Semantics COMPILED BY MARIAM JASMINE SAAKA D Thakur Scanned with CamScannerOne Some General Observations What is Semantics? The study of meaning is in a sense as old as man’s analytical awareness of language. Semantics as a separate discipline in its own right is of a very recent origin, however. In view of the information available in the published literature on the subject, it can be said that among scholars in Modern European languages it was M Breal, who in the year 1893 coined the French word semantique from the Greek word semantikos (significant) and used it for the first time. In 1894 the word semantics was used for the first time in English in a paper read to the American Philological Association. Until about the end of the 18th century this subject was confined to a historical study of changes in the meaning of words. In his famous article ‘The Problem of Meaning in Primitive Languages’ published in 1893, Malinowski for the first time in English used this word in a non-historical sense. Breal was perhaps the second well-known scholar who in his book Semantics: Studies in the Science of Meaning published in 1900 used this word in its present sense of a systematic study of what meaning, is and how it operates. A great deal of research has been done in the field of semantics during the last few decades and these days this discipline has established itself as one of the primary branches of language studies, Historical semantics continues to be a worthwhile intellectual pursuit but semantics as such is no longer confined to the study of meaning in its historical perspective. 1 Scanned with CamScanner2 Linguistics Simplified: Semantics It is, however, not enough to realize that semantics is not just , historical study of the changes in the meanings of words. It woulq perhaps be in order at this stage to have greater clarity about wha; semantics is not. This clarity is necessary particularly in view of the fact that when politicians, journalists, etc., talk about semantics in non-technical sense they tend to project either a laudatory or an excessively pejorative view of this subject. There are people, for example, who seem to believe that many of the misunderstandings that arise at the individual, national or international level are caused by a lack of a proper understanding of the speaker's or the writer's intentions. These people seem to think that a study of semantics will enable us to have a proper understanding of each other and will, therefore, help to reduce tension. To quote Leech (1981:xi), semantics “was popularized in the 1930s and 1940s by a school of thought—that of general semantics—which holds that the study of communicative processes can be a powerful force for good in the resolution of human conflict, whether on an individual, local or international scale”. Similarly, there are people outside the profession of linguistics who use the word semantics in a pejorative sense. As Crystal (1987:100) has said, a pejorative sense of the term that has developed in popular use can be noticed “when people talk about the way language can be manipulated in order to mislead the public”. To illustrate the pejorative use of this word, Crystal gives the example of “Unemployment reduced to semantics” as a possible headline in a newspaper. This headline might be intended to suggest that a misleading procedure of counting has been used to distort the actual figures about unemployment, It is necessary to emphasize here that semantics as a branch of linguistics has little to do with the mistaken expectations created by such popular uses of the word. Semantics is a systematic study of what meaning is and how it operates, It is as much a branch of linguistics as phonology, morphology and syntax and is intended to be studied with the same analytical rigour with which these other branches of linguistics are studied. To say that semantics is a clever device for misleading people would be similar to saying that astronomy is not a scientific study of the universe but a magical manipulation of planets and Scanned with CamScannerSome General Observations 3 stars for winning and influencing people. Jvct as it is necessary to guard against the pejorative use of the word semantics, one needs to be judiciously sceptical about the excessively unrealistic expectation that semantics may lead to a better understanding at the individual, social, national and international levels and can make this world a better place by reducing tension. Semantics is a serious academic discipline like any other branch of theoretical knowledge. It aims at providing a clear understanding of how language operates at the level of meaning. It is, in other words, a serious and systematic study of how meaning is structured, expressed and understood in the use of a language. Does it, therefore, mean that semantics has no practical application at all? Does it mean, in other words, that in semantics meaning must be studied for its own sake and in its own terms with a zero possibility for an improvement in our linguistic behaviour? The answer is no. If studied in a proper spirit, it can certainly help us to improve our linguistic behaviour. In this connection Leech (1981:xi) says the following: .