The Word as the Basic Unit of the Language

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Introduction

As it is known, the word has been in the centre of studies carried out by a number of scholars. Despite a considerable number of scientific works on this subject the problem of exact and unique definition of the word is still one of the most disputable in modern linguistics. Therefore, the aim of our paper is to make an attempt to outline the basic differences in grammatical and lexical aspects of the word.

        It is very difficult to give a comprehensive definition of the word and at the same time the one which would unambiguously apply to all the different word-units of the lexicon. M.Y. Blokh [2, p. 20] admits that within the framework of different linguistic trends and theories the word is defined as the minimal potential sentence, the minimal free linguistic form, the elementary component of the sentence, the articulate sound-symbol, the grammatically arranged combination of sound with meaning, the uninterrupted string of morphemes and so on. But still none of these definitions has the power to precisely cover all the lexical segments of language without a residue remaining outside the field of definition. It is universally recognized that word meaning is not homogeneous, but it is made up of various components, which are described as types of meaning. At the same time all of the mentioned definitions of the word admit the existence of two types of its meaning:grammatical and lexical O.S. Akhmanova [1, p. 54] defines lexical meaning as the realization of notion, emotion or relation by means of the language system. Lexical meaning is a complex thing based on the procedure of reflecting the reality in a person’s mind. It is a specific kind of “content” produced (or engendered) by the reverberation of objective reality in the human consciousness which constitutes the inner structure of linguistic units with respect to which their material form is the outer structure; the material meaning of a word, i.e. the meaning of the main material part of the word, which reflects the concept the given word expresses and the basic properties of the thing (phenomenon, property, state, etc.) the word denotes.

Grammatical meaning is very abstract, very general. Thus, the grammatical form is not confined to an individual word, but unites a whole class of words, so that each word of the class expresses the corresponding grammatical meaning together with its individual, concrete semantics. Grammatical meaning is a general abstract meaning of classes of words which finds its expression through formal markers thus placing a linguistic unit in a grammatical category or a grammatical class of words (a part of speech). Therefore, the word is a structural and semantic language unit, which serves for naming objects, phenomena, their peculiarities, states and relations; it is an indivisible unit, having its own meaning and function. Lexical meaning of the word is unique for every linguistic unit and is typical not of every unit. On the contrary, grammatical meaning is general and characteristic to a whole class of words; some words (called functional) are devoid of lexical meaning and have only grammatical one.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Word as the Basic Unit of the Language  

 

 

 

Word – the basic unit of language, directly corresponds to the object of thought (referent) – which is a generalized reverberation of a certain 'slice', 'piece' of objective reality – and by immediately referring to it names the thing meant.

Typology of words:

Morphologically we distinguish between:

·                     - monomorphemic word  (root word );

·                     - polymorphemic word  (derivatives, compounds, derivational compounds – q.v.).

Semantically:

·                     - monosemantic word  – word , having only one lexical meaning and denoting, accordingly, one concept;

·                     - polysemantic word  – words having several meanings, i.e. word  having several meanings, thus denoting a whole set of related concepts grouped according to the national peculiarities of a given language.

Stylistically:

·                     - neutral word ;

·                     - elevated (bookish) word ;

·                     - colloquial word  (q.v.);

·                     - substandard word

Etymologically:

·                     - native word  – q.v.;

·                     - borrowed word  (borrowings) – q.v.;

·                     - hybrids – q.v.;

·                     - international word  (interonyms) – q.v.;

·                     - dictionary word  

The word is a basic unit of the language, which combines meaning and form, and consists of 1 or more morphemes. It is the smallest language unit which can stand alone as a complete utterance, capable naming objects f.e. Listen! Mom!

Every word has two aspects: the outer aspect (its sound form) and the inner aspect (its meaning) . Sound and meaning do not always constitute a constant unit even in the same language. E.g. the word «temple» may denote «a part of a human head» and «a large church» In such cases we have homonyms. One and the same word in different syntactical relations can develop different meanings, e.g. the verb «treat» in sentences:

·                     a) He treated my words as a joke.

·                     b) The book treats of poetry.

·                     c) They treated me to sweets.

·                     d) He treats his son cruelly.

In all these sentences the verb «treat» has different meanings and we can speak about polysemy.

On the other hand, one and the same meaning can be expressed by different sound forms, e.g. «pilot» , and «airman», «horror» and «terror». In such cases we have synonyms.

Both the meaning and the sound can develop in the course of time independently. E.g. the Old English /luvian/ is pronounced /l^v / in Modern English. On the other hand, «board» primariliy means « a piece of wood sawn thin» It has developed the meanings: a table, a board of a ship, a stage, a council etc.

