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CONTEXT – keine Wortliste in Cambridge Advanced nötig

CONTEXT – keine Wortliste in Cambridge Advanced nötig

 

Read in less than 8 minutes 

Context Words

The average English speaker manages to amass around 60 000 words. It might sound ominous to an English learner, but it is not as phenomenal as it sounds.

 60 000 words?!

Truth be told, it needs to be broken down into active vocabulary (words we use) which only come down to 20 000, thus leaving a grand total of 40 000 passive words (words we understand but do not use).

Many have tried to popularize and market methods claiming to cater to people’s most pressing and immediate language needs; such was the case of ‘Globish’ or ‘Basic English –British American Scientific International and Commercial English’. Being quite keen on languages is a bias but the appeal of simplifying the language learning process seems logical because not everyone has the knack, the time or even the stamina to pursue a new language.

Regardless of how alluring that prospect was, sadly most failed to contemplate that even though you might only need between 300 and 600 words to survive – please let me emphasize survive – in an English-speaking country; you are still falling short by 400 more words in order to have a ‘normal’ conversation.

Basic English might have worked in the wake of WW2 but nowadays such conversations would have to for example allow the speaker to negotiate the terms of a contract so if you go down the ‘word list’ learning route; you will, without doubt, fall short.

ACCEPT, ACCEPT, ACCEPT

We need to take a hard long look at the face of the issue and accept that vocabulary acquisition never ever ends and if you think it does, you will only disappoint yourself.

So naturally you ought to ask yourself how to go about this problem and my succinct advice would be: become independent, context will set you free.

Your head is probably spinning wondering exactly what on earth do I mean by this…so we might as well start from the top.

WHAT IS CONTEXT?

Words in isolation lack meaning; this is particularly true if we are encountering them for the first time. Connections need to be made in order to make sense of vocabulary, and words are likely to have several meanings; so it is a daunting task if you attempt learning a list.

You could create many Quizlet flash cards describing all the possible relevant meanings but it will be a tedious task not many would enjoy. The rule of thumb is simple, the more meaningful connections we make, the more likely we are to recall the meanings. Context will foster making those connections.

Whenever, we use language, whether we are speaking, listening, reading or writing, we always do it in some kind of context. Language without context lacks important reference points for meaning and so it is not effective communication.

Strictly speaking, as a language learner, context refers to the events and circumstances that surround a word because language does not take place in a vacuum and cannot be separated from its context.

WHY CONTEXT?

Furthermore, phonetically speaking, English can be quite complex, and we might have to rely on it to understand which word the speaker is using. As it is the case of the number ‘two’ and the adverb ‘too’, subtract context from the equation and these isolated words would be very difficult to retain in your brain.

But consider:

After lunch I bought two ice cream cones because my friend wanted one too.

And hence the information falls into place.

It is not the same to refer to a chance, an opportunity or a possibility. Without a given context, it is very difficult to clarify and comprehend how they differ in meaning.

  • I have the chance to learn more with this new job.
  • This new job will be an opportunity to learn more.
  • There are more possibilities to learn at this new job.

So inevitably at this point you might take for granted that these words are interchangeable. However, if I were to alter the context this idea will start morphing.

‘Take chances, make mistakes. Welcome the opportunities that knock on your door and so the possibilities will be endless.’

If you truly wanted to dive into the subject, I could suggest registering to the British National Corpus type in the different words and this lovely fairy godmother will grant you over 100 examples in context per word. This tool was created in the late twentieth century by Oxford University in collaboration with the British Library to serve as a representation of both written and spoken British English from a wide variety of genres. However, if you are not enthralled by language this might turn out to be quite mind-numbing.

SIMPLICITY OVER EXCESS

Making context your best friend will allow you to cope when there is no dictionary or Google around to save you, so it is distinctly useful for exams. That being said, inferring meaning from context demands good language knowledge, therefore this would not be available to you if you were a beginner or an elementary English learner but then again you would probably not be reading this if that were the case.

It can be rather annoying to keep bumping into the same word over and over again without truly understanding its actual meaning so I would never ever banish the dictionary but instead force yourself not to depend on it, learn to guess the meaning and if need be, use the dictionary to check whether your educated guess was indeed correct.

5 STEP MENTAL WORK OUT

Learning to come to terms with ambiguity is key in language learning because words have several meanings and sometimes clarity seems to be hiding behind a veil of mist.

  1. Identifying parts of speech.

My apologies but you do need some background knowledge to deduce meaning. So is it a verb, an adjective, an adverb, etc?

  1. Look at the words and sentences around the unknown word.

Can you find a synonym or antonym in the text?

  1. When possible, break it down.

What is the root word? Can you identify any affixes?

  1. Give it meaning.

Throw accuracy out the window, and give it meaning; be it vague, be it questionable but let it allow you to continue to navigate the text. This can prove to be quite a challenge for most adults so here is an example:

‘Dark clouds appeared and a few minutes later, everyone at the football match was completely drenched. ‘

From context I can hypothesize that the state of being ‘drenched’ is a consequence of the menacing black clouds mentioned right at the beginning of the sentence. And what but water falls down from a cloud? So, I may conclude that they are probably very wet.

  1. Try a synonym in the sentence to see if it makes sense.

There is without a doubt a huge gap between theory and practice, so how many of you dare to figure out what the word ‘ambiguity’ means?

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