Synonymic Dominant

Most of synonymic groups have a central word, whose meaning is equal to the denotation common to all of the synonymic group. This word is called the synonymic dominant.

e. g. to shout - to scream - to roar - to yell: to surprise - to astonish - to amaze - to astound - to shock - to embarrass - to confuse

The synonymic dominant possesses the following characteristic features:

1) high frequency of usage;

2) lack of connotations;

3) broad combinability;

4) broad general meaning.

Sources of synonymy:

1) borrowings (to ask - native, to question - French, to interrogate - Latin);

2) dialects (long distance call - BrE, trunk call - AmE);

3) set expressions (to choose - to pick out);

4) shortening (exam - examination, cab - cabinet, cabriolet);

5) conversion (to laugh - a laugh (laughter));

6) euphemisms (naked - i one's birthday suit).

Synonymy is associated with some theoretical problems which still at present are controversial issues. Synonyms of words of the same part of speech conveying the same concept, but differ either in shades of coloring of meaning or in stylistic characteristics. The only existing classification of synonyms was established by academician Vinogradov.

46. Criteria of Synonymy (Критерии синонимов).

47. Antonymy. Classifications of Antonyms (Антонимы. Крассификация антонимов).

Antonyms may be defined as two or more words of the same language belonging to the same part of speech and to the same semantic field, identical in style and nearly identical in distribution, associated and often used together so that their denotative meanings render contradictory or contrary notions.

Contradictory notions are mutually opposed and denying one another, e. g. alive means ‘not dead’ and impatient means ‘not patient’. Contrary notions are also mutually opposed but they are gradable, e. g. old and young are the most distant elements of a series like: old:: middle-aged:: young, while hot and cold form a series with the intermediate cool and warm, which, as F.R. Palmer points out, form a pair of antonyms themselves. The distinction between the two types is not absolute, as one can say that one is more dead than alive, and thus make these adjectives gradable.

Another classification of antonyms is based on a morphological ap-proach: root words form absolute antonyms (right:: wrong), the presence of negative affixes creates derivational antonyms (happy:: unhappy).

The juxtaposition of antonyms in a literary text emphasises some contrast and creates emotional tension as in the following lines from “Romeo and Juliet” (Act I, Scene V):

My only love sprang from my only hate\ Too early seen unknown, and known too late!

One of the features enhancing the pathetic expressiveness of these lines is contrast based on such pairs as love:: hate; early:: late; unknown:: known. The opposition is obvious: each component of these pairs means the opposite of the other. The pairs may be termed antonymic pairs.

Antonyms have traditionally been defined as words of opposite meaning. This definition, however, is not sufficiently accurate, as it only shifts the problem to the question of what words may be regarded as words of opposite meaning, so we shall keep to the definition given at the beginning of the present paragraph.

The important question of criteria received a new and rigorously linguistic treatment in V.N. Komissarov’s work. Keeping to the time-honoured classification of antonyms into absolute or root antonyms (love:: hate) and derivational antonyms, V.N. Komissarov breaks new ground by his contextual treatment of the problem. Two words, according to him, shall be considered antonymous if they are regularly contrasted in actual speech, that is if the contrast in their meanings is proved by definite types of contextual co-occurrence.

Absolute antonyms, then, are words regularly contrasted as homogenous sentence members connected by copulative, disjunctive or adversative conjunctions, or identically used in parallel constructions, in certain typical contexts.

48. Euphemisms (Эвфемизмы).

A source of synonymy also well worthy of note is the so-called euphemism in which by a shift of meaning a word of more or less ‘pleasant or at least inoffensive connotation becomes synonymous to one that is harsh, obscene, indelicate or otherwise unpleasant.1 The euphemistic expression merry fully coincides in denotation with the word drunk it substitutes, but the connotations of the latter fade out and so the utterance on the whole is milder, less offensive. The effect is achieved, because the periphrastic expression is not so harsh, sometimes jocular and usually motivated according to some secondary feature of the notion: naked:: in one’s birthday suit] pregnant:: in the family way. Very often a learned word which sounds less familiar is therefore less offensive, as in drunkenness:: intoxication; sweat:: perspiration.

Euphemisms can also be treated within the synchronic approach, because both expressions, the euphemistic and the direct one, co-exist in the language and form a synonymic opposition. Not only English but other modern languages as well have a definite set of notions attracting euphemistic circumlocutions. These are notions of death, madness, stupidity, drunkenness, certain physiological processes, crimes and so on. For example: die:: be no more:: be gone:: lose one’s life:: breathe one’s last:: join the silent majority:: go the way of alt flesh:: pass away:: be gathered to one’s fathers.

A prominent source of synonymic attraction is still furnished by interjections and swearing addressed to God. To make use of God’s name is considered sinful by the Church and yet the word, being expressive, formed the basis of many interjections. Later the word God was substituted by the phonetically similar word goodness: For goodness sake\ Goodness gracious] Goodness knows! Cf. By Jovel Good Lord! By Gum! As in:

His father made a fearful row.