-. the more we understand the cognitive and communicative structures of language, the better we are able to recognize and control the “pathological” or destructive elements in communication, and the better we are able to appreciate and to foster the forces that make for concord. We need to be clear here about the difference between the essential aims of semantics and a likely by-product of those essential aims. It is true that semantics can enable us to control the pathological and destructive elements in communication and that it can enable us to foster the forces that make for concord. But primarily semantics is a theoretical study of what meaning is and how it operates. The avowed aim of semantics is to enrich our understanding of how language functions at the level of meaning. So semantics is a study of meaning. But what is meaning? The Oxford English Dictionary lists more than 25 meanings of the verb “mean” and more than 10 meanings of the noun “meaning”. In his famous book The Meaning of Meaning Ogden and Richards discuss Scanned with CamScanner4 Linguistics Simplified: Semantics sixteen different meanings of “meaning” and some people feel that we should better replace this word by another word amenable to an unambiguous and precise definition. Morris (1946:19), for example, says the following: Accounts of meaning usually throw a handful of putty at the target ofsign phenomena, while a technical semiotic must provide us with words which are sharpened arrows... hence it is desirable for semiotic to dispense with the term and to introduce special terms for various factors which “meaning” fails to discriminate. Must semanticists, therefore, arrive at an unambiguous and uncontroversial definition of meaning before further questions about how meaning operates can be satisfactorily answered? Or, alternatively, must they replace the highly ambiguous word meaning by a rigorously and unequivocally definable term which will prove to be a much better starting point for the study of semantics? To insist on a precise and unarguably acceptable definition of meaning as a precondition for further research in semantics will amount to putting the cart before the horse. A large number of worthwhile concepts in semantics have been studied during the last few decades and new areas of knowledge relevant to the study of meaning are being explored and investigated. The view taken in this book, therefore, is that the right kind of approach would be not to insist on a perfect definition of meaning as the starting point of the study of semantics but to attempt a further precision and refinement in the concepts under study so that by interrelating these concepts relatable to meaning we are in a position to provide a satisfactory, if not a perfect, definition of meaning. As more and more facts and observations about how meaning operates are interrelated and organized more coherently with the passage of time, the definition of meaning arising out of those facts and observations will also be increasingly more refined. One of the reasons why the study of meaning has proved to be so illusive is that it “is ‘cognition turning in upon itself’; an activity which may seem to have much in common with a dog chasing its own tail” (Leech 1981: ix). Scanned with CamScannerSome General Observations 5 The discipline which is closest to semantics is pragmatics. It would be useful, therefore, to present here a brief outline of pragmatics and then to ascertain the relationship between these two disciplines. What is Pragmatics? Pragmatics is the study of the problems and principles of the use of language in social interaction. The three philosophers whose ideas provided the theoretical basis for pragmatics are Austin, Searle and Grice. Austin gave a series of William James lectures at Harvard University in 1955. Basically, these lectures weie a protest against the age-old assumption that the function of a declarative sentence was to describe, report or state something and that the statement made by a declarative sentence could be proved to be either true or false. These lectures were later published in the form of a book ‘called How to Do Things with Words and the theory expounded in these lectures came to be known as the Theory of Speech Acts. Searle made certain modifications and improvements in this theory. Later, in this book this theory has been discussed in the form of a separate chapter. Like Austin, Grice also gave a series of William James lectures at Harvard University in 1967. The ideas presented by Grice in these lectures were known as the Theory of Conversational Implicature. This theory became the starting point for a discussion of the norms, expectations and maxims that people have at the