DESCRIBING LANGUAGE AND LANGUAGE SKILLS
Affix noun and verb, affixation noun
A letter or letters added to the beginning or end of a word to make a new word, which can be a different part of speech from the original word, e.g. interview, interviewer; ‘er’ is an affix added to interview to make the new word interviewer. Affixation is the process of adding letters at the beginning (prefix) or end of a word (suffix) to make a new word. See prefix, suffix.
Root word (or BASE WORD) noun
The main word or part of a word from which other words can be made by adding a prefix or suffix; e.g. help is the root or base word of helpful, unhelpful and helpless.
Prefix noun
A prefix is a letter or group of letters added to the beginning of a word to make a new word, e.g. clear – unclear. See affix and suffix.
Suffix noun
A suffix is a letter or group of letters added at the end of a word to make a new word, e.g. good – goodness. See affix and prefix
Collocation noun, collocate verb
Words which are regularly used together. The relation between the words may be grammatical, for example when certain verbs/adjectives collocate with particular prepositions, e.g. depend on, good at, or when a verb like make or do collocates with a noun, e.g. do the shopping, make a plan. Collocations may also be lexical when two content words are regularly used together, e.g. We went the wrong way NOT We went the incorrect way.
Compound noun
Nouns, verbs, adjectives or prepositions that are made up of two or more words and have one unit of meaning, e.g. assistant office manager, long-legged.
Idiom noun, idiomatic adjective
An unchangeable phrase or expression, in which the meaning of the phrase is different from the meaning of each individual word; e.g. She felt under the weather means that she felt ill.
Phrasal verb (or MULTIWORD VERB)
It is made up of a verb and one or more particles (adverbs and/or prepositions). The meaning of a multiword verb is not the same as the meaning of the individual verbs and participles that make it. One multiword verb may have more than one meaning, e.g. Get your coat on and then we can leave (wear); How are you getting on with that job? (progressing).
False friend (or COGNATES) noun
A word in the target language which looks or sounds similar to a word in the learners’ first language but does not have the same meaning in both languages. For example, in French, ‘librairie’ is a place where people can buy books. In English, a library is a place you may go to borrow books rather than somewhere where you buy books (a bookshop).
Homonym noun
A word with the same spelling or pronunciation as another word, but which has a different meaning. There are two types of homonym: homographs, which are words with the same spelling but which have different meanings, e.g. bit (past form of ‘bite’) and a bit (a little), and homophones, which have the same pronunciation but different spelling and different meanings, e.g. write and right. See homophone, homograph.
Homophone noun
A word which sounds the same as another word, but has a different meaning and may have a different spelling, e.g. I knew he had won; I bought a new book. See homograph, homonym.
Homograph noun
A word which is spelled the same as another word but has a different meaning, e.g. It’s close to the river (adverb not far) and Please close the window (verb shut). See homophone, homonym.
Register noun
The formality or informality of language used in a particular situation. Formal register or formal language is language which is used in serious or important situations, e.g. in a job application. Informal register or informal language is language used in relaxed or friendly situations, e.g. with family or friends. Register may also refer to language which is specific to a particular group, e.g.
technical register, scientific register. See formal, informal.
Word family noun
A group of words that come from the same root or base word, e.g. economy, economist, economic. See root word, base word.
Lexical set noun
A group of words and/or phrases which are about the same topic or subject; e.g. a lexical set on the topic of weather could be: storm, rain, wind, cloud.
Synonym noun
A word which has the same, or nearly the same, meaning as another word; e.g. nice is a synonym of pleasant.
Antonym noun
The opposite of another word, e.g. hot is an antonym of cold. See synonym.