Lexicology Flashcards
The Lexicon
Vocabulary of a language or branch of knowledge
Lexeme
A unit of lexical meaning, which exists regardless of any inflectional endings it may have or the number of words it may contain
E.g. speak up, or cholestrol.
Unit of meaning in a dictionary/vocabulary.
Word Classes:
Noun (n)
Words that name people, places, things, qualities or actions.
E.g. dog, cat, loyalty.
Word Classes:
Common noun
Nouns
Nouns that can be concrete (felt through the senses) or abstract (ideas, concepts or emotions), count (can be counted and made plural) or non-count
Concrete: Kangaroo, skeleton. Abstract: truth, justice, bravery. Count: coin, book. Non-count: traffic, information.
Word Classes:
Proper Nouns
Nouns
Names of specific things, that are always capitalised
E.g. Melbourne or Raha
Word Classes:
Collective Nouns
Nouns
Names for groups of animals, people and things
E.g. Swarm of bees, murder of crows
Word Classes:
Regular or Irregular Plural Nouns
Nouns
A way of distinguishing the bound morphemes that a word can take
Regular plural: atlas-atlases, bug-bugs, ox-oxen. Irregular plural: goose-geese (stem change), sheep (no change).
Word Classes:
Pronoun (pron, pn)
(Noun)
Short words that can replace nouns and noun phrases in a sentence
Various types
Subject pronouns: I, you, he/she/it, they, we
Object pronouns: me, you, him/her/it, them, us
Possesive pronouns: my, your, his/hers/its, theirs ours
Relative pronouns: that, who/whoever, whom/whomever, which/whichever
Demonstrative pronouns: this, that, these, those
Word Classes:
Verbs (v)
Verbs denote actions, processes and states. Regular verbs use the suffix -ed in the past tense, e.g. (jump)
Inflectional morpheme -ing to indicate a continuing action
Morpheme -s indicates second person singular verb form (he/she/it)
Word Classes:
Auxillary Verb (aux)
(Verb)
Verbs that modify/change a main verb, creating a range of tenses, negatives, questions, and create constructions such as the passive voice.
E.g. was dancing, have been walking, do you like pumpkin?
Usually, to be, to have, to do and modal verbs.
Word Classes:
Modal Verb
(Verb)
Can, could, shall, should, will, would, may might, and must.
Word Classes:
Adjective (adj)
Define or modify (provide additional information about) nouns, by referring to qualities (red), size (big), judgements (delicious), or comparative degrees (harder).
Typically in front of nouns (fat dog), or aftter certain verbs (seems tired). Usually gradable using morphemes -er (fatter) or -est (fastest), or using more/less/most/least in front.
Word Classes:
Adverb (adv)
Words that modify verbs, or adjectives, or other adverbs (very slowly). Used for time (later), frequency (often), manner (slowly), place (here), or degree (very/somewhat).
Most common form is adding -ly
Useful to answer: how, how often, where, when, how much? Flexible syntactical location.
Word Classes:
Preposition (prep, p)
Function words that show the relationship between nouns/pronouns and other words in a sentence. They position things in space, time, or describe the manner in which an action is performed.
E.g. under, behind, in, before, after, with, by
Word Classes:
Conjunctions (conj, cj)
Words that connect other words or larger elements of a sentence
