Etymological survey of the English word-stock Working Definitions of Principal Concepts

Word-formation in Modern English.

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Plan:

1. Etymological survey of the English word-stock:

а) definition of native terms, borrowing, translation loan, semantic loan. Words
of native origin and their characteristics;

b) foreign elements in Modern English. Scandinavian borrowings, classical
elements - Latin and Greek, French borrowings, Ukrainian-English lexical
correlations;

c) assimilation of borrowings. Types and degrees of assimilation;

d) international words.

2. Word-formation in Modern English:

a) the morphological structure of a word. The morpheme. The principles of
morphemic analysis. Types of morphemes. Structural types of words:
simple, derived, compound words.

b) productivity. Productive and non-productive ways of word-formation.

c) affixation. General characteristics of suffixes and prefixes. Classification of
prefixes. Classification of suffixes. Productive and non-productive affixes,
dead and living affixes.

d) word - composition. Classification of compound words. Coordinative and
subordinate compound words and their types.

e) conversion, its definition.

f) shortening. Lexical abbreviations. Acronyms. Clipping.

g) non-productive means of word formation. Blending. Back-formation.
Onomatopoeia. Sentence-condensation. Sound and stress interchange.

Recommended Literature

1. Kveselevich D.I., Sasina V.P. Modern English Lexicology in Practice. -
Житомир, 2000., 118 c.

2. Reading in Modern Lexicology: Хрестоматія з порівняльної лексикології. -
Черкаси, 2002-160 с.

3. Arnold I.V. The English Word. - L,, 1986. - p. 252-262.

4. Мостовий M.I. Лексикологія англійської мови. - Харків, 1993. - с. 151-174.

Etymologically the vocabulary of the English language is far from being homogeneous. It consists of two layers - the native stock of words and the borrowed stock of words. Numerically the borrowed stock of words is considerably larger than the native stock of words. In fact native words comprise only 30% of the total number of words in the English vocabulary but the native words form the bulk of the most frequent words actually used in speech and writing. Native words are highly polysemantic and productive in forming word clusters and set expressions.

Borrowed words ( or loan words or borrowings) are words taken over from another language and modified according to the patterns of the receiving language.

The most effective way of borrowing is direct borrowing from another language as the result of contacts with the people of another country or with their literature. But a word may also be borrowed from source language but through another language.

When analyzing borrowed words one must distinguish between the two terms - " source of borrowing " and " origin of borrowing ". The first term is applied to the language from which the word was immediately borrowed, the second - to the language to which the word may be ultimately traced e.g.

table - source of borrowing - French, origin of borrowing - Latin

elephant - source of borrowing - French, origin - Egypt

convene - source of borrowing - French, origin - Latin

There are different ways of classifying the borrowed stock of words. First of all the borrowed stock of words may be classified according to the nature of the borrowing itself as borrowings proper, translation loans and semantic loans.

Translation loans are words or expressions formed from the elements existing in the English language according to the patterns of the source language (the moment of truth - sp. el momento de la verdad).

A semantic loan is the borrowing of a meaning for a word already existing in the English language (e.g. the compound word shock brigade which existed in the English language with the meaning "аварійна бригада" acquired a new meaning "ударна бригада" which it borrowed from the Russian language. Latin Loans are classified into the subgroups.

1. Early Latin Loans. Those are the words which came into English through the language of Anglo-Saxon tribes. The tribes had been in contact with Roman civilization and had adopted several Latin words denoting objects belonging to that civilization long before the invasion of Angles, Saxons and Jutes into Britain (cup, kitchen, mill, port, wine).

2. Later Latin Borrowings. To this group belong the words which
penetrated the English vocabulary in the sixth and seventh centuries
when the people of England were converted to Christianity (priest
bishop, nun, candle).

3. The third period of Latin includes words which came into English due to
two historical events: the Norman Conquest in 1066 and the Renaissance
or the Revival of Learning. Some words came into English through French but some were taken directly from Latin (major, minor
intelligent, permanent).

4. The Latest Stratum of Latin Words. The words of this period are mainly
abstract and scientific words (nylon, molecular, vaccine, phenomenon
vacuum).

Norman-French Borrowings may be subdivided into subgroups:

1. Early loans - 12^th - 15^th century

2. Later loans - beginning from the 16^th century.

The Early French borrowings are simple short words, naturalized in accordance with the English language system (state, power, war, pen, river). Later French borrowings can be identified by their peculiarities of form and pronunciation (regime, police, ballet, scene, bourgeois).

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