Comprehensive Glossary of Linguistic and Communication Terms
English
Translate
Translate: To change words into a different language or to decide that words, behavior, or actions mean a particular thing.
Translation
Translation: Something which is translated, or the process of translating something, from one language to another.
Language
Language: A system of communication consisting of sounds, words, and grammar, or the system of communication used by the people of a particular country or profession.
Culture
Culture: The way of life, especially the general customs and beliefs, of a particular group of people at a particular time and place.
Code
Code: A set of rules which are accepted as general principles, or a set of written rules which state how people in a particular organization or country should behave.
Assertion
Assertion: A statement that you strongly believe is true.
Sentence
Sentence: A group of words, usually containing a verb, which expresses a thought in the form of a statement, question, instruction, or exclamation and starts with a capital letter when written.
Proposition
Proposition: A statement that affirms or denies something; the meaning expressed in such a statement, as opposed to the way it is expressed.
Word
Word: A single unit of language which has meaning and can be spoken or written.
Dialect
Dialect: A form of language that people speak in a particular part of a country, containing some different words and grammar.
Message
Message: A short piece of information that you give to a person when you cannot speak to them directly.
Text
Text: The written words in a book, magazine, etc., not the pictures.
Context
Context: The text or speech that comes immediately before and after a particular phrase or piece of text and helps to explain its meaning.
Meaning
Meaning: Something that is conveyed or signified; sense or significance. Something that one wishes to convey, especially by language.
Grammar
Grammar: The rules about how words change their form and combine with other words to make sentences.
Linguistics
Linguistics: The systematic study of the structure and development of a language in general or of particular languages.
Vocabulary
Vocabulary: All the words known and used by a particular person.
Lexicon
Lexicon: All the words used in a particular language or subject, or a dictionary.
Spanish
Traducción
Traducción: Es el sentido o la interpretación que se le da a un texto.
Traducir
Traducir: Expresar en una lengua lo que está escrito o se ha expresado antes en otra.
Palabra
Palabra: Segmento del discurso unificado habitualmente por el acento, el significado y pausas potenciales, iniciales y finales.
Vocablo
Vocablo: Representación gráfica de los sonidos.
Lengua
Lengua: Sistema lingüístico cuyos hablantes reconocen modelos de buena expresión.
Lenguaje
Lenguaje: Conjunto de sonidos articulados con que el hombre manifiesta lo que piensa o siente.
Idioma
Idioma: Lengua de un pueblo o nación o común a varios.
Cultura
Cultura: Conjunto de modos de vida y costumbres, conocimiento grado de desarrollo artístico, científico, industrial en una época o grupo social.
Léxico
Léxico: Conjunto de palabras de una lengua.
Dialecto
Dialecto: Variedad de una lengua que se habla en un determinado territorio.
Código
Código: Conjunto de normas legales sistemáticas que regulan unitariamente una materia determinada.
Mensaje
Mensaje: Es el objeto central de cualquier tipo de comunicación que se establezca entre dos partes, el emisor y el receptor.
Comunicación
Comunicación: Transmisión de señales mediante un código común al emisor y al receptor.
Oración
Oración: Grupo de palabras en la cual existe un verbo.
Aseveración
Aseveración: Afirmación de alguna cosa.
Texto
Texto: Grupo de palabras escritas en un documento.
Contexto
Contexto: Conjunto de palabras que rodean o condicionan un hecho.
Semántica
Semántica: Parte de la lingüística que estudia el significado de los signos lingüísticos y de sus combinaciones desde un punto de vista sincrónico y diacrónico.
Lingüística
Lingüística: Ciencia que estudia el lenguaje y las lenguas.
Types of Meaning
Lexical Meaning
Lexical meaning: It may be thought of as the specific value it has in a particular linguistic system and the “personality” it acquires through usage within that system.
