The Word as the Basic Linguistic Unit
Людмила Владимировна Минаева
Лексикология и лексикография английского языка
Людмила Владимировна Минаева
English. Lexicology and Lexicogfaphy / Лексикология и лексикография английского языка
Preface
Given the great complexity of English vocabulary it is a formidable task to write a book on English Lexicology and Lexicography. My aim has been twofold: firstly, to ‘transpose’ as consistently as possible available lexicological knowledge from the written form of speech into the oral one by considering the dialectical unity of the two forms of speech on the level of lexicology, and, secondly, to outline the main aspects of English lexicography in terms of dictionary use by learners of EFL.
It has always been one of the tenets of Russian linguistics that the two forms of speech, written and oral, cannot be separated, that they together form a dialectical unity. The oral form is primary. This fact is borne out by the existence of a great number of languages which in spite of their having no written form are, nevertheless, adequately performing the communicative functions corresponding to the development of the particular speech community. It does not mean, of course, that the written form of speech is of no importance. As society develops and especially as cultural traditions become more and more prominent writing comes to the fore. The written form of speech becomes particularly important for certain registers, for instance, the register of scientific discourse. But if what we are after is the study of speech in all its entity we should always take into account both of its forms.
The study of the spoken word, the word as it actually appears in speech, is thus carried out with the help of the method of lexicological phonetics. This branch of phonetics investigates the different phonetic means which serve as the expression plane of lexical units as elements of the vocabulary each of which is endowed with the ability to refer individually to certain elements of extralinguistic reality. Lexicological phonetics, then, concentrates on those phonetic means which alone can enable the lexicologist to single out his ultimate units – the running words to be later lemmatized as ‘lexemes’ – and explain their ‘semantic structure’ as actually realized in speech.
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Thus, in the first part of the book I have explained the methodology of lexicological research in oral speech by using as examples those facts and materials which have been newly discovered and developed in the process of recent investigations in the field. I have tried to present the material systematically beginning with morphophonemic structure of the word and gradually working up to include the involved problems of meaning equivalence and phraseology.
The second part of the book is devoted to English lexicography. Various people want to learn foreign languages and, as is well known, the best and most reliable language arbiter for those who study them in non‑native environments are primarily dictionaries. However, in the past two decades the number and variety of dictionaries have increased astonishingly and the dictionary user is often at a loss: which dictionary is preferable for which purposes. I hope that the book will both guide students of English through lexicographic woods and help them to acquire necessary dictionary reference skills.
The book grew in part from my difficulties as a teacher. Hence the third part which consists of tasks and exercises aimed at checking students’ knowledge of lexicological theory, on the one hand, and developing dictionary reference skills, on the other.
I have received a lot of help and encouragement from my colleagues at the Faculty of Foreign Languages of Moscow State University who are interested in lexicography. I owe a particular debt to Professor Galina Ivleva and Professor Alevtina Morozova for their detailed reviewing of the manuscript. I am also grateful to all the students I have taught. Like all teachers, I have learned more from them over the years than they have learned from me.
I have refrained from adding names of all those who have helped me but I hope that the staff of the Department of Speech Communication of Moscow State University will accept my thanks.
Part 1.
Lexicology
Chapter 1.
The Word as the Basic Linguistic Unit
1. The Size‑of‑Unit Problem
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We begin with the word as a linguistic unit because one of the tenets of Russian linguistics has always been the assumption that it is the word which is the basic unit of language. The theory of the word was created by V.V. Vinogradov, L.V. Scerba, A.I. Smirnitsky and other Soviet linguists in the 1940s and was based mainly on the written form of language.
V.V. Vinogradov, A.I. Smirnitsky, and others were mainly concerned with the division of the written text into ultimate syntactic units – ‘words’, thus differing widely from the descriptivists, who approached the size‑of‑unit problem (the term ‘size‑of‑unit’ itself was devised by them) in terms of so‑called ‘free forms’ as against ‘bound’ ones.
Descriptivists did not seek to distinguish, consistently and conclusively, between language and speech, ‘running’ words and their emic counterparts, lemmatisation and one‑to‑one analysis of ultimate syntactic units, etc. Russian linguists who were involved into prodigious lexicographic activity approached the ‘problem of the word’ in a different way. It was proved that to a greater or less degree, all lexical units possess the qualities of both ‘separability’ and ‘separateness’, i.e. the word differs from the morpheme, on the one hand, and the word‑combination, on the other, and can be singled out in the flow of speech as an independent unit.
It becomes possible to single out words in the uninterrupted flow of speech if we apply the criterion of grammatical whole‑formedness to categorematic words and that of residual separability to syncategorematic ones. Thus, as far as the former is concerned the application of the criterion can be illustrated in
the following way. The word sun has both the lexical meaning expressed by
the stem sun‑ («the star that shines in the sky during the day and gives the earth heat and light») and the categorial meaning of the noun, the part of speech
it belongs to. Consequently, it possesses the grammatical categories of case
and number. Otherwise stated, it is grammatically formed. The stem sun‑ in sundial, sunshade, sunflower, sunstroke,etc., on the contrary, is devoid of these properties and in this respect differs from the full‑fledged word sun.To show the difference between the word and the word– combination we can compare two sequences: place‑nameand (the) name of (a) place.It does not require a close examination to see that they are identical in terms of their lexical meaning, they denote basically the same thing. But grammatically they are quite different.
