实用英语词汇学课后练习答案张华

1、1.Explain briefly the two methods of the study of lexicology. There are two main approaches which are used to study English lexicology. One is a synchronic approach and the other is a diachronie approach. A synchronic approach shows that words can be studied at a point in time, disregarding whatever

2、 changes might be taking place, while a diachronic approach indicates that words can be considered historically, with emphases on the origin and changes in form and meaning.2.What is a word? Word can be defined as a meaningful group of letters printed or written horizontally across a piece of paper.

3、 The definition of a word will cover the following points:a) a minimal free form of a languageb) a sound unityc) a unit of meaning d) a form that can function alone in a sentence3.What is vocabulary? All the words in a language make up what is generally known as its vocabulary. Vocabulary is most co

4、mmonly used to refer to the sum total of all the words of a language. 4.Explain briefly transparent words and opaque words. How the majority of words were formed cannot be explained. These words are called opaque words, such as whose axe, book, table, and work .Only a minorityof words can be explain

5、ed . They are words whose meaning is determined is from the meaning of their components. Such as cuckoo, ping-pong, motherland, and blackbird.5.How do you account for the role of native words in English in relation to loan-words?Words can be divided into native words and loan words according to thei

6、r origin. Native words are Anglo-Saxon words still retained in Modern English, while loan words are word taken from different foreign languages. Native words cannot compare with loan-words in number, but have a more important role in the language.4. Why do we say “English is a heavy borrower?” Engli

7、sh owes 80% of its vocabulary to other languages. That is to say English has borrowed 80 percent of its vocabulary from other languages. In fact, the English vocabulary contains words from all the major languages of the world. No other language of the world has borrowed so heavily. Therefore, the na

8、me “ heavy borrower” best describes the characteristic of the English vocabulary. 5.Enumerate the major modes of modern vocabulary development.   Modern Enlish vocabulary develops through three channels:creation,semanticchang

9、e, and borroeing.(1)Creation refers to the formation of new words by using existing materials,namely roots, affixes, and other elements.(2)Semantic change means an old form, which&

10、#160;takes on a new meaning to meet the new ,such as mouse and web.(3)Borrowing has played a vital role in the development of vocabulary, particulary in earlier time

11、s.Borrowed words constitute merely six to seven percent of all new words.  21Both initialism and acronyms are .explain them with example. Initialism is a word formed init

12、ial letters and pronounced letter by letter while acronym is a word fromed from initial letters but pronounced as a normal sord. BBC,GMT,WHO,ISBN,FBI are all initialisms 

13、and SARS,ROM,UNESCO are acronyms. Why Should a Chinese Student of English Study English LexicologyLexicology is an important part which we should not neglect it. Otherwise, our English is not English because we cannot write it down or spell it. Don't you think it is iridous if we

14、put the lexicology aside? Take my experience for example, then you can realize that how essential the lexicology is.During my senior lifetime, I just studied the dumb English, I never recite the new words, even pay much attention to the lexicology, in my opinion, lexicology is empty and above me a l

15、ot. What I care about is the right answers for reading.Gradually, i found i was wrong,I had lost the functional thing like the building without the basically construction. As the time goes by, my English lever keeps falling down, eventually got it that it is time to focus on the lexicology. Generall

16、y speaking, the Chinese students of English are poor in the English firstly, so, that means we must pay great attention on it.6.Why should students of English lexicology study the Indo-European Language Family?The Indo-European Language Family is one of the most important language families in the wo

17、rld. It is made up of most of the languages of Europe, the Near East and India. English belongs to this family and the other members of the Indo-European have more or less influence on English vocabulary. Knowledge of the Indo-European Language Family will help us understand English words better and

18、 use them more appropriately. 22.How Word-formation Has Benefited Me in English Vocabulary Learning? The importance of vocabulary in English learning. Vocabulary is the foundation of all languages skills and is the rather afflicting part that English learners may come across in the first place. The

19、situation of the vocabulary learning and the approaches to improve. The rules of word-formation are terribly powerful to form new words, it pretty necessary and helpful for us to have a good command of word-formation in order to help students with both the understanding and memorizing of English voc

20、abulary.Why Should a Student of English Lexicology Study Sense Relations? Vocabulary is the most unstable element of a language as it is undergoing constant changes both in form and meaning. Comparatively speaking, the meaning is even more unstable than the form. Almost every word we use today has a

21、 slightly different meaning from the one it had a century ago; and a century ago it had a slightly different meaning from the one it had a century before that. How Do You Account for the Semantic Change in Living Language?Semantic change is a change in one of the meanings of a word. Every word has a

22、 variety of senses and connotations which can be added, removed, or altered over time, often to the extent that words of one time period mean quite different things to the same words as spoken in a previous time. Moreover, two words derived from the same original may develop in very distinct ways: c

23、ognates across languages often look very similar but mean entirely different things. Semantic change is not to be confused with etymology, another field in diachronic linguistics; etymology is the scientific study of word origin, while semantic change deals with the development of sense. In fact, se

24、mantic change is one of the factors that need to be taken under consideration, in order to evaluate a proposed etymology.State the roles of “context”(陈述语境的作用) Context means the total environment in which the word appears; when we speak of context, however, we most often mean the sentence context, or

25、 discourse or text because they are where a word normally acquires its meaning. Without context, there is no way to determine the very sense of the word that the speaker intends to convey; while with context, there is generally no danger of misinterpretation, for meaning lives in context and context

26、 defines Why Is the Study of Dictionary Necessary in Lexicology? First ,it will help his personal vocabulary and consciously increase their word power . second ,it will give him a deeper understanding of word-meaning and enable him to organize ,classify and store words more effectively .third, it wi

27、ll gradually raise his awareness of meaning and usages of words ,and enable him to use words more accurately and appropriately. fourth, it will improve his skills of using reference books and raise his problem-solving ability and efficiency of individual study .and at last ,it will improve his receptive and productive skills in language processing as will as language production.18 Why is the study of the dictionary necessary in lexicology? a dictionary is a book which presents in alphabetical order the words of English, with information as to their spelling, pronunciation, meaning, usage, rul