Lexicon Language & Mind Summer 2011

Nature of the lexicon Much more structured than dictionaries Links between phonological forms and meanings – E.g. morphemes and their allomorphs

Lexicon Contains: – Words – Root Morphemes – Derived stems (bec of unpredictability) – Irregular inflected forms – Morphologically complex words – Idioms Regular Inflected forms are not included bec their meanings are predictable given English morphology

Openness Lexicon is not fixed; it changes rapidly Due to social and tech change Language contact/multilingualism – Hasta la vista, ‘please’, uffda, Normans – 1066, Vikings … Tabooing of words Even grammatical morphemes change: – Can, have, genitive es  ‘s

Parts of Speech Traditionally defined by meaning; now by grammatical behavior Not all words pattern the same way and there are sufficient commonalities among some groups of words to allow us to make generalizations about them (viz. ‘parts of speech’)

Parts of speech Nouns -inflect for number, take modifiers? Adjectives –qualities or properties of things Pronouns –grammatical morphemes Verbs –inflect for tense, person, and # of subj Auxiliaries –express grammatical (not lex) info Adverbs –qualities or properties of events Prepositions –go w/ nouns; relate event to T&S Conjunctions –join words or groups

Criteria Parts of speech are defined by gram. behavior – E.g. ‘seem’ : it doesn’t seem like a prototypical verb; i.e. it doesn’t really represent an event. – How does its grammatical behavior group it? NB its suffixes and its sentence position Keep in mind the overlap due to the ability of some morphemes to function in multiple roles

Making new words Clipping: fan, condo, flu, Steve – Hypocorism: telly, barbie Acronyming: RAM, AIDS; EU,PR Blending: motel, bit, modem Borrowing: loanwords, loan translations Coinage: ‘completely new’ nerd, barf – Phonoaesthesia: sounds become associated with meaning, often partially iconic. E.g.?

Old forms, new meanings Derivation: +derivational morphemes = stem Compounding: 1+1=? Reduplication: numerous, intensity – often iconic: ‘marginal’ yet 2k+ in English Backformation: incise, burger Meaning extension: holiday, kleenex Meaning narrowing: doctor, meat

Fixed expressions Idioms: ‘fixed’ & ‘unpredictable’ – thus need to be listed separately in our lexicons Modification is ‘restricted’ (e.g. piece of mind) Can be exaggerated w/ elaborating material or replacement of salient word (1+1=?)? –arbitrary/motivated (construal)

Fixed expressions Collocations: habitual word combos – Pairings are unpredictable: strong coffee/liquor, hard coffee?/liquor; on the radio – on TV – Binomials: fully predictable meaning, ‘fixed’ order Come easy, go easy Includes idioms: spick & span, livelong day, eke out – Idioms’ words often collocate strongly

Taboos – Often related to sex and bodily functions (Euro Ls) Euphemisms – Ways to avoid being offensive by being evasive Dysphemisms – Replacing a euphemistic/neutral term w/ a harsher one. Also: for sacred items; gifts (tsumanarai mono)