Propositional Meaning
Propositional meaning: The propositional meaning of a word or an utterance arises from the relation between it and what it describes in a real or imaginary world, as conceived by the speakers of a particular language to which the word or utterance belongs.
Expressive Meaning
Expressive meaning: Is related to the speaker’s feelings or attitudes rather than to what words and utterances refer to.
Presupposed Meaning
Presupposed meaning: Arises from co-occurrence restrictions, that is to say, restrictions on what other words or expressions we expect to use before or after a particular lexical unit. These restrictions are of two types:
- Selectional: These are a function of the propositional meaning of a word. We expect a human subject for the adjective “studious”, and an inanimate one for “geometrical”. Selectional restrictions are deliberately violated in the case of figurative language but are otherwise strictly observed.
- Collocational: These are semantically arbitrary restrictions which do not follow logically from the propositional meaning of a word. For instance, laws are “broken” in English, but in Arabic, they are “contradicted”. Another example is that in English “teeth are brushed”, but in German and Italian they are “polished”.
Evoked Meaning
Evoked meaning: Arises from dialect (a variety of language which has currency within a specific community) and register (a variety of language that a language user considers appropriate to a specific situation). It only depends on the speaker’s or writer’s level.
Idioms and Fixed Expressions
Idioms
Idioms: Are expressions which have a meaning that is not obvious from the individual words. For example, the idiom drive somebody round the bend means to make somebody angry or frustrated.
- Kill two birds with one stone: Produce two useful results by just doing one action.
- In the blink of an eye: In an extremely short time.
- Cool, calm and collected: Relaxed, in control, not nervous.
Fixed Expressions
Fixed expressions: Allow little or no variation in form. They have a literal meaning.
- Big as an elephant
- Salt and pepper
- Bread and butter
- Up and down
- Best wishes
- Black and white
Proverbs
Proverbs: A simple and concrete saying, popularly known and repeated, that expresses a truth based on common sense or the practical experience of humanity.
- Success breeds success: Means that one success leads to another. Success breeds success and within a few years, I will be the best teacher in the world.
- Laughter is the best medicine: Laughing is an excellent remedy for disorders of body or mind. Patch Adams says: “Laughter is the best medicine that can cure people”.
- Morning dreams come true: The dreams you have in the early hours of the morning, or just before waking, are the most likely to come true. If morning dreams really do come true, I’ll be a millionaire. I dreamed this morning that I had won the lottery.
Collocations
Collocation: Is a group of two or more words that like to hang out together.
- The fast train (not the quick train)
- Fast food (not quick food)
- A quick shower (not a fast shower)
- A quick meal (not a fast meal)
- Make a mistake (not do a mistake)
Common Expressions
- Incidentally: A propósito, de paso.
- Now and then: De vez en cuando.
- Soon and later: Tarde o temprano.
- One way or another: De una u otra forma.
- Married with children: Casado y padre de familia.
- With 20 years: De veinte años.
- In the middle of the desert: En pleno desierto.
- A poor performance: Un desempeño deficiente.
- This way: De esta manera.
- Timing: Programación, asignación de tiempo.
- Solid gold: Oro macizo.
- In other words: Dicho de otro modo.
- Suddenly: Así de repente / Imprevisto.
- Out of the blue: De la nada.
- Exhaust: Agotador.
- Exhausted: Agotado.
- Exhaust tube/ pipe: Tubo de escape.
- Domestic fly: Vuelo nacional.
- Around the world: En / Por el mundo.
- Entertainment industry: Industria del ocio.
- Show business: El negocio del espectáculo.
- Prescription: Receta médica.
- Prescribe medicine: Recetar (un remedio).
- Expire: Prescribir, vencer.
- To access: Acceder.
- An attachment: Un adjunto.
- Somebody else: Otra persona.
- Inside out: Al revés (polera).
- Parody: Parodia, farsa, tongo.
- Bigot: Fanatismo, intolerancia.
- Nutrition: Alimentación.
- Bad practice: Negligencia médica.
