Week 2 - What is a word and categorisation

Question 1

Define word (general)

Name

Answer 1

• A unit that strikes the mind, something central in the mechanism of language

Saussure

Question 2

Define word (ortho)

Answer 2

• A string of letters bounded by a space at each end

Question 3

What are the issues with defining the orthographic word?

Answer 3

• Not all languages mark boundaries eg. Chinese
• Irregularities such as cannot and will not
• Non literate cultures can isolate words in speech

Question 4

What are the issues with defining the phonological word?

Answer 4

• Stress for performing not for boundaries
• Single main stress phrases eg. The White House
• Function words not often stressed

Question 5

Define word (phono)

Answer 5

• Spoken word allows one main stress
• Bounded by pauses

eg. Blackbird and black bird

Question 6

Define word (semantic)

Name

Answer 6

The smallest meaningful unit that can occur in isolation

Bloomfield

Question 7

What are the issues with defining the semantic word?

Answer 7

• What about compounds that require two words for meaning?

- Affixes and bound morphemes carry meaning but can’t occur in isolation

Question 8

What were Carter’s issues with defining the word?

Answer 8

• Many words don’t fit the categories
• ‘Meaning’ is vague
• Homonyms
• Multi-word expressions function as one unit

Question 9

How do we rectify the word issue?

Answer 9

• Distinguish semantic load and grammatical load
• Recognise that there’s smaller units of meaning than a word
• Use more technical terms eg. lexeme, lexical item and lexis

Question 10

Define and list content words

Answer 10

Open set, carry meaning

• Nouns
• Verbs
• Adverbs
• Adjectives

Question 11

Define and list function words

Answer 11

Grammatical, closed and hard to define

• Pronouns
• Conjunctions
• Articles
• Aux verbs
• Prepositions

Question 12

Define morpheme

Answer 12

The smallest unit of meaning within a word

• Convey semantic-syntactic information
• Two classes, bound and free

Question 13

Define bound morpheme

Answer 13

• Must be attached to another morpheme

- un-, -ing etc.

Question 14

Define free morpheme

Answer 14

• Can occur independently

- table, chair etc.

Question 15

Give a problematic instance of categorisation

Answer 15

• Bowl
• Pot
• Colander is round like a bowl and used for cooking
• But it doesn’t perfectly fit the category
• A new word must be given

Question 16

How do we categorise words?

Answer 16

• By their internal structures (morphology)
• By their boundaries
• By their grammatical behaviour
• By their function and meaning (semantics)

Question 17

What are 3 ways to group words?

Answer 17

Lexical sets:
- Based on semantic similarities eg. cat, dog

Word families:
- Base form + inflections/derivations

Word classes:

• Structure vocabulary
• Allows us to make general statements about words
• Central members

Question 18

How do we recognise nouns?

Answer 18

• Inflected by numbers eg. Mouse = mice

- Inflected for possession eg. Boy = boy’s

Question 19

Define proper/common nouns, concrete and abstract nouns

Answer 19

Proper:

• Specified people, places, times or publications
• Do not usually allow plural or determiners

Abstract:
- We can perceive them but not physically eg. Love

Concrete:
- We can perceive them with the senses eg. Bricks

Question 20

Define count and non-count nouns

Answer 20

Count:

• Individual countable entities
• Can’t stand alone in English

Non-count:
- An indistinguishable mass or notion eg. advice, grass

Some nouns can be both

Question 21

Scale of typicality

Answer 21

Nouns
Verbs
Adjectives
Adverbs