Tema 46 EOI

UPDATED EDITION CRISTÓBAL MARTÍNEZ ALFARO. INGLÉS.
EPO 1 -17
UNIT 46 ‘EOI’
THE WORD AS A LINGUISTIC SIGN.

HOMONYMY, SYNONYMY,
ANTONYM. POLYSEMY. “FALSE
FRIENDS”. LEXICAL CREATIVITY
By Cristóbal Martínez Alfaro
OUTLINE
1. INTRODUCTION.
2. THE WORD AS A LINGUISTIC SIGN.
3. HOMONYMY.
4. SYNONYMY.
5. ANTONYMS.
6. FALSE FRIENDS.
7. LEXICAL CREATIVITY.
8. CONCLUSION.
9. BIBLIOGRAPHY.
UPDATED EDITION CRISTÓBAL MARTÍNEZ ALFARO. INGLÉS. EPO 1 -17

1. INTRODUCTION.
Within the last decades there has been an increasing interest in Semantics. Many
scientists have re-examine the principles on which this branch of Linguistics is based;
others have looked into specific aspects of signification, and others have focused their
attention on Semantics of some particular languages. Research in this field has been
revitalized due to the great revolution that has taken place in modern Linguistics; the
new conception of Language as a highly organized structure, made up of interdependent
elements, and the verification of the fact that words play an essential role in the function
of modelling our thoughts and guiding them through certain channels. Recent advances
in philosophy, psychology, anthropology, new communication devises, and many
others, have also had an important impact on the study of meaning.
Two main branches of Linguistics take care of words: Etymology, the study of
the origin of words, and Semantics, the study of the meaning of words. The former has
been established as discipline since ancient times, whereas the latter is a comparatively
new discipline. It was in the 19th century when the term Semantics was coined and
when Semantics was considered as an important part of Linguistics.
This does not mean that meaning problems had not been studied before. On the
contrary, ancient theorists made important observations about the sense and use of
words. They found several essential problems about the semantic chance. In fact, most
main topics of modern Semantics were already outlined by Ancient Greek and Latin
writers.
Nevertheless, as it has been stated above, the two last decades of the 19th c.
brought about a particular interest in the topic. Germany is the country where there first
started to appear numerous specialised studies.
At classroom level, this unit connects with the semantic or lexical contents
included in the concepts of any didactic exploitation, therefore it is convenient to
include some of the exercises listed below:
 Matching columns where synonyms are used.
 Matching words and their definitions.
 Tick the odd one out of a series where words share some similarity or, on the
contrary, some difference.
 Word formation.

 Crosswords.
 Word spotting.
 Spelling.
2. THE WORD AS A LINGUISTIC SIGN.
o Definition of sign.
Sign is a feature of language or behaviour which conveys meaning, especially
when used conventionally within a system (such as speech, writing, gesture, dance);
also called a symbol (but many writers make a distinction between these terms). The
term was particularly used by Ferdinand de Saussure to summarize the two-way,
arbitrary relationship which exists between a vehicle (a signifier, French signifiant) and
a meaning (a signified, French signifié). The relationship itself is known as
signification.
According to Saussure, the word is an entity of two sides, namely signifier and
signified. Both of them are related to an extra-linguistic "object" called the referent.
On the one hand, the above-mentioned elements of a given word are involved in
a process of interaction with the same elements of other words, given rise therefore to
certain phenomena; the so-called homonymy, as in "SALE" /seil/ and "SAIL" /seil/, two
words which have the same pronunciation but different meaning and form, this case
being one of homophony, which must be contrasted to homography, where two words
are spelt in the same way but are different in pronunciation and meaning; synonymy,
exemplified in "HAPPENING" and "INCIDENT"; and antonymy, as in "HUGE" and
"TINY".
On the other hand, the concept of "false friends" comes from the interaction
between such elements, yet belonging to the lexicon of different linguistic systems. For
instance, this can be noticed in the pair of words "ACTUALLY" and
"ACTUALMENTE", which despite their similarities in form, often leading to
confusion, differ in meaning.
Finally, as a result of the creative side of language, mainly due to the symbolic
function of the linguistic sign, we will deal with lexical creativity, which in relation to
words leads us to consider multiple and metaphoric designation, metonymy, people's
etymology and ellipsis.