back of their minds during a conversation. One of the main principles discussed in pragmatics is the co-operative principle which specifies that if a conversation is to proceed in a rational manner it must consist of utterances which are connected to each other. The other principle is the politeness principle, which not only emphasizes the value of politeness in social interaction but also highlights the fact that what is considered very polite in one society may be less polite or utterly impolite in another society. Pragmatics also discusses a number of maxims relevant to social interaction. The maxim of manner, for example, requires that the participants in a conversation Scanned with CamScanner6 Linguistics Simplified: Semantics be brief and orderly and avoid obscurity and ambiguity. So, just as there are phonological errors, morphological errors, syntactic errors and semantic errors, there are errors relatable to pragmatics. Lf orve tells jokes during a funeral, for example, or if he makes a sex-relatec| joke in the presence of a senior person or in the presence of a person of the opposite sex, it will be considered a pragmatic error. The Relationship between Semantics and Pragmatics As has been pointed out earlier, semantics is a study of what meaning is and how it operates and pragmatics is a study of how during a social interaction people experience, make sense of, and react to the way meaning is communicated. So, how is semantics related to pragmatics? Leech has written a book on semantics and also a book on pragmatics and has distinguished himself as a notable authority on these subjects. It may be, therefore, relevant to find out what he has to say on the relationship of these two disciplines. Before expressing his views on the relationship between. the two, he identifies three distinct logical possibilities and mentions them as follows: (a) Pragmatics should be subsumed under semantics. (©) Semantics should be subsumed under pragmatics. (©) Semantics and pragmatics are distinct and complementary fields of study. After mentioning these possibilities, Leech adopts complementarist position and describes that position as “probably the one most widely espoused in linguistics today” (Leech 1981:319- 20). The view held in this book is that the relationship between semantics and pragmatics is too complex to be described with reference to the three distinct logical possibilities mentioned by Leech. Most linguists would perhaps agree that these two disciplines are two distinct fields of study. But to say that they are « complementary would amount to saying that they are mutually =mpassionate” can, for example, be mentioned as some of the notations of the word woman. It may be pointed out here that though the denotation of a word aally remains more or less the same, the connotation of a word «nges with the passage of time. In many cases it changes from one Scanned with CamScannerSome Uasic Concepis in Semantics 5 culture to another ani, in some cases it changes from one individual to another. Thus, the connotation of a word is unstable and, compared to its denotation, it is peripheral to its meaning. Exercise 1 Say *vhather the two sentences in each of the following pairs express the same propositio= 1.74: Mary loves John. ‘Zn loves Jane. 2. A: He took out all the packets. B: He tok alll the packets out. 3. A:Ineed 2 znd car. B: Ihave bought a good car. 4. A: That old man passed away at 4 o'clock. B: That old man died at 4 o'clock. 5. A: Mary gave Philip a book. B: Philip was given a book by Mary. 6. A:T like apples. B: am fond of apples. 7. A: He took off his shoes. B: He took his shoes off. 8. A: A criminal killed that businessman yesterday. B: That businessman died yesterday. 9. A: This company never completed any project on time. : No project was ever completed on time by this company. 10. A: Peter wrote down the answer. B; Peter wrote the answer down. 11. A: The attendant has rolled up the carpet. B: The attendant has rolled the carpet up. 12. A:Mary almost fell over yesterday. B: Mary nearly fell over yesterday. Scanned with CamScannerwy, 14. 15. 16. A: made myself an excellent cup of coffee. B: I made an excellent cup of coffee for myself. A: He always helps his students. B: His students always help him. A: My sister cooked me an excellent meal. B; My sister cooked an excellent meal for me. A: You never gave me a book. B: You never gave a book to me. Exercise 2 Say whether the sentences listed below are analytic sentences (A), synthetic sentences (5), or contradictions (C). . Ahungry man is an angry man. Aids can be treated with a high rate of success in America these days. Mary is wiser than her brother. Philip’s wife is married. . That boy is his own father’s father. . Britain is in Europe. ’. All cats are animals. This animal is a piece of furniture. Anapple a day keeps the doctor away. |. Bachelors are male. . Lions never live for more than 30 years. - That girl is her own father's daughter. - Dogs are more loyal to their masters than cats, A rectangle has four sides. A square is a figure with four equal sides. The earth moves round the sun. A thermometer is an instrument for measuring temperature. Scanned with CamScanner143 Theories of Meaning: A Brief Survey * Exercise 26 Are the following statements true or false? 