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1English Vocabulary A learner's nightmare A COMPLICATED MIXTURE Compared to many languages, English seems to have a rich and very large vocabulary. The reasons for this are well known. English vocabulary is a complicated mixture of Germanic words and Romance words. The Germanic words are words which English shares with languages like German, Danish, and Norwegian. The Romance words are words which English shares with languages like French, Spanish and Italian. These Romance words are further split up into two main groups. Some of these words became part of English at the time of the Norman Conquest, around 1100AD. The others were imported into English by scholars in the 18th Century, directly from Latin, or occasionally from Greek. The result of all this borrowing and adoption of words is that English vocabulary presents a lot of very awkward problems for foreign learners. DIFFERENT FORMS One problem is that English has lots of different words for the same basic idea. For example, in English we have the word HOUSE - a good, plain Germanic word - and a number of related forms are built on this basic word: HOUSING, HOUSEHOLD, HOUSEWIFE, HOUSEBREAKING, HOUSEKEEPER, and so on. However, a large number of other words, whose meaning includes the idea of HOUSE or HOME are actually based on another root instead: words such as DOMESTIC, DOMICILE and DOMESTICITY, for example. These words are all based on the Latin word for a home: DOMUS. There is also another set of words based on the Latin word RESIDERE. These include RESIDE, RESIDENT, RESIDENCE and RESIDENTIAL. Similarly, we have in English, HORSE, with its associated words CAVALRY (from the Latin word for horse CABALLUS), CHIVALRY (from the French word for horse, CHEVAL) and EQUINE (from another Latin word for horse, EQUUS). It would be easy to give lots of examples of this sort, but the general point is that English will often use two or three different forms where many other languages will only use a single basic form. This obviously makes it difficult for learners of English to acquire a good grasp of English vocabulary. You may know the basic words, but not be familiar with the more unusual terms for the same thing. So, for instance, you might understand COW and BRAIN, but if you came across a reference to BOVINE SPONGEIFORM ENCEPHALITIS, you may not realise it had anything to do with cows or brains. In fact, it's a kind of illness that canter an inflammation in the brains of cows. 2 MIXED MESSAGES A second problem for learners is that English Romance words and Germanic words tend to be used in different ways. On the whole, the words of Germanic origin tend to be more frequent than words of Romance origin, and they also tend to appear in less formal contexts than the Romance words do. So, for example, a DOOR is more ordinary than a PORTAL, a WOOD is more ordinary than an ARBORETUM, and a JOB is more informal than an OCCUPATION. English speakers are very sensitive to usages of this kind, and it is very easy to give the wrong impression by using a word in an inappropriate context. For example, I might write to someone, ASKING them to come and EAT at my HOUSE. But if instead I REQUESTED them to DINE at my RESIDENCE, this would imply an altogether grander affair, and a completely different set of social conventions. If you mix up the two sets of words, and REQUEST someone to come and EAT at your HOUSE, you end up with a complicated set of social messages, which is difficult for native speakers to disentangle: it isn't clear if this is a formal invitation or an informal one. THE PROFESSIONAL PASSPORT This distinction between words of Germanic origin and words of Romance origin seems to play an important social role in English. Corson (1985) has suggested that formal schooling in English is not just about building up a learner's vocabulary. Specifically, he argues that schooling teaches the learner a vocabulary that is largely based on Latin, and that people who do not have access to this vocabulary are effectively barred from certain types of profession, where complex vocabulary of this sort is taken for granted. It would be very difficult, for example, to become a lawyer if you did not have a good grasp of the Latin and Greek elements in the English language. ITEMS AND SYSTEMS Hakan Ringbom ( 19 8 3 ) has suggested that learning vocabulary involves two very different types of learning. You have to learn the items that make up the vocabulary。
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