3. HOMONYMY.
o Definition.
We used the term homonymy to refer to words which have the same form but
different meaning, as in ear (of a body’ or ‘of corn’). Partial homonymy (heteronymy1)
takes place when the identity is within a single medium (speech or writing), as in
homophony2 (for sounds) and homography3 (for spelling). When there is ambiguity
between homonyms, a homonymic clash is said to have occurred.
o Sources.
Homonymy is much less common and less complex than polysemy, although its
effects may be as serious and even more dramatic. There are only three ways through
which homonymy may arise, and the third of them is of a secondary importance.
1) Phonetic Convergence.
The most common cause for homonymy to occur is the development of
convergent sounds. Under the influence of common phonetic changes, two or more
words which used to have different forms coincide in both spoken and, sometimes, in
the written language. The process is so simple that just a few examples will help to
understand it:
OE melo > meal ‘flour’
/mi:l/
OE mael > meal ‘food’
Old Scandinavian ras > race (e.g. car race)
/reis/
French race > race (e.g. human race)
OE mete > meat
OE metan > meet
OE metan > mete
This sort of homonymy is very common in languages with a high average of
monosyllabic terms; thus, it is especially frequent in English and French, whereas in
German and Italian is not so spread, because the phonetic substance of the words has
1
Threw and through are heteronyms, identical in sound but not in spelling, as are tear (in clothing) and
tear (from the eye), identical in spelling but not in sound.
2
It is applied to words which have the same pronunciation but different meanings, as in rode and rowed.
3
Orthographic system where there is one-to-one correspondence between symbols and sounds, as in
some alphabets. It contrasts with heterography, where the system lacks this correspondence. The
clearest example of a homographic system is the International Phonetic Alphabet.
been kept. Another factor favouring homonymy is the loss of final consonants, that is
why there are fewer homonyms in English than in French. But, although it is clearly
assumed that some languages have a larger number of homonyms than others, it is not
difficult to find examples of homonymy by chance.
o Semantic Divergence.
Homonymy may also occur through the development of divergent meanings.
When two or more meanings of the same word are separated to the point of not being an
evident connection between them, polysemy will give way to homonymy and the word
unit will be destroyed.
Pupil (student) and pupil (part of the eye).
To long (miss) and long (as opposed to short).
Sole (particular sort of fish) and sole (part of a shoe, in contact with the ground).
Still (quiet) and still (adverb with actions not finished, but already started).
The change from polysemy to homonymy and viceversa poses the same
problem, since we are unable to measure the grade of proximity of the meanings, as
Bloomfield declared, it is difficult to say where polysemy ends and where homonymy
starts. The question has a direct relation with a lexicographer’s job, since he is supposed
to decide, in each case, whether certain doubtful homonyms must be registered as just
one word or two words.
o Foreign Influence.
Many foreign words have been introduced in other languages, such as English,
and they have been considered as homonyms, such as we have already seen in some of
the examples given. In certain cases, such homonymy has led to serious conflicts; that is
the case of the following pairs of words:
gate (door, entrance < OE geat) and gate (path, street < Scandinavian gata)
straight (direct, undeviating < ME stregt) and strait (narrow, confined < French estreit,
and at the same time from Latin strictus).
When a borrowed word is firmly established in its new surrounding, it will be
adapted to the local phonetic system, and from then on it will take part in the normal
changes of the sounds.
4. SYNONYMY.