1. Bloomfield's concept of meaning is identical with the Skinnerian view of meaning. 2. Wittgenstein's concept of meaning is essentially a referential concept of meaning. 3. Skinner defined meaning as a set of operations. 4, The notion of the context of situation has been given a great deal of importance in the Firthian theory of meaning. 5. Jackendoff's theory of meaning is not different from the theory known as the standard theory. ‘ 6. Generative semanticists' approach to the study of meaning is the latest approach to the study of meaning within the framework of generative grammar. 7. Generative semanticists challenged some of the basic assumptions of the standard theory. 8. Interpretive semanticists held the view that there was no need for projection rules. 9. The concept of global rules was posited by generative semanticists. 10. Until the late seventies interpretive semanticists held the view that interpretive rules had to be applied to the deep syntactic structure of a sentence. Topics for Discussion 1. Discuss the important points of difference between interpretive semantics and generative semantics. 2. “Semanticists differ widely in their opinions regarding the importance of the context of situation in the study of meaning”. Discuss this statement with reference to the theories of meaning that you have studied in your course. 3. “The referential theory of meaning is all right as far as it goes but the trouble is that it does not go far enough”. Do you agree? Give reasons in support of your answer. Scanned with CamScannerSome Basic Concepts in Semantics 7 18. A triangle is the same thing as a circle. 19. A triangle is a plane figure with three straight sides. 20. Anger makes us do stupid things. 21. IBM computers are more expensive than other computers. 2. A mammal is an animal that feeds its young with milk from its breast. 23. Bachelors feel very lonely in their old age. 24. Every female dog is a bitch. 25. Hitler was a German. Exercise 3 Read the following pairs of sentences carefully and then say whether sentence A in that pair entails sentence B. 1. A:He earns a great deal of money. B: He spends a great deal of money. 2. A: The boy bought a rose. B: The boy bought a flower. A: No one in that country lives in great comfort. B: Some people in that country live in great comfort. ‘A: He made a square hole in the roof. B: He made a rectangular hole in the roof. A: He is a university teacher. B: He is a university professor. A: He is taller than his brother. B: His brother is shorter than him. 7. A: He went in a small vehicle. B: He went in a small bus. 8. A:She has just bought an apartment. B: She has just bought something. 9. A: He works in Europe. B: He works in Britain. Scanned with CamScanner18 Linguistics Simplified: Semantics | 10. A: His speech disturbed me. B: His speech deeply disturbed me. 11. A: Martha and Barbara are twins. B: Barbara and Martha are twins. 12. A:He killed four rats yesterday. B: He killed four rodents yesterday. 13. A: He loves his wife. B: His wife loves him. A: Edinburgh is to the north of York. B: York is to the south of Edinburgh. 5. A: Tam Mr Joseph's student. B: Mr Joseph is my teacher. 16. A: John resembles Jim. B: Jim resembles John. = Topics for Discussion 1. “Semantics studies both sense and reference”. Discuss. 2. “Asentence is not the same thing as a proposition. Nor is a sentence the same thing as an utterance”. Discuss these statements with the help of suitable examples. Scanned with CamScannerThree The Semantics of Words (1) Antonyms Words having opposite meanings are called antonyms. The four main types of antonyms mentioned in the literature on semantics are the following: (i) Binary opposites (ii) Gradable opposites (iii) Converse terms (iv) Multiple incompatibles Each of these four types of antonyms has becn discussed below in some detail. Binary Opposites There are pairs of antonyms in the case of which the truth of one word in the pair implies the falsity of the other and similarly. the falsity of one implies the truth of the other. single — married employed — unemployed Europeans — non-Europeans male — female animate © — inanimate alive — dead Jolin is married implies John is not single. Similarly, John is not married implies Jolin is single. Scanned with CamScanner20 Linguistics Simplified: Semantics One of the important features of such antonyms is that they are not gradable. A person, for example, is either single or married, either alive or dead. He cannot, truly speaking, be more single or more dead than another person. In certain limited contexts these ungradable words are used as words for gradable qualities, in the