Word that has several meanings

Our language is multifaceted and rich. Sometimes, using this or that word, we do not think about the boundaries of its meaning. We know that the Earth is the name of our planet, and the earth is part of its surface, land, soil. Also, everyone knows that the world is the entire system around us and at the same time the world is the absence of enmity, life without war. Some of the semantic interpretations we express are the same lexical units, which are words with several meanings. Let’s find out why this happens.

Why are there words in the language that have several meanings?

Another linguist AA Potebnya, who lived in the XIX century, wrote in his monograph «Thought and Language» that the development of human speech goes in the direction of greater abstraction.

When our distant ancestors learned to express their desires and emotions with the help of sounds, they did not yet know what the geometry and Mendeleyev’s table were, they did not distinguish between the concepts «bad» and «terrible», «good» and «excellent.» The first words called objects, phenomena and feelings, the ability to identify and express which was necessary in everyday life. Similarly, children who are only learning to speak, first use simple words such as «mom», «dad», «house», «table», and only then understand what kindness, joy, hatred, anger means.

In the course of the development of an ancient person’s capacity for figurative and analytical thinking, it became necessary to come up with new designations for the newly emerging concepts. Sometimes as such notations used already existing words in the language, which, however, was given a new meaning. But the original meaning of these words was preserved. So many words appeared that have several meanings.

How correctly to name lexemes with several meanings

In linguistics, a word that has several meanings is called multivalued. This is the term of Russian linguistics, and in foreign science such words are called polisemic (from the Greek polis — «many», and semanticos — «signifying»).

Russian academician V. V. Vinogradov called multivalued the ability of one word to convey various information about objects and phenomena of extralinguistic reality. It should be said that the meaning embedded in the word, its real-semantic shell is called a lexical meaning. Above, examples of the interpretation of words with several lexical meanings are given. However, few people know that the word «peace» has not two, but seven values! Check it can be on the explanatory dictionary Ozhegova.

Polysemy and homonymy

In linguistics, as in any other science, there are concepts that are among the debatable. So, for example, AA Potebnya and R. Jakobson believed that words with several meanings do not exist, because if a lexeme under some circumstances began to designate another object or phenomenon, then it completely changed its semantic core.

However, in the traditional grammar, the concepts of polysemy and homonymy are still different, although they are often confused in Internet resources.

It is believed that words that have several meanings still retain in each interpretation their semantic center, some representation that lies at the very root of the structure of the lexical unit. It is assumed that polysemantic words have a continuity of meanings, and homonyms do not. For example, a crane and a crane in the kitchen, the note «salt» and the kitchen salt are homonyms, and not many-valued words, because there is no semantic connection between them.

How does the ambiguity of words

It is believed that polysemy occurs in three main ways:

• By metaphorical transfer. A metaphor is a shift in the meaning of a word, based on the similarity of several objects. For example: the wheat grain is the seed of truth.
• With the help of metonymy. By metonymy we mean the transfer of the meaning of one word to another according to the principle of the presence of semantic connections between two concepts. For example: a dish of expensive porcelain — a delicious dish of French cuisine.
• With the help of a synecdoche. Many linguists believe that the synecdoche is a special case of metonymy. By this term we mean the transfer of the part name to the whole. For example: «home» instead of «home» and «returning home from America» instead of «returning to Russia» (if you mean exactly coming to your country, and not specifically to your home from someone else’s house).

Examples of polysemantic words

We can assume that the name of our planet — Earth — appeared again from the name of land, soil. After all, people and mammals exist on land, it is their real habitat. And the name of our planet was formed by means of metonymic transfer, that is, the designation of a part of the surface was transferred to the whole. We also say, for example, that the class listens attentively to the teacher, meaning by this not the room, but the students in it.

We call the raspberries berries, and also the bush on which they grow. Multivalence here developed on the principle of synecdoche. But the vernacular meaning of the word «raspberry» — «thieves’ hangout» is, rather, homonymous to the other two examples of its use.

What does the word «prefix» mean?

Can you at once say — one or several meanings has the word «prefix»? From the school course of the Russian language, everyone knows that the so-called part of the word preceding the root and serving to change the meaning of the lexical unit is called. This noun is formed from the verb «pestering» and actually calls everything that is «attached», that stands next to something.

In the explanatory dictionary of the Russian language two meanings of this word are noted:

• Tape recorder, amplifying the sound power;
• Morpheme, prefix;
• 10-15 years ago, a prefix for virtual games was also called a prefix.

Language puns, based on polysemy and homonymy

In every developed language there are words that coincide in form but differ in meaning. The combination of such lexical units in one text is used to create a comic effect, play puns. Try to explain what the comic effect of the following phrases is based on:

• Mowed oblique oblique braid.
• He stoked the furnace all night. By the morning, she drowned.
• Parrot us, parrot.
• He learned the verse and the verse.

In the above phrases, the comic effect is based on the homonymy of certain forms of words. But the vocabulary forms of these lexical units are different. So, in the first example, the words «mow», «oblique», «braid» are used. «Oblique» as an adjective means «uneven,» «curve,» and «oblique» as a noun is a colloquial name for a hare. The second example uses the ambiguity of the word «sink»: kindle the fire, plunge deeply into the water. In the third example, homonyms are used: a parrot as a noun — the name of a bird, a parrot as an imperative from the verb «scare». And finally, in the fourth example, the pun is based on the coincidence of the past tense form of the verb «subscribe» and the noun in the nominative «verse» (a line in poetry).

It is not always easy to understand one or more meanings have words. The root of lexemes and the analysis of usage contexts can help to determine whether the units under consideration are multi-valued or homonymous.

Exercise on the interpretation of the meanings of many-valued words

Assignment: look at the list below and try to determine on your own whether one or more values have the selected words: wardrobe, fox, machine, path, hand, core . Explain your choice. How many values did you have for each word?

All of the above words have several lexical meanings:

• Wardrobe refers to clothing items, as well as a room where they are stored.
• The fox is an animal and at the same time a cunning person. The ambiguity developed due to the fact that in ancient times (and in the villages — now) foxes at night, when no one sees them, they penetrated into people’s dwellings and barns to steal food.
• The machine is both a vehicle and technical equipment.
• The path is both the road on earth, and the air communication, and metaphorically the life of man.
• The hand is part of the body and handwriting.
• The core is both the central part of something, and the basis of any movement, for example, of the army.

Several tasks for logic

Look at the phrases below. Can you guess what unites:

1. The post of diplomat and salting;
2. Radiation of the sun and the class of aristocrats;
3. Marital relations and badly made products;
4. A strip of land in the sea and the pride of a Russian beauty;
5. A river fish and a dishwashing brush.

Answers: the ambassador; shine; marriage; Braid; ruff.

How do you think, which of these examples relate to homonymy, and which ones to polysemy? Words with several meanings differ from homonyms by the presence of some logical-semantic connection between different concepts. In Example 2, the connection is based on a metaphor: how the sun illuminates the earth, and aristocrats, because of their education and development, were the adornment of society. And in Example 5, the connection between the fish and the brush is based on metonymy, so the external shape resembles a fish. Examples under numbers 1, 3, 4 are based on homonymy.

Thus, we found out that a word having several meanings is called polysemantic, or polysemantic. But it is desirable to be able to distinguish ambiguity from homonymy. If there is any semantic connection between words with several values, then there are no semimonies between homonyms.