Chapter 1--Basic concepts of words and vocabulary
Word: A word is a minimal free form of a language that has a given sound and meaning and syntactic function.
(1)a minimal free form of a language
(2)a sound unity
(3)a unit of meaning
(4)a form that can function alone in a sentence
sound and meaning: almost arbitrary, “no logical relationship between the sound which stands for a thing or an idea and the actual thing and idea itself”
sound and form: the sound should be similar to the form
Vocabulary: all the words in a language make up its vocabulary
The 3 Stages of Development of E Vocabulary: Old English vocabulary, Middle EV, Modern EV
Classification of English Words According to Different Criteria
The basic word stock: is the foundation of the vocabulary accumulated over centuries and forms the common core of the language.
Though it constitute a small percentage of the EV, it is the most important part of vocabulary.
The Fundamental Features of the Basic Word Stock:
1)All-National character（全民通用性most important）
2)Stability（相对稳定性）
3)Productivity（多产性）
4)Polysemy（多义性）
5)Collocability（可搭配性）
words:(1)Terminology(术语)
(2)Jargon（行话）
(3)slang（俚语）
(4)Argot（暗语）
(5)Dialectal words(方言)
(6) Archaisms（古语）
(7) Neologisms（新词语）:Neologisms means newly-created words or expressions, or words that have taken on new meanings.(email)
Content words (cloud, run walk, never, five, frequently) and functional words (on, of, and, be, but)
Native Words and Loan Words
Native words: known as Anglo-Saxon words (50,000-60,000), are words brought to Britain in the 5th century by the Germanic tribes. (mainstream of the basic word-stocks)
Loan words: words taken over from foreign languages.(80% of modern EV)
4 Types of loan words:
1) denizens(同化词) (shirt from skyrta(ON))
2) aliens（外来词）:are borrowed words which have retained their original pronunciation and spelling (kowtow (CH)磕头)
3) translation loans(译借词):按其他语言方式组成英语 long time no see from China
4) semantic loans（借义词）：their meanings are borrowed