14. Point out classification of the phraseologisms

Phraseology is a branch of linguistics which studies different types of set expressions, which like words name various objects and phenomena. They exist in the language as ready-made units.

A Phraseological unit can be defined as a non-motivated word-group that cannot be freely made up in speech, but is reproduced as a ready-made unit. It is a group of words whose meaning cannot be deduced by examining the meaning of the constituent lexemes. The essential features are: 1) lack of motivation; 2) stability of the lexical components.

The first classification of phraseological units was advanced for the Russian language by a famous Russian linguist Виноградов. According to the degree of idiomaticity phraseological units can be classified into three big groups: phraseological collocations, phraseological unities and phraseological fusions.

Phraseological collocations are not motivated but contain one component used in its direct meaning, while the other is used metaphorically (e.g. to break the news, to attain success).

Phraseological unities are completely motivated as their meaning is transparent though it is transferred (e.g. to shoe one’s teeth, the last drop, to bend the knee).

Phraseological fusions are completely non-motivated and stable (e.g. a mare’s nest - nonsense, tit-for-tat – revenge, white elephant – expensive but useless).

Phraseological units can be classified as parts of speech. This classification was suggested by I.V. Arnold. Here we have the following groups:

a) noun phraseologisms denoting an object, a person, a living being, e.g. bullet train, latchkey child, redbrick university, Green Berets,

b) verb phraseologisms denoting an action, a state, a feeling, e.g. to break the log-jam, to get on somebody's coattails, to be on the beam, to nose out , to make headlines,

c) adjective phraseologisms denoting a quality, e.g. loose as a goose, dull as lead ,

d) adverb phraseological units, such as : with a bump, in the soup, like a dream , like a dog with two tails,

e) preposition phraseological units, e.g. in the course of, on the stroke of ,

f) interjection phraseological units, e.g. «Catch me!», «Well, I never!» etc.

15. Point out the peculiarities of metaphors and metonyms

The branch of Lexicology that is devoted to the study of meaning is known as Semasiology. Change of meaning is effected through association between the existing meaning and the new. This association is generally based on the similarity of meaning (metaphor) or on the contiguity of meaning (metonymy).

Similarity of meanings or metaphor may be described as a semantic process of associating two referents, one of which in some way resembles the other.

The word hand, e.g., acquired in the 16th century the meaning of ‘a pointer of a clock of a watch’ because of the similarity of one of the functions performed by the hand (to point at something) and the function of the clockpointer.

Contiguity of meanings or metonymy may be described as the semantic process of associating two referents one of which makes part of the other or is closely connected with it. In a metonymy, this referring to one thing as if it were some other one is based on association of contiguity (a woman —a skirt).

It is generally held that metaphor plays a more important role in the change of meaning than metonymy. A change of meaning, e.g., may be brought about by the association between the sound-forms of two words. The word boon, e.g.”, originally meant ‘prayer, petition’, ‘request’, but then came to denote ‘a thing prayed or asked for’. Its current meaning is ‘a blessing, an advantage, a thing to be thanked for.’ The change of meaning was probably due to the similarity to the sound-form of the adjective boon (an Anglicised form of French bon denoting ‘good, nice’).

2