英语词汇学大作业

英语词汇学大作业

On the Basic Word Formation

班 级 姓 名 学 号 指导教师

2011级4班 王苗苗 1141030423 张金宝

2013年6月17日

英语词汇学大作业

Abstract

As an international language, English has been used widely all over the world. And as a recognized international communication language, English teaching also is important to people. Vocabulary is the key to learn English. English learners are easy to find that to remember a large number of forms complex English vocabulary need to rack one's brains, but spend a lot of time to memory words may be quickly forgotten. How to learn vocabulary well? Actually, memorizing words need methods. English word formation can help us recognize English words, understand them correctly, and enlarge our vocabulary quickly. It is an efficient way and powerful weapon for English study. Among them，affixation is the strongest one to form a great range of vocabulary, and it is claimed to be one of the best ways of learning English.

Key words: derivation compounding conversion

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英语词汇学大作业

摘要

英语作为一种国际化的语言已经被全世界广泛的使用。而作为国际公认的交际语言，英语教学也成为各国教学的重点之重。其中词汇的掌握又是学习英语的关键点。学习英语的人不难发现, 要记住大量形式复杂的英语词汇需要绞尽脑汁, 但是花费很多时间记忆的单词可能转眼就忘了。如何更好的掌握词汇？其实, 记忆单词需要方法。英语构词法能够帮助我们很好的辨别并正确理解英语，同时也可以在短时间内增加我们的词汇量。英语构词法是学习英语的有效途径和强有力的“武器”。 关键词：派生法； 复合法； 转化法

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英语词汇学大作业

Contents

1. Introduction ................................................................................................................... 1 2. Three basic word formation ........................................................................................... 1 2.1 Derivation .............................................................................................................. 1 2.2 Compounding ........................................................................................................ 2 2.3 Conversion ............................................................................................................. 2 3. The benefits of learning word formation ....................................................................... 2 4. Conclusion ..................................................................................................................... 3 References ......................................................................................................................... 4

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英语词汇学大作业

On the Basic Word Formation

1. Introduction

Language is one of the basic elements of vocabulary, in the initial stages of language development, people are using small and simple vocabulary, the words say simple daily things and concepts, Original in the English new words are mostly monosyllabic, such as: the sun, the man, the head, foot, fish, see, run and so on, their number is limited. With society development and progress, the expansion of the language and the fusion make language becomes complex, the original limited original words is not enough, people created new some new word to say some things and concepts.

The expansion of vocabulary in modern English depends chiefly on word formation. The most productive are derivation, compounding and conversion. Talking about word formation patterns means dealing with rules.

2. Three basic word formation

2.1 Derivation

Derivation is the process of forming new words from existing ones by adding affixes to them. It also means affixation is defined as the formation of words by adding word-forming or derivational affixes to bases. The words that are created in this way are called derivatives. According to the position affixes occupy in words, there are two subcategories: pre-fixation and suffixation.

Prefixation is the formation of new words by adding prefixes to bases, which do not generally change the word-class of the base. That is to say, prefixes do not change the part of speech of a word.

Suffixation is the formation of new words by adding suffixes to bases. Their primary function is to change the grammatical function of the base, such as the change of the word class with a slight modification of meaning, though there are a few exceptions. For example, the word “countless”, “-less” change the part of form and show the negative meaning of the stem.

Prefixes and suffixes are different in grammatical functions, semantic. Most suffix

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英语词汇学大作业

will change the part of speech of root, but most prefix do not affect the root and other grammatical category. In a word, derivation can help students enlarge their English vocabulary, let they remember words efficiently.

2.2 Compounding

Compounding is the formation of new words by joining two or more bases. Words formed in this way are called compounds. In the process of English development, compounding plays an important role in formation. Compounding is one of the oldest methods of word-formation in English, and the compounding of compound is one of the features of Old English vocabulary.

Compounding composition can have all kinds of word forms, and the combination is not restricted by grammar in the arrangement of word order in English. Compounding word formation of most materials provided by the basic vocabulary.

2.3 Conversion

Conversion is the formation of mew words by converting words of one part of speech to those of another part of speech. Conversion may lead students often confused with words which have two or more part of form in English learning. Words created in this way are new only in a grammatical sense. Words produced by conversion are primarily nouns, adjectives and verbs. It deserves nothing that conversion is not only a change of grammatical function of the item involved but with it the different range of meaning is originally carried.

The biggest characteristic of conversion is the same word may have lots of meaning, the meaning can be similar, it also can be completely irrelevant.

3. The benefits of learning word formation

Presently, a great number of people have taken notice of learning English. The number of the people who begin to learn English has increased at a high speed. How can we improve our English effectively is undoubtedly the focus of our attention. Generally speaking, vocabulary and grammatical rules are keys to learning English

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英语词汇学大作业

well. Among the two aspects, vocabulary apparently plays a more important role in learning English. If a language learner doesn’t have enough vocabulary to express his or her opinions and understand other people, and he or she cannot communicate with others well. So vocabulary is the foundation of language. Why it is so important?

There are three main reasons account for this question. It can help students to enlarge their English vocabulary. Students spend a lot of time on remembering new words, but the results are not so efficient. However, if we have knowledge of English word formation, the results will be not so bad. Besides, word formation can help students have a better comprehension of a new article. When students are reading a new article, they often encounter with some new words that they have never seen before. In this way, they can use word formation to solve it. What’s more, many new words can be derived based on the rules of word formation. Recent years, the use of computers as a medium of communication has given birth to a new language phenomenon-cyber language. A large amount of cyber language has sprung up. Most of the new words that have been recognized are derived based on certain rules of word formation.

Students can learn English in easy, quick and efficient way by learning word

formation. Learning English means to memory, understanding and mastery lots of vocabulary.

4. Conclusion

It is important for students to learn word formation. Nowadays, English is so popular in every field, and people have high requirement for English. However, it is not enough only learn English in careless way for students. If students can working hard, patient and learn word formation, there will be a great help for their study, and it will make students’ vocabulary increase. Therefore, it is essential, as well as important, for people to learn word formation, especially for the students of English major.

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英语词汇学大作业

References

Ingo Plag. Word-Formation in English [M].Cambridge University Press, 2003. 何光明. 英语构词法与快速记忆[M]. 河南教育学院学报,2001 (2). 曩洪汉. 英语构词法字典李长庚 [M].东华大学出版社 ,2008.

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