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In the word place‑name both elements form one global whole, and together possess the categories of case and number (for example, place‑names, not pla‑ces‑names), whereas in the word‑combination each component is grammati‑cally independent, i.e. (the) name‑s of the place‑s, (the) name of (the) place‑s, etc.
If categorematic words can be singled out in the flow of speech because of their grammatical whole‑formedness, that is positively, syncategorematic ones are separable negatively, or due to their residual separability. Thus, to state that the definite article the is not a morpheme but an independent word it is necessary to compare it with the place, the name, the sun,etc. In these sequences the units place, name, sun are independent words and thus can be singled out positively. Then we have to admit that the is not a part of the word but a separate word.
Of course, it should be borne in mind that there are words and words. Different syncategorematic words possess the quality of residual separability to a greater or lesser degree. But by and large it is possible to conclude that even syncategorematic words which sometimes at first sight look like morphemes are independent lexical units.
It does not require a very close examination of pertinent facts to see that even in abstract poetry, for example, ultimate segments can be divided from one another in writing (or in printing, as the case may be) by empty spaces. Thus, even in nonsense poetry:
‘Twas brillig and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe.
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.
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not only categorematic words, but syncategorematic ones, as well, are regularly and neatly divided from the rest of the ultimate ‘pieces of nonsense’ by empty spaces.
But in the oral form of language this is much more difficult to achieve, for here it is not a question of conventional ‘empty spaces’ but of (so far) ill‑defined ‘cessation of phonation’. It is common knowledge that there is no one‑to‑one correspondence between the ‘gaps’, which separate words on the printed page, and the pauses, which normally interrupt the flow of speech. Words do ‘flow’ and are fused together. This is the reason why so many linguists were far from clear on the subject of lexical articulation in oral speech.
The matter is further complicated by the fact that the division of the flow of speech into words creates related but somewhat different problems in different languages. Thus, for instance, it is obvious that the word in English, or Russian is far more independent and ‘self‑contained’ than in French. If we compare the following three phrases: Whйn rйading a nйwspaper, читаягазету, en lisant le journбl – we shall see that in English and Russian each word has its own stress while in French the word tends to be engulfed, as it were, by a larger unit.
To solve the problem of lexical articulation in the oral form of language we must begin by dwelling on the system of ‘levels’ of linguistic investigation.
Attention has repeatedly been drawn to the existence of three interrelated levels of research in so far as natural human speech is concerned: the feature level, the semantic level, and the metasemiotic level. At each of these levels we are dealing with the sum total of different units and categories.
We begin with the feature level, where we try and discover those parameters on which the semiologically relevant ‘diacritic’ oppositions are based. On this level the flow of speech is segmented into a number of discrete sounds. Thus, for instance, the sentence: How do you think we ought to start? is naturally apprehended by the ear as a sequence of phonemes:
(haudq jqTINkwI LtqstQ: t).
The ‘broad transcription’ is a kind of phonetic orthography. It would be pointless, in this context, to attempt anything like a true phonetic representation even of the shortest fragments of speech. A sequence of this kind can give no idea of the size or nature of lexical units which constitute it.
This does not mean to say, of course, that a close study of the phonotactic regularities of a language is of no importance. It is common knowledge that in every language there are definite combinations of sounds which occur on word boundaries. Thus, as is well known, long vowels and diphthongs do not precede final (N); (e, x, A, P) do not occur finally; (N) does not occur initially; no combinations are possible with (C, G, р, z),
(r, j, w) can occur in clusters only as non‑initial elements; such initial sequences as (fs, mh, stl, spw) are unknown, etc. Finally, only (l) may occur before non‑syllabic (m, n); (h, r, j, w) do not occur in the type of phonemic analysis here used; terminal sequences as (kf, Sp, lр, Zbd) are unknown, etc.
Nevertheless, phonotactic rules can be applied only to a limited number of cases. It follows that the analysis of the flow of speech on the feature level cannot yield satisfactory results as regards its lexical articulation.
Next comes the semantic level, on which all linguistic units are considered in terms of their ability to pass on different kinds of information. As far as the sound aspect of speech on this level is concerned, all the taxonomies are based on syntactic prosody which serves to express syntactic relations as actually realized in oral form of language, for example:
|| 0 Yesterday · children· got.up.very \early. ||
|| 0 Yesterday · children.got.up.very /early? ||
|| 7 Yesterday? || 0 Children. got · up.very 6early. ||
A change in prosodic arrangement changes the purport of the utterance. (The metalanguage of prosodic description see in: Minaeva, L.V.Word in Speech and Writing. М., 1982, р. 96–97.) But it does nothing to prove that the different contours (whose global syntactic function is so obvious) are really and actually divisible (or ‘segmenatable’) into the ultimate syntactic units we insist on regarding as the ‘main units of language’.
