Kinds of lexicology

Lexicology as a branch of linquistics

Introduction

A course of lectures

The term lexicology is composed of two Greek morphemes: lexikós meaning ‘relating to the word’ and lógosdenoting ‘learning’. Thus, literally, the term lexicology means ‘the science of the word’. Lexicology, as a branch of linguistics studying words, has its own object, aims and methods of scientific research.

The object of lexicology is lexical and phraseological units, including morphemes, words, variable word-groups and idioms. The basic object of Lexicology is the word.

The word may be defined as the basic structural and functional two-facet linguistic unit, used for the purposes of human nomination and communication, materially representing a group of sounds, possessing a meaning, susceptible to grammatical employment and characterized by formal and semantic unity.

The aims of lexicology are a study and systematic description of lexical units and the word-stock in general, in respect to their origin, development, structure, semantics and current use.

The main tasks of lexicology are as follows:

1. to investigate the word-structure, word-formation and combinations of words;

2. to analyze the semantic structure of words, semantic changes and semantic groupings of words;

3. to reveal the sources and means of the replenishment and growth of vocabulary, and the specific laws and regulations governing its development;

4. to study the vocabulary of a language as a system, relations between words in this system, synchronically an diachronically;

5. to describe the differentiation of vocabulary into various social, stylistic, territorial and ethnic layers, and to ascertain the relations existing between these lexical layers of vocabulary;

6. to study the problems of dictionary-compiling and lexicographical description of words.

Lexicology as an autonomous branch of linguistics is subdivided into several kinds.

First of all it is natural to distinguish between General or Theoretical Lexicology and Special or Descriptive Lexicology.

General or Theoretical Lexicology is part of General Linguistics. It is concerned with the study of vocabulary, irrespective of specific features of the vocabulary of any particular language. Its aim is to work out theoretical notions, classifications and principles of research that may be used to study words, word combinations and vocabularies of all languages in general. It also summarizes achievements of lexicologies of separate tongues.

Special or Descriptive Lexicology is the lexicology of a particular language (English, German, Russian), that is the study and description of its lexical units and vocabulary. Special Lexicology is based on the general theory of vocabulary, notions, classifications and principles of investigation laid down by General Lexicology.

Theoretical Lexicology is also opposed to Practical Lexocology. The aim of Practical Lexocology of a particular language is to supply a theoretical study of vocabulary with concrete examples showing the morphological, semantic, word-building and etymological peculiarities of lexical units of a given language and help teachers explain and students learn these lexical phenomena and develop their lexical skills and enrich their knowledge of vocabularies and private lexicons on the basis of special practical exercises.

In linguistic science there are two principal approaches to the study of language forms and facts, namely the synchronic and diachronic approaches. These approaches are also applied to the differentiation of lexicological explorations. It explains the existence of synchronic or Modern Lexicology and diachronic or Historical Lexicology.

synchronic or Modern Lexicology describes the present existence and state of a language word stock as a result of its previous growth and changes.

diachronic or Historical Lexicology shows the process of the formation of a language lexical system, the sources of its growth and changes in the structure and semantics of words that occurred in the recorded history of their existence, that is their etymology.

In regard to Special Lexicology the synchronic approach is concerned with the vocabulary of a language at a given time, for instance, at the present time. It is Special Descriptive Lexicology that deals with the words and word-stock of a particular language at a certain time.

Therefore, A Course in Modern English Lexicology represents a course in Special Descriptive Lexicology of the English Language and the object of study of this art is the English vocabulary as it exists at the present time.

The diachronic approach in terms of Special Lexicology is concerned with the development of vocabulary in the course of time. It is Special Historical Lexicology that deals with the evolution of a language lexical system and words along the whole period of their recorded existence. Therefore, the tasks of English Historical Lexicology are to reveal the origin, sources and growth of the English vocabulary, changes and development in the morphological composition and semantics of English words, linguistic and extralinguistic factors modifying their structure, meaning and usage within the history of the English language.

Closely connected with Historical Lexicology is Comparative Historical or Diachronic Lexicology. Comparative Historical Lexicology studies lexical systems of cognate languages with the aim to reveal the origin of their words and laws of the development of their vocabularies.

Here we also distinguish Contrastive Descriptive or Synchronic Lexicology. Contrastive DescriptiveLexicology studies the vocabulary and words of a certain language in comparison with the corresponding facts of another language or several other languages, whether cognate or non-cognate, with the aim to ascertain their typical features, similarities and peculiarities.

Every language has a number of regional, territorial and local varieties. Therefore, we may distinguish Dialectal Lexicology that studies lexical dialectisms.

One of the most up-dated branches of lexicology is the so-called social lexicology or, shortly, Sociolexicology. Sociolexicology studies the non-standard or substandard part of a language vocabulary – low colloquialisms, slang, vulgarisms, different kinds of jargons, argot, cant, lexicons of social and ethnic dialects, such as Negro slang, city patois, such as London Cockney, Liverpool Scouse, contact-language lexicons, such as Pidgin English, “secret languages”, such as Pig Latin of American gangsters.

One more branch of Lexicology should be also mentioned. It is the Applied Lexicology. It includes 4 fields of its application: Lexicography, translation, linguodidactics and the so-called culture of speech.

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