ELT Teaching Article #1
Generating words from other words
by
Robert L. Fielding
(This article was published in UGRU Journal - United Arab Emirates University - Edition 2)
Language, like nature, according to the American poet, Ralph Waldo Emerson, is an endless combination and repetition of a very few laws. When you hear a word, it makes you think of another, and another, and so on. Whether words are thoughts or vice versa, it is obvious that words encapsulate thoughts and sometimes images of objects. The English word ‘dog’, for instance, conjures up the familiar animal so beloved of children, postmen, and gamblers.But say the word ‘dog’ and it is quickly followed by other words – ‘cat’, ‘Alsatian’, or ‘dirty’, depending upon the way your thoughts line up.If they line up horizontally, you are thinking paradigmatically, if vertical, syntagmatically.
Let’s look at this.
Paradigmatic – horizontal - dirty dog - dog in the manger - dog days - sheep dog
Syntagmatic – vertical - dog Alsatian cur mutt
These two planes of thought: the horizontal variety and the vertical one show us what is possible in the world of word-association. Horizontally patterned associations are probably prompted by words that are frequently heard in everyday speech.Vertical patterning, however, probably inclines us to use our creative side – accessing our knowledge of the world and the things contained in it that we are aware of.In the paradigmatic mode, those of us who produce similar combinations of words (dog days, sheep dog, dog in the manger) are likely to belong to similar communities of usage of words – speech communities.In the syntagmatic mode, people who can readily produce similar items from a single point of origin probably indicate by doing so that they share a similar interest or intellectual niche rather than a spoken one.By way of proof of this last point, if we take an arcane selection originating from the word ‘dog’, we will readily come to realize that those persons producing the names of several little known breeds of canines come from those amongst us who are interested in dogs, but who have virtually nothing else in common save this interest.‘Dog days’ and ‘dog in the manger’ are both expressions that are infrequently used these days and anyone aware of them and still using them would probably come from a group socialized in a certain region at a certain specific time in recent history.Using such patterning in ways that reproduce both current expression and similar fields of knowledge can and should be put to good use in the language classroom.After all, our students need to know or at least be aware of currently used collocations in language (chunking) as well as a generally expected world of discourse illustrated by a limited and more or less clearly defined lexicon, be it from the fields of medicine, geology, or meterology – whatever students feel is their intended field of study.Alternatively, the encyclopedic knowledge used by students might be captured by a vocabulary that approaches general knowledge – non-specialist, by definition.If this is the case, the vertical pattern will vary somewhat from patterning associated with a specialized field like dentistry or ornithology.Any brief look though a thesaurus will confirm that many words are either out of use or at least are not useful to us in our own everyday lives.With paradigmatic patterning and selection, we have any starting point within our range of reasonably frequently used words, and those combinations (and only those) that are used sufficiently frequently by members of our speech community.If we start with the unlikely word, ‘Hell’ we may come up with the expression, ‘Hell on Earth’, but not the more earthy expression, ‘ruddy Hell’.The first is found in common speech whereas the second is actually defined as a vulgarity. Educated people might well be expected to use the former but not the latter, in polite company.Moving on to sentences – syntactical sequences, though not necessarily semantic ones (‘Green ideas sleep furiously.’), we notice now that both paradigmatic patterns emerge as well as syntagmatic ones. Some have called this lateral thinking. I bring it to mind with regard to creative writing, and connected in particular with what has been called ‘brainstorming’ by some, and ‘formation of schemata’ by others like Rumelhart.Either way, I want to suggest that both ways of association – paradigmatic and syntagmatic, can be used to good effect with students traditionally ‘stuck for words’ when writing.Beginning writing a short story this way can and does lead students down avenues not previously explored, but profitable and productive ones for all that.Writing, “The man entered the room’ on the board or the blank page, immediately brings scenarios to mind, vertically and horizontally.Horizontally, we get, ‘The young man entered the dining room.’Vertically, we get ‘The bank-robber (usually male) entered the bank.’ If this word is used instead of the fairly neutral word, ‘man’ other related and associated words readily come to mind.A robber entering a dining room, for instance, rarely amounts to anything suggesting drama unless the hour is two in the morning. Entering a bank, however, robbers usually intend availing themselves of the contents of the bank’s safe without the need to sign a withdrawal form; they intend robbing the bank, which is why such men are called bank-robbers. The word,’ bank-robber’ readily and easily conjures up the word, ‘bank’, and a lot of other words like ‘gun’, ‘security cameras’, and comically and somewhat theatrically, the utterance, “Stick ‘em up!”And with the words, ‘robber’ and ‘bank’ come the intentions of the robbers and the expected outcomes of their visit . So much for vertical associations.To combine both horizontal and vertical, we could get, ‘The bank-robber entered the bank through the window that had been left open for him.’From this sentence it is clear that the bank is closed for business, or that the window in question is in some under-utilized part of the bank if the bank is still open.The words, ‘had been left open for him’ suggest there is someone on the inside helping the bank-robber. Sometimes the horizontal is more productive than the vertical plane. A skillful combination of both is probably the most productive of all.With students who haven’t many English words in their vocabulary, thinking of words in their mother tongue can be used to generate other words in the manner suggested above. The main thing is engaging students and helping them to produce words that they themselves have thought of rather than words their teacher gives them. ‘Ownership’ of language in the sense that the words and expressions, and the ideas too, originate in the student’s head and in that sense ‘belong’ to her.
