English lexis- semantics fields
Traveling abroad In literature we have many examples of describing travelling abroad. The semantic field is not totally clear, because these texts are describing countries, cities, buildings and forms of travel. The semantic field of travelling abroad is overlapping with semantics fields of architecture, art, geography, culture, history, sports, etc. I analysed two type of text. The first one is describing a cultural tour in Vienna and second one is about an adventure in Africa.
My first night I did what’s expected in this Old World city noted for symphonies, opera, and Freud, where ….
Old World –semantic field of history, special connotation, became compound, synonym Eastern hemisphere, with special reference to Europe, Africa and Asia, the part of world known to European before contact with the Americas, as opposed, antonym to the New World.
I’m overwhelmed by the bold Gothic and decoration-giddy rococo architecture, interspersed with art-deco touches, the beauty not betraying damages inflicted during World War II. The copper-domed Hofburg palace, edged in gold lattice and hosting a party of winged beasts on its roof, is home to the Imperial Apartments, the former in-town digs of Empress Elisabeth and Emperor Franz Joseph; the ubiquitous chandeliers and red velvet furnishing become almost monotonous features as one troops through room after room of them. Here we have clear example of overlapping of semantics field. Text is describing travel to Vienna but is full of words from the semantic field of art. All these words Gothic, rococo and art-deco are co-hyponyms which are belonging to hyponymy of art styles. The words rococo and art-deco are loanwords from French, typical for many words from semantic field of art. World War II – semantic field of history, also we can say that it is collocation, and World War became compound. The words copper-domed, lattice, roof, chandelier and furnishing belong to the semantic field of architecture and design. The words lattice and chandelier are loanwords from French. Empress Elizabeth and Emperor Franz Joseph belong to the semantic field of history.
He said for some reason that the schnellboot is not available .Robyn groaned. “I knew it…we’re going over on one of those coconut log things…. We were on the island of Bathala in the Ari atoll of the Maldives, near the equator, southwest of India. This was the start of a voyage that gave us fresh appreciation for the oceanic wanderings of migratory peoples in dugout canoes and balsa rafts. They gently organized us so that we sat two people on each side of the dhoni, properly stowed our dive bags forward….
In this text we have examples of words which belong to the semantics fields of geography and types of boots. The shnelboot and the dhoni sound rare, because these words are names of boots directly borrowing from language of islands and perhaps don’t exist in official English language; at least I didn’t find them in dictionary. But we can recognize shnellboot as compound of words schnell – fast, borrow from German and boot, so schnellboot mean fast boot. Also coconut log have special meaning because it refers to boot and not to the log. So all this words (schnelboot, coconut log, dugout canoe, balsa raft and dhoni) belong to the hyponymy of types of boots. The words island, atoll, equator, southwest belong to the semantic field of geography as well as the words Bathala, Ari and India, but these ones belong to the subgroup of names of geographic places. Also we have here the semantic field of sport which is represented with word dive.
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