Thematic and ideographic groups. The theories of semantic fields

A further subdivision within the lexico-grammatical groups is achieved in the well-known thematic subgroups, such as terms of kinship, names for parts of the human body, colour terms, military terms and so on. The basis of grouping this time is not only linguistic but also ex­tra-linguistic: the words are associated, because the things they name occur together and are closely connected in reality. It has been found that these words constitute quite definitely articulated spheres held together by differences, oppositions and distinctive values.

The group of colour terms has always attracted the attention of lin­guists, because it permits research of lexical problems of primary impor­tance. The most prominent among them is the problem of the systematic or non-systematic character of vocabulary, of the difference in naming the same extra-linguistic referents by different languages, and of the re­lationship between thought and language. There are hundreds of arti­cles written about colour terms.

The basic colour name system comprises four words: blue, green_r yellow, red; they cover the whole spectrum. All the other words denot­ing colours bring details into this scheme and form subsystems of the first and second order, which may be considered as synonymic series with corresponding basic terms as their dominants. Thus, red is taken as a dominant for the subsystem of the first degree (level): scarlet, orange, crimson, rose, and the subsystem of the second (third) level is: vermilion, wine red, cherry, coral, copper-red, etc. Words belonging to the basic system differ from words belonging to subsystems not only semantically but in some other features as well. These features are: (1) frequency of use; (2) motivation; (3) simple or compound character; (4) stylistic colouring; (5) combining power. The basic terms, for instance, are frequent words, their motivation is lost in present-day Eng­lish. They are all native words of long standing. The motivation of colour terms in the subsystem is very clear: they are derived from the names of fruit (orange), flowers (rose), colouring stuffs (indigo). Basic system words and most of the first degree (level) terms are root words, the sec­ond (third) level terms are derivatives or compounds: copper-red, lade-green, sky-coloured. Stylistically the basic terms are definitely neutral, the second (third) degree terms are either special or poetic.

All the elements of lexico-semantic groups remain within limits of the same part of speech and the same lexico-grammatical group. When grammatical meaning is not taken into consideration, we obtain the so-called ideographic groups.

The ideographic subgroups are independent of classification into parts of speech. Words and expressions are here classed not according to their lexico-grammatical meaning but strictly according to their sig­nification, i.e. to the system of logical notions. These subgroups may comprise nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs together, provided they refer to the same notion. Thus, such words as light n, bright a, shine v and other words connected with the notion of light as something permitting living beings to see the sur­rounding objects are united into the ideographic group.

This leads to the conception of linguistic fields. The starting point of the whole field theory is the theory of intellectual terms, which form a lexical sphere where the significance of each unit is determined by its neighbours. This sphere is called a lin­guistic, conceptual or lexical field. The field unites different parts of speech, words and phrases of different structure. For example, the lexico-grammatical field of temporality unites verbs as its core, prepositions, adjectives, nouns, adverbs: hour, year, often, late, frequent. Situated farther and farther from the core (less and less frequently rendering temporal meaning) the elements of the lexical field form the periphery of the field, where figurative means are situated, like in: two cigarettes ago. once in a blue moon.

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