is highly productive in replenishing the English word-stock with new words.

Conversion as the formation of new words through changes in its paradigm.

Conversion has been the subject of a great many linguistic discussions since 1891 when H. Sweet first used the term in his New English Grammar.

Paradigm plays a significant role in the process of word-formation in general and not only in the case of conversion.

As a paradigm is a morphological category conversion can be described as a morphological way of forming words.

The following indisputable cases of conversion have bееn discussed in linguistic literature:

1) formation of verbs from nouns and more rarely from other parts of speech, and

2) formation of nouns from verbs and rarely from other parts of speech.

There are a lot of opinions our linguists:

1) Define conversion as a non-affixal way of forming words pointing out that the characteristic feature is that a certain stem is used for the formation of a different word of a different part of speech without a derivational affix being added.

2) conversion is the formation of new words with the help of a zero-morpheme.

sing — song; to feed — food; full — to fill.

Two types of derivation in ME.

1) Effected by employing suffixes and prefixes.

2) Using a zero derivational affix.

Typical Semantic Relations.

I. Verbs converted from nouns (denominal verbs).

1) action characteristic of the object, e.g. ape n — ape v — ‘imitate in a foolish way’; butcher n — butcher v — ‘ kill animals for food, cut up a killed animal’;

2) instrumental use of the object, e.g. screw n — screw v — ‘fasten with a screw’; whip n — whip v — ’strike with a whip’;

3) acquisition or addition of the object, e.g. fish n — fish v — ‘ catch or try to catch fish’; coat n — ‘covering of paint' — coat v — ‘put a coat of paint on’;

4) deprivation of the object, e.g. dust n — dust v — ‘ remove dust from something’; skin n — skin v — ’strip off the skin from’; etc.

II. Nouns converted from verbs (deverbal substantives).

1) instance of the action, e.g. jump v — jump n — ’sudden spring from the ground’; move v — move n — ‘ a change of position’;

2) agent of the action, e.g. help v — help n — ‘a person who helps’; it is of interest to mention that the deverbal personal nouns denoting the doer are mostly derogatory, e.g. bore v — bore n — ‘a person that bores’; cheat v — cheat n — ‘a person who cheats’;

3) place of the action, e.g. drive v — drive n — ‘a path or road along which one drives’; walk v — walk n — ‘a place for walking’;

4) object or result of the action, e.g. peel v — peel n — ‘the outer skin of fruit or potatoes taken off; find v — find и — ’something found,” esp. something valuable or pleasant’; etc.

Basic Criteria of Semantic Derivation

The first criterion makes use of the non-correspondence between the lexical meaning of the root-morpheme and the part-of-speech meaning of the stem in one of the two words making up a conversion pair.

The second criterion involves a comparison of a conversion pair with analogous word-pairs making use of the synonymic sets, of which the words in question are members.

Criterion based on derivational relations within the word-cluster of which the converted words in question are members.

Criterion of semantic derivation based on semantic relations within conversion pairs. It is natural to conclude that the existence within a conversion pair of a type of relations typical of, e.g., denominal verbs proves that the verb is the derived member.

Sound – interchange in English is often combined with a deference in the paradigm.

1) breath — to breathe

As far as cases of this type are concerned, sound-interchange distinguishes only between words, it does not differentiate word-forms of one and the same word. Consequently it has no relation to the paradigms of the words. Hence, cases of this type cannot be regarded as conversion.

2) song – to song

In the above given examples the vowels in song interchanges with three different vowels, the latter interchanging with one another in the firms of the verb to sing:

Дата добавления: 2015-11-04