following sentences, for example. He is more alive to the dangers of the situation than his wife. He is more of a bachelor than his bachelor friends. In such cases what is graded, however, is only the secondary implication or one of the generally accepted connotations of the word. The word alive in this sentence means conscious or aware. Being conscious or being aware is one of the secondary attributes of being alive and what has been graded here is this secondary attribute of the word alive and not really its primary meaning. Similarly, what has been used as gradable in the second example is not the primary meaning of the word but one of its accepted connotations. Another important thing about such pairs of antonyms is that they are exhaustive and mutually exclusive. They are exhaustive in the sense that the words in such pairs of antonyms cannot both be false. We cannot, for example, say that John is neither European nor non-European. Similarly, we cannot normally say that Ahmed is either married nor single. They are mutually exclusive in the sense hat the words in such pairs of antonyms cannot both be true. Jormal usage, for example, would not permit us to say, that John is oth European and non-European. Such antonyms are what aaditional logicians described as contradictory terms. Lyons =68:467) and Palmer (1981:8) call them complementary terms. _llowing Hurford and Heasley (1983), such antonyms have been elled in this book as binary opposites. able Opposites _ ©e are pairs of antonyms in the case of which the truth of one in the pair implies the falsity of the other but the falsity of one Scanned with CamScannerThe Semantics of Words (1) 2 does not necessarily imply the truth of the other. The following are some examples. large — small good — bad wide — narrow hot — cold young — old This book is good implies This book is not bad. But This book is not good does not necessarily imply that the book is really bad. It may well be that the book is neither good nor positively bad. Antonyms known as gradable opposites represent two opposite extremes of a continuous scale of qualities. Hot and cold, for example, are two extremes of a scale on which some points in the middle can be represented as adjectives like warm, tepid and cool. An important thing about these antonyms is that they are gradable. They are gradable in the sense that the qualities denoted by them can be measured in terms of degree and so adjectives constituting such pairs of antonyms can take more or -er. Delhi is hotter than London. Edinburgh is colder than Oxford. The notion of gradable opposites is not confined to adjectives; it applies to gradable adverbials as well. The following are some of the examples. rudely — politely slowly — rapidly boldly — timidly gently — ferociously Converse Terms There are pairs of antonyms in the case of which the existence of one word in the pair inevitably implies the existence of the other. buy — sell debtor — creditor give — receive above — below husband — wife northof — south of lend — borrow east of — west of Scanned with CamScanner2 Linguistics Simplified: Semantics rent — let in frontof — behind own — belong to ‘Ahmed sold a car to Mahmoud implies that Mahmoud bought a cay from Ahmed. Peter gave Elizabeth a present implies that Elizabeth received a present from Peter. Lyons (1968:467) describes such pairs of opposites as converse terms and Palmer (1981:98) calls therm relational opposites. It may be mentioned here that the addition of the comparative suffix -er and, similarly, the use of the periphrastic more changes gradable adjectives into converse terms. Adjectives listed in group (a) are examples of gradable antonyms but the adjectival expressions listed in group (b) are examples of converse terms. (a) good — bad (b) better than — worse than tall — short taller than — shorter than rich — poor richer than — poorer than hot = — cold hotter than — colder than The converse nature of these antonyms is evident from the fact that in each of the following pairs of sentences (X) implies (Y) and, similarly, (Y) implies (X). (X) John is better than Jim. (¥) Jim is worse than John. (X) He is richer than Faris. (Y) Faris is poorer than him. Like richer than and poorer than, adjectival expressions like senior to and junior to, superior to and inferior to are also classified as converse terms because of their essentially comparative meaning. Multiple Incompatibles A large number of antonyms are terms taken from “systems of multiple incompatibility” (Hurford and Heasley, 1983). Antonyms like liquid and solid, for example, are terms taken from the three-term system of physical state, gas being the remaining term of that three- term system. Antonyms like black and white are terms taken from the system of colours in English. Antonyms like present, and past arc terms taken from the three-term system of time segments, futur. Scanned with CamScannerThe Semantics of Words (1) 23 being the third term of that system. The