The segmentation of the flow of speech at this level brings out parts of the sentence. Various syntactic bonds are expressed with the help of pauses of different length. The most versatile of syntactic bonds – the completive one – has three pauses which serve to single out
a) direct object:
I shall say | a few very brief words about Gray…
b) prepositional object:
He comes just before the new period where you get a poetry much more animated | by emotion.
c) adverbial modifier:
The words are very often poetical words or archaic words a lot of them are not used | in English speech | today.
The two principal parts of the sentence are connected by means of the predicative bond, which is the pivotal element of the sentence for it constitutes the latter as such. The corresponding predicative pause is used to perform the actual division of the sentence, for example:
This brings us naturally | to the more general problem of the scope and the aim of philology…
The flow of speech is often interrupted by pauses in quite unexpected places, for example:
At the | last lecture we made | several very important points. One, | we tried to explain to | the students that when | a student comes to the University | he or she | does not expect or should not expect to be provided with ready‑made knowledge..|.
This highly specific functioning of pauses is psychologically determined and has no constraints. But as can be clearly seen from the prosodic notation it has very little to do with the segmentation of the flow of speech into words.
It would be natural to conclude from what has just been expounded that the word as a lexical unit does not exist in the oral form of language. Nothing, however, could be further from the truth. The analysis in terms of lexicological phonetics gives us every reason to insist that the lexical articulation is real and can be established objectively by the simple process of shifting (or raising) the operations to the metasemiotic level of research.
By means of suprasynatactic prosody which is concerned with the metasemiotic functioning of speech sounds every single word can be brought into prominence within the natural flow of speech by using logical stress and timbre II, as the basic parameters of this level of prosodic investigation, for example:
|| You \are my.friend, are you 7 not? ||
|| 0 How · is it that. you · cannot \see. ||
|| I have 0 eight or · ten \other · cases, shall we · say,
ma6turing.||
slowly
br> <br
|| The 0 lady was a 4 charming corres 6 pondent. ||
very slowly
br> <br
|| For 0 Sherlock · Holmes she was · always \the / woman. ||
||\ Why, 7 damn, it’s 4 in the 7 child. |
slowly
On the metasemiotic level the speaker is free to realize all the potential junctures which are at his disposal to make the purport of the utterance as clear as possible, for example,
|| But | 0 what · matters to \me | is 0 not whether it is · true or / not | but that I be\lieve it to be / true, | or rather 0 not that I be \lieve it, |but that |
\I believe it..|.
Examples could be multiplied indefinitely. But those already adduced will suffice to show that not a single word of any kind that is normally and conventionally brought out (by means of ‘empty spaces’) in the written form of language could fail to acquire lexical prominence on the metasemiotic level, to prove its lexical independence and phonetic separability.
Having made this point, we must immediately qualify it by saying that although the word can, in principle, be brought out in the flow of speech, the lexical articulation is different in different registers. To illustrate this statement let us analyse the following versions of two passages from «Julius Caesar» by W. Shakespeare:
1
|| 0 Friends, |. Romans, | \countrymen, \lend me · your / ears; ||
I 0 come to \ bury 6 Caesar, | not to 6 praise him. ||
The 0 evil that · men \ do| 0 lives 6 after them, ||
The / good |is 0 oft in. terred with their 6 bones; ||
slowly
0 So · let it be with 6 Caesar. || The 0 noble · Brutus
slowly quickly
Hath / told you | 0 Caesar was am\ bitious;
quickly
|| If it 0 were / so, | it was a 4 grievous 6 fault, ||
And \ grievously hath 0 Caesar 6 answer’d it. ||
|| If 0 you have / tears, | pre\pare to \shed them 6 now. ||
0 You · all · do \ know| this 6 mantle: | 0 I re /member |
The 0 first \ time | 0 ever · Caesar put it 6 on; ||
’T was on a 0 summer’s /evening, in his\tent, ||
’That \ day |he over. came the 6 Nervii.
