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Antrushina G. Lexicology
| Tweed ("a coarse wool cloth") got its name from the river Tweed and cheviot (another kind of wool cloth) from the Cheviot hills in England.
The name of a painter is frequently transferred onto one of his pictures: a Matisse — a painting by Matisse.1 Broadening (or Generalisation) of Meaning. Narrowing (or Specialisation) of Meaning Sometimes, the process of transference may result in a considerable change in range of meaning. For instance, the verb to arrive (French borrowing) began its life in English in the narrow meaning "to come to shore, to land". In Modern English it has greatly widened its combinability and developed the general meaning "to come" (e. g. to arrive in a village, town, city, country, at a hotel, hostel, college, theatre, place, etc.). The meaning developed through transference based on contiguity (the concept of coming somewhere is the same for both meanings), but the range of the second meaning is much broader. Another example of the broadening of meaning is pipe. Its earliest recorded meaning was "a musical wind instrument". Nowadays it can denote any hollow oblong cylindrical body (e. g. water pipes). This meaning developed through transference based on the similarity of shape (pipe as a musical instrument is also a hollow oblong cylindrical object) which finally led to a considerable broadening of the range of meaning. The word bird changed its meaning from "the young of a bird" to its modern meaning through transference based on contiguity (the association is obvious). The second meaning is broader and more general. It is interesting to trace the history of the word girl as an example of the changes in the range of meaning in the course of the semantic development of a word. 1 Also: see Supplementary Material, p. 279. 156 In Middle English it had the meaning of "a small child of either sex". Then the word underwent the process of transference based on contiguity and developed the meaning of "a small child of the female sex", so that the range of meaning was somewhat narrowed. In its further semantic development the word gradually broadened its range of meaning. At first it came to denote not only a female child but, also, a young unmarried woman, later, any young woman, and in modern colloquial English it is practically synonymous to the noun woman (e. g. The old girl must be at least seventy), so that its range of meaning is quite broad. The history of the noun lady somewhat resembles that of girl. In Old English the word (ОЕ hlæfdiZe) denoted the mistress of the house, i. e. any married woman. Later, a new meaning developed which was much narrower in range: "the wife or daughter of a baronet" (aristocratic title). In Modern English the word lady can be applied to any woman, so that its range of meaning is even broader than that of the OE hlæfdiZe. In Modern English the difference between girl and lady in the meaning of woman is that the first is used in colloquial style and sounds familiar whereas the second is more formal and polite. Here are some more examples of narrowing of meaning: Deer: \ any beast] > [ a certain kind of beast ] Meat: [ any food] > | a certain food product [ Boy: | any young person of the male sex [ > [ servant of the male sex ] It should be pointed out once more that in all these words the second meaning developed through transference based on contiguity, and that when we speak of them as examples of narrowing of meaning we simply imply that the range of the second meaning is more narrow than that of the original meaning. 157 CHAPTER 9 Homonyms: Words of the Same Form Homonyms are words which are identical in sound and spelling, or, at least, in one of these aspects, but different in their meaning. E. g. J bank, n. — a shore bank, n. — an institution for receiving, lending, exchanging, and safeguarding money ball, n. — a sphere; any spherical body ball, n. — a large dancing party \ English vocabulary is rich in such pairs and even groups of words. Their identical forms are mostly accidental: the majority of homonyms coincided due to phonetic changes which they suffered during their development. If synonyms and antonyms can be regarded as the treasury of the language's expressive resources, homonyms are of no interest in this respect, and one cannot expect them to be of particular value for communication. Metaphorically speaking, groups of synonyms and pairs of antonyms are created by the vocabulary system with a particular purpose whereas homonyms are accidental creations, and therefore purposeless. In the process of communication they are more of an encumbrance, leading sometimes to confusion and 166 misunderstanding. Yet it is this very characteristic which makes them one of the most important sources of popular humour. The pun is a joke based upon the play upon words of similar form but different meaning (i. e. on homonyms) as in the following: "A tailor guarantees to give each of his customers a perfect fit." (The joke is based on the homonyms: I. fit, n. — perfectly fitting clothes; II. fit, n. — a nervous spasm.) Homonyms which are the same in sound and spelling (as the examples given in the beginning of this chapter) are traditionally termed homonyms proper. The following joke is based on a pun which makes use of another type of homonyms: "Waiter!" "Yes, sir." "What's this?" "It's bean soup, sir." "Never mind what it has been. I want to know what it is now." Bean, n. and been, Past Part, of to be are phones. As the example shows they are the same in sound but different in spelling. Here are some more examples of homophones: night, n. — knight, n.; piece, n. — peace, n.; scent, n. — cent, n. — sent, v. (Past Indef., Past Part, of to send); rite, n. — to write, v. — right, adj.; sea, n. — to see, v. — С [si:] (the name of a letter). The third type of homonyms is called homographs. These are words which are the same in spelling but different in sound. 167 E.g. to bow [bau], v. bow [bqu], п. to incline the head or body in salutation a flexible strip of wood for propelling arrows to lead [li:d],v.— to conduct on the way, go before to show the way - a heavy, rather soft metal lead [led], n. to tear [teq], v. tear [tie], n. to pull apart or in pieces by force a drop of the fluid secreted by the lacrinial glands of the eye жүктеу/скачать 0,63 Mb. Достарыңызбен бөлісу:
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