Synonyms ETAI2012
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Transcript of Synonyms ETAI2012
Does the word “synonym” have a
synonym?Leo Selivan
British Council
Annual ETAI Conference3-4 July 2012
Outline
• A bit of history
• Latinate and Germanic words
• Lexical density
• Synonyms or near synonyms?
• Multi-part verbs
• Teaching implications & practical suggestions
Latinate words
Latinate affixes-able, -ible-ance-fy, -ify-ment-sion, -tion-ty, -ity
Latinate roots-dict--pel-pend--scrib/script--tract--vert-
Latinate = derived from Latin or Old French
TASK 1
Look at a page from the dictionary.
• Count the number of words on the page.
• How many Latinate words can you find?
Hybrid language
English – Germanic group
but 60% Latinate vocabulary
The Norman Conquesthttp://www.youtube.com/v/1B8TwBrCIEY
French influencedidn’t replace Germanic words
but went to coexist side by side
feeling / sensationbrotherly / fraternalring / (tele)phonefast / rapidjob / occupationhelp / assistbegin / commenceend / finishflood / inundate
TASK 2
Make a list of 10 (near-) synonyms in English
• Most are based on Germanic/French distinction
Synonyms within sets
Latinate / Latinate
• mansion / villa• ascend / mount
Germanic / Germanic
• go / walk• start / begin• home / house
Germanic / Latinate
Synonyms freedom - liberty
sight - vision
learn – study
ask – enquire
buy – purchase
child, kid – infant
begin; start – initiate; commence
kill – assassinate
hide – conceal
before – prior
meet – encounter
Largest vocabulary?
How many words are there in English?
The Global Language Monitor in 2009:
English passed 1 million word mark
Oxford Dictionaries:
250,000 at the very least
Nuances vs economy
invite
book
reserve
order
להזמין
It’s my treat / It’s on me
Lexical abundanceCherokee: 20 verbs for wash (hands, face)
Hebrew: different verbs to describe the harvest of different types of produce
English: One word for know(cf. German: wissen / erkennen
French: savoir / connaitre)
Lexical voids
Lexical density
Synonymy and near-synonymy
TASK 3What’s the difference?
freedom - libertysight - visionlearn – studyask – enquirebuy – purchasechild, kid – infantbegin – commence
kill – assassinatehide – concealbefore – priormeet – encountertable - deskdamp - moisttall - highlift - elevatorprecipitation - rain
What makes synonyms different
• register
• collocation
• semantic prosody
• colligation
Phrasal verbs vs. Latinate
“equivalents”bring about
find out
look into
put out
put up (with)
set up
take in
Phrasal verbs vs. Latinate
“equivalents”bring about cause
find out discover
look into investigate
put out extinguish
put up (with) tolerate, endure
set up found, establish
take in deceive
Collocationlook into / investigate
matter
possibility
problem
possibility
murder
effects
Collocationlook into / investigate
matter
look into possibility
problem
possibility
investigate murder
effects
Collocationset up / establish
relationship
relation(s)
links
business
committee
company
Collocationset up / establish
relationships
establish relation(s)
links
business
set up committee
company
Register, style & domain
Register – formal / informal
Style – written / spoken
Domain – academic / journalistic / jargon
Register, style & domain
investigate 15 21 85 97 58
look into 18 38 12 4 9
Spoken
Fiction
NewsAca
demic
Misc.
Occurrences per million words
Semantic prosody
Cause: controversy, damage, problems, suffering, troubleBring about: change, improvement
Withstand: temperature, storm, hurricane - weatherResist: temptation, urge, pressure, attempt, arrest
ColligationGrammatical context of a word or
grammatical function it prefers
ColligationGrammatical context of a word or
grammatical function it prefers
Don’t be taken in by their promises
It was founded in (year) by (person)
Pedagogical ideas &
suggestions
Collocation forksAlways provide collocations for new words
matter
look into possibility
problem
possibility
investigate murder
effects
Teach “chunks”
reserve a table
book a ticket
invite a friend (round) for dinner
order pizza
Leave used language alone
Look up twice
Bilingual dictionary - meaning
Monolingual dictionary - increase their depth of meaning
Learner dictionaries: Macmillan CambridgeLongman
(all three available online)
photo by eltpics on Flickr
Present a word(or a pair)
All you know about a word- meaning and connotations- grammar- contexts, collocations- frequency- etymology
From Ur, P. (2012). Vocabulary Activities
Teach affixes & roots
Latinate affixes-able, -ible-ance-fy, -ify-ment-sion, -tion-ty, -ity
Latinate roots-dict--pel-pend--scrib/script--tract--vert-
Use corpus and concordances
British National Corpus (BNC)
Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA)
http://corpus.byu.edu/
Just the word - a tool for looking up collocations
www.just-the-word.com
Conclusion“As near synonyms usually differ in their collocational behaviour and semantic prosodies, the traditional practice of explaining meanings to learners by offering synonyms should be used with caution”
Xiao & Mcenery (2006)
ReferencesBarber, C. (1993). The English Language. Cambridge: CUPDavies, M. (2004-). BYU-BNC: The British National Corpus. Available at http://
corpus.byu.edu/bncGardner, D. & Davies, M. (2007). Pointing out frequent phrasal verbs: A corpus-based
analysis. In TESOL Quarterly 41(2), pp 339-359Hoey, M. (2000). A World Beyond Collocation: New Perspectives on Vocabulary
Teaching. In Lewis. M (ed.), Teaching Collocation: Further Developments in the Lexical Approach. (pp. 224-243). Hove: Thomson-Heinle
McCrum, R., Cran, W. & MacNeil, R. (2002). The Story of English. London: Penguin.Schuessler, J. (2009, June 13). Keeping It Real on Dictionary Row. The New York Times.
Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/14/weekinreview/14shuessler.html?_r=2
Ur, P. (2012). Vocabulary activities. Cambridge: Cambridge University PressWelcome to the World of Global English. (2010, February 24). The Global Language
Monitor. Retrieved from http://www.languagemonitor.com/Xiao, R. & McEnery, T. (2006). Collocation, Semantic Prosody, and Near Synonymy: A
Cross-Linguistic Perspective. Applied Linguistics, 27(1), 103-129