COGNATES

A cognate is a word that comes from the same origin as a word in a different language. Cognates
generally have similarities in spelling, pronunciation, and meaning. So, even though I don’t speak
Spanish, I could discern that accidente was the same as an accident in English.

A cognate is a word that is related in origin to another word, such as the English word brother and
the German word bruder or the English word history and the Spanish word historia. The words were
derived from the same source, they are cognates (like cousins tracing their ancestry). Because they
come from the same origin, cognates have similar meanings and often similar spellings in two
different languages.             

Cognates are often derived from Romance languages (French, Spanish, Italian) that have their origins
in Latin, although some are derived from other language families (like Germanic).

English-Spanish Cognates

Using cognates to teach vocabulary can be helpful to English language learners (ELL), especially
those students whose native language is Spanish, because of the great amount of overlap between
the two languages.

Not only can you learn new-language words faster and infer meaning to figure words out in context,
but you can also remember the vocabulary more easily when the words are cognates. This kind of
language study can begin with learners as early as preschool age.

Problems that come with learning vocabulary through cognates include pronunciation and false
cognates. Two words might share similar spellings but be pronounced differently. For example, the
word animal  is spelled the same way in English and Spanish but pronounced with different stresses
in each language.
Three Types of Cognates
There are three different kinds of cognates. These cognates are still considered valid but have a few
distinctions that set them apart from each other.

1. Words that are spelled the same.

These words are exactly the same in English and another language. This is the most easily
identifiable cognate and doesn’t require much explanation to understand them.

1. Words that are spelled slightly differently.

These words may have an additional letter, but for the most part, are written the same in English
and another Romantic language. If you are reading and encounter a word that you don’t know, but
it is spelled like a word that you know in English, then it’s a safe bet that you have encountered a
cognate.
3. Words that are spelled differently, but sound similar. You may encounter a word that looks
completely different than it’s English counterpart, but after saying the word aloud, you may be able
to identify the word. For example, initial in English and incial in Spanish are cognates.
EXAMPLES: nourish: nutrir, controversy: controversia, abortion: aborto, government: gobierno.

FALSE COGNATES
False cognates are pair of words that seem to be cognates because of similar sounds and meaning
but actually have different etymologies they can be within the same language or from different
languages.

The false cognates or false friends recognize a common origin in Latin but they evolved with a
certain meaning in English and with a partially or totally different one in Spanish.

False  cognates are etymologically related but no longer overlap in meaning between the languages;

their meanings may be related but also opposite (in English an auditorium is a place for a large
gathering, where as in Spanish an auditorio is an audience; stretch means 'to extend' in English
but estretcher in Spanish is 'to make narrow'). Accidental cognates  are not etymologically related
but just happen to share form (English juice and Spanish juicio, 'judge').

The first definition of the term false friends is found in 1928 in the book Les Faux Amis ou Les
Trahisons du Vocabulaire Anglais by the French Maxime Koesler and Jules Deroc. In this interesting
manual the authors restricted the term to the false friends between the English and French
languages, but over time the term was extended to the rest of the world languages.

The term "false cognate" is sometimes misused to refer to false friends, but the two phenomena are
distinct. False friends occur when two words in different languages or dialects look similar, but have
different meanings. While some false friends are also false cognates, many are genuine cognates. For
example, English pretend and French prétendre are false friends, but not false cognates, as they have
the same origin
False friends don't just exist in English. Other Romance languages such as French, Italian or
Portuguese can confuse us and cause us to make translation errors that in certain texts can be very
serious. For this reason, it is essential that translations of corporate documents, web environments or
virtual stores, international contracts and agreements, certificates or birth certificates - to give just a
few examples - are carried out by a professional and highly qualified translation agency.

Examples:

 an abstract: resumen (and no abstracto)

 to achieve: lograr (and no archivar, that is to file)
 carpet: alfombra (and no carpeta, that is folder)

“Estoy constipado” in Spanish means “I have a cold”. Its false cognate in English, “I am constipated”,
has a completely different meaning. This is an example of a false cognate that often appears.
Another example is :
“She is embarrassed”
Spanish speakers could confuse the term “embarrased” with “pregnant” but the first term has
nothing to do with the second shown, so this confusion turns “embarrased” into a false cognate of
“pregnant” and vice versa.

PHRASEOLOGY
In linguistics, phraseology is the study of set or fixed expressions, such as idioms, phrasal verbs, and other
types of multi-word lexical units (often collectively referred to as phrasemes), in which the component
parts of the expression take on a meaning more specific than, or otherwise not predictable from, the sum
of their meanings when used independently.

Phraseology, a discipline of linguistics, has the fundamental purpose of

identifying and analyzing various lexical units that show certain expressions,
postures and behaviors of the speakers who use them. One of these lexical
units is the saying that expresses and perpetuates the wisdom and language
of a people.
Phraseology is essentially devoted to the study of ready-made linguistic
elements that can be used by the speaker in concrete communicative
situations.
Although phraseology is a fundamental part of the language and occupies an
important space within the lexicon of every native speaker, its teaching in
the mother tongue is testimonial.
PHRASEOLOGICAL UNIT
Se considera unidad fraseológica la combinación de palabras caracterizada por presentar un cierto grado
de fijación o idiomaticidad, esto es, se trata de combinaciones de palabras cuyo significado no se deduce
necesariamente del significado de los componentes por separado y tienen limitada "la modificación, la
sustitución, la adición de complementos o cualquier otra alteración de su estructura”. Por ejemplo, en
español: paño de lágrimas, dar calabazas, eso es harina de otro costal, dicho y hecho, de tal palo tal
astilla.
En fraseología se consideran, en términos amplios y no estrictamente hablando, unidades fraseológicas
la locución, el enunciado fraseológico y la colocación.
La clasificación más común de los tipos de unidades fraseológicas es:

Colocaciones: combinación frecuente de palabras con un significado claro.

Locuciones: mezcla de palabras cuyo significado no siempre es literal.

Enunciados fraseológicos: paremias o refranes.

La unidad fraseológica debería cumplir, al menos, dos condiciones esenciales: fijación e

idiomaticidad

Fijación: En el ámbito fraseológico, la fijación debe ser entendida como algo que el hablante
almacena y tiende a reproducir sin descomponer la unidad en elementos constituyentes. Eso quiere
decir, que el hablante usa un grupo de palabras que ha sido previamente creado y unido, que
constituya una estructura fija con cierto significado.

Idiomaticidad: la idiomaticidad se define como la imposibilidad de determinar el significado de una

unidad fraseológica a partir de la suma de los significados de sus componentes; una concepción que
la sitúa en equivalencia directa con la idea de no composicionalidad semántica.