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in the globalized world
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THE PROBLEM OF DIFFERENTIATING POLYSEMY AND HOMONYMY
IN ENGLISH
Dehqonova Sayyoraxon Tuxtamurod qizi student of
Uzbek State World Languages University scientific
advisor: Kattabaeva D.K.
Abstract:
The majority of content words do not have a single meaning for each; rather
they associate to a number of senses. When these senses are semantically incompatible
in non-neutral contexts, they are then homonymous; otherwise, they are polysemous
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where polysemous words have an underspecified meaning that encompasses their
different senses. To reliably differentiate between these two lexical relations helps very
much in the improvement of the retrieval process. In this orientation, this article
highlights the concepts of homonymy and polysemy, as they constitute one of the
central issues in semantics and the psychology of word meaning.
Key words:
homonymy, vocabulary, polysemy, lexical relation, word meaning, word
The total sum of words of a specific language is called a lexicon; consequently,
the exploration of word meaning is called lexical semantics. Lexical semantics deals
with the systematic study of meaning-related properties of words; how best to specify
the meaning of a word; and how to manage the paradigmatic relations of meaning such
as synonymy, antonymy, hyponymy ...etc.; and how to investigate the processes of
meaning extension including homonymy and polysemy.
If two or more words have the same pronunciation, they are said to be
homophones
.
Accordingly, homophony is the semantic relation in which two or more
forms are similar in pronunciation only, such as,
see and sea; to, two
, and
too; meet
and meat
; ... etc. These words have obviously different forms of writing but one
pronunciation.
Homographs
,
on the other hand, are two or more words that have the
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same spelling, different pronunciations, and different meanings. Thus, holography is a
lexical relation in which two or more words are alike in their writing forms only, such
as
, bow (n.) ZbouZ and bow /bau/ (v.)
Homonyms can be distinguished from other lexical relations by having different
origins: The word
‘match’
(n.) might refer to a game between two or more teams or a
stick made of wood for lighting fire. Hence,
‘matchi’ and ‘match2’
are two words of
different meanings and different origins that look and sound the same:
‘Matchi’
descends from an Old English word meaning
‘a husband or wife’
,
whereas,
‘match2’
comes from an Old French word meaning
"the wick of a candle".
The word polysemy originates from the Greek words "доки- (poly-) 'many', and
oppa, (sema) 'sign'", resulting in the linguistic term meaning to 'have many multiple
meanings'. Word shows polysemy when it apparently has several related meanings. The
noun foot, for example, has related meanings when we speak of the lower extremity of
the leg below the ankle on which a person stands or walks- foot of a person; the lower
or lowest part of something standing or perceived as standing vertically- the base or
bottom; a unit of linear measure which is equal to 12 inches (30.48 cm); or it might refer
to a group of syllables constituting a metrical unit in poetry. Taking the anatomical
referent as the basic one (foot), the other meanings can be seen as derived from the basic
one, reflecting either the general shape of the human foot or, more abstractly, the
relation of the foot to the rest of the div.
When a native speaker feels that multiple senses are related in one way or another,
it can be judged that these lexemes are belonging to the same word and this word is
polysemous. In fact, when a new word is coined, it starts life with one sense. As time
passes, this sense may associate to other senses in a way that the original one is lost
throughout different processes like:
• Semantic shift which involves meaning change - e.g. mail changed its meaning
from ‘bag’ to ‘letters’, and it no longer means ‘bag’!
Semantic extension, which involves the addition of new senses to the original one
- e.g. mail, came to mean ‘electronic messages’ as well as ‘letters’. Since polysemy
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refers to the case of a word having two or more senses, it is accordingly the consequence
of semantic shift and extension.
In spite of the fact that homonymy and polysemy are categorized as different
notions, the boundary between them may not be clear-cut in some cases for there is an
extensive doubtful area between them.
In relation to the factor of frequency, homonymous and polysemous words can be
sorted into two types: balanced and polarized. Balanced ambiguous words are those
whose multi meanings are equally common; whereas, polarized ambiguous words are
the words whose meanings are the prevailing or the predominant ones.
Homonymy and polysemy are two interrelated lexical relations to the extent that the
boundaries between the two seem to be fuzzy. In neutral contexts, homonymy and
polysemy foil comprehension. In biasing contexts, balanced ambiguous lexical items
are incompatible with the meaning and result in obviously distinguishable meanings;
whereas polarized ambiguous lexical items seem to have the precedence over context
resulting in wrong judgments in on line decision tasks.
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in the globalized world
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