quantum of opposition in the case of these antonyms is not as strong as it is in the case of binary opposites or in the case of gradable opposites and that is why many linguists do not consider such “opposites” to be antonyms at all. These antonyms do have a characteristic in common with grtadable opposites, however. in the case of gradable opposites, as also in the case of these incompatibles, the truth of one leads to the falsity of the other but the falsity of one does not necessarily lead to the truth of the other. If a substance is in the form of solid, for example, it means that it is not in the form of liquid. But if it is not in the form of solid, it does not necessarily mean that it is in the form of liquid. Similarly, if something is black, it necessarily means that it is not white, but if it is not black, it does not necessarily mean that it is white. This is true about gradable antonyms as well. If something is hot, for example, it necessarily means that it is not cold. But if it is not hot, it does not necessarily mean that it is cold; it may well be just warm, tepid or cool. This is probably the reason why, in traditional logic, both these types of antonyms, ie., gradable antonyms and multiple incompatibles, are discussed’ under the same heading of contrary terms. Exercise 4 Say whether the following pairs of words are gradable opposites (GO), binary opposites (BO), converse terms (C), or multiple incompatibles (MI) Example: good — bad GO BO C MI 1. better than — worse than co BO C MI 2. friendly — hostile GO BO C MI 3, hot—cold GO BO C MI 4. elephant — mouse GO BO C MI 5. clever — stupid GO BO C MI 6. own — belong GO BO C MI Scanned with CamScanner24 Linguistics Simplified: Semantics 7. buy —sell GO BO Cc M 8. borrow — lend GO BO C M 9. red —blue GO BO Cc M 10. yellow —green GO BO Cc M 11. male —female GO BO C M 12, true—false GO BO C M 13. give— receive GO BO C M 14. liquid — solid GO BO C M 15. alive—dead GO BO C M 16. cheese — butter GO BO C MI 17. beautiful — ugly GO BO C M 18 circular — rectangular GO BO C MI 19, tall — short GO BO C M 20. winter — spring GO BO C MI 21. near —far GO BO. C MI 22. easy — difficult GO BO C M 23, love—hate co BO C M 24, below — above GO BO C M 25. lunch — dinner GO BO C MI 26. bachelor — spinster GO BO C M 27. husband — wife GO BO C M 28. gold —silver GO BO C MI 29. Monday —Tuesday GO BO C M 30. married — unmarried GO BO C MI 31. Indian — non-Indian GO BO C M 32, January — December GO BO C M 33. first — last GO BO C M 34 same — different GO BO C M 35. bigger than — smaller than co BO Cc M 36. in front of — behind GO BO C MI 37. agree — disagree Go BO C MI 38. cheap — expensive GO BO C MI 39. superior — inferior GO BO C MI 40. senior — junior GO BO C M 41. rich— poor co BO C M 42. pass — fail GO BO C M 43. high—low Go BO Cc M 44. normal — abnormal Go BO C M 45. north — south GO BO C M Scanned with CamScanner‘The Semantics of Words (1) 25 46. grandparent — grandchild GO BO C MI 47. wise — foolish GO BO C MI 48. pro-American — anti-American GO BO C MI 49. ambiguous — unambiguous GO BO C MI 50. sweet — sour GO BO C MI Synonyms Words having more or less the same meaning are known as synonyms. freedom : liberty snake: serpent hide: conceal broad: wide jail : prison almost : nearly © It is important to note that no two words have exactly the same meaning. Even if two words have exactly the same referential meaning, they may differ from the point of view of their emotive meaning or from the point of view of the associations they carry and the evocative effects they produce. As Dr Johnson, the famous lexicographer of the eighteenth century, rightly remarked, “words are seldom exactly synonymous”. The Two Tests of Synonymy (i) One of the ways in which we can ascertain whether two items are synonymous or not is to apply the test of substitutability. Business in this country is not as profitable (lucrative) as it is in certain other countries. In this sentence the words lucrative and profitable can replace each other and that shows that in this context these two words are synonyms. The following sentences provide some more examples of synonyms to be identified on the basis of their mutual interchangeability. I don’t like such dirty (filthy) jokes. He has a wide variety (range) of goods in his shop. Scanned with CamScanner26 Linguistics Simplified: Semantics Almost every rich (wealthy) family in that village owns a video cassette recorder. It may be in order to emphasize here that no two items can replace each other in all possible contexts. As is shown in the following examples, handsome can replace beautiful in some contexts but not in many other contexts. a beautiful woman a handsome woman a beautiful present a handsome present a beautiful weather *a handsome weather a beautiful village ‘a handsome village a beautiful dog *a handsome dog a beautiful voice *a handsome voice The fact that the word handsome and the word beautiful cannot replace each other in certain