|| \ Look! in this \place| 0 ran. Cassius’ · dagger 6 through: ||
0 See what a \rent |the 0 envious \Casca 6 made: ||
Through \this| the 0 well‑be. loved \Brutus 6 stabb’d; ||
And as he 0 pluck’d his · cursed. steel a. way, |
\Mark | how the 0 blood of · Caesar \follow’d it. |
As 0 rushing out of \doors, |to be re · solv’d |
If \ Brutus 0 so un\kindly. knock’d or 6 no; ||
For \Brutus, |as you \know, |was 0 Caesar’s 6 angel: ||
0 Judge, O \ you \ gods!| how 4 dearly. Caesar 6 loved him. ||
0 This was the. most | un\kindest \cut of 6 all; ||
For 0 when the · noble · Caesar saw \him / stab, |
In\gratitude, more \strong than \traitors’ / arms, |
\Quite 6 vanquish’d him: || \then \burst his \mighty / heart; ||
And, in his 0 mantle · muffling · up his /face, |
quickly
0 Even at the · base of \ Pompey’s. statua, |
quickly
Which. all the · while · ran/blood, || 0 great \Caesar 6 fell, ||
slowly
O! 0 what a \fall was 6 there, | 0 my 6 countrymen; || |
Then /I, |and /you, |and \all of us 0 fell 6 down, |
Whilst 0 bloody · treason \flourish’d 6 over us. ||
2
|| /Friends, | /Romans, | /countrymen, | lend me your 6 ears; ||
quickly
I /come |to 4 bury Caesar, |. not to /praise him. ||
The 0 evil that · men /do| 0 lives \after them, ||
The 3 good is · oft in· terred with their 6 bones; ||
· So · let it /be |with 6 Caesar. || The 0 noble \Brutus |
Hath. told you · Caesar was am 6 bitious; ||
If 0 it were /so, | it 0 was a · grievous 6 fault, ||
/And | 0 grievously hath · Caesar 6 answere’d it. ||
|| If 0 you | · have | · tears, | pre· pare | to 6 shed them 6 now. ||
tr> <tr
You 0 all do /know| · this 6 mantle: || I re 0 member
The. first /time |ever. Caesar put it 6 on; ||
’T was on a 0 summer’s 6 evening, | in his 6 tent, |
slowly
That day he over 0 came the 6 Nervii. ||
\ Look! | in 4 this /place | 0 ran ‘ Cassius’ \dagger 6 through: ||
0 See what a /rent |the 0 envious \Casca / made: ||
tr> <tr
· Through 6 this| the 0 well‑beloved \Brutus 6 stabb’d; ||
And as he 0 pluck’d his · cursed. steel a/way,
quickly
0 Mark how the · blood of · Caesar \follow’d it. ||
quickly
As 0 rushing · out of. doors, to be re/solv’d
quickly
If/Brutus|. so un. kindly · knock’d or 6 no; ||
quickly
For \ Brutus, |as you 6 know,| was 0 Caesar’s \ angel: ||
1n
0 Judge, O 6 you 6 gods!| how \dearly · Caesar 6 loved him. ||
· This /was |the most |. un\kindest · cut of 6 all; ||
For 0 when the · noble /Caesar | 0 saw · him /stab,
In 0 gratitude, | 0 more /strong |than 0 traitors’ 6 arms, |
h > <h
0 Quite \ vanquish’d him:. then \ burst |his \mighty 6 heart; ||
quickly
And, in his /mantle | 0 muffling up his /face,
quickly
0 Even at the · base of · Pompey’s /statua,
quickly
Which. all the · while · ran 6 blood, | \great | 0 Caesar 6 fell. ||
slowly
O! what a \fall was 7 there, | 0 my 6 countrymen; ||
Then, /I |and/ you, and \ all of /us | 0 fell 6 down,
0 Whilst|. bloody|/ treason| 0 flourish’d 6 over us. ||
The two versions cited above represent two different registers: the pragmalinguistic register ((1) and the register of fiction (2). The difference between the alternatives indicated by the notation of the two versions is that the former is less varied than the latter. One of the most striking features of the register of fiction is the use of various voice qualities for the emphasis in the flow of speech, for example:
|| 0 See what a /rent | the 0 envious \Casca 6 made; ||
tr> <tr
|| For 0 when the · noble /Caesar | 0 saw · him /stab, |
In 0 gratitude | 0 more /strong |than 0 traitors’ 6 arms, |
h> <h
0 Quite \vanquish’d him:
quickly
|| If 0 you | · have | · tears, | pre · pare | to 6 shed them 6 now. ||
tr> <tr
The prosodic arrangement in the proper sense of the term (pitch‑movement, loudness, pitch‑range, tempo) is no less expressive. The register of fiction makes ample use of combinations of prosodic parameters, whereas the pragmalinguistic register chooses only one parameter for the same purpose, for example:
1.0 Judge, O \you \ gods! |how 4 dearly. Caesar 6 loved him. ||
2. Whilst 0 bloody · treason \ flourish’d 6 over us. ||
1n
1. 0 Judge, · O 6 you 6 gods! |how \ dearly · Caesar 6 loved him. ||
2. 0 Whilst |. bloody|/ treason | 0 flourish’d 6 over us. ||
Enough has been said to demonstrate the difference in the lexical articulation of speech in two registers in terms of suprasyntactic prosody. But the reader will have realized that in the immediately preceding discussion, we have deliberately not taken account of the fact that prosody is closely connected with the segmental structure of the utterance. In what follows we shall dwell, however briefly, on this aspect of the lexical articulation of speech. But before that, it is essential to make a digression.
It is a generally accepted fact that language as an emic system and speech as an etic system lend themselves to analysis in terms of completely different units. The units of language are the phoneme, the morpheme and the construction, whereas the units of speech are the syllable, the word and the sentence. To gain a deeper insight into the nature of articulation of speech it is necessary to understand the correlation of the two principal units of speech, the word and the syllable. It goes without saying that looked from the speechological point of view their correlation should be explained against the background of the rules and regularities of articulation of a concrete language, because, as has been shown above, there is a world of difference between languages in so far as the articulation of speech is concerned.
We should begin by stating that in contrast with the word which is a bilateral unit the syllable is unilateral because it carries no meaning of its own, that is, the expression plane of this unit is not in one‑to‑one correspondence with the content plane. It is, therefore, natural that the study of the syllable should be based on the theory of psycholinguistic stereotypes.
