Lexis and Grammar for Translation

1
Lexis and Grammarfor Translation
Lingua e Traduzione Inglese I

• Dott. M. Gatto
• Lingue e Culture per il Turismo

2
From words to word classes

• The stock of English words is immense
• According to David Crystal there might be over 1
  million words in English (scientific terminology
  excluded).
• In any language words can be classified on the
  basis of their features into
• word classes (or parts of speech).

3
There is substantial agreement about word
classes in English

• NOUNS
• VERBS
• ADJECTIVES
• ADVERBS

• DETERMINERS
• PRONOUNS
• PREPOSITIONS
• CONJUNCTIONS
• (INTERJECTIONS)

4
There is substantial agreement about word
classes in English

• LEXICAL WORDS

• FUNCTION WORDS

• NOUNS
• VERBS
• ADJECTIVES
• ADVERBS

• DETERMINERS
• PRONOUNS
• PREPOSITIONS
• CONJUNCTIONS
• (INTERJECTIONS)

5
LEXICAL WORDS (lexical meaning)

• Lexical words are the main carriers of meaning
  in a text. In speech they are generally stressed.
  
• They are characteristically the words that
  remain in information-dense telegrams (e.g.
  telegrams, lecture notes, head lines)
• Arriving tomorrow
• Family killed in fire
• Lexical words form an OPEN class

6
FUNCTION WORDS (grammatical meaning )

• While lexical words are the main building blocks
  of texts, function words provide the mortar which
  bind the text together.
• Function words indicate the relationship between
  lexical words or larger units.
• Function words form a CLOSED class

7
Lexical words have

• Morphological features (it has a structure)
• Semantic features (it has a meaning)
• Syntactic features (it plays a role in the
  sentence)

8
NOUNS

• Morphological features
• inflectional
• - Number (singular/plural) -s
• - Case s
• - Gender?
• derivational
• - -ITY -NESS ER -EE -ATION -MENT

9

• Semantic features
• Nouns refer to concrete/abstract things as well
  as to people or animals
• Syntactic features
• A noun typically fills the subject slot or the
  object slot in a sentence
• TOM arrived
• I saw TOM
• A noun can complement a verb in a sentence Tom
  has become an ACTOR

10
NOUNS

• ABSTRACT

• CONCRETE

11
NOUNS

• COUNTABLE
• car/cars, dog/dogs, boy/boys

• UNCOUNTABLE
• milk, information,hair

BUT some nouns can be used in both forms HAIR
(Countable) PELO/I HAIR (Uncountable)
CAPELLI
12
VERBS

• LEXICAL VERBS

• AUXILIARY VERBS

13
LEXICAL VERBS

• Morphological features
• Verbs are marked for
• Tense (present/past) -s -ed
• Aspect (ongoingness) -ing
• Voice (active/passive) be -ed

14
LEXICAL VERBS

• Semantic features
• Verbs denote
• Action
• Process
• State
• Syntactic features
• They serve as the centre of the clause
  (predicate)

15
AUXILIARY VERBS

• Primary auxiliaries/Operators BE HAVE DO
• Modal auxiliaries CAN COULD MAY MIGHT MUST SHALL
  SHOULD WILL WOULD
• Marginal auxiliaries dare, need, ought to, used
  to

16
ADJECTIVES

• Morphological features
• Inflectional
• Adjectives are marked for comparison
• er, the -est
• Derivational
• -FUL -LESS -Y -AL -ABLE

17
ADJECTIVES

• Syntactic features
• Adjectives generally occurr before a noun they
  can also occurr after the noun or after the main
  verb
• The RED box/ The box is RED

18

• Semantic features
• Adjectives express qualities (they modify a
  noun), in terms of
• -shape
• -taste
• -size
• -colour
• -judgement

19
ADVERBS

• Morhological features
• Inflection
• Adverbs have no inflections. Only a few adverbs
• Are marked for comparison (like adjectives)
• soon
• soon-er
• soon-est
• Derivation
• -LY

20

• Syntactic features
• Adverbs are often used as adjuncts in clauses
• She speaks English very well
• In the mornung I get up quite early
• Adverbs can modify adjectives
• The party was terribly boring