- Actual: Real, verdadero, genuino.
- Extravagant: Derrochador, gastador.
- Flamboyant: Estrambótico, extravagante, llamativo.
- Notorious: Conocido por su mala reputación.
- Current / Present: Actual.
- Deadline: Último plazo, fecha de cierre.
- Guidelines: Pauta.
- Range: Tramo, intervalo, segmento, gama, franja, banda, abanico, espectro.
- Rank: Rango.
- Ability: Capacidad.
- Capacity: Condición, calidad de, función.
- Skill: Habilidad, destreza.
- Vegetables: Verduras.
- Medical doctor / Physician: Médico.
- Environmental impact: Daño ambiental.
Advanced Linguistic Concepts
Coherence
Coherence: Network of relations which organize and create a text. This network underlies the surface text.
Cohesion
Cohesion: Network of surface relations which link words and expressions to other words and expressions in a text.
Implicature
Implicature: The question of how it is that we come to understand more than is actually said.
Text
Text: The verbal record of a communicative event. It is actually what the speaker means or implies rather than what he literally says.
Pragmatics
Pragmatics: The study of language in context. It refers to how people speak and not to how they should speak.
Reference
Reference: The relationship which holds between a word and what it points to in the real (or accepted imaginary) world.
Cognates
Cognates
Cognates: They are words that look and sound similar in both languages and mean the same.
False Cognates
False cognates: They are words that look and sound similar but whose meaning is completely different.
Semi-False Cognates
Semi-false cognates: A word which is spelled and/or pronounced similarly in two languages and which has two or more meanings, at least one of which is different in the two languages.
True Cognates
True cognates: Animal, enthusiasm, communication, museum, music, university, attitude, attack, technology, mention, computer, café, forum, auditorium, telephone, converse, literature, automatic, session, plastic, secret, complete, kilometer, sofa, elephant, idea, television, crisis, necessity, panic, culture, aggression, secretary, page, message, fossil, algebra.
False Cognates
False cognates: Extravagant (despilfarrador), range (intervalo, segmento, franja, etc.), sensitive (sensible), sensible (sensato), to pretend (fingir), actually (en realidad), rare (exceso, difícil de encontrar), groceries (abarrotes), exciting (emocionante), exit (salida), tuna (atún), success (éxito), entertainment (esparcimiento, diversión).
Semi-False Cognates
Semi-false cognates: Severe (punishment- attitude), drama (theatre-drama), argument (argumento- discussion), instance (instancia- ejemplo), convenient (cómodo- práctico).
Vocabulary Pairs
- Build: To make something by putting bricks or other materials together.
Construe: To understand the meaning, especially of other people’s actions and statements, in a particular way. - Freeze: To make food last a long time by storing it at a very low temperature so that it becomes hard.
Congeal: To change from a liquid or soft state to a thick or solid state. - Human: Of or typical of people; a man, woman, or child.
Humane: Showing kindness, care, and sympathy towards others, especially those who are suffering. - Answer: A reaction to a question, letter, phone call, etc.
Reply: To answer; to react to an action by someone else.
Response: An answer or reaction. - Error: A mistake without knowledge of it.
Mistake: An action, decision, or judgment that produces an unwanted or unintentional result. - Understand: To know the meaning of something that someone says.
Comprehend: To understand something completely. - Light: The brightness that comes from the sun, fire, etc., and from electrical devices, and that allows things to be seen.
Illumination: Colored decorative lights outside which make a town look bright and exciting at night. - Artist: Someone who paints, draws, or makes sculptures.
Artiste: A skilled performer, especially a dancer, singer, or actor. - To resume: If an activity resumes, or if you resume it, it starts again after a pause.
To summarize: To express the most important facts or ideas about something or someone in a short and clear form. - To house: A building that people, usually one family, live in.
To inhabit: To live in a place. - To talk: To say words aloud; to speak to someone.
To converse: To have a conversation with someone.
