全国2010年7月自学考试英语词汇学真题

I. Each of the statements below is followed by four alternative answers. Choose the one that best completes the statement and put the letter in the bracket. (30%)

1. As defined in terms of spoken language, a word is viewed as a sound or combination of sounds which are made voluntarily with human ______ equipment.( )

A. visual B. vocal

C. physical D. mental

2. Words may fall into content words and functional words by ______.( )

A. use frequency B. notion

C. origin D. sound

3. ______ refers to the specialized vocabularies by which members of particular arts, sciences, trades and professions communicate among themselves. ( )

A. Terminology B. Archaisms

C. Slang D. Jargon

4. Which of the following is NOT one of the three channels through which modern English vocabulary develops? ( )

A. Creation. B. Semantic changes.

C. Clipping. D. Borrowing.

5. Rapid growth of science and technology breeds such new words as the following EXCEPT ______.( )

A.TV dinner B. earthrise

C. moon walk D. space shuttle

6. The surviving languages fall into eight principal groups, which can be grouped into the Eastern set and the _______ set. ( )

A. Western B. African

C. American D. Northern

7. The plural morpheme '-s' is pronounced as/z/in the following words EXCEPT ______.( )

A. beds B. bags

C. cheats D. bottles

8. The word 'prisoner' comprises ______ morphemes. ( )

A. 1 B. 2

C. 3 D. 4

9. The following words have derivational affixes EXCEPT ______.( )

A. reread B. prewar

C. bloody D. harder

10. The prefix 'over-' in the word 'overweight' is a prefix of ______.( )

A. orientation and attitude B. degree or size

C. time and order D. number

11. The method of creating words by removing the supposed suffixes is called ______.( )

A. back-formation B. acronymy

C. conversion D. clipping

12. 'Champagne', a common noun, comes from a ______.( )

A. name of a person B. name of a place

C. name of a book D. tradename

13. ______ is the relationship between language and the world. ( )

A. Reference B. Concept

C. Sense D. Motivation

14. Motivation accounts for the connection between the linguistic symbol and its ______.( )

A. form B. pronunciation

C. spelling D. meaning

15. The word“______”is an onomatopoetically motivated word. ( )

A. miaow B. sword

C. laconic D. airmail

16. In modern English, an overwhelming majority of words are ______.( )

A. original B. initial

C. polysemous D. periodical

17. ______, the derived meanings, no matter how many, are secondary in comparison. ( )

A. Synchronically B. Diachronically

C. Etymologically D. Onomatopoetically

18. Want, wish, like and desire are synonyms, but as far as intensity is concerned, ______ is the strongest of all. ( )

A. wish B. like

C. want D. desire

19. There are five types of meaning changes and among which ______ are the most common.( )

A. degradation and elevation B. transfer and extension

C. elevation and narrowing D. extension and narrowing

20. Due to ______ reason, a word is retained for a name though the meaning has changed because the referent has changed. ( )

A. psychological B. historical

C. class D. linguistic

21. Among the following words only ______ is the word which originally had a specialized meaning and now has become generalized. ( )

A. journal B. wife

C. accident D. disease

22. Based on ______ context, we can arrive at the meaning of “do a sum”.( )

A. grammatical B. lexical

C. cultural D. non-linguistic

23. The sentence 'The fish is ready to eat.' is ambiguous due to ______.( )

A. grammatical structure B. hyponymy

C. cultural influence D. non-linguistic context

24. In the sentence 'Perhaps the most startling theory to come out of kinesics, the study of body movement, was suggested by Professor Birdwhistell.' The meaning of kinesics can be inferred from the clue of _______.( )

A. definition B. synonymy

C. antonymy D. hyponymy

25. Which of the following is NOT a figure of speech? ( )

A. Metaphor. B. Personification.

C. Euphemism. D. Shortening.

26. Never do things by halves is a(n) ______.( )

A. verbal idiom in nature B. nominal idiom in nature

C. sentence idiom D. adverbial idiom in nature

27. The change of idiom 'Silence is golden' from the original form is ______.( )

A. replacement B. position-shifting

C. addition D. shortening

28. The following are the unique features of Collins COBUILD English Language Dictionary EXCEPT ______.( )

A. definition B. extra column

C. usage examples D. clear grammar codes

29. Webster's Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary (1983) is a(n) ______ dictionary. ( )

A. unabridged B. desk

C. pocket D. encyclopedic

30. Which of the following is NOT true for the Chinese-English Dictionary (Revised Edition)(CED)(1995)? ( )

A. The new edition has more single character entries and more multi-character entries.

B. The new edition revised some old entries.

C. The new edition cut off the previous alphabetical order of entries.

D. The dictionary boasts of the quality of the English equivalents.

Ⅱ. Match the words in Column A with the words in Column B according to 1) types of word formation; 2) types of morphemes; 3) types of vocabulary by notion; and 4) discrimination of synonyms. (10%)

A B

( ) 31. honeybee A. difference in application

( ) 32. handy/manual B. difference in denotation

( ) 33. upon C. bound morpheme

( ) 34. rich/wealthy D. clipping

( ) 35. medicare E. functional word

( ) 36. answer/reply F content word

( ) 37. flu G. compounding

( ) 38. steel H. initialism

( ) 39.VOA I. blending

( ) 40. idealistic J. difference in connotation

III. Complete the following statements with proper words or expressions according to the course book. (10 % )

41. ______ are newly-created words or expressions,, or words that have taken on new meanings.

42. In modern English, word endings were mostly lost with just a few exceptions because English has evolved from a ______ language to the present analytic language.

43. The morphemes can be grouped into ______ morphemes and bound morphemes.

44. The prefix 'un-' in the word 'unwrap'is a ______ prefix.

45. Lexical meaning of a word has two concepts: ______ meaning and associative meaning.

46. Hyponymy can be described in terms of ______ graphs, with higher-order superordinates above the lower subordinates.

47. In Old English, animals and their ______ share the same name.

48. Structural patterns where a particular word is used is called ______ context.

49. Idioms verbal in nature can be subdivided into ______ verbs and other verb phrases.

50. Webster's Third New International Dictionary is the best-known ______ dictionary.

IV. Define the following terms. (10% )

51. bound morphemes

52. affixes

53. blending

54. unabridged dictionary

55. dismembering of idiom

V. Answer the following questions. Your answers should be clear and short. Write your answers in the space given below. (20%)

56. What are the three periods in view of the development of English vocabulary?

57. How many types do bound morphemes include? What are they?

58. What is concept? Give an example to illustrate your point.

59. How do you use a dictionary to the full?

VI. Analyze and comment on the following. Write your answers in the space given below. (20 % )

60. Analyze the following dialogue and comment on the rhetoric use of homonym in italicized font. Customer: 'How come your sausages taste like meat at one end, but like bread at the other? ' Butcher replied: 'Madam, in times like these no butcher can make both ends meet. '

61. Analyze and comment on the following statement.

As most words have more than one meaning, it is often impossible to tell the meaning of a word before it is used in context.