o Definition.
The term Synonymy is used to indicate the relation between of sameness of
meaning between lexical items. Items are synonyms if they are close enough in meaning
to allow a choice to be made between them in some contexts, without this affecting the
meaning of the sentence as a whole; an example is a nice range/selection/choice of
flowers.
o Differences between synonyms.
Words, according to what Dr Johnson once suggested, are seldom exact
synonyms. Macaulay expressed the same idea in terms that, by themselves, are
recommended to a modern linguist: ‘Change the structure of a sentence, replace a
synonym by another one, and the total effect will be destroyed’ 4. In contemporary
linguistics is has become almost axiomatic the fact that absolute synonymy does not
exist. Bloomfield considered that ‘each linguistic form has a constant and specific
meaning. If the forms are phonemically different, we suppose that their meaning also
are different - for instance, that each one of a set of forms like quick, fast, swift, rapid,
speedy, differs from all the others in some constant and conventional feature of
meaning... We suppose, in short, that there are no actual synonyms’ 5. Long before
Bloomfield, Bréal had spoken of a ‘law of distribution’ in the language, according to
which ‘words that should be synonyms, and which used to be in the past, have acquired
different meanings and they are not interchangeable any longer’6.
Although there is, no doubt, a lot of true content in what has been stated above,
it would be wrong to deny the possibility of absolute synonymy. Paradoxically, we find
it wherever it is expected the least: in technical nomenclature. The fact that scientific
terms are precisely delimited and emotionally neutral, allows us to find out whether two
of them are completely interchangeable, and absolute synonymy is, therefore, not
infrequent. Recent studies about the formation of industrial terminology have proved
that there will appear several synonyms about a new invention, until they finally
separate from one another.
However, it is perfectly true that absolute synonymy is opposed to the general
way of how language is considered. When we see different words, we indistinctively
suppose that there must be some difference in meaning, and, in most cases, there is a
4
Both references are from NED; this abbreviation stands for A New English Dictionary on Historical
Principles, commonly known as The Oxford English Dictionary.
5
Bloomfield, L.: Language, p. 145. Unwin University Books. London, 1973.
6
Bréal, M., Essai de sémantique. Science des significations. 5th edition, Paris, 1921.
distinction, however difficult it is to formulate it. Very few words are completely
interchangeable in any context without the slightest change of the objective meaning,
sentimental tone or evocating value.
Professor W. E. Collinson7 carried out an interesting attempt to tabulate the most
typical differences between synonyms. He distinguishes nine possibilities:
1. When one term is more general than the other, e.g. refuse - reject.
2. When one term more intense than the other, e.g. repudiate - refuse.
3. When one term is more emotive than the other, e.g. reject - decline.
4. A term may imply approval of moral censorship, whereas the other one is neutral,
e.g. thrifty - economical.
5. When one term is more professional than the other, e.g. decease - death.
6. When one term is more literary than the other: passing - death.
7. When one term is more colloquial than the other, e.g. turn down - refuse.
8. When one term is more local or dialectal than the other, e.g. flesher (Scottish ) -
butcher.
9. One of the terms belongs to children’s talk, e.g. daddy - father.
The best method for synonym delimitation is that of substitution proposed by
Macaulay. This is one of the essential procedures of modern linguistics, and, in the case
of synonyms, it reveals, at the same time, whether, and to which extent they are
interchangeable. If the difference is mainly objective, a certain partial superposition will
be found in the meaning; the terms under consideration may be interchangeable in some
contexts, but not in others. So, broad and wide are synonyms in some of their uses:
broadest sense is the same as widest sense. In other contexts, only one of them can be
used: we say five foot wide and not broad; but we say broad accent but not wide. If, on
the other hand, the difference between synonyms is basically emotive or stylistic,
superposition is not possible at all, no matter how close synonyms are with regard to
their objective meaning, they belong to different registers or to completely different
levels of style, and they cannot normally be interchangeable. It is difficult to imagine
any context - except one deliberately comic or ironical - where mingy can replace
avaricious, or where pop off (‘suddenly get away’) can be replaced by pass away
(leave).
7
W. E. Collinson, Comparative Synonyms: Some Principles and Illustrations, Transactions of the Philological Society, 1939, pp.
54-77.
We may also distinguish synonyms by finding their antonyms, that is their

