Prototypes
The characteristic instance of a category of words is called a prototype. For example
the word furniture in relation to chair and stool.
Homophones and Homonyms
Homophones are when two words with different spellings have similar
pronounciations. For example, the word meat and meet.
Homonyms is a term used for words that has multiple meanings but the same
spelling. For example, the word race which could either mean race as in skin color or race as
in contest of speed.
Polysemy
Is a term that is used for a word that has multiple meaning relating through its
extension. For example, the word head can be put into context as a top person of a
department, an important part, or an object that is on top of your head.
Word Play
Prototypes, homophones, homonyms and polysemy are the basis of word play. Word
Play is used in humorous form. An example of word play would be the homonymy in the
joke “Why are trees mistaken for dogs? Because they bark. Showcasing the double meaning
of the word.
Metonymy
The relatedness of words to their context is called metonymy. We can easily interpret
that car is related to wheel and water is related to bottle, this familiarity makes us easily
interpret words that shouldn’t sound correct taken in context. For example, on the text “The
White House announced…” The word “The White House” isn’t actually refering to a house
but rather a department of people.
Collocation
Collocation is the knowledge of how words are closely knit to one another. For
example, the average person would agree that chair and table sounds more tangible than chair
and ball.
Concordance
Concordance is how a text is structured around a “key word in context”
Instrument and Experiencer
An instrument is an object used to perform an action. Like "an old razor" or
"a crayon" in sentences where "the boy" or "he" uses them.
The Experiencer is a person who feels something without performing an action like "The
woman" in "The woman feels sad."
Location, Source and Goal
Locations describe where something is, sources show where something starts, and goals
show where something ends, as in "We drove from Chicago to New Orleans." One entity can
have multiple roles, like George, who is both a source and a goal in different actions.
Lexical Relations
Lexical relations describe how words are connected in meaning. Instead of defining words
by their parts, we often use their relationships with other words, such as saying "conceal"
means the same as "hide" (synonymy) or "shallow" is the opposite of "deep" (antonymy).
Synonymy
Synonyms have similar meanings and can sometimes replace each other like
"big" and "large" or "couch" and "sofa".
Context, formality, and regional differences can affect their usage, as seen with "candy"
(U.S.) and "sweets" (U.K.) or "purchased" (formal) and "bought" (informal).
Antonymy
Antonyms are words with opposite meanings and come in three main types: gradable, non-
gradable, and reversives.
1. Gradable antonyms like "big/small" or "hot/cold” exist on a scale and can be
compared (example "smaller" or "colder") but the negative of one doesn't always
mean the other (example "not old" doesn't mean "new").
2. Non-gradable antonyms, like "alive/dead" or "true/false" don't have comparative
forms, and the negative of one implies the other.
3. Reversives, such as "enter/exit" or "tie/untie" indicate the reverse of an action.
Hyponymy
Hyponymy is a relationship where one word is a more specific term under a broader
category, This shows a hierarchical relationship where a specific term (example: terrier) is
included under a broader category (example: Dog).For example, "horse" is a hyponym of
"animal", "ant" is a hyponym of "insect", and "turnip" is a hyponym of "vegetable"
The broader terms like "animal" "insect" and "vegetable" are called superordinates.
Words that share the same superordinate are co-hyponyms, such as "dog" and "horse"
both co-hyponyms under "animal" or "ant" and "cockroach" under "insect" This relationship
expresses the idea of "is a kind of" such as "a schnauzer is a kind of dog" Hyponymy also
applies to actions: "punch" "shoot" and "stab" are co-hyponyms of "injure" and
"bake" "boil" "fry" and "grill" are co-hyponyms of "cook".
