VOCABULARY BUILDING

VOCABULARY BUILDING

EVERYONE—FROM BEGINNING LEARNERS in English to veterans in journalism—knows the frustration of not having the right word immediately available in that lexicon one carries between one's ears. Sometimes it's a matter of not being able to recall the right word; sometimes we never knew it. It is also frustrating to read a newspaper or homework assignment and run across words whose meanings elude us. Language, after all, is power. Building a vocabulary that is adequate to the needs of one's reading and self-expression has to be a personal goal for every writer and speaker.

Making It Personal

Using some durable piece of paper—white construction paper or the insides of the ripped-off covers of old notebooks—begin to write down words in small but readable script that you discover in your reading that you can't define. Read journals and newspapers that challenge you in terms of vocabulary. Pursue words actively and become alert to words that you simply overlooked in the past. Write down the words in one column; then, later, when you have a dictionary at your disposal, write down a common definition of the word; in a third column, write a brief sentence using the word, underlined.

Carry this paper or cardboard with you always. In the pauses of your busy day—take out the paper and review your vocabulary words until you feel comfortable that you would recognize (and be able to use) these words the next time you see them. The amazing thing is that you will see the words again—even "nefarious miscreants," and probably sooner than you thought. In fact, you might well discover that the words you've written down are rather common. What's happening is not that, all of a sudden, people are using words you never saw before, but that you are now reading and using words that you had previously ignored.

Using Every Resource

Most bookstores carry books on building a more powerful vocabulary. If you've got money to spare or if they're on sale, buy them and use them; they can't hurt. Books that group words according to what they have in common—more in meaning than in spelling—are especially useful.

            Newspapers often carry brief daily articles that explore the meanings of words and phrases. These articles often emphasize peculiar words that won't find themselves into your working vocabulary, but they can still be fun. Often you'll find that learning one new word leads to other new words, little constellations of meaning that keep your brain cells active and hungry for more. Make reading these articles one of your daily habits, an addiction, even.

Play dictionary games with your family in which someone uses the dictionary to find a neat word and writes down the real definition and everyone else writes down a fake (and funny) definition. See how many people you can fool with your fake definitions.

A thesaurus is like a dictionary except that it groups words within constellations of meaning. It is often useful in discovering just the right word you need to express what you want to say. Make sure you correctly understand the definition of a word (by using a dictionary) before using it in some important paper or report. Your bookstore salesperson can provide plenty of examples of an inexpensive thesaurus. The online Dictionary has access to both an extensive dictionary and a hyperlinked thesaurus. Links allow you to go conveniently back and forth between the dictionary and the thesaurus.

Knowing the Roots

At least half of the words in the English language are derived from Greek and Latin roots. Knowing these roots helps us to grasp the meaning of words before we look them up in the dictionary. It also helps us to see how words are often arranged in families with similar characteristics.

For instance, we know that sophomores are students in their second year of college or high school. What does it mean, though, to be sophomoric? The "sopho" part of the word comes from the same Greek root that gives us philosophy, which we know means "love of knowledge." The "ic" ending is sometimes added to adjectival words in English, but the "more" part of the word comes from the same Greek root that gives us moron. Thus sophomores are people who think they know a lot but really don't know much about anything, and a sophomoric act is typical of a "wise fool," a "smart-ass"!

Let's explore further. Going back to philosophy, we know the "sophy" part is related to  knowledge and the "phil" part is related to love (because we know that Philadelphia is the City of Brotherly Love and that a philodendron loves shady spots). What, then, is philanthropy? "Phil" is still love, and "anthropy" comes from the same Greek root that gives us anthropology, which is the study ("logy," we know, means study of any kind) of anthropos, humankind. So a philanthropist must be someone who loves humans and does something about it—like giving money to find a cure for cancer or to build a Writing Center for the local community college. (And an anthropoid, while we're at it, is an animal who walks like a human being.) Learning the roots of our language can even be fun!

Some common Greek and Latin roots:

Root (source)              Meaning                      English words

aster, astr (G)              star astronomy,            astrology

audi (L)                       to hear                                     audible, auditorium

bene (L)                       good, well                   benefit,  benevolent

bio (G)                         life                               biology, autobiography

dic, dict (L)                 to speak                       dictionary, dictator

fer (L)                          to carry                        transfer, referral

fix (L)                          to fasten                      fix, suffix, affix

geo (G)                        earth                            geography, geology

graph (G)                     to write                        graphic, photography

jur, just (L)                  law                              jury, justice

log, logue (G)              word, thought,             monolog(ue), astrology, biology,

speech                         neologism

luc (L)                          light                             lucid, translucent

manu (L)                     hand                            manual, manuscript

meter, metr (G)           measure                       metric, thermometer

op, oper (L)                 work                            operation, operator

path (G)                       feeling                         pathetic, sympathy, empathy

ped (G)                        child                            pediatrics, pedophile

phil (G)                        love                             philosophy, Anglophile

phys (G)                      body, nature                physical, physics

scrib, script (L)            to write                        scribble, manuscript

tele (G)                        far off                          telephone, television

ter, terr (L)                  earth                            territory, extraterrestrial

vac (L)                         empty                          vacant, vacuum, evacuate

verb (L)                       word                            verbal, verbose

vid, vis (L)                  to see                           video, vision, television