There is every reason to believe that people would not be able to produce speech unless they knew how to encode their message. To do that they must have at their command a certain set of rules with the help of which one semiotic system (the content of psycholinguistics) can be «translated» into another semiotic system (the natural human speech). Thus, the speaker avails himself of two codes: the inner code of language and the outer code of speech.
It should be emphasized in this connection that in actual speech the form of the word is subject to various constraints as far as its enunciation is concerned. It follows that we can speak of what can be described as the word stereotype, the word thus becoming the focus of two different aspects of speech formation. On the one hand, the word consists of separate sounds, on the other, it is a combination of morphemes. At the same time the word stereotype depends to a great extent on the syllable stereotype because the latter is the basic articulatory unit.
The syllable is a term which has repeatedly evoked various controversies. Very much has already been written and said concerning the antropophonic character of syllables, their phonological structure and suprasegmental peculiarities. So far, however, the syllabic articulation of speech in different registers and its interdependence with lexical articulation have been the object of very little study. One way of embarking upon the analysis of articulation of speech is to ask what is the role of tempo in this case.
It has been conclusively shown that at the rate of 320–330 syl/min the potentialities of articulation of speech which we have, so far, regarded as typical of English in contrast with French, are never realized. When speaking with this tempo the speaker tends to ‘telescope’ his utterances in a way which makes them practically indistinguishable from French, for example:
|| Well, I 0 have to confess to you at this point that when
I 0 very first heard that song I didn’t \like it very much.
In\deed you may not be able to be\lieve that but it’s
\grown over the 6 years. |Probably has with you 6 too.
| 0 Elton · John /there |and 0 ‘Crocodile 6 Rock’ | I’d 0 also
slowly
like to re\mind you 0 early on in the programme, for a
6 change, that if you’d. like to be included in the show, it’d
be my 0 absolute de^light |to have you a/board. ||
slowly
As has been shown above the lexical articulation in English is fully realized on the metasemiotic level: the word does stand out in the flow of speech. But under certain conditions the word in English, to say nothing of the syllable, is engulfed by the environment. When the tempo exceeds 320–330 syl/min the actual enunciation of English speech has very much in common with French in spite of the ‘emic’ difference between the two as outlined above: syllables, and, consequently, words tend to fuse. Long words are apt to drop out some syllables, whereas short syncategorematic words are often reduced either to one or two phonemes or a bundle of distinctive features.
It should be added in this connection that this process does not necessarily influence the intelligibility of speech. Psycholinguists have conclusively proved that the enthropy being favourable one can leave out up to 50% of speech material and nevertheless be understood. The ‘telescoped’ word in this case can be reconstructed judging by the context, verbal or extralinguistic.
It would be natural to conclude from what has been expounded and illustrated above that full lexical articulation of speech beyond the metasemiotic level is hardly feasible. This is not, however, the case. By studying different registers we can come to the conclusion that a clear‑cut lexical and syllabic articulation of the flow of speech is the indispensable property of the most important registers, their phonetic core. A case in point is the register of oratory, for example, tempo – 130–180 syl/min:
|| To/day, «0 science has brought · all the · different · quarters of the
· globe. so \close to/gether |that it is im\possible to \isolate them «0 one from a 6 nother. ||
To 0 day we are · faced with the · pre‑eminent 6 fact |that, 0 if civilization is to sur 6 vive,| we 0 must \cultivate the · science of · human re\lationships| – the a 0 bility of. all \peoples, |of 0 all \kinds,| to 0 live to· gether and \work to · gether,| in the 0 same 6 world, |at 6 peace. ||
In the cited example each word carries a stress of its own. This inevitably leads to an unambiguous division of the flow of speech into syllables. When the speaker tries to single out every word he says he cannot do it unless he realizes the syllabic stereotype of the language he is speaking. Of paramount importance, thus, is the accentual system of the English language. This problem, however, requires a more detailed discussion.
By lexical stress we mean bringing out one of the syllables by means of a sudden change in the melodic curve accompanied and enhanced by increased intensity and duration. In English there are several types of stress: primary, secondary, even, unifying, etc. The unifying stress is lexically the simplest case when one of the syllables is the accentual centre of the word, for example: explain(ik ’ splein), phonetic(fqV ’ netIk), importance(Im ’ pO: tns), etc. The weak unstressed syllables cling, as it were, to the strong one.
Very often, however, the accentual pattern of the word is more complex. There are a great many words which have two (distribution
(’ dIstrI ’ bju: Sn), segregation(’ segre ’ geISn), precursor(’ pri: ’ kE: sq), etc.), three (unceremonious(’An ’ serI ’ mqVnjqs), supererogation(’ su: pqr ’ erq ’ geISn), autobiographic(’ O: tqV ’ baIqV ’ grжfIk), etc.) stresses. The matter is complicated by the fact that English consonant clusters with resonants are syllabic by nature and as a result acquire a secondary stress, for example, table(’ teI ’ bl), mumble(’ mAm ’ bl), subtle(’ sA ’ tl), etc.
When the tempo of speech is slowed down to 130–180 syl/min all the stresses become particularly conspicuous. Let us consider the following passage representing the register of poetry in terms of its syllabic articulation:
They, looking back, all the eastern side beheld
Of Paradise, so late their happy seat,
Waved over by that flaming brand, the gate
With dreadful faces thronged and fiery arms.