To chat: To talk to someone in a friendly informal way. - Hollow: Having a hole or empty space inside.
Void: A large hole or empty space. - Balance: A state where things are of equal weight or force.
Poise: Calm confidence in a person’s way of behaving, or a quality of grace (= moving in an attractive way) and balance in the way a person holds or moves their body. - Heritage: Features belonging to the culture of a particular society, such as traditions, languages, or buildings, that were created in the past and still have historical importance.
Inheritance: Money or objects that someone gives you when they die. - Safety: A state in which or a place where you are safe and not in danger or at risk.
Security: Protection of a person, building, organization, or country against threats such as crime or attacks by foreign countries. - Easy: Needing little effort.
Facile: Describes a remark or theory that is too simple and has not been thought about enough: as much as is necessary; in the amount or to the degree needed. - Loneliness: The state of being lonely.
Solitude: The situation of being alone without other people in a comfortable way. - To replace: To take the place of something, or to put something or someone in the place of something or someone else.
To substitute: To use something or someone instead of another thing or person. - Deep: Going or being a long way down from the top or surface, or being of a particular distance from the top to the bottom.
Profound: Felt or experienced very strongly or in an extreme way. - Guilty: Feeling guilt.
Culpable: Deserving to be blamed or considered responsible for something bad. - Clever: Having or showing the ability to learn and understand things quickly and easily.
Intelligent: Showing intelligence, or able to learn and understand things easily.
Keen: Very interested, eager, or wanting (to do) something very much.
Smart: Intelligent, or able to think quickly or cleverly in difficult situations.
Brainy: Clever. - Look: To direct your eyes in order to see.
Glance: A quick short look.
Stare: To look for a long time with the eyes wide open, especially when surprised, frightened, or thinking. - Gape: To look in great surprise at someone or something, especially with an open mouth.
Gaze: To look at something or someone for a long time, especially in surprise or admiration, or because you are thinking about something else. - Hate: To dislike someone or something very much.
Loathe: To hate someone or something. - Oblivion: The state of being completely forgotten.
Forgetfulness: Often forgetting things. - Thankful: Pleased or grateful for something.
Grateful: Showing or expressing thanks, especially to another person. - Happiness: The feeling of being happy.
Felicity: Happiness, luck, or a condition that produces positive results. - Trip: A journey in which you go somewhere, usually for a short time, and come back again.
Journey: The act of traveling from one place to another, especially in a vehicle.
Voyage: A long journey, especially by ship.
More Proverbs
- Least said, soonest mended: Hable menos y haga más.
- Leave well enough alone: Lo perfecto es enemigo de lo bueno.
- Lend your money and lose your friend: Cuentas claras conservan la amistad.
- Length begets loathing: Ir al grano / Menos es más.
- The leopard can’t change its spot: Aunque la mona se vista de seda, mona se queda.
- Less is more: Menos es más.
- Let bygones be bygones: Pasado pisado / Borrón y cuenta nueva.
- Necessity is the mother of invention: La necesidad es la madre de la creación y el padre del crimen.
- Necessity knows no law: La necesidad tiene cara de hereje.
- Necessity sharpens industry: La necesidad hace moverte.
- Need makes the old wife trot: La necesidad hace a la vieja correr.
- Needs must when the devil drives.
- Ne’er cast a clout till May be out.
- Neither a borrower nor a lender be: Ni prestes ni pidas prestado.
- Neither give nor take offense.
- Nero fiddled while Rome burned: No estar ni ahí.
- Never ask pardon before you are accused: El que se excusa, se acusa.
- Never choose your woman or your linen by candlelight.
- Never do evil that good may come of it.
- Never give a sucker an even break.
- It’s a wise child who knows his own father: La sangre fría.
- It’s best to be off with the old love before you are on with the new: Un clavo saca a otro clavo.
- It’s better to be on the safe side: Mejor prevenir que lamentar.