opposed words. So, decline is more or less the synonym of reject when it means the
opposed to accept, but not when it is opposed to rise. Deep is partly equivalent to
profound in ‘deep sympathy’, where its opposed would be superficial, but not in ‘deep
water’, where its antonym is shallow.
Another way of differentiating synonyms consists of ordering them in groups,
where their meanings and distinctive tones will be highlighted by contrast, such as in
the following examples, where several adjectives denote speed: quick, swift, fast,
nimble, fleet, rapid, speedy8.
There is an amusing example of the differences between synonyms in As You
Like It, act V, scene 1, where Touchstone uses his professional wit against a young
illiterate peasant:
Therefore, you clown, abandon - which is in the vulgar leave - the society -which
in the boorish is company - of this female - which in the common is woman -
which together is: abandon the society of this female; or, clown, thou perishest;
or, to thy better understanding, diest; or, to wit, I kill thee, make thee away,
translate thy life into death9.
The distinction between synonyms is a big challenge to the lexicography’s
originality. For many languages there exist special dictionaries on synonyms; in France,
there is a long tradition of them which culminated with the well-known Dictionnaire
des synonymes de la langue française, by B. Lafaye.
o Synonym Models.
Synonym resources of a language tend to form certain characteristic and partly
consistent models. In English, for instance, synonyms are organised according to two
basic principles, one of them bearing a double scale and the other a triple one.
The double scale -’Saxon’ against ‘Latin’, as it is commonly called, is rather
well-known to be commented on. There is an endless number of pair of synonyms
where a native term is opposed another one taken from French, Latin or Ancient Greek.
In most cases the native word is more spontaneous, less formal and pretentious, whereas
the foreign word frequently has a rather learned, abstract and even abstruse load. There
8
About this group of synonyms, see G. Stern, ‘Swift, Swiftly’ and their Synonyms. A Contribution to Semantic Analysis and
Theory, XXVII, 1921.
9
“Por consiguiente, rústico, abandonad (o, en lenguaje vulgar, dejad) la sociedad (que en estilo grosero es compañía) de esta
hembra (que en idioma común se llama mujer); palabras que, en conjunto, quiren decir: rústico, abandona la sociedad de esta mujer,
o pereces; o, para hacértelo comprender mejor, mueres; o sea que te mato, que te extermino, que cambio tu vida en muerte.”
Shakespeare, Obras completas, Madrid, pág. 1951.
may also be emotive differences: the Saxon term is usually warmer and more intimate
than its foreign counterpart. At the same time, phonetically, the latter may have
sometimes a strange appearance, non assimilated.
It is important to list a few examples of this synonym norm. All the main parts of
a sentence are involved in the process:
Adjectives:
bodily corporeal
brotherly fraternal
heavenly celestial
idle otiose
inner internal
learned erudite
lying mendacious
sharp sooty
starry sidereal
Verbs:
answer reply
buy purchase
read peruse
tire (weary) fatigue
Nouns:
fiddle violin
friendship amity
help aid
player actor
wire telegram
wireless radio
world universe
o Synonymy and style.