Some natural tears they dropped, but wiped them soon;
The world was all before them, where to choose
Their place of rest, and Providence their guide.
They hand in hand with wandering steps and slow,
Through Eden took their solitary way.
~ – ’ ~ – ’ ~~ – ’ ~ – ’ ~ – ’
~ – ’ ~ – ~ – ’ ~ – ’ ~ – ’
~’ – ’ ~ – ~ – ’ ~ – ’ ~ – ’
~ – ’ ~ – ’ ~ – ’ ~ – ’ ~ – ’
~ – ’ ~ – ’ ~ – ’ ~ – ’ ~ – ’
~ – ’ ~ – ’ ~ – ’ ~ – ’ ~ – ’
~ – ’ ~ – ’ ~ – ’ ~ – ~ – ’
~ – ’ ~ – ’ ~ – ’ ~ – ’ ~ – ’
~ – ’ ~ – ’ ~ – ’ ~ – ’ ~ – ’
If we are looking for the ideal cases of syllabic articulation we can hardly do better than concentrate on poems like the one cited above. These poems, it should be noted, are comparable with the register of oratory because both are normally uttered word by word, and there is no other way of producing them.
Granted that it is plausible to say that to pronounce the word is to realize its syllabic stereotype, it does not follow that each syllable carries a stress of its own. Of course, there may be cases when a usually unstressed syllable acquires a secondary stress owing to the general rhythm and meter of the poem. Thus, the word solitary in the last line of the poem under analysis as an emic unit has only one stress (’ sQlItqrI). But under the influence of the rhythmical arrange‑ment of the utterance it acquires the secondary stress on the third syllable (’ sQlI ’ terI). As a result the division of the word into syllables presents no problem.
Cases of this kind, however, are comparatively rare. Most of the time the syllable stereotype becomes prominent because when the tempo is slow the speaker can easily make use of stress gradation within the word.
It is a matter of common observation that between the primary stress and unstressed syllables there exists a transition of force. Thus, for example, in Providence, wandering, Paradise, etc. the primary stress is on the first syllable, the second syllable is not stressed at all and the last syllable carries a very weak stress. This point should be borne in mind in view of the syllabic articulation of the flow of speech.
It follows that we can draw a clear distinction between the registers where neither words or syllables are brought into prominence and the registers where the separability of words and singling out of syllables go hand in hand. There is every reason to assume that the difference between two articulations is not qualitative but quantitative. This is why tempo comes to the fore.
2. The Identity‑of‑Unit Problem
The term ‘identity‑of‑unit problem’ corresponds to the Russian ‘проблема тождества слова’ which was first introduced by V.V.Vino‑gradov. Following V.V.Vinogradov A.I.Smirnitsky, Olga Akhmanova and Ksenija Levkovskaja went on with studies of the ‘identity‑of‑unit problem’ in Russian, English and German.
It is often implied, if not actually asserted, that the word is a ‘sign’ pure and simple because its expression plane is in one‑to‑one correspondence with its content. But in actual fact the ‘law of the sign’ is hardly ever observed in natural human language. Polysemy – non‑uniqueness of the content plane with singleness of expression, homonymy – different words identical in their expression planes, synonymy – words which have nothing in common as far as their expression is concerned but the content of which may be shown to be nearly the same – are among the most widely recognized instances of the violation of the ‘law of the sign’ in the lexis of a language. The above‑named linguists have worked out a consistent theory of various departures from the presumed one‑to‑one correspondence of expression and content within the same word – that is, violations of the ‘law of the sign’ without impairing the word’s globality as a separate lexical unit.
We shall begin our discussion of lexical variation with phonetic variation which is of three kinds:
1) automatic, 2) accentual, 3) emic.
Automatic variation comprises the phonetic variants due to assimilative processes on word‑boundaries. This kind of variation is most frequently observed in the case of syncategorematic words. The following set of examples illustrates the phonetic modifications of the conjunction and in different environment:
normal and natural (nLmql n2жtSrql)
now and then (naV n2 рen)
bread and butter (bredm bAtq)
king and queen (kINkwi: n)
It follows that syncategorematic words are prone to vary their expression plane under the influence of their immediate phonetic environment. This does not, however, destroy their lexical and semantic globality.
The second kind of phonetic variation is found in the case of several co‑existent accentual patterns of the same word. Although, in the case of words like necessary – necessary, contrary – contrary, territory – territory, dictionary – dictionary, etc. (the stressed syllable is underlined) accentual variation is usually attributed to diatopy (British and American variants of pronunciation), the non‑uniqueness of expression is also found within British English, for example, aristocrat – aristocrat, confisca‑tory – confiscatory, contemplative – contemplative, intercessor – intercessor, protean – protean, etc.