Robert L. Fielding
by
Robert L. Fielding
(This article was published in UGRU Journal - United Arab Emirates University - Edition 2)
Language, like nature, according to the American poet, Ralph Waldo Emerson, is an endless combination and repetition of a very few laws. When you hear a word, it makes you think of another, and another, and so on. Whether words are thoughts or vice versa, it is obvious that words encapsulate thoughts and sometimes images of objects. The English word ‘dog’, for instance, conjures up the familiar animal so beloved of children, postmen, and gamblers.But say the word ‘dog’ and it is quickly followed by other words – ‘cat’, ‘Alsatian’, or ‘dirty’, depending upon the way your thoughts line up.If they line up horizontally, you are thinking paradigmatically, if vertical, syntagmatically.
Let’s look at this.
Paradigmatic – horizontal - dirty dog - dog in the manger - dog days - sheep dog
Syntagmatic – vertical - dog Alsatian cur mutt
These two planes of thought: the horizontal variety and the vertical one show us what is possible in the world of word-association. Horizontally patterned associations are probably prompted by words that are frequently heard in everyday speech.Vertical patterning, however, probably inclines us to use our creative side – accessing our knowledge of the world and the things contained in it that we are aware of.In the paradigmatic mode, those of us who produce similar combinations of words (dog days, sheep dog, dog in the manger) are likely to belong to similar communities of usage of words – speech communities.In the syntagmatic mode, people who can readily produce similar items from a single point of origin probably indicate by doing so that they share a similar interest or intellectual niche rather than a spoken one.By way of proof of this last point, if we take an arcane selection originating from the word ‘dog’, we will readily come to realize that those persons producing the names of several little known breeds of canines come from those amongst us who are interested in dogs, but who have virtually nothing else in common save this interest.‘Dog days’ and ‘dog in the manger’ are both expressions that are infrequently used these days and anyone aware of them and still using them would probably come from a group socialized in a certain region at a certain specific time in recent history.Using such patterning in ways that reproduce both current expression and similar fields of knowledge can and should be put to good use in the language classroom.After all, our students need to know or at least be aware of currently used collocations in language (chunking) as well as a generally expected world of discourse illustrated by a limited and more or less clearly defined lexicon, be it from the fields of medicine, geology, or meterology – whatever students feel is their intended field of study.Alternatively, the encyclopedic knowledge used by students might be captured by a vocabulary that approaches general knowledge – non-specialist, by definition.If this is the case, the vertical pattern will vary somewhat from patterning associated with a specialized field like dentistry or ornithology.Any brief look though a thesaurus will confirm that many words are either out of use or at least are not useful to us in our own everyday lives.With paradigmatic patterning and selection, we have any starting point within our range of reasonably frequently used words, and those combinations (and only those) that are used sufficiently frequently by members of our speech community.If we start with the unlikely word, ‘Hell’ we may come up with the expression, ‘Hell on Earth’, but not the more earthy expression, ‘ruddy Hell’.The first is found in common speech whereas the second is actually defined as a vulgarity. Educated people might well be expected to use the former but not the latter, in polite company.Moving on to sentences – syntactical sequences, though not necessarily semantic ones (‘Green ideas sleep furiously.’), we notice now that both paradigmatic patterns emerge as well as syntagmatic ones. Some have called this lateral thinking. I bring it to mind with regard to creative writing, and connected in particular with what has been called ‘brainstorming’ by some, and ‘formation of schemata’ by others like Rumelhart.Either way, I want to suggest that both ways of association – paradigmatic and syntagmatic, can be used to good effect with students traditionally ‘stuck for words’ when writing.Beginning writing a short story this way can and does lead students down avenues not previously explored, but profitable and productive ones for all that.Writing, “The man entered the room’ on the board or the blank page, immediately brings scenarios to mind, vertically and horizontally.Horizontally, we get, ‘The young man entered the dining room.’Vertically, we get ‘The bank-robber (usually male) entered the bank.’ If this word is used instead of the fairly neutral word, ‘man’ other related and associated words readily come to mind.A robber entering a dining room, for instance, rarely amounts to anything suggesting drama unless the hour is two in the morning. Entering a bank, however, robbers usually intend availing themselves of the contents of the bank’s safe without the need to sign a withdrawal form; they intend robbing the bank, which is why such men are called bank-robbers. The word,’ bank-robber’ readily and easily conjures up the word, ‘bank’, and a lot of other words like ‘gun’, ‘security cameras’, and comically and somewhat theatrically, the utterance, “Stick ‘em up!”And with the words, ‘robber’ and ‘bank’ come the intentions of the robbers and the expected outcomes of their visit . So much for vertical associations.To combine both horizontal and vertical, we could get, ‘The bank-robber entered the bank through the window that had been left open for him.’From this sentence it is clear that the bank is closed for business, or that the window in question is in some under-utilized part of the bank if the bank is still open.The words, ‘had been left open for him’ suggest there is someone on the inside helping the bank-robber. Sometimes the horizontal is more productive than the vertical plane. A skillful combination of both is probably the most productive of all.With students who haven’t many English words in their vocabulary, thinking of words in their mother tongue can be used to generate other words in the manner suggested above. The main thing is engaging students and helping them to produce words that they themselves have thought of rather than words their teacher gives them. ‘Ownership’ of language in the sense that the words and expressions, and the ideas too, originate in the student’s head and in that sense ‘belong’ to her.
Robert L. Fielding
posted by Justice at 12:35 AM
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