Aristotle in his Rhetoric made an interesting remark about the difference

between synonymy and ambiguity. According to him, synonyms are ‘useful for the
poet’, whereas ‘ambiguous meaning words are useful above all to let the sophist mislead
his listeners’. Synonymy is a stylistic device really valuable not only for the poet, but
also for any writer, and it may have uses. These uses are included in two wide
categories according to whether the speaker may have to choose among synonyms or
prefer to combine them with some specific purpose.
1. Choosing among synonyms. The possibility to choose between two or more words
is essential for our modern conception of style, and synonymy provides one of the most
clear examples of such a choice. If we have more than one word for the expression of
the very same idea, the writer will select that which is most convenient for the text; that
providing the appropriate quantity of emotion and emphasis, that which fits
harmoniously best the phonetic structure of the sentence.
2. Synonym combination. It is very interesting and varied as it implies the stylistic
uses of synonym combination. Here we find two possibilities: either the synonyms may
appear at intervals, or they may be in close contact with one another. The former is
called variation and the latter placement of synonyms.
a) Variation. We all use synonyms to avoid the repetition of the very same word in
order to express the same idea. However, there are two different sorts of danger, from
which we must protect ourselves. Firstly, the use of another term may suggest that the
meaning is also slightly different, and it may lead to ambiguity or error. Whenever there
is such a risk, a good stylist will take into account the advantages and disadvantages of
using the same word, and, if there is not any other alternative, he/she will not hesitate to
use it rather than make a fake of his/her thought.
Another inherent risk of this use of synonyms is what H. W. Fowler called
elegant variation. If it is obvious for the reader that the writer has deliberately tried to
avoid using repetition and has changed the expression of the same thought, then the
device will frustrate his/her own purposes and the style will have a false elegance, a
slightly artificial touch.
b) Placement. This can have a certain number of different uses. This may mean an
exit to violent emotions. The first soliloquy of Hamlet starts with a passionate
accumulation of synonyms:
O, that this too too solid flesh would melt,
Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew!
Act I, scene 2.
An important function of such placement of synonyms is to make the meaning of
one synonym clearer and more emphatic. In the Middle Ages a French word used to be
explained by adding a native word to it. As time went by, this phenomenon turned into a
literary figure used by Chaucer, Shakespeare and others. The phrase ‘liberty and
freedom’, which has become rather popular in modern times, is already found in
Caxton, who seems to have been particularly keen on this structure: ‘Fredome and
lyberte is better than ony gold or syluer’. Some compounds and tautologies: courtyard,
mansion-house, lord and master, pray and beseech, and others, go back to the same
tradition.
One type of language where synonym is endemic is legal style: ‘goods and
chattels’, last will and testament’, good repair, order and condition’. Charles Dickens
parodied this legal language by means of Mr Micawber who enjoyed himself using
accumulating formal words.
When we find these tautologies in poetry, we have the impression of just filling
in a verse. That is the case found in Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage:
Away! - there need no words nor terms precise,
The paltry jargon on the marble mart ...
Chant IV, 50.10
we feel that the placement of words and terms does not aim at clarifying of
emphasising, but at achieving the number of syllables needed.
Occasionally, the placement of synonyms will help to produce a contrast effect.
The contrast may be serious or humorous.
We can conclude that the placement of synonyms is a stylistic device, but the
election and variation, when handle with care, are not merely useful but indispensable
for any style entitled to be called so.
5. ANTONYMS.
o Definition.
Antonymy is a type of sense relation expressing the meaning of oppositeness;
for example, the contrast between hot and cold. A distinction is sometimes drawn
between gradable antonyms, where it is possible to express degrees of the difference
10
“¡Fuera! No hay necesidad de palabras ni términos precisos, la jerga vil del marmóreo
mercado ...”
(as with hot and cold), and ungradable antonyms, where there is an either/ or contrast
(as with single and married). This distinction can be illustrated by the acceptable forms
hotter and hottest, and the unacceptable forms *more single and *most single.
Antonymy is a semantic phenomenon which results from the human tendency to
organize "reality" according to a binary system. It is a semantic phenomenon given that
it only involves semantic criteria without taking into account spelling and
pronunciation, yet it must be pointed out that morphology can play an important role in
the formation of these antonymous dualities. Such dualities can be illustrated with the
following examples: "high" vs. "low", "heaven" and "hell", "asleep" and "awake",
"light" and "darkness", "left" and "right", "kind-unkind", "approve" and "disapprove",
etc.
When carrying out an approach to the topic of antonymy, we must bear in mind
