英语词汇语义关系及其在词汇教学中的应用

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Chapter 1 Introduction

Chapter1. Introduction

English has become the most widely used language in the world. To master English

is to gain an important tool for global communication. Therefore, English teaching and

learning has become more and more popular in domestic education. But investigations

tell us many learners have problems in their learning process especially in vocabulary

acquisition, the basic and essential part in language learning. The inadequateness of

learners’ command in vocabulary acquisition mainly lies in: great efforts but little

results in vocabulary memorizing; lack of the understanding of the real meaning of the

words taught; inability to retrieve the words that have been taught when the case of use

comes up; inability to use the appropriate word according to the situation.

1.1. Significance of This Study

Although many famous linguists have tried to deal with these problems from

different approaches, vocabulary teaching is still a big problem for us to tackle. First

let’s see what it means to “really learn” vocabulary. Carter classifies lexical competence

into five assumptions:

1) Words exist in a semantic space, knowing a word in a language involves knowing

what parts of space it occupies and what its semantic value is.

2) Knowing a word in a language means knowing both its syntagmatic and

paradigmatic relations.

3) Knowing a word in a language means knowing its limitations of use according to

function and situation.

4) Knowing words in groups of semantically related items might be encouraged as an

important stage in foreign language learning.

5) Knowing a word involves knowing its syntactic behavior.

(Ronald Carter, 1998)

From Carter’s assumptions we know that to really know a word is to know its real

meanings as well as its relations with other words. And to know the real meanings of a

word depends on an elaborate manipulation of its relations with other words including

its synonyms, antonyms, etc.

According to semantic theory, words do not exist in isolation but are related to each

other and thus form the massive word store of a language. So vocabulary is an

integrated system of lexemes interrelated in sense. We can divide the whole vocabulary

of a language up into different fields of concepts which may consist of many subfields.

Chapter 1 Introduction

The meaning of a word does not exist in the word itself but rather spreads over the

neighboring words, since it is the neighboring words that help pin down the meanings of

the word. In other words, the meaning of a word can only be adequately described

through its semantic relations and contrasts to other words. Probably we all have

experience that remembering words from lists that contain semantically related subsets

is much easier than remembering words from lists of unrelated words. Thus we may

suggest that meaning organizes the vocabulary and teaching vocabulary through sense

relations should be the best way to give organized access to the lexicon (Ronald Carter,

1998).

Human mind usually unconsciously takes account of such relatedness of meaning

when organizing the words of a language and store them in the brain. So it is quite

reasonable to assume that a method of teaching that takes account of the psychological

process underlying semantic relatedness must be more pedagogically efficient.

1.2. Research Background

Many researchers have studied sense relations. Herbert Reichl studies sense

relations in the book Lexical Relations, and M.Lynne Murphy researches them in the

book Semantic Relation and the Lexicon:A ntonymy, Synonymy and other Paradigms.

Grains and Redman(1986), in their well-known book Working with Words, argue that

grouping words by meaning “provide greater precision in guiding students towards

meaning, and in helping them define the boundaries that separate lexical items”. Seal

(1991) explains that when words are learned in semantic sets, “the learning of one item

can reinforce the learning of another”. All of these linguists assume that at least two

advantages in learning words in semantic set: a) can make the task of learning

vocabulary of a foreign language much easier b) can draw the attention of the learner on

the subtle distinction or relations between other words, which is essential for a profound

and complete interpretation of the meaning of the word.

In the domestic field, Chinese English linguists focus on the application of the

sense-relation theory by reproducing it in their own way. As far as the English language

instruction is concerned, the scholars resort to various methods such as the application

of collocations, the associative vocabulary instruction, the proper use of super-ordinates,

the use of proper synonyms or antonyms to achieve a particular literary style, the study

of vocabulary exercises in light of sense relations.

