Compounds may be classified:

1. from the functional point of view;

2. from the way their components are linked together;

3. from the point of view of different ways of composition.

Functionally compounds are viewed as words belonging to different parts of speech: nouns (armchair), adjectives (mediashy), verbs (stone-wall), adverbs (indoors), etc.

Compounds are created by:

1. placing one constituent after another (door-handle), this means of linking the components is typical of the greater part of ME components,

2. joining its components with the help of a linking element (Afro-Asian, sportsman, tradesman, etc.)

There are compounds-proper and derivational compounds. Compounds-proper are formed by putting together stems of words or without the help of special linking element (door-step, age-long). Derivational compounds are free word-groups whose member words are joined by composition or adding a derivational suffix, e.g.: long-legged (a free word group long leg +ed).

Lecture 3 Free word-combinations and phraseological units

1. Free word-combinations and phraseological units.

2. Acad. V.V. Vinogradov’s classification of phraseological units.

1

Phraseological units are usually defined as non-motivated word-groups that cannot be freely made up in speech but are reproduced as ready-made units.

There is a difference between free-word combinations and phraseological units. If we take the free word-combination red flower and the phraseological unit red tape, we can change red in the free word-group by any other adjective denoting colour (blue, yellow, white) the meaning of the word-group will not change (a flower of a certain colour). But in the phraseological unit we can’t change the word red. If we change the adjective, we will change the meaning of the whole group: a black (yellow, white) tape would mean “a tape of a certain colour”.

So one of the main features of phraseological units in comparison with free word-combinations is stability of their lexical components. The grammatical structure of phraseological units is also stable. The noun flower in the free word-group can be used in the plural (red flowers) and the lexical meaning of this word-group will not change. But no such change is possible in the phraseological unit red tape; red tapes will mean “tapes of red colour”, not bureaucratic methods.

2

Acad. V.V. Vinodradov classified phraseological units into:

1). Phraseological fusions (сращения), or completely non-motivated word-groups such as “a pretty kettle of fish”, “once in a blue moon” (very rarely), “to kick the bucket” (to die), etc. The meaning of elements making up these units has no connection (synchronically) with the meaning of the whole group.

2). Phraseological unities (единства) or partially non-motivated word-groups as their meaning can usually be understood through the metaphoric meaning of the whole phraseological unit. E.g. to come to one’s senses, to make both ends meet, to show one’s teeth (to take a threatening tone), to be in full swing, etc.

3). Phraseological collocations (сочетания) are motivated but they are made up of words having specific lexical valency which explains degree of stability in such word-groups. In phraseological collocations change of their components is strictly limited. E.g., to bear a grudge may be changed into to bear malice but not into to bear a fancy or liking. We can say to take a liking (fancy) to somebody but not to take hatred (disgust).

Lecture 4 Synonyms

1. The definition of synonyms.

2. Academician V.V. Vinogradov’s classification of synonyms.

1

Synonyms are traditionally described as words different in sound form but similar in meaning. This definition is open to thought and questioning.

1. It seems impossible to speak of identical or similar meanings of words as such as this part of thee definition cannot be applied to polysemantic words.

To make - to create - to produce but in the meaning to force smb to do smith it is not at all synonymous.

2. It seems impossible to speak of identity or similarity of lexical meaning as whole as it is only the denotational component that may be described as identical or similar, e.g. face - visage the denotational meaning which makes this word similar is the front part of the head but their connotational component or stylistic reference is quite different - face is neutral and visage is literary.

3. It seems impossible to speak of identical meaning as a criterion of synonymyty because identity of meaning is rare even among monosemantic words. (e.g. scarlet fever and scarlatina)

Taking into consideration all these arguments we may define synonyms as words different in sound form but similar in their denotational meanings. Besides a long-standing result of linguistic study gives every reason to define synonyms as those numbers of the thematic which

1. belong to the same part of speech

2. are so close to one another semantically that their current use in speech can be assured only if the shades of meaning and stylistic aspects which keep them apart are carefully investigated.

2

Academician V.V. Vinogradov traditionally classified synonyms into 3 groups:

1. ideographic

2. stylistic

3. absolute synonyms

1) Ideographic synonyms are nearly identical in one or more denotational meanings and interchangeable at least in some contexts. They are very numerous and sometimes are called relative synonyms.

We also distinguish among ideographic synonyms:

1) those which are very close in meaning (e.g. horrible-terrible);

2) those which differ in meaning considerably (e.g. interpreter- translator does the written side of the work );

3) those differ in the action expressed by the verb (e.g. to look (neutral), to stare (to look at smb steadily), to gaze (to look for some time);

4) those which differ in the degree of a given quality or the intensity of emotions (e.g. to want, to desire, to long for);

5) those which denote the same thing but differ in emotional colouring (e.g. mother- mummy);

6) those which differ in the volume of the concept they express (e.g. happy - lucky);

7) pairs of synonyms where one expresses continuity of an action while the other expresses the momentary action (e.g. to speak, to say, to talk)

In a synonymic group including several synonyms we can distinguish its synonymic dominant of the most general term which unites such synonyms into one group and makes them representative of the concept. In the following syntactical group the word to look is the general one and is called a synonymic dominant, to glance – to look quickly, to stare – to look fixedly, to gaze – to look intently and earnestly.

2) Stylistic synonyms

Among stylistic synonyms we find such that differ not so much in meaning as in stylistic reference (e.g. bellow – wave, woe - sorrow). In many cases a stylistic synonym has an element of elevation in the meaning (e.g. brow and forehead - лоб и чело). Along with elevation of meaning there is a reverse process that of degradation of meaning (e.g. to begin and to fire away - валяй; face and muzzle).

3) Absolute synonyms. They are so much identical in meaning that one can be easily substituted by the other without any change in the context, e.g. looking glass – mirror, fatherland-motherland.