Accentual variation, if discreetly handled, is conducive to more elaborate poetic form, for example:
Complete
…that thou dead corpse again in complete steel;
how many make the hour full complete…
Contract
…how shall we then dispense with that contract;
a contract of true love to celebrate…
Outrage
…with this immodest clamorous outrage;
do outrage and displeasure to himself…
Perfume
…the perfume and supplience of a minute, no more;
to take perfumes? distil preserve? yea so…
Revenues
…by manors, rents, revenues I forego;
long withering out a young man’s revenue…
Sojourn
…that if they come to sojourn at my house;
sojourn in Mantua; I’ll find out your man…
The evidence of the above examples suggests that this kind of accentual variation in poetry is determined by exigencies of the metre, the poet selecting and arranging the variants in a way best suited to the rhythmical organization of his lines.
Of particular interest, in this connection, is the fact that in English there exist even‑stressed words like upstairs, broad‑shouldered, blue‑eyed, Chinese, etc. The thesis that each component of such a word carries a stress of its own can, however, be refuted by the fact that in the flow of speech this accentual pattern is never retained. The point is that the accentual structure of even‑stressed words depends entirely on their immediate environment in speech, for example: Let’s go upstairs. Anupstairs room. He is abroad‑shouldered man. The man was broad‑shouldered. A prettyblue‑eyed girl. The girl was blue‑eyed. Can you speak Chinese? This is aChinese grammar.There is every reason to believe that even‑stressed words may be said to be non‑existent because when taken in isolation and pronounced with equal stress on both components, the words would sound unnatural and artificial.
The third kind of phonetic variation depends on the coexistence of several ‘emic’ versions of the outer side of the word, for example:
Asian (eISn, – sIqn, – zIqn, – zqn)
begin (bI ’ gIn, bq ’ gIn)
cathedra (kq ’ Ti: drq, kж ’ tedrR, kж ’ Tedrq, kq ’ tedrR)
ceramic (sI ’ rжmIk, sq ’ rжmIk, kI ’ rжmik, kq ’ rжmIk)
direct (dI ’ rekt, dq ’ r‑, daI ’ r‑)
elastic (I ’ lжstIk, I ’ lRstIk)
explain (Ik ’ spleIn, qk ’ spleIn)
fascism (’ fжSIzqm, ’ fжsIzqm)
usage (’ ju: zIG, ’ ju: sIG)
Vietnam (’ vjet ’ nжm, ’ vjet ’ nRm)
Examples of this kind can be multiplied infinitely the moment we turn to any pronouncing dictionary of modern English.
Next comes morphological variation. By morphological variant we mean those cases in which one of the morphemes within a word becomes meaningless, i.e. it does not carry the meaning which is normally assumed to belong to it. In Olga Akhmanova’s «Очерки по общей и русской лексикологии» (М., 1957) this complex phenomenon is explained by means of the following examples: ежегодный – ежегодний, длинношерст‑ный – длинношерстый, обклеивать – оклеивать, будний – будничный, etc., on the one hand, and бычий – бычачий, петуший – петушиный, etc., on the other. In the former case it is difficult to draw a line between phonetic and morphological variants, whereas in the latter, examples of morphological variation in Russian appear to be sufficiently convincing.
As far as English is concerned we rely mainly on A.I.Smirnitsky’s «Лексикология английского языка». He distinguishes two kinds of morphological variation: grammatical morphological and lexical morphological. Thus, learn – learnt, learn – learned, bandit – banditi, bandit – bandits are examples of grammatical morphological variation, while pairs in –ic, – ical such as stylistic – stylistical, mathematic – mathematical, etc. are examples of lexical morphological variation.
So much by way of general background to the notion of morphological variation. But there are obvious problems which arise the moment we try to penetrate deeper into the question. The fact is that what has just been said about lexical morphological variation can be accepted only if one of the component morphemes within a word can be shown to have lost its meaning and thus to become a unilateral unit. It is common knowledge that words and morphemes are bilateral units. The balaterality of words and morphemes is regularly contrasted with the unilaterality of units of the diacritic level – phonemes and letters. If bilateral units are founded on the unity of expression and content which forms the basis of what is described as ‘individual reference’, unilateral units are set up on the basis of a different category – the category of ‘otherness’. Thus, for instance, in (pIl) – (bIl), (set) – (sжt), (kQt) – (gQt), (p) – (b), (e) – (ж), (k) – (g) are semiologically relevant sounds and they serve to distinguish the words pill and bill, set and sat, cot and got. These sounds have no meaning of their own and signal the otherness of the above word pairs.
To reiterate, in the case of morphological variation we are confronted with the situation when generally a bilateral unit becomes unilateral the difference between the contrasted words ceasing to be morphological. A case in point is adjectives in –ic, – ical. In public, politic, poetic, periodic, specific, etc., and formal, usual, structural, functional, casual, etc., the suffixes ‑ic and ‑al function as regular full‑fledged morphemes. But in pairs like academic – academical, stylistic – stylistical, mathematic – mathematical, morphologic – morphological, etc. the situation is drastically different. The suffix ‑al carries no meaning of its own. As a result, we can no longer regard these units as separate words and must treat them as morphological variants of one and the same word.
