Lexical meaning includes several components. Traditionally they differentiate between 2 components: denotational; connotational.
One of the functions of words is to denote things concepts etc. users of a language cannot have only knowledge or thought of the object of the real word unless this knowledge is embodied in words. This is the denotational meaning. This component makes the communication possible.
Connotational — emotive charge and the stylistic value of the word. Almost all words have connotational meaning. e.g.: big, large, tremendous more emotional.
All the words in a certain language which contain a cultural connotation divide into:
1 words which denote unique notions and absent in other culture. Have no equivalents in other language. Exotic words — тайга, пельмени.
2 words which dont only denote the object but also point out to their characteristic features. E.g.: scone for English and Scotland it is a soft cake with dried fruit. For Americans it is a small biscuit baked on a grill.
3 words which possess some additional semantic and stylistic colouring known only to the people speaking this language.
The colour terms and phraseologies. There are cases when there is a direct connection between the structural pattern of the word and its meaning. This relationship between morphemic structure and meaning is termed morphological motivation.
Morphological motivation implies a direct connection between the lexical meaning of the component morphemes, the pattern of their arrangement and the meaning of the word. The degree of morphological motivation may be different varying from the external complete motivation to the lack of motivation
Phonetical motivation implies a direct connection between phonetic structure and its meaning. It is argued that speech sounds may suggest special and visual dimensions shape, size etc. Sound imitation — boom, splash. The sound clusters in these words are the direct imitation of sounds these words denote.
Semantic motivation implies a direct connection between the central and marginal meanings of the word. This connection can be regarded as metaphoric extension of the central meaning based on the similarity of different classes of reference denoted by words. e.g.: necessity is the mother of invention.
