Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- An introduction to the textbook
- Chapter One Word origins
- Chapter Two The background of English
- Chapter Three Composition of the Early Modern and Modern English vocabulary
- Chapter Four Smaller than words: morphemes and types of morphemes
- Chapter Five Allomorphy, phonetics, and affixation
- Chapter Six Replacement rules
- Chapter Seven Deletion rules and other kinds of allomorphy
- Chapter Eight Fossilized allomorphy: false cognates and other etymological pitfalls
- Chapter Nine Semantic change and semantic guesswork
- Chapter 10 The pronunciation of classical words in English
- Appendix I An introduction to dictionaries
- Appendix II Morpheme list
- Index
An introduction to the textbook
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 September 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- An introduction to the textbook
- Chapter One Word origins
- Chapter Two The background of English
- Chapter Three Composition of the Early Modern and Modern English vocabulary
- Chapter Four Smaller than words: morphemes and types of morphemes
- Chapter Five Allomorphy, phonetics, and affixation
- Chapter Six Replacement rules
- Chapter Seven Deletion rules and other kinds of allomorphy
- Chapter Eight Fossilized allomorphy: false cognates and other etymological pitfalls
- Chapter Nine Semantic change and semantic guesswork
- Chapter 10 The pronunciation of classical words in English
- Appendix I An introduction to dictionaries
- Appendix II Morpheme list
- Index
Summary
This book is about the origins of English words, about their etymology. It is important to realize, however, that it is not about all possible origins, it is not about all the ways in which English has introduced new words into the language, but rather it is primarily about a particular subset, that portion of the vocabulary which is borrowed from the classical languages (Latin and Greek) either directly, or indirectly through French.
This (very large) portion of our vocabulary is a familiar subject. Greek and Latin roots in the English language have been studied and described for many centuries. Departments of Classical Languages traditionally offer courses under titles like “Classical Roots in English,” and in the past a decent education necessarily included a full program in the classics. At the beginning of the twenty-first century, however, it is extremely rare for students entering college to have a clear idea what Latin is, or whether English is derived from it or not, and even what it means for a language to be “derived,” in any sense, from another. The word cognate is not only generally unknown to undergraduate students, it often remains conceptually obscure, because it is simply not one of the topics we grow up with these days.
We take the view that people cannot call themselves “educated” who do not have a minimal acquaintance with the history and structure of the words in their own language.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- English WordsHistory and Structure, pp. 1 - 2Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2001