In this article we argue that vocabulary teaching through sense relations of words is

Chapter 1 Introduction

efficient and plausible. Teaching vocabulary through sense relations such as synonymy,

hyponymy, antonymy and collocation will provide a precise elaboration in the word

learning, and is highly effective in deepening the understanding of the new items as well

as facilitating the long-term retention of words.

The idea of constructing sense relations of words in English teaching is not a new

one. But the application of different theories in the different sense relation construction

accordingly is a new attempt in this area of study. Besides it is a beneficial attempt in

the design of different vocabulary exercises and activities based on the theory of sense

relations. Finally the suggestion of a synthetically pedagogical procedure in vocabulary

teaching provides a practical operating process for language teachers.

This thesis is divided into six chapters. Chapter 1 is the introduction part, in which

the idea of teaching vocabulary through sense relations is put forward and the layout of

the thesis is made. Chapter2 is the literature review, which introduces the main

theoretical basis for the application of sense relation in vocabulary teaching and the

different theories concerning different sense relation teaching. Chapter 3 is a detailed

elaboration of sense relations including synonymy, antonymy and hyponymy. Chapter 4

is the application of sense relation construction to vocabulary teaching. Chapter 5

presents a synthetical teaching approach with the application of sense relation theory.

Chapter 6 is the conclusion part of the whole paper.

Chapter 2 Literature Review

Chapter 2. Literature Review

This chapter deals with the findings concerning the sense relations study in the

realm of semantics. The most relevant research are worthy of a full-fledged illumination

in that their findings are important for the present study. Since this study falls into the

domain of semantics study, the literature review shall begin with a general introduction

to this division.

2.1. Theories

2.1.1. Reference, Sense and sense relations

When we talk about a word, we will be first interested in its meaning. What is the

meaning of a word? For example, the linguistic form bird is used to refer to “a creature

with wings and feathers which can usually fly in the air”. It may be believed that “a

creature with wings and feathers which can usually fly in the air” is the meaning of the

word bird. But ‘meaning’ is not as simple as it seems to be. Now we will first talk about

two important concepts in semantic study of meaning: reference and sense.

Reference means what a linguistic form refers to in the real physical world. It deals

with the relationship between the linguistic element and the non-linguistic world of

experience. In other words, reference is a matter of extralinguistic relations. “By means

of reference, a speaker indicates which things in the world (including persons) are being

talked about.”(Hurford and Heasley 1983:25). If we say “The bird is flying”, we must

be talking about a certain bird which is existent in a certain situation and which is

known to both the speaker and the hearer. This is the reference of the word “bird” in this

particular situation. Only when a connection between a linguistic sign and a referent is

established does the linguistic form of a word become meaningful. For example, the

linguistic form bird has meaning because the language user employs it to refer to “a

creature with wings and feathers which can usually fly in the air”. The referent of a

word to an object outside the language is arbitrary and conventional, which is the result

of generalization and abstraction. As we know, the word bird refers to all the animals of

the same category no matter the size, color, region, weight, etc.

Sense of a word denotes the relationship inside the language. It is concerned with

the inherent meaning of the linguistic form. It is the collection of all the features of the

linguistic form. In other words, sense is a matter of interlinguistic relations. It is the

aspect of meaning dictionary compilers are interested in. For example, in the dictionary

the definition of bird is “a creature with wings and feathers which can usually fly in the

Chapter 2 Literature Review

air” (Longman Dictionary Of Contemporary English, 1998) This does not refer to any

particular bird that exists in the world, but applies to any animal that have all the

features described in the definition. So this is the sense of the word “bird”.

From the above discussions of sense and reference we can know that linguistic

forms having the same sense may have different references in different situations.

Consider the following dialogues:

I hate my neighbor’s bird.

Well, I’ve just bought a lovely bird.

Obviously the two speakers are talking about two different birds.

On the other hand there are occasions when linguistic forms with the same reference

might differ in sense. A very good example is the expressions “morning star” and

“evening star”. The “star” in the two expressions differs in sense but they actually refer

to the same thing in the world.

