English Words

EXERCISES
1. What are the main similarities and differences between the organisation of the mental lexicon and that
of the dictionaries sold in bookshops?
2. Explain in detail how the meaning of it and his is inferred in the following sentence which you might
encounter next time you read a detective story:
The murderer put the arsenic in his glass and took it to his table.
3. Identify the malapropisms in the following passage and suggest how each of them might have arisen:
‘Observe me, Sir Anthony.—I would by no means wish a daughter of mine to be a progeny of
learning: I don’t think so much learning becomes a young woman… I would send her, at nine
years old, to a boarding school, in order to learn a little ingenuity and artifice.—Then, Sir, she
should have a supercilious knowledge in accounts;—and as she grew up, I would have her
instructed in geometry, that she might know something of the contagious countries;—but above
all, Sir Anthony, she should be mistress of orthodoxy, that she might not mis-spell, and mis-
pronounce words so shamefully as girls usually do; and likewise she might reprehend the true
meaning of what she is saying.—This, Sir Anthony, is what I would have a woman know;—and I
don’t think there is a superstitious article in it.’
(Sheridan, The Rivals, I, ii)
THE MENTAL LEXICON 181

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4. Identify the kinds of error in these sentences. Explain what went wrong in each case.
a.
Utterance:
Don’t hide your light under a bush.
Target:
Don’t hide your light under a bushel.
b.
Utterance:
It was a very enjoyful performance.
Target:
It was a very enjoyable performance.
c.
Utterance:
Prosecutors will be trespassed.
Target:
Trespassers will be prosecuted.
5. Account for the errors involving negative morphemes in the data below. What inferences can we make
about the mental lexicon on the basis of such errors?
a.
Utterance:
I tell you he’s not crazy—I mean, he’s insane.
Target:
I tell you he is insane.
b.
Utterance:
The bonsai didn’t die because I watered it.
Target:
The bonsai died because I didn’t water it.
c.
Utterance:
The vowels are not stricted—are unrestricted.
Target:
The vowels are unrestricted.
(data from Fromkin 1973)
6. Many people cannot spell certain words correctly although they can read them correctly. They confuse
their
with there, weather with whether, they are not sure if independent ends in -ent or -ant
(*independant)
. What does this tell us about the relation between the production and perception of
words in speech and in writing?
7. Show how the spreading activation model can be used to represent in the mental lexicon the meaning
of tulip, palm (tree), desk and chair.
182 ENGLISH WORDS

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Glossary
Ablaut
A change in a vowel in the root of a word that is used to show a
grammatical difference, e.g. 
sing
(verb) ~ 
song
(noun); 
shrink
(present
tense) ~ 
shrank
(past tense).
Accusative
A case marking for the object of a transitive verb, e.g. 
them
in 
We ate
them
.
Active voice
If the doer of the action is also the subject of the verb the sentence is
said to be in the active voice (e.g. The dog bit the man.) 
see also