Learning Prefixes and Suffixes

Knowing the Greek and Latin roots of several prefixes and suffixes (beginning and endings attached to words) can also help us determine the meaning of words. Ante, for instance, means before, and if we connect bellum with belligerant to figure out the connection with war, we'll know that antebellum refers to the period before war. (In the United States, the antebellum period is our history before the Civil War.)

Prefixes showing quantity

Meaning Prefixes in English Words

half                  semiannual, hemisphere

one                  unicycle, monarchy, monorail

two                  binary, bimonthly, dilemma, dichotomy

hundred           century, centimeter, hectoliter

thousand         millimeter, kilometer

Prefixes showing negation

without, no, not          asexual, anonymous, illegal, immoral, invalid,

irreverent, unskilled

not, absence of,           nonbreakable, antacid, antipathy, contradict

opposing,

against

opposite to,                 counterclockwise, counterweight

complement to

do the opposite           dehorn, devitalize, devalue

of, remove,

reduce

do the opposite           disestablish, disarm

of, deprive of

wrongly, bad               misjudge, misdeed

Prefixes showing time

before              antecedent, forecast, precede, prologue

after                 postwar

again                rewrite, redundant

Prefixes showing direction or position

above, over                  supervise, supererogatory

across, over                 transport, translate

below, under               infrasonic, infrastructure, subterranean, hypodermic

in front of                    proceed, prefix

behind                         recede

out of                          erupt, explicit, ecstasy

into                              injection, immerse, encourage, empower

around                         circumnavigate, perimeter

with                             coexist, colloquy, communicate, consequence, correspond,

sympathy, synchronize

Suffixes, on the other hand, modify the meaning of a word and frequently determine its function within a sentence. Take the noun nation, for example. With suffixes, the word becomes the adjective national, the adverb nationally, and the verb nationalize.

See what words you can come up with that use the following suffixes.

·         Typical noun suffixes are -ence, -ance, -or, -er, -ment, -list, -ism, -ship, -ency, -sion,   -tion,

·         -ness, -hood, -dom

·         Typical verb suffixes are -en, -ify, -ize, -ate

·         Typical adjective suffixes are -able, -ible, -al, -tial, -tic, -ly, -ful, -ous, -tive, -less,       -ish, -ulent

·         The adverb suffix is -ly (although not all words that end in -ly are adverbs—like friendly)

Using Dictionary

The dictionary should be one of the most often used books in home. Place the dictionary somewhere so that you can find it immediately and use it often. If you do your reading and homework in the kitchen and the dictionary is on a shelf in the den or bedroom, it's too tempting to say "I'll look it up next time."

The home dictionary should be large enough to contain much more than just spellings. It should contain extensive definitions, word origins, and notes on usage. Carrying in your purse or backpack a pocket dictionary with more concise definitions is also a good idea. Get in the habit of turning to it often. A well worn dictionary is a beautiful thing.

Using the Internet

Use the internet as an aid to vocabulary development by exploring the abundant opportunities for reading available on the World Wide Web. Online newspapers and commentary magazines those challenge your mind and your vocabulary with full-text articles. At least once a week read a major article with the purpose of culling from it some vocabulary words that are unfamiliar to you.

Vocabulary University is a new online resource for working on groups of related vocabulary words in a puzzle format. Vocabulary University a graphically rich Web site, is broken into beginning, intermediate, and college-level work. Vocabulary for English Language Learners is a treasury and nicely organized resources for ESL students.

You can also go to the web-site of the Scripps-Howard Annual National Spelling Bee and listen to words. The words are arranged in interesting groups. With Real Audio on your browser, you can hear the word and its definition and then try to spell it on your own. Have

a dictionary handy! This Guide to Grammar and Writing also has a series of spelling tests that can be used as vocabulary builders: go to the section on Spelling and choose the spelling tests.

            Javascript Vocabulary Stretchers, offers a new computer graded vocabulary test (ten words) every week. Wide World of Words (also available as a weekly e-mail newsletter). You can spend days wandering through the maze of word-games and language resources listed in Word Play.

Crossword puzzles are an excellent way to develop vocabulary. Do the puzzles that appear in local newspaper on a daily or weekly basis or try these interactive crossword puzzles on the internet.