Lexicology Exercises

Lexicology,
PHRASEOLOGY
1) What is an idiom? Consider the following examples that are ambiguous in the sense that two
interpretations can be assigned to them. State these two different meanings in each case and say in
which contexts they are appropriate.
1. She has a tongue.
2. He has the Sword of Damocles hanging over his head.
3. All went down the drain.
4. Keep your chin up!
5. What have you got up your sleeve?
6. She was skating on thin ice.
7. They were left out in the cold.
8. When one person sneezes, another catches cold.
2) There are instances where literal meaning does not make sense (e.g. to have green fingers, storm
in a teacup). Give more examples to show inappropriateness of the literal interpretation of the
idiom.
3) Idioms are typically metaphorical: they are metaphors that have become petrified and fossilized
(black sheep).
4) Find out what the underlined idioms mean:
1. She hardly socializes at all: shes a bit of an odd-ball.
2. When I look at models with all that over-the-top make-up, I think, What happens when you
take your face off, when they see you in the morning?
3. Each design is very different in style. Some are subtle, some gloriously OTT.
4. Before I got involved in this I used to think that mountaineers were a little bit round the bend.
5. These are, for the most part, ordinary middle-of-the-road people who want the usual things out
of life.
6. His political ideas are very much middle-of-the-road.
5) Here are some idiomatic adjective and noun phrases and their meaning: animal spirits natural
cheerfulness, arch look a sly, significant look, bad blood vicious temper, blind alley a
lane closed at one end. Find out the meaning of the following idioms:
black sheep ___________________, blue stocking ___________________, cold feet
___________________, cold shoulder ___________________, cold war ___________________,
crocodile tears ___________________, diamond wedding ___________________, French leave
___________________, Dutch courage ___________________, hush money
___________________, queer fish ___________________, swan song ___________________.
6) Here are some eye idioms for you to say what they mean and to use them in context:
before your eyes, cant take your eyes off someone, feast your eyes on something, have eyes in the
back of your head, keep your eyes peeled, only have eyes for someone, open someones eyes, eyeopener, keep your eyes open, up to your eyes, with your eyes closed, with your eyes glued to
something.
7) Match the following fish idioms with their meaning:
1. A big fish 2. A big fish in a small pond. 3. A small fish in a big pond. 4. A cold fish.
5. Drink like a fish. 6. A fish out of water. 7. Have other fish to fry. 8. Have bigger fish to fry.
9. Like shooting fish in a barrel. 10. Neither fish nor fowl. 11. There are plenty more fish in the
sea.
Idiom meanings: 1. Difficult to identify, classify or understand.
2. There are still many other people you can be happy with.
3. The weaker side has no chance at all of winning.
4. Feel awkward or ill at ease because you are in an unfamiliar situation.
5. Not interested because you have more important, interesting, or profitable things to do.
6. Not interested because you have something else to do.
7. Drink a lot of alcohol.
8. Unemotional, unfriendly and unsympathetic.
9. Somebody not very important because they are part of a much larger organization.
10. Somebody who is one of the most important and influential people in a small organization or
social group.
11. Somebody very important and powerful.
8) Say what these sentences mean:
1. Kate thinks shes the bees knees.
2. When they showed her in everybody was in a state of shock: she was dressed up like a dogs
dinner.
3. I hate to say it, but this paper of yours is a dogs breakfast.
4. I was not impressed at all although it was meant to be a dog and pony show.
5. His career was ruined and everything went to the dogs.
6. In all honesty he will trick you, cheat you, use you, drop you, throw you to the dogs.
7. I think he has no feet on the ground and this idea of his is only a pie in the sky.
8. It was a horrific accident and they survived by the skin of their teeth.
9. I think you should challenge his opinion and not dance to his tune just because he is your
superior.
10. The show was excellent: the music was great and the costumes were out of this world.
9) Translate these English idioms into Serbian: by the skin of your teeth, jump out of your skin, out
of a clear blue sky, theres no smoke without fire, cover your tracks, get out of bed on the wrong
side, have a bee in your bonnet, beat your chest, drop a brick, have a finger in every pie, laugh
your head off, wet your whistle, a wolf in sheeps clothing, the bush telegraph.
10) Translate these Serbian idioms into English: drveni advokat, sitni sati, radio Mileva, bije ga
baksuz, svako zlo ima svoje dobro, bacati biser pred svinje, dua od ovjeka, ubiti nekoga u pojam,
podviti rep, igrati na jednu kartu, ne mrdnuti ni prstom, iroke ruke, deveta rupa na svirali, kom
obojci kom opanci.
11) Here are some English words and phrases whose meaning you cant work out on the basis of
your knowledge of the meaning of their constituent parts. We say that such words and phrases are
idiomatic: salad days, trim your sails, the salt of the earth, red herring, acid test, a fishing
expedition, shoot yourself in the foot, play gooseberry, grapevine, lose your marbles, if you pay
peanuts you get monkeys, learn the ropes, love birds, pig-headed, clockwork, glass-house, a smart
cookie, push up the daisies.
Meanings.
1. Offering a low salary will not attract skilled employees: _____________________

