S.U. 2 Glossary

Question 1

Equivalence

Answer 1

A central term in linguistic-based translation studies, relating to the relationship of similarity between ST and TT segments.

Question 2

Morpheme

Answer 2

The minimal formal element of meaning in language.

Question 3

Morphology

Answer 3

The study of word structure, the way in which the form of a word changes to indicate contrast in grammatical systems such as tense and gender.

Question 4

Untranslatability

Answer 4

When form contributes to the meaning of the text, then untranslatability is reached.

Question 5

Translatability

Answer 5

The relative notion that has to do with extent to which, despite obvious differences in linguistic structures, meaning can still be adequately expressed across languages.

Question 6

Word

Answer 6

A single distinct meaningful element of language which phonologically may be preceded and followed by pauses.
Orthographically may be separated by means of spaces or punctuation marks.
Syntactically may be used alone as a single utterance.
Semantically may be assigned one or more dictionary meanings.

Question 7

Collocational Restriction

Answer 7

Semantically arbitrary restrictions which do not logically follow from the propositional meaning of a word.

Question 8

Dialect

Answer 8

A variety of language which has currency within a specific community or group of speakers.

Question 9

Evoked meaning

Answer 9

Meaning which arises from variation in dialect and register.

Question 10

Expressive meaning

Answer 10

Meaning which relates to the speaker’s feelings or attitude.

Question 11

Field

Answer 11

An abstract term for ‘what is going on’ that is relevant to the speaker’s choice of linguistic terms.

Question 12

Lexical meaning

Answer 12

The specific value a word or lexical unit has in a particular linguistic system and the ‘personality’ it acquires through usage within the system.

Question 13

Mode

Answer 13

An abstract term for the role that the language is playing (speech, essays) and for its medium of transmission (spoken and written).

Question 14

Presupposed meaning

Answer 14

Meaning which arises from co-occurrence restrictions, namely selectional restrictions and collocational restrictions.

Question 15

Propositional meaning

Answer 15

Meaning which arises from the relationship between a word or utterance and what it refers to.

Question 16

Register

Answer 16

The set of features which distinguishes one stretch of language from another in terms of variation in context.
Relating to the language user (geographical dialect, idiolect) and/or language use (field or subject matter, tenor of level of formality and mode or speaking vs writing).

Question 17

Selectional Restriction

Answer 17

Restrictions which follow logically from the propositional meaning of words.

Question 18

Tenor

Answer 18

An abstract term for the relationship between the people taking part in the discourse.

Question 19

Basic level

Answer 19

A word that is used most readily to refer to a given phenomena.
Short and morphological simple.
Dog, tree, pants, fruit.

Question 20

Componential analysis

Answer 20

Breaking down lexical items into their basic meaning components.

Question 21

Connotative analysis

Answer 21

The emotional reaction engendered in the reader by a word.

Question 22

Co-text

Answer 22

The other lexical items that occur before and after a word.

Question 23

Disambiguation

Answer 23

Differentiation of different senses of a word.

Question 24

False friend

Answer 24

Words or expressions which have the same form in two or more languages but convey different meanings.

Question 25

Generic

Answer 25

The superordinate.

Question 26

Homonym

Answer 26

A word that has the same sound and spelling as another word, but a different meaning.

Question 27

Hyponym

Answer 27

It is a relation in which the meaning of a word is included in the meaning of a more general word.

Question 28

Lexical set

Answer 28

Refer to the actual words and expression within a semantic field.
Also refers to a list of items which have a like privilege of collocation.
Items which collocate with a specific word or expression.

Question 29

Near-synonyms

Answer 29

Two words that have a very similar sense.

Question 30

Polysemy

Answer 30

Where one word has two or more senses.

Question 31

Referential meaning

Answer 31

Covers the decontextualised, dictionary meaning of a given lexical item.

Question 32

Semantic field

Answer 32

Conceptual fields which reflect the divisions and sub-divisions imposed by a given linguistic community on the continuum.

Question 33

Specific

Answer 33

Lowest level.

Subordinate.

Question 34

Subordinate

Answer 34

Is the lower level, more specific items.

Question 35

Superordinate

Answer 35

The generic term.

Question 36

Synonym

Answer 36

The ability of two words to be substituted for one another without a change in meaning.