two concepts: dichotomization and opposition. Dichotomization, on the one hand, is the
result of the human trend to think in opposites, according to Lyons, in his work
Semantics II page 271. This can be clearly seen in the following antonyms: "male" and
"female", "to fall" and "to pass", "alive" and "dead", "animate" and "inanimate",
"organic" and "inorganic". On the other hand, within the concept of opposition, we
cannot find any "dichotomy". The difference can be easily noticed in that in a case of
dichotomization there is no possibility of inserting a term in a scale of opposition,
whereas in opposition, other terms may be easily inserted. Examples of opposition are
"sad" and "happy", "slow" and "fast", "a lot" and "a little", where some can be inserted
between the two terms.
o Gradable and ungradable antonyms.
As a result of these two phenomena, we see that they give rise of two types of
antonyms. First, we have the ungradable antonyms which, as it may be deduced from
the last paragraph, come from dichotomization. Example of this type are "ill" and
"healthy", "day" and "night", "single" and "married", "native" and "foreigner", "in" and
"out", "winner" and "looser", "minimum" and "maximum", etc.
And second, we are confronted with gradable antonyms which come from
opposition. Gradable antonyms, as it has been stated when considering opposition, are
the ones in which other terms can be inserted, as for instance in "upper class" and
"lower class", in which we can insert "middle-class", "heaven" and "hell", where "earth"
can be placed between them; "many" and "flew", where "some" can be inserted.
o Morphologically related and unrelated antonyms.
Moving to another linguistic level and still regarding the different types of
antonyms, the distinction between morphologically related and morphologically
unrelated antonyms must be added. Concerning the first type, it has to be pointed out
that they are the antonyms which have a morphological connexion between them as for
instance "moral" and "immoral", "sane" and "insane", "gradable" and "ungradable",
"certain" and "uncertain", "planned" and "unplanned", "agree" and "disagree", "like"
and "dislike", "noise" and "noiseless", etc. As it can be clearly noticed, the
morphological link is often a prefix, often being "in-" or "un-", but also "dis-". Some
times suffixes can also be considered as opposition markers as "less" in "noiseless" and
"restless". Concerning the second type of type within this morphological division of
antonyms, it must be said that no opposition markers are noticeable in these antonyms.
Examples of this type are "slow" and "fast", "leisure" and "work", "dark" and
"light", "high" and "low", "deep" and "shallow", "big" and "small", "wide" and
"narrow", "clean" and "dirty", "senior" and "junior", "short" and "tall", "thin" and
"fat", ....
6. FALSE FRIENDS.
False friends are words in different languages which resemble each other in
form, but which express different meanings; also called false cognates, and often
known by the French equivalent expression faux amis /fo:za mi:/. Examples include
French demander, which translates into English as ‘to request’ not ‘to demand’, and
Italian caldo, which translates as ‘warm’ not ‘cold’.
Broadly speaking, the problem of "false friends" is a result of the similarities of
signifiers, either in pronunciation or in spelling, between two words belonging to
different languages or linguistic systems.
According to Peter Newmark in his Approaches to Translation, the so-called
"false friends", a type of interference at the lexical and semantic level, are the translators
worst problem of "false friends", according to the same author problem, as well as the
language learner's (page 162). The derives from the fact that many English words have
other meanings when used in the L2 code by means of a process of adaptation carried
out by L2 learners. In other cases the words have an etymological sense but within a
given context, the meaning changes. Some examples which clearly illustrate what has
been mentioned above are the following cases of similarity in the signifiers of Spanish
and English words with different meanings: "responsible" and "responsable", "fatal" and
"fatal", "sensible" and "sensible" and "sensible", "insane" and "insano", "embarrassed"
and "embarazada", etc. These pairs of words may cause problems to Spanish speaking
learners of English and English speaking learners of Spanish. So it would not be strange
to hear a Spanish student saying "I'm fatal", meaning he or she is not feeling well, or
"John is not very responsible" meaning he or she does not study at all.
Concerning the implications of this particular subject, it must be said that, Peter
Newmark states that the solution for translator is to regard dictionaries, grammars and
works on linguistics with caution, and also to take into account the maximum number of
sources and a context sensitive arrangement. This same advice can also be adopted by
language learners.
Another solution to this "hard nut to crack" is that linguists and teachers can
sometimes predict which words will be confusing by making a comparative study of the
languages concerned. This solution derives from the "Contrastive Analysis" proposed
by Chomsky and the behaviourist linguists.
7. LEXICAL CREATIVITY.
Words go up and down in the social scale, and it often happpens that a term,
which is now part of our daily vocabulary, used to be rejected not long ago as being
vulgar or slang. The term joke which appeared in the second half of the 17th c.,