contexts does not mean that they are not synonyms. These two words are synonyms in the sense that they can replace each other in some contexts. The view held in modern linguistics (e.g., Lyons 1963) is that synonymy is a context. dependent concept and that two words are synonyms if they can replace each other even in one context. It is possible to argue that if two words can replace each other in some contexts only they are examples of partial synonymy and not of total synonymy. But it is partial synonymy that modem linguists talk about when they discuss synonyms. As Lyons (1968:447) has pointed out, “it is almost a truism that total synonymy is an extremely rare occurrence, a luxury that language can ill afford”. (ii) Another possible device for ascertaining whether two words are synonyms or not is to find out whether their antonyms are the same. If two words have the same antonym, we can take it to mean that these two words are synonyms. If these two words have two different antonyms, we can safely conclude that these two words are mot synonyms. If two words have the same antonym in one context, say, context 1 but two different antonyms in context 2, it only means Ahat these two words are synonyms in context 1 but not in context 2. He listened to that speech with profound interest He listened to me with deep interest. The river is very deep. Scanned with CamScannerThe Semantics of Words (1) 27 The antonym of the word profound as used in the first sentence is superficial. The antonym of the word deep as used in the second sentence is also superficial. We can say, therefore, that the word profound as used in the first sentence is synonymous with the word deep as used in the second sentence. However, the antonym of the word deep as used in the third sentence is shallow and not superfi We can, therefore, conclude that the word deep as used in the third sentence is not synonymous with the word profound as used in the first sentence. Patterns of Synonymy in English Synonyms in English can be studied in terms of patterns like the ones listed below. (i) There are pairs of synonyms in which one word is from one regional variety of a language and the other word is from another regional variety of the same language. Americans, for example, use the word fall where British people use the word autumn. British people use the word maize but Americans use corn. Americans use the word dumb in situations in which the British use the word stupid. British people use the word undertaker where Americans use the word mortician. In the context of punctuation marks, British people use the term full stop whereas Americans use the term period. Synonyms of this type, if we call them synonyms at all, are synonyms only in a peripheral sense. As Palmer (1984:89) has tightly pointed out, “their status is no different from the translation-equivalents of, say, English and French. It is simply a matter of people speaking different forms of the language having different vocabulary items.” (ii) There are pairs of synonyms in which one cf the words is a native Anglo-Saxon word and the other one is a word borrowed from Greek or Latin. As is evident from the following examples, such pairs of synonyms are not confined to any one part of speech. Scanned with CamScanner28 ‘Nouns fiddle friendship hell help wire world smell Adjectives bodily brotherly fatherly inner learned nasty Verbs answer buy die read tire Linguistics Simplified: Semantics violin amity inferno aid telegram universe effuvium corporeal fraternal paternal internal (interior) erudite obnoxious reply purchase expire peruse fatigue In most pairs of words of this type the native word show informality and homeliness whereas its foreign counterpart has th overtone of learning and formality and sometimes even ¢ abstruseness. In the case of certain groups of words of this type, however, th synonymic values are reversed and the native word in the pair more literary than its foreign counterpart. dale deed foe meed valley action enemy reward (iii) There are pairs of synonyms in which the two items difl mainly from the point of view of their emotional overtones a evocative effects. Scanned with CamScannerThe Semantics of Words (1) 29 liberty freedom politician statesman hide conceal As Palmer (1984:90) has pointed out, the function of such words is to influence attitudes and the choice of the appropriate word from the Pair, particularly in politics, depends on the emotional effect the word is likely to produce. (iv) There are pairs of synonyms in which the two words in the pair are used in two different registers. children kids die Pop off father daddy mother mummy gentleman chap lady woman Daddy and mummy, for example, are more likely to occur in children’s language than in the variety of language used by adults. Similarly, woman is more likely to occur in the common man’s language and lady more likely to occur in the variety of language used by the upper class. (v) The synonymic patterns