21

• Semantic features
• Adverbs specify circumstances
• How?
• When?
• Where?
• Adverbs specify the speakers attitude
• Certainly apparently..
• Adverbs specify the connection between clauses
• However, nevertheless

22
DETERMINERS

• FUNCTION Identify a noun
• Identifiers (a/an the)
• Possessives (my, your)
• Demonstratives (This, that)
• Quantifiers
• - numerals (one, two)
• - indefinite (some, few

23
PRONOUNS

• FUNCTION replace nouns to refer to a person,
  thing, situation, animal
• Personal
• Indefinite
• Reflexive
• Reciprocal
• Possessive
• Demonstrative
• Interrogative
• Relative

24
PREPOSITIONS

• FUNCTION prepositions express a relationship of
  meaning between one word (noun, verb, adjective)
  and another word in the sentence in terms of
• Space in, at, on ,
• The book is ON the table
• Time before, after,
• See you AFTER the lecture
• Topic about,
• This is a book ABOUT tourism development

25
CONJUNCTIONS

• FUNCTION conjunction links words, phrases and
  clauses
• Coordinators (and, or, but) they link units
  which have equal grammar status
• Tom bought the tickets AND Mary parked the car
• Subordinators gt link units which have different
  grammar status
• Tom bought the tickets WHILE Mary parked the car

26
Subordinating conjunctions(a sample)

• They express several meanings
• -Time when
• -Place where
• -Condition if
• -Concession though
• -Purpose in order to
• -Reason because

27
Do-It-Yourself

• BEFORE is
• A PREPOSITION?
• A CONJUNCTION?
• AN ADVERB?

28
BEFORE is

• She had never asked him that before
• He was there before her
• Dont go away before I arrive!

• ADVERB
• PREPOSITION
• CONJUNCTION

29

• PAST
• SPORT
• MAGIC

30
And now

• PAST SIGNS MAGIC LIES
• OR
• Why word class matters!!!

31
PAST SIGNS

• The Greeks took the easiest route to Troy,
  crossing the Aegean in a thousand ships. I drove
  a hire car from Istanbul airport to Canakkale
  going along roads that followed the coast.
• I had booked to stay in the Truva Hotel. The
  only problem is that Truva is the Turkish word
  for Troy and everything in Canakkale is named
  after the town's sole attraction and sports a
  picture of a horse on it. Driving my clattering
  machine past signs for Truva Tours, Truva Car
  Hire and Truva Souvenirs, I ended up in a rather
  empty-looking building on the seafront where the
  only language we seemed to have in common was my
  three words of Turkish. I was given a long thin
  room with a view of where the sea would be were
  it not so dark and windswept. It had been a long
  cold day but tomorrow, as Agamemnon might have
  said, I would be in Troy.

32
(No Transcript)
33
(No Transcript)
34
(No Transcript)
35
(No Transcript)
36

• I pronoun gt IO
• DROVE verb gt GUIDAI
• PAST preposition gt OLTRE
• SIGNS noun (common) gt SEGNALI
• TRUVA TOURS noun (proper) gt TRUVA TOURS
• Io oltrepassai in auto insegne con la scritta
  Truva Tours

37
MAGIC LIES

• When I was 13 I fell in love with Valparaiso. I
  drove in from the neighbouring town, and there it
  was - a semi-circle of lights ringing the bay's
  natural amphitheatre. The hills that run down to
  the harbour were carpeted in white lights,
  creating a magical effect. But beneath the magic
  lies a tough harbour town, eclipsed now by its
  flashier neighbour, Viña del Mar, and struggling
  still to recover from the twin blows of a massive
  earthquake in the Seventies and the loss of
  shipping revenue (much of it diverted down the
  Panama canal).

38
BUT CONJUNCTIONBENEATH PREPOSITIONTHE
DETERMINERMAGIC NOUN (NO ADJECTIVE!)LIES
VERB (NO NOUN1)

• B

39
HOMEWORK

• Word Classes
• LAVIOSA, Linking Wor(l)ds Chapters 5-6
• JACKSON, Grammar and Vocabulary pp.4-8 (A2)
  3537 (B2) 62-73 (C2)
• A Practical English Grammar UNIT 2 (NOUNS)
  Exercises
• English Grammar in Use UNIT 69