probably coming from the Latin word jocus, used to be originally a slang term.
Lexical creativity can be defined as one of the main distinguishing features of
human language, by which it is possible to give several signifieds to one signifier, as
will be shown in the different cases with this phenomenon.
It must be pointed out that there are lots of rhetorical figures or figures of
speech, yet most of them may be used within the context of literature where language
displays its most powerful "colouring". That is why, given the large amount of figures
of speech, that we will mainly concentrate on metaphor and metonymy, the main
components of lexical creativity. But the modification of meaning may also derive from
the particular context in which a word is used; this is called contextual modulation.
Another important aspect in relation to creativity, is the concept of "multiple
designation" which is a result of the ability of a given speaker to relate an object to
several signifiers.
In addition to its literary use, metaphors are a device frequently used by speakers
to designate an object. It consists of the substitution of a word by another one, whose
meaning is involved in an analogical relationship with the replaced word.
For example in literature or poetry, the concept "warrior" is expressed with the
word "lion". On the contrary, the expression of the idiom "wet-blanket" denotes a
person who inhibits others in their enjoyment or enthusiasm. Another example is "live
wire" meaning a restless person. Within metaphor there are two types: on the one hand
metaphors which have become part of the linguistic system.
Within this group Ullman distinguishes:
- Man-related metaphors:
"The lungs of a town".
"The sinews of a war".
"The clock's hands".
- Animal-related metaphors:
e.g.: Some plants are given names of animals as in "dog's tail" and
"cock's foot", etc.
- Metaphors from the concrete to the abstract:
e.g.: "light" in "to throw light on something", and "high-lights" meaning
interesting details.
- Synaesthetic metaphor, that is, the transference from one sense to another:
e.g.: "warm voice", "cold voice", "piercing sounds", etc.
On the one hand, there are metaphors which are the result of the individual use
of language, that is the result of invention, as in the example "he's an eagle" meaning
someone with a very good sight.
Metonymy is another device which consists primarily of the designation of the
"whole" by one of its components as in military police "whole" by "red caps" part of
uniform. On the other hand it can be the designation of an "effect" by its "cause", as in
"the works of Horace" and the name "Horace" in a sentence such as "have you ever
read Horace?. In addition, within metonymy, we have to take into account that one word
may be used to designate an object which is physically very close in space to the object
designated primarily by that word, as in "Exmouth", which is an English town close in
space to the mouth of the river. Another type of metonymy is based on time
relationships, that is the name of an action or event can be transferred to something
which is previous to that action or otherwise, takes place afterwards, as for instance
"mass", referring to the catholic term which in its origin "mittere", meant the last part of
a church service, but nowadays we use the term "mass" to refer to the whole service.
Another example is "meeting" which actually points at or refers to the fact of two or
more people coming together, that is the moment when they gather. Yet "meeting" is
applied to the whole period of time spent by people discussing, or for a sports contest,
etc.
Another "instrument" of lexical creativity is "conceptual modulation". In other
words, the modification of the sense of a word by the context. "Conceptual modulation"
has two different effects; on the one hand, the effect of "promotion" which can be seen
in the following example: "Arthur poured the butter into a dish", in this sentence,
context helps us realize that the butter in question is hot. On the other hand, the effect of
"high-lighting" or "backgrounding" which in a sentence like "we cannot afford that
car", emphasizes the price of the car.
We also have to take into account within lexical creativity the so-called
"multiple designation". This is the possibility of giving a particular meaning several
signifiers. This is due to a little difference in those particular meanings. The case can be
illustrated in the following example: The possibility of calling a "book" a "volume",
when it belongs to an encyclopaedia, "essay", "treatise", "paper", "work", etc., that is
depending on some minimal distinguishing features. Such as whether it belongs to an
encyclopaedia, as research paper, etc.
Another "component" of lexical creativity, is what Ullman calls "people's
etymology". Speakers of a given language can alter the form or the content of a word by
connecting it to another word which is similar to the former in sound as can be seen in
the following example: The word "boon" means "request" or "favour", but the second
meaning derives from an analogy with the adjective "boon" meaning "generous" from
French "bon".
As a last point within this last part of the topic, we will deal with "ellipsis". This
phenomenon consists of two words which are often together and therefore have a great
influence on each other, being the consequence that one of them is omitted and its
meaning is included in the other. For instance this can be seen in the following example:
"daily paper", "daily".
8. CONCLUSION.