He said: “By Gum, you’ve done it now.” (Belloc)

A certain similarity can be observed in the many names for the devil (deuce, Old Nick). The point may be illustrated by an example from Burns’s “Address to the Devil":

О thou! Whatever title suit thee,

Auld Hornie, Satan, Nick, or Clootie...

Euphemisms always tend to be a source of new synonymic formations, because after a short period of use the new term becomes so closely connected with the notion that it turns into a word as obnoxious as the earlier synonym.

49. Neologisms (Неологизмы).

Neologisms can develop in three main ways: a lexical unit existing in the language can change its meaning to denote a new object or phenomenon. In such cases we have semantic neologisms, e.g. the word «umbrella» developed the meanings: «авиационное прикрытие»,»политическое прикрытие». A new lexical unit can develop in the language to denote an object or phenomenon which already has some lexical unit to denote it. In such cases we have transnomination, e.g. the word «slum» was first substituted by the word «ghetto» then by the word-group «inner town». A new lexical unit can be introduced to denote a new object or phenomenon. In this case we have «a proper neologism», many of them are cases of new terminology.

Here we can point out several semantic groups when we analize the group of neologisms connected with computerization, and here we can mention words used:

a) to denote different types of computers, e.g. PC, super-computer, multi-user, neurocomputer / analogue of a human brain/;

b) to denote parts of computers, e.g. hardware, software, monitor, screen, data, vapourware / experimental samples of computers for exhibition, not for production/;

c) to denote computer languages

) to denote notions connected with work on computers, e.g. computerman, computerization, computerize, to troubleshoot, to blitz out / to ruin data in a computer’s memory/

In the sphere of lingusitics we have such neologisms as: machine translation, interlingual / an artificial language for machine translation into several languages / and many others.

With the development of social activities neologisms appeared as well, e.g. youthquake - волнения среди молодежи, pussy-footer - политик, идущий на компромисы, Euromarket, Eurodollar, Europarliament, Europol etc.

In the modern English society there is a tendency to social stratification, as a result there are neologisms in this sphere as well, e.g. belonger - представитель среднего класса, приверженец консервативных взглядов. There are different semantic groups of neologisms belonging to everyday life:

a) food e.g. «starter»/ instead of «hors d’oevres»/, macrobiotics / raw vegetables, crude rice/, longlife milk, clingfilm, microwave stove, consumer electronics, fridge-freezer, hamburgers /beef-, cheese-, fish-, veg- /.

b) clothing, e.g. catsuit /one-piece clinging suit/, slimster, string / miniscule bikini/, hipster / trousers or skirt with the belt on hips/, completenik / a long sweater for trousers/, sweatnik /a long jacket/, pants-skirt, bloomers / lady’s sports trousers/.

c) footwear e.g. winklepickers /shoes with long pointed toes/, thongs /open sandals/, backsters /beech sandals with thick soles/.

d) bags, e.g. bumbag /a small bag worn on the waist/, sling bag /a bag with a long belt/, maitre / a small bag for cosmetics/.

There are also such words as: dangledolly / a dolly-talisman dangling in the car before the windscreen/, boot-sale /selling from the boot of the car/, touch-tone /a telephone with press-button/.

Neologisms can be also classified according to the ways they are formed. They are subdivided into: phonological neologisms, borrowings, semantic neologisms and syntactical neologisms. Syntactical neologisms are divided into morphological /word-building/ and phraseological /forming word-groups/.

Phonological neologisms are formed by combining unique combinations of sounds, they are called artificial, e.g. rah-rah /a short skirt which is worn by girls during parades/, «yeck» /»yuck» which are interjections to express repulsion produced the adjective yucky/ yecky. These are strong neologisms.

Strong neologisms include also phonetic borrowings, such as «perestroika» /Russian/, «solidarnosc» /Polish/, Berufsverbot / German /, dolce vita /Italian/ etc.

Morphological and syntactical neologisms are usually built on patterns existing in the language, therefore they do not belong to the group of strong neologisms. Quite a number of neologisms appear on the analogy with lexical units existing in the language, e.g. snowmobile /automobile/, danceaholic /alcoholic/, airtel /hotel/, cheeseburger /hamburger/, autocade / cavalcade/.

There are many neologisms formed by means of affixation, such as: decompress, to disimprove, overhoused, educationalist, slimster, folknik etc. Phraseological neologisms can be subdivided into phraseological units with transferred meanings, e.g. to buy into/ to become involved/, fudge and dudge /avoidance of definite decisions/, and set non-idiomatic expressions, e.g. electronic virus, Rubic’s cube, retail park, acid rain, boot trade etc.

50. Thematic and Ideographic Groups. The Theories of Semantic Fields (Тематические и идеографические группы. Теория семантических полей).

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