Syntagmatics – linear (simultaneous) relationship of words in speech as distinct from associative (non-simultaneous)  relationship of words in language.

Paradigmatics – 1) associative (non-simultaneous) relationship of words in language as distinct from linear (simultaneous) relationship of words in speech (syntagmatics); relation of units in absentia (e.g. synonymic, antonymic relationships); 2) an approach to language when the elements of its system are regarded as associated units joined by oppositional relationship. 

Simple words consist of one root morpheme and an inflexion (in many cases the inflexion is zero), e.g.  «seldom», «chairs», «longer», «asked».

Derived words consist of one root morpheme, one or several affixes and an inlexion, e.g.  «deristricted», «unemployed».

Compound words consist of two or more root morphemes and an inflexion, e.g.  «baby-moons», «wait-and-see (policy)».

Compound-derived words consist of two or more root morphemes, one or more affixes and an inflexion, e.g. «middle-of-the-roaders», «job-hopper».  

When speaking about the structure of words stems also should be mentioned. The stem is the part of the word which remains unchanged throughout the paradigm of the word, e.g.  the stem «hop» can be found in the words: «hop», «hops»,  «hopped», «hopping».  The stem  «hippie»  can be found in the words: «hippie», «hippies», «hippie’s», «hippies’».  The stem «job-hop»  can be found in the words : «job-hop», «job-hops», «job-hopped», «job-hopping».  

 

Lexical  and Grammatical  Meaning  of the Word 

 

Meaning is a certain reflection in our mind of objects, phenomena or relations that makes part of the linguistic sign - its so-called inner facet, whereas the sound-form functions as its outer facet.

Grammatical meaning is defined as the expression in Speech of relationships between words. The grammatical meaning is more abstract and more generalised than the lexical meaning. It is recurrent in identical sets of individual forms of different words as the meaning of plurality in the following words students, boob, windows, compositions.

Lexical meaning. The definitions of lexical meaning given by various authors, though different in detail, agree in the basic principle: they all point out that lexical meaning is the realisation of concept or emotion by means of a definite language system.

Denotation. The conceptual content of a word is expressed in its denotative meaning. To denote is to serve as a linguistic expression for a concept or as a name for an individual object. It is the denotational meaning that makes communication possible.

Connotation is the pragmatic communicative value the word receives depending on where, when, how, by whom, for what purpose and in what contexts it may be used. There are four main types of connotations stylistic, emotional, evaluative and expressive or intensifying.

Stylistic connotations is what the word conveys about the speaker's attitude to the social circumstances and the appropriate functional style (slay vs kill), evaluative connotation may show his approval or disapproval of the object spoken of (clique vs group), emotional connotation conveys the speaker's emotions (mummy vs mother), the degree of intensity (adore vs love) is conveyed by expressive or intensifying connotation.

The interdependence of connotations with denotative meaning is also different for different types of connotations. Thus, for instance, emotional connotation comes into being on the basis of denotative meaning but in the course of time may substitute it by other types of connotation with general emphasis, evaluation and colloquial stylistic overtone. E.g. terrific which originally meant'frightening' is now a colloquialism meaning 'very, very good' or 'very great': terrific beauty, terrific pleasure.

The orientation toward the subject-matter, characteristic of the denotative meaning, is substituted here by pragmatic orientation toward speaker and listener; it is not so much what is spoken about as the attitude to it that matters.

Fulfilling the significative and the communicative functions of the word the denotative meaning is present in every word and may be regarded as the central factor in the functioning of language.

The expressive function of the language (the speaker's feelings) and the pragmatic function (the effect of words upon listeners) are rendered in connotations. Unlike the denotative meaning, connotations are optional.

Connotation differs from the implicational meaning of the word. Implicational meaning is the implied information associated with the word, with what the speakers know about the referent. A wolf is known to be greedy and cruel (implicational meaning) but the denotative meaning of this word does not include these features. The denotative or the intentional meaning of the word wolf is "a wild animal resembling a dog that kills sheep and sometimes even attacks men". Its figurative meaning is derived from implied information, from what we know about wolves - "a cruel greedy person", also the adjective wolfish means "greedy".

There are 2 main types of  word-meaning: 

·                   the grammatical meaning

·                   the lexical  meaning.

They are found in all words.

The interrelation of these 2 types of meaning may be different in different groups of words.

Grammatical meaning:     

We notice, that word-forms, such as:  girls, winters, joys, tables, etc. though denoting widely different objects of reality have something in common. This common element is the grammatical meaning of plurality, which can be found in all of them.     