In this unit we have taken into account different phenomena which are studied
by Semantics. Therefore the content includes all the different aspects which make the
language seem rich, varied, and object of a stylistic study.
Words have been approached from the point of view of meaning, therefore, we
have analysed the linguistic sign, homonymy, synonymy, antonymy, false friends, to
end up with lexical creativity, in the last section of this topic.
9. BIBLIOGRAPHY.
 Baldinger, K., Semantic Theory. Basil, Blackwell, Oxford, 1980.

 Bloomfield, L., Language. Unwin University Books. London, 1973.
 Greenwood, J., Activity Box, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1999.
 Redman, S. et al., A Way with Words, Vocabulary activities – intermediate to upper
intermediate, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1997.
 The Pan Dictionary of Synonyms and Antonyms. Pan books Ltd. 1980.
 Ullman, S., Language and Style, Basil Blackwell, Oxford, 1964.
 Ullman, S., Semantics, An Introduction to the Science of Meaning. Basil Blackwell,
Oxford, 1962.

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UPDATED EDITION CRISTÓBAL MARTÍNEZ ALFARO. INGLÉS.

THE WORD AS A LINGUISTIC SIGN.

By Cristóbal Martínez Alfaro

2. THE WORD AS A LINGUISTIC SIGN.

UPDATED EDITION CRISTÓBAL MARTÍNEZ ALFARO. INGLÉS. EPO 1 -17

UPDATED EDITION CRISTÓBAL MARTÍNEZ ALFARO. INGLÉS. EPO 2 -17

2. THE WORD AS A LINGUISTIC SIGN.

UPDATED EDITION CRISTÓBAL MARTÍNEZ ALFARO. INGLÉS. EPO 3 -17

UPDATED EDITION CRISTÓBAL MARTÍNEZ ALFARO. INGLÉS. EPO 5 -17

We may also distinguish synonyms by finding their antonyms, that is their

o Synonymy and style.

UPDATED EDITION CRISTÓBAL MARTÍNEZ ALFARO. INGLÉS. EPO 9 -17

Aristotle in his Rhetoric made an interesting remark about the difference

UPDATED EDITION CRISTÓBAL MARTÍNEZ ALFARO. INGLÉS. EPO 16 -17

 Baldinger, K., Semantic Theory. Basil, Blackwell, Oxford, 1980.

UPDATED EDITION CRISTÓBAL MARTÍNEZ ALFARO. INGLÉS. EPO 17 -17

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