So far the discussion of morphological variation has been deliberately, though tacitly, restricted to only one aspect of the problem, namely the correlation of unilateral and bilateral units. But we cannot lose sight of the relationship between morphological variants and other lexicological categories, such as synonymy and homonymy. To illustrate the point let us adduce a few examples: классовый – классный, ананасный – ананасовый. At first sight it may seem that these pairs of two words are identical but in actual fact they have nothing in common. Классныйand классовый are homonyms pure and simple because they are derived from two homonymous words класс‑1 and класс‑2 whereas ананасныйand ананасовый are derived from one and the same word and can be treated as morphological variants because there is no noticeable semantic difference between them. It follows that although structurally these pairs of words seem to be identical, from the point of view of their content plane they belong to different categories – homonymy and polysemy. The difference between homonymy and polysemy is something that we shall come back to in a later chapter. It is sufficient for our present purpose to emphasize the fact that when dealing with seemingly indistinguishable cases we should take into consideration quite a few factors.
Let us now return to the relationship between morphological variation and synonymy. We cannot arrive at really reliable results unless we come to perfect understanding of the category of synonymy because morphological variation very often brings up synonymy. Thus, for example, academic – academical, mathematic – mathematical are morphological variants while economic – economical, historic – historical are synonyms. This fact is borne out by the impossibility of bringing together in synonymic condensation the former (*This is an academic and academical subject) and the acceptability of a phrase like This is a historic and historical place where the first shot was fired meaning that it is both 1) historically important and 2) a part of history.
The above discussion is by no means exhaustive, for much still remains to be done. Now we should turn to another kind of lexical variation – the semantic one. All along we have dealt with the expression plane (phonetic and morphological variants). Semantic variants are modifications of the content plane.
When we turn to the content plane and semantic variation we are immediately confronted with some metalinguistic complications. What we describe as ‘semantic variation’ is much better known by the name of polysemy, we nevertheless insist on the term ‘semantic variation’ because this metalinguistic expression helps to elucidate some moot points in the theory of the identity‑of‑unit problem. For one thing, using the term ‘polysemy’ would logically imply preference for ‘polyphony’ to denote phonetic variation. The latter, however, would be misleading because it is now used in linguostylistics to denote simultaneous realization of several lexical‑semantic variants of the same word. Secondly, as will be shown below, semantic variation goes hand in hand with prosodic variation, that is different inherent or adherent prosodic features. We must, therefore, decide in favour of the term ‘semantic variation’ which corresponds very neatly to phonetic, morphological and prosodic variation.
Although we are satisfied with the results of the metalinguistic discussion we are fully aware of the enormous difficulties which will have to be contended with the moment an attempt is made to exemplify semantic variation. The fact is that there is a strong tendency in the literature on the subject to deny semantic variation altogether. Some linguists state that every time a word is used in a different meaning a homonym is created. This view has affected, to some extent, modern learner’s lexicography. Thus, for example, in «Cambridge International Dictionary of English» the entry of a polysemantic word is organized in such a way that the head word is printed every time a new meaning is singled out. Special guide words following the head word indicate the difference:
Bedfurniture / bed/ n C – a large rectangular piece of furniture, often with four legs which is used for sleeping…
Bedbottom /bed/ n C – the bottom or something that serves as
a base…
Bed area of ground/bed/ n C – a piece of ground used for planting flowers
Although, of course, this type of the entry outlay is very user‑friendly because it facilitates the process of finding different meanings of the word in question in a long entry, it should be emphasized that this approach destroys the globality of the word as a separate linguistic unit and replaces polysemy by homonymy.
There is no reason, however, to substitute homonymy for semantic variation in cases of this kind because there are scientifically reliable methods of drawing a line between polysemy and homonymy which will be considered below. The point to be emphasized here is that the notion of semantic variation implies the globality of the word when used in different meanings. To illustrate semantic variation let us consider the following examples:
1. Do you like your tea sweet?
2. What a very sweet name.
Sweet 1means ‘tasting like sugar or honey’ while sweet 2 is ‘pleasant or attractive’. Both variants are registered by all the dictionaries as belonging to the same entry. Although there is a slight semantic difference between the two variants it is not big enough to split up the word into two lexical units.
Throughout this chapter we have been mainly concerned with the specific character of the correlation of expression and content planes in natural human language and concluded that phonetic and morphological variants are not directly correlated with semantic variants. The relationship that holds between prosodic and semantic variants is different. Special studies have shown that correspondence between ‘meaning’ and ‘form’, expression and content is regularly established by means of prosodic contrasts. Thus, for example, the semantic variants of sweet 1 and sweet 2, to melt 1 and to melt 2, noble 1 and noble 2are clearly distinguishable on the expression plane by the opposition of the following prosodic patterns:
1. || 0 Do you · like your. tea 7 sweet? ||
2. || 0 What a · very \ sweet. name. ||
slowly
1. || 0 Mary‑Ann made · short 7 pastry «that 0 melted in the 6 mouth. ||
2. || My 0 heart \melted as I. sorted him 6 out. ||
slowly
1. || He is a 0 man of · noble 6 birth. ||
2. || 0 What a 4 noble. nature you have, 7 Gwendolen. ||
Thus, there is every reason to assume that if the arguments put forward above are valid, they show that it is possible, in principle, to discover objective criteria on which to base the semantic variation of words.
Although so much has been achieved and the general approach to the identity‑of‑unit problem is now outlined clearly enough, very much remains to be done before it ceases to be a ‘problem’.
Chapter 2.
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