Grammatical meaning may be defined as the component of meaning recurrent in identical sets of individual form of different words, as, e.g., the tense meaning in the word-forms of verb (asked, thought, walked, etc)  or the case meaning in the word-forms of various nouns (girl’s, boy’s, night’s, etc).      

In a broad sense it may be argued that linguists, who make a distinction between lexical and grammatical meaning are, in fact, making a distinction between the functional [linguistic] meaning, which operates at various levels as the interrelation of various linguistic units and referential [conceptual] meaning as the interrelation of linguistic units and referents [or concepts].       

In modern linguistic science it is commonly held that some elements of grammatical meaning can be identified by the position of the linguistic unit in relation to other linguistic units, i.e. by its distribution. Word-forms  speaks, reads, writes have one and the same grammatical meaning as they can all be found in identical distribution, e.g. only after the pronouns he, she, it and before adverbs like well, badly, to-day, etc.       

It follows that a certain component of the meaning of a word is described when you identify it as a part of speech, since different parts of speech are distributionally different.

Lexical meaning:        

Comparing word-forms of one and the same word we observe that besides gram. meaning, there is another component of meaning to be found in them. Unlike the grammatical meaning this component is identical in all the forms of the word. Thus, e.g. the word-forms go, goes, went, going, gone possess different grammatical meaning of tense, person and so on, but in each of these forms we find one and the same semantic component denoting the process of movement. This is the lexical  meaning of the word, which may be described as the component of  meaning proper to the word as a linguistic unit, i.e. recurrent in all the forms of this word.

The difference between the lexical and the grammatical components of meaning is not to be sought in the difference of the concepts underlying the 2 types of meaning, but rather in the way they are conveyed. The concept of plurality, e.g., may be expressed by the lexical  meaning of the word plurality; it may also be expressed in the forms of various words irrespective of their lexical meaning, e.g. boys, girls, joys, etc.  The concept of relation may be expressed by the lexical  meaning of the word relation and also by any of prepositions, e.g. in, on, behind, etc.   ( the book is in/on, behind the table ).

It follows that by lexical  meaning we designate the  meaning proper to the given linguistic unit in all its forms and distributions, while by grammatical  meaning we designate the  meaning proper to sets of word-forms common to all words of a certain class. Both the lexical and the grammatical  meaning make up the word-meaning as neither can exist without the other.

Lexical meaning is not homogenous either and may be analysed as including the number of aspects.  We define 3 aspects:

·                   denotational

·                   сonnotational

·                   pragmatic aspects.

a) It is that part of lexical meaning, the function of which is to name the thing, concepts or phenomenon which it denotes. It’s the component of Lexical meaning, which establishes correspondence between the name and the object. (den.  meaning– that component  which makes communication possible).

e.g.  Physics knows more about the atom than a singer does, or that an arctic explorer possesses a much deeper knowledge of what artic ice is like than a man who has never been in the North. Nevertheless they use the words atom, Artic, etc. and understand each other.

It insures reference to things common to all the speakers of given language.

b) The second component of the l meaning comprises the stylistic reference and emotive charge proper to the word as a linguistic unit in the given language system. The connotational component – emotive charge and the stylistic value of the word.  It reflects the attitude of the speaker towards what he is speaking about. This aspect belongs to the language system.

c) Pragmatical aspect – that part of the Lexical meaning, which conveys information on the situation of communication.

 

 

 

 

Conclusion 

 

 

Word – the basic unit of language, directly corresponds to the object of thought (referent) – which is a generalized reverberation of a certain 'slice', 'piece' of objective reality – and by immediately referring to it names the thing meant. Every word has two aspects: the outer aspect (its sound form) and the inner aspect (its meaning)

The lexical meaning of the word groups is the combined lexical meaning of the component words. The meaning of the word groups is motivated by the meanings of the component members and is supported by the structural pattern. Word groups possess not only the lexical meaning, but also the meaning conveyed mainly by the pattern of arrangement of  their constituents

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bibliography

Crystal, David. Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Language. Cambridge/New York: Cambridge University Press, 1995.

Kolln, Martha and Robert Funk. Understanding English Grammar. 5^th ed. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 1998.

McArthur, Tom, ed. The Oxford Companion to the English Language. Oxford/New York: Oxford University Press, 1992.

Блох М.Я. Теоретическая грамматика английского языка: Учебник. Для

студентов филол. фак. ун-тов и фак. англ. яз. педвузов. – М.: Высш. школа, 1983. –

383 с.