DERIVATIONAL PARADIGMS WITHIN SELECTED CONCEPTUAL FIELDS – CONTRASTIVE RESEARCH

Abstract

The paper discusses the nature of derivational paradigms and accounts of them as a combination of two parameters that establish a paradigmatic network. I tis demonstrated that there are no substantial differences between inflectional and derivational paradigms and that the only major difference concerns the saturation value, i.e., the degree of structural completeness of a paradigmatic network. It is emphasized that actual words are only one aspect of derivational paradigmaticity, theother one being an enormous potential capacity of the derivational system. A contrastive empirical research analyses three selected cognitive fields in three different languages in order to demonstrate the possibility the advantage of the parameter of saturatiuon value for contrastive examination of derivational systems of various languages.