LEXICOGRAPHIC ASPECTS OF FUNCTIONING OF THE CONCEPT «MEDICINE» IN MODERN ENGLISH

Abstract

Various aspects of the concept medicine functioning in modern English are considered in the terms of lexicographic discourse. The present research is motivated by current renovations within modern medical paradigm and by appearance of new medical terms registered in dictionaries, reference books, textbooks for doctors and medical professionals. The analysis of lexicographic discourse is aimed at identifying synonymous and hypero-hyponymic links in the thematic groups of English nouns in the terms of linguocultural and medical terminological markers. The results of the present research provide a reliable interpretation of medical nomenclature in terms of lexicography. All medical terminological markers of the English lexicographic space have been grouped according to their semantic parameters into monosemantic and multivalent language units. In the process of their analysis the ways of adapting foreign monosemantic medical terms to the English discursive vector are systematized. Moreover etymological aspects of the verbal units under consideration are also described. Multivalued units are characterized as the linguistic units with a significant semantic potential on the one hand and they also may be considered as a reliable basis for further semantic development of modern English vocabulary on the other hand. It has also been discovered that the specific feature of medical terminological field on the lexicographic level is its ability to be constantly replenished by synonymous groups created by means of specialization, generalization, metaphor, metonymy, and enantiosemy.