Semantic Overlapping Between the English and Nepali Verbs

Abstract

This thesis report is an attempt to study some English and Nepali verbsrelated to actions performed by different parts of the body. The mainpurpose of this study is to find out the English and Nepali verbs that areequivalent and that overlap in meaning.Mainly Primary sources wereused for the collection of data. However, some secondary sources werealso used for the analysis of meaning. The primary sources were thenative speakers of English and Nepali. They were selected usingjudgmental sampling procedure. Unstructured interviews were used forthe collection of data. At first the researcher used the Englishand Nepaliverbs in his own sentences. Then the native speakers checked andcorrected them.Componential analysis approach has been followed foranalysis and interpretation of the collected data. Some verbs, however,have also been studied through definitions. The verbs that are equivalentand that overlap in meaning have also been presented. The findingsof thestudyshow that there aremore English verbs than theNepali ones. Likewise, instances of semantic overlapping are more thanthose of semantic equivalence. Therefore, language teaching should focusmore on the words that overlap in meaning than the words that areequivalent. This thesis report contains four different chapters:The first chapter gives introduction, which includes general background,review of the related literature, objectives of the study and significance ofthe study. The second chapter deals with the methodology, which includes sourcesof data and population of the study, sampling produce, research tools,process of data collection and limitations of the study. The third chapter includes analysis and interpretation of the collecteddata. The fourth chapter presents the findings and recommendations, which arebased on analysis and interpretation.Finally, appendices have been presented. They include someEnglish andNepali sentences in meaningful contexts.