2. Two people who are obviously very much in love with each other: _________________
3. Gossip, or rumor from person to person: ___________________
4. A fact, idea, or subject that takes people's attention away from the central point being
considered: ____________________
5. To be dead: ___________________
6. The period of time when you were a young person and had little experience: _______________
7. Very regularly, or at exactly planned times: _________________
8. A test which will really prove the value, quality, or truth of something: __________________
9. Stupidly obstinate: _________________
10. Someone who is clever and good at dealing with difficult situations: __________________
11. A common hard working person: _________________
12. Lose one's mind; insanity; person who does not have common sense/wits:
_________________
13. To do something without intention, which spoils a situation for yourself: _______________
14. Make changes to suit ones new circumstances: __________________
15. A prison: ________________
16. To understand how to do a particular job or activity: ________________
17. An attempt to discover the facts about something by collecting a lot of information, often
secretly: _________________
18. To be an unwanted third person who is present when two other people, especially two people
having a romantic relationship, want to be alone: __________________
12) Here are some English proverbial sayings. Express their meaning in a non-idiomatic way. find
their equivalent sayings in the Serbian language.
1. What cant be cured must be endured.
2. Prevention is better than cure.
3. A rolling atone gathers no moss.
4. Rome was not built in a day.
5. Better late than never.
6. Easy come, easy go.
7. As you make your bed. So you must lie.
8. Too many cooks spoil the broth.
9. A stitch in time saves nine.
10. All his geese are swans.
11. Birds of a feather flock together.
12. You shouldnt put all your eggs in one basket.
13) Find six examples of familiar quotations (e.g. to be or not to be, to err is human, to forgive
divine, etc.).
Morphological operations
1) Define the grammatical category of definiteness. What does it denote?
2) What are the exponents of definiteness?
3) What are the allomorphs which realize the definite and indefinite article? Give the rules.
4) What is a tense as a grammatical category?

5) State both writing and pronunciation rules which regulate the realization of the past tense
marker in regular verbs. Illustrate.
6) Here are some verb forms with the past tense marker. Divide them into three groups
corresponding to three allomorphs which realize the past tense marker:
divided, snubbed, hopped, brimmed, concluded, manipulated, overpowered, reduplicated, glided,
compensated, predominated, surfaced, seemed, lulled, canned, coached, bridged, laughed,
occurred, mailed, served, wiped, air-conditioned, smoothed, played, regarded, sabotaged,
managed, banged, bequeathed, guided.
7) Define the grammatical category of modality. Two types can be distinguished. Explain and
illustrate.
8) The English verb has three moods. Which are they?
9) Define the grammatical category of aspect. What are the subcategories? Give examples.
10) In what way is the {ing} realized in speech and writing?

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Lexicology,

1. Offering a low salary will not attract skilled employees: _____________________

4) What is a tense as a grammatical category?

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