A Study Of Potential English Words Based On Minimal Pairs

Modern linguists (Bloomfield1935; Lyons1979; Scalise1986) hold a commonview that in English there exist a large number of potential words, or possible words. Inthis thesis we use the term "potential words". Mathematically, actual words form asubset of potential words. Being short of communicative values, potential words receivelittle attention in linguistics. So few people have discussed them in a profound manner.Even if appears the issue in some works, what we can see is no more than a briefmention with a few examples. In fact, the study of potential words has not come intobeing. Any scholar who does pioneering work in this field would fill vacancy and makesome contribution for general linguistics and applied linguistics. The significance of thispaper is evident.The current discussion about potential words is made chiefly from the followingthree perspectives: phonology, morphology and semantics. Firstly, according tophonological rules, potential words are referred to those that do not enter the dictionarybut they are permissible sound sequences in English, such as blick, cruck. Secondly,potential words are defined as words whose morphological structures are in accordancewith the rules and regularities of a given language, but nonexistent words, such asmountainal, denationalizationally. Thirdly, potential words are viewed as nonexistentcompound words whose meanings are in accordance with the semantic rules andregularities, such as wife computer, which means 'the computer the wife uses' or 'thecomputer owned by someone's wife'.However, potential words not only oppose to actual words, but also to impossibleones, for example*kbli,*like-dis,*enwhite,*wife computer. No matter from whichperspective, study of potential words is only at the stage of being mentioned in passing.There is no systematic discipline for reference yet. Few linguists are interested in thetopic. One of the purposes of this paper is to draw attention to the study of potentialwords.This thesis focuses upon the phonological attributes of potential words. Due to theinfinite number of potential words, it is impossible as well as meaningless to make a complete list. As some scholars point out, method is the soul of linguistics. Only if wefind a correct method can we make a significant study of potential words. As a matter offact,"minimal pair" in morphology is a very simple yet useful technique, which is goodenough for our purposes. With the help of that technique, we can establish a finite set oftheoretical models for the relations between actual words and potential words, so thatwe can obtain an atlas of actual-potential words which undoubtedly provides a newperspective for lexicology or lexical semantics.Through data collection and statistic analysis, the author of this thesis finds thestatement that most linguists held is not always correct, which says that the number ofpotential words is greater than that of actual words. Each of the theoretical models thatare given in the thesis can be considered as a local position. Figures show that in somelocal positions, the number of actual words is greater than or equal to that of potentialwords. The theoretical models enable us to see the changes in the lexicon more clearly.In addition to that, these models show that there are a considerably large number ofempty frames to be filled in. However, during the process of lexical change anddevelopment, some of the empty frames will be filled in by new sequences of sounds.The discussion on ways of creating new sequences of sounds is an important part of thethesis.In the final part of the thesis, the author discusses the difficulties of the study andgives some suggestions for future study. Firstly, the study of potential words inphonology is more creative. There is no ready-made theory to base. All of them makeour study tough to move on. Any tentative work will help to establish theoreticalfoundations for future study of potential words. Secondly, how to confirm potentialwords is another problem. Language not only includes written language, but alsospoken language. For example, dialect, slang, colloquial and dialect variants and so on.It is very difficult to confirm whether a word is an actual one or not. So this jobdemands the author possess abundant knowledge of English etymology and dialect, soas to make sure the correctness of potential words. Finally, although the thesis haveestablished some principles and methods of potential words study, the scope of thethesis is only confined to CVC, CV and VC structures. The author suggests that futurestudy should broaden its study scope, such as CCVC, CVCC and CCVCC structures. Inaddition to that, any study of potential words can help to revise current principle andmethod the author established. More new principle and method are welcomed.