FREE-WORD
COMBINATIONS
 Definition of a word-group and its
basic features
 Structure of word-groups
 Meaning of word-groups
 Motivation in word-groups
Word-Group
 the largest two-facet
language unit
 consists of more than one
word
 studied in the syntagmatic
level of analysis
Word-Group
 the degree of structural and
semantic cohesion may vary
e.g. at least, by means of, take place –
semantically and structurally inseparable
e.g. a week ago, kind to people – have
greater semantic and structural
independence
Free-Word Combination
 word-groups that have a
greater semantic and
structural independence
 freely composed by the
speaker in his speech
according to his purpose
Features of Word-groups
Lexical Valency
Grammatical Valency
Lexical Valency
(Collocability)
 The ability of a word to appear in
various combinations with other
words, or lexical contexts
e.g. question – vital/pressing/urgent/etc.,
question at issue, to raise a question, a
question on the agenda
Lexical Valency
(Collocability)
 words habitually collocated in
speech make a cliché
e.g. to put forward a question
Lexical Valency
(Collocability)
 lexical valency of correlated words in
different languages is different
e.g. flower
garden flowers
hot-house flowers
pot flowers
цветок
садовые цветы
оранжерейные
цветы
комнатные цветы
Lexical Valency
(Collocability)
 different meanings of one and the
same word may be revealed through
different type of lexical valency
e.g. heavy table, book
heavy snow, rain
heavy drinker, eater
heavy sorrow, sleep
heavy industry
Grammatical Valency
 The ability of a word to
appear in specific
grammatical structures, or
grammatical contexts
Grammatical Valency
 the minimal grammatical context
in which the words are used
when brought together to form a
word-group is called the pattern
of the word-group
Grammatical Valency
 restricted by the part of speech
e.g. an adjective + noun, infinitive,
prepositional group
a kind man, kind to people, heavy to lift
 limited by the inner structure of the
language
e.g. to propose a plan – to suggest a plan
to propose to do smth -
Grammatical Valency
 grammatical valency of
correlated words in different
languages is different
e.g. enter the room - войти в комнату
Classifications of wordgroups
 according to the distribution
 according to the head-word
 according to the syntactic
pattern
Word-groups according to
distribution
 endocentric –
central member
functionally
equivalent to the
whole word-group
e.g. red flower ( I saw
 exocentric – the
distribution of the
whole word-group
is different from
either of its
components
a red flower – I saw a e.g. side by side,
flower)
grow smaller, John
runs
Word-groups according to
the head word
 nominal groups
e.g. red flower
 adjectival groups
e.g. kind to people
 verbal groups
e.g. to speak well
Word-groups according to
the syntactic pattern
 predicative –
 nonhave a syntactic
predicative –
structure similar
to that of a
sentence
e.g. John went, he
works
do not have a
structure similar
to a sentence
e.g. red flower, running
John
Non-predicative and
endocentric word-groups
 coordinative –
elements of a
word-group are
coordinated with
each other
e.g. day and night, do
or die
 subordinative –
one member of a
word-group is
subordinated to
the central
element
e.g. red flower, a man
of wisdom
Meaning of Word-Groups
 lexical meaning
 structural meaning
Lexical meaning
 the combined lexical meaning of the
component words
 BUT the meaning of the word-group
predominates over the lexical
meanings of its components
e.g. atomic weight, atomic warfare
Lexical meaning
 polysemantic words are used only in one
of their meanings
e.g. man and wife, blind man
 stylistic reference of a word-group may
be different from that of its components
e.g. old, boy, bags, fun – old boy
(дружище), bags of fun
Structural meaning
 meaning conveyed by the
arrangement of components of a
word-group
e.g. school grammar – grammar
school
Structural meaning
 structural and lexical meanings
are interdependent and
inseparable
e.g. school children – to school
children
all the sun long – all the night
long, all the week long
Motivation in Word-groups
 lexically
motivated - the
combined lexical
meaning of a
group is deducible
from the meanings
of its components
 lexically nonmotivated – the
meaning of the
whole is not seen
through the
meanings of the
elements
Motivation in Word-groups
 lexically
motivated
 lexically nonmotivated
e.g. red flower
e.g. red tape –
‘official
bureaucratic
methods’
Motivation in Word-groups
 e.g. apple sauce – ‘a sauce
made of apples’
apple sauce – ‘nonsense’
Motivation in Word-groups
 Non-motivated wordgroups are called
phraseological units or
idioms