listed above are describable in terms of two words in every group. There are, however, certain other synonyms which can be discussed better in terms of a triple scale. One of the three words in such groups of synonyms is an Anglo- Saxon word, the second one is a word of French origin and the third one is a word of Greek or Latin origin. begin commence initiate end finish conclude food nourishment nutrition kingly royal regal time age epoch In such sets of synonyms, words of Anglo-Saxon origin are generally characterized by simplicity, warmth and informality whereas words of Greek and Latin origin have an aura of erudition. Words of French origin refer to the semantic area between these two extremes. Scanned with CamScanner30 < Linguistics Simplified: Semantics Exercise 5 Provide synonyms for each of the following words. The first letter of the synonymous word to be found by you, and in some cases the first few letters of that word, have been mentioned to help you. il. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. BRS 24. 25. 26. 27. 28. 29. 30. FeNe ~Peran assess vain beautiful situation generate unwilling lucrative hurt shiver dangerous distant mad scrutinize turn down militant arid advance astonished slice deliberately restrict tidy shrewd keep up alter solicitor change glow sparkle genuine con. Scanned with CamScannerThe Semantics of Words (1) 31 Exercise 6 Match the words on the left with their synonyms on the right. 1. plain 1. inhabitant 2 guard 2. cange 3. gather 3. exhibit 4. hide 4. children 5. affect 5. collect 6. search for 6. genuine 7. odd 7. simple 8. fake 8. look for 9. fight 9. influence 10. display 10. petty 11. cunning 11. conceal 12. decline 12. struggle 13. kids 13, surpass 14. authentic 14. crafty 15. begin 15. refuse 16. outdo 16. commence 17. resident 17. bogus 18. get 18. inscrutable 19. trivial 19. acquire 20. mysterious 20. protect Topics for Discussion 1. Discuss the similarity and the differences between gtadable opposites and multiple incompatible. Give suitable examples in support of your answer. 2. What are the four types of antonyms in English? Give five examples to illustrate each of the four types. 3. “Two words are considered synonymous if they can replace each other even in one context”. Discuss this statement with the help of suitable examples. Scanned with CamScanneri The Semantics. © | ot ol | toe [ hair hare Four fe om, | ee I eye rds (2) The Semantics of Words {2) i 0 Died skier ke alts , pronunciation and the same spelling bank = the bank of river bank = organization for keeping ‘ear = organ of hearing, ear = seed-bearing part of a cere Homonime left = past tense of leave If two words have two different and unrelated meanings but the left= opposite of right same pronunciation and/or the same spelling, they are calle mine = a variant of the pronous homonyms. Homonyms are of the following three types. mine = underground source of () Words which have different meanings and differen, wel = underground scuircerof pronunciations but the same spelling. well = ina satisfactory conditic lead /led/ = the name of metal Words in such pairs are homopho: lead /li:d/ = to show the way row /rav/ = noisy quarrel or argument row /r9u/ = to propel a boat by using oars sow /sav/ = female pig | sow /s20/ = to put seed in soil | | wind /wind/ = air in motion | Exer wind /waind/ = to move something in a twisting manner I : tear /tia(e)/ = drop of salty water coming down from the eye. | = rte he! Gree wore tear /tea(r)/ = pull something sharply to pieces cae As the words in such pairs have identical spellings, they areale — =F called homographs. In their Dictionary of Linguistics, Pei and Gayna . ai (1954:90) label such pairs of words as heteronyms. ee ye (ii) Words which have different. meanings and difers hurt heart = Yes. spellings but the same pronunciation know no Yes cat cot Yes caught court Yes cot caught Yes Scanned with CamScannerThe Semantics of Words (2) 33 feet feat meet = meat hear here right write hair hare soul sole hour our there their in inn tire tyre I eye threw — through (ii) Words which have different meanings but the same pronunciation and the same spelling. bank = the bank of river bank = organization for keeping money safely ear = organ of hearing eed-bearing part of a cereal plant like wheat, barley, etc. ast tense of leave left = opposite of right mine = a variant of the pronoun my mine = underground source of coal or minerals well = underground source of water well = ina satisfactory condition of health Words in such pairs are homophonous and also homographous. Exercise 7 Say whether the two words in each of the following pairs are homophonous. Examples: see sea Yes No sin sign Yes No night knight Yes No | lessen lesson Yes No son sun Yes No in inn Yes No hurt heart Yes No foul fowl Yes No know no Yes No | pear pair Yes No cart cot Yes No | sweet suit Yes No caught court Yes No | suit suite Yes No cot caught Yes No | bail bale Yes No Scanned with CamScanner