F.de Saussure, the Swiss scholar, famous for his great work Course de Linguistique

Generale, is generally regarded as the founder of modern structural linguistics. The

central tenet of structuralism is that “every language is a unique relational structure, or

system, and that the units which we identify, or postulate as theoretical constructs, in

analyzing the sentence of a particular language (sounds, words, meanings, etc.) derive

both their essence and their existence from their relationships with other units in the

same language-system. We cannot first identify the units and then, at a subsequent stage

of the analysis, enquire what combinatorial or other relations hold between them: we

simultaneously identify both the units and their interrelations. Linguistic units are but

points in a system, or network, of relations; they are the terminals of these relations, and

they have no prior and independent existence.” (Lyons 1977a:231-232)In other words,

lexical items are not independent of each other, but related to each other and the sense

of each lexical item is meaningful and realized in the interrelation with other items.

Thus the vocabulary of a language is just like a network system.

We know that it is one of the cardinal principles of “structuralism” that every

linguistic item has its place and function in a language system, or the value of every

linguistic item lies in the different relations which it contracts with other items in the

system. To quote from Firth, “Meaning is the total network of relations or functions into

which any linguistic item enters”. And when talking about “meaning”, Quine also said,

“Words have their meaning by virtue of their place in a network.” So we can say the

Chapter 2 Literature Review

sense of a lexical item may be defined as identical with as well as dependent upon the

set of relations which hold between the lexical item in question and other items in the

same lexical system.

De Saussure also made the distinction between paradigmatic and syntagmatic

relations. Syntagmatic relations hold in praesentia. They hold between two or more

terms co-present in a sequence. Associative relations, on the other contrary, hold in

absentia. They hold between terms constituting a mnemonic group. As Palmer(1976)

interpreted “The paradigmatic relations are those into which a linguistic unit enters

through being contrasted or substitutable, in a particular environment, with other similar

units. Syntagmatic relations are those that a unit contracts by virtue of its co-occurrence

with similar units.” For example, in an old man and a young man,old and young are in

a paradigmatic relation to each other, while each is in a syntagmatic relation with man.

According to Carter (1987), the paradigmatic relations can be divided into synonymy,

antonymy, hyponymy, polysemy, homonymy and part-whole relation, etc. In this paper

we only focus on the most important ones: antonymy, hyponymy and synonymy. And

syntagmatic relations mainly refer to collocational restrictions. Generally there are three

types of collocations: free combinations, restricted combinations(collocations)and

idioms.

Sense relations falls into either syntagmatic or paradigmatic relation which have

their own important function respectively. The syntagmatic aspect of the meaning of a

lexical item contributes to the cohesion of a sentence or a discourse, while the

paradigmatic relation between lexical items is the basis of the field theory. Therefore the

vocabulary of a language can be visualized as a highly structured network with

interconnected nodes as different categories of lexical items.

2.1.2. Semantic Field Theory

The Saussurean structural semanticist takes the view that a semantic field is a

paradigmatically or syntagmatically structured subset of the vocabulary since the

meaning of any linguistic unit is determined by the paradigmatic and syntagmatic

relations ehich hold between that unit and other units in a language-system. (Lyons,

1977b:268) The lexical items that that are sematically related to each other fall into the

same semantic field. The most famous semantic field theory is that of Jost Trier, a

German linguist, who regards the vocabulary as an integrated network composed of

lexical items interrelated to each other in sense, and every lexical item is surrounded by

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摘要：

Chapter1Introduction1Chapter1.IntroductionEnglishhasbecomethemostwidelyusedlanguageintheworld.TomasterEnglishistogainanimportanttoolforglobalcommunication.Therefore,Englishteachingandlearninghasbecomemoreandmorepopularindomesticeducation.Butinvestigationstellusmanylearnershaveproblemsintheirlearning...

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