Структура лексико-семантичного поля «ювелірні прикраси» в англійській мові

Abstract

The article is dedicated to the investigation of the structure of the lexical semantic field “jewellery” in the English language. The semantic relations between jewellery nominations and core-peripheral structure of the given field are analyzed in the article. The key to analysis of any lexical semantic field is in investigation of its constituents and peculiarities of relations between its core and periphery. We were able to identify two types of relations in lexical semantic field under consideration – hypo-hyperonymic and synonymic. The core of the English language lexical semantic field “jewellery” comprises only such hyperonyms that have a certain number of hyponyms and cover all of the body parts that can be decorated with jewellery: ring (fingers), crown (head), necklace (neck), earring (ear), bracelet (arm). The medial part of the lexical semantic field under consideration includes 59 nominations. These are such nominations that are used less than in 10% cases of tokens of jewellery in our sample and nominations reflected in explanatory dictionaries. It is necessary to note that both core and medial constituents of lexical semantic field “jewellery” are found in non-specialized explanatory dictionaries, yet medial elements are either less frequent in speech or completely absent from our sample. Medial part of the lexical semantic field under consideration includes as well nominations of quite popular kinds of jewellery and names of their wide spread variations. The periphery of lexical semantic field “jewellery” comprises 135 field constituents found exclusively in specialized encyclopedic sources. These include the bigger part of hyponyms and nominations of a large group of jewellery items used to decorate genitalia. As we can see peripheral elements of this lexical semantic field surpass core and medial elements and are less frequently used, while core constituents of the field reveal to the full integral meaning of the units under consideration, i.e. an item of jewellery is an object that decorates a certain part of the human body, highlights the social status of is owner and has a certain symbolic value.