LEXICAL AMBIGUITY

This Paper is Presented as Partial Fulfill one of the Requirements to Join of

Semantics Lesson.

By:
Name

: Maria Goreti Endah Erliani

No

: 0811202194

ENGLISH EDUCATION STUDY PROGRAM

TEACHER TRAINING AND EDUCATION FACULTY
WIDYA DHARMA UNIVERSITY
KLATEN
2011

LEXICAL AMBIGUITY
A. INTRODUCTION
Language is very important to people for communication. It contains
meaning. It can be words, phrases, and sentences. Sentences are composed of
words (and phrases), and the meaning of a sentence is the product of words (and
phrases) of which it is composed.
Words may be considered purely as forms, whether spoken and written, or
alternatively, as composite expressions, which combine form and meaning. One
of the writer principals aims is to sort out these different senses of word and
form and to establish notational and terminological conventions for avoiding
ambiguity and confusion.
Another reason why it is not as easy to say whether something is or is not
a word as not-linguists might think or to say whether all natural languages have
words is that several different criteria come into play in the definition of words,
both as forms and as expression, and these criteria are often in conflict.
Moreover, some of criteria employed by linguists, taken separately, are such that
they do not sharply divide words from non-words.
The technical term that people use is called dictionary-words is lexeme.
The noun lexeme is of course related to the words lexical and lexicon. A
lexeme is a lexical unit, a unit of the lexicon. The lexical structure of a language
is the structure of its lexicon or vocabulary and the term lexical meaning. It is
therefore equivalent to the commonly used, less technical (but ambiguous), term
word-meaning.
An ambiguity, in ordinary speech, means something very pronounced,
and as a rule witty or deceitful. I propose to use the word in an extended sense:
any verbal nuance, however slight, which gives room for alternative reactions to
the same piece of language.
The notion of ambiguity has philosophical applications. For example,
identifying an ambiguity can aid in solving a philosophical problem. Suppose one
wonders how two people can have the same idea, say of a unicorn. This can seem

puzzling until one distinguishes 'idea' in the sense of a particular psychological

occurrence, a mental representation, from 'idea' in the sense of an abstract,
shareable concept. On the other hand, gratuitous claims of ambiguity can make
for overly simple solutions.
B. CONTENT
1. Ambiguity
According to Hornby (1995: 35) ambiguity is as the state of having
more than meaning.
Ambiguity is a term used in writing and math, and under conditions
where information can be understood or interpreted in more than one way and
is distinct from vagueness, which is a statement about the lack of precision
contained or available in the information. (www.google.com, 08.20 pm,
18/05/2011).
Ambiguity is closely related to vagueness. It may be confused, such as
unclarity and inexplicitness. (www.google.com, 08.20 pm, 18/05/2011).
From the definitions above, the writer can conclude that ambiguity is
as the state of having more than one meaning that it can make vagueness,
confused, unclarity, and inexplicitness.
Although people are sometimes said to be ambiguous in how they use
language, ambiguity is strictly speaking, a property of linguistic expressions.
A word, phrase, or sentence is ambiguous if it has more than one meaning.
Obviously, this definition does not say what meanings are or what it is for an
expression to have one (or more than one). One of the ways in which listeners
work out the syntactic or grammatical structure of spoken sentences is by
using prosodic cues in the form of stress, intonation, and so on. For example,
in the ambiguous sentence 'The old men and women sat on the bench,' the
women may or may not be old. If the women are not old, then the spoken
duration of word 'men' will be relatively long and the stressed syllable in
'women' will have a steep rise in speech contour. Neither of these prosodic
features will be present if the sentence means the women are old."
2.

Lexical

According to Hornby (1995: 677) states lexical is the words of

language.
Lexical is relating to dictionaries (www.googleusercontent.com, 08.20
pm, 18/05/2011).
Based on the definitions above, lexical is the word of language related
to dictionaries.
The lexical ambiguity of a word or phrase consists in its having more
than one meaning in the language to which the word belongs. "Meaning"
hereby refers to whatever should be captured by a good dictionary
(www.google.com, 08.10 pm, 18/05/2011).
A lexical ambiguity is an ambiguity occurs when a language element
(in a single word) has more than meaning. (www.google.com, 08.05 pm,
18/05/2011).
Lexical ambiguity is a pervasive problem in natural language
processing. However, little quantitative information is available about the
extent of the problem or about the impact that it has on information retrieval
systems. (www.google.com, 08.10 pm, 18/05/2011).
From the definition above, the writer can conclude that lexical
ambiguity is words or phrases which have more than one meaning based on a
good dictionary and a pervasive problem in natural language processing.
C. ANALYSIS
We call ambiguous when we recognize that there could be a puzzle as to
what the author meant, in that alternative views might be taken without sheer
misreading. If a word stands independently without applying in a sentence, it will
be riskier to be ambiguous because it doesnt have setting or context of the
meaning. So, if it has been formed in the sentence, it will be less ambiguity. The
writer gives some examples below:
(1) Hard
Application in sentences:
a. My brother pounds the hard stone.
Hard as adjective, hard in the sentence means strong.
b. Saskia has to solve her hard problem herself.

Hard as adjective, hard in the sentence means difficult.

(2) Run
Application in sentences:
a. Rina runs quickly.
Run as verb, run in the sentence means to move at a speed faster than
walk, never having both or all the feet on the ground at the same time.
b. The manager runs this company well.
Run as verb, run in the sentence means carries out.
(3) Glass
Application in sentences:
a. My daughter has broken a glass.
Glass as noun, glass in the sentence means a drinking container made of
glass. (gelas).
b. The door is made of glass.
Glass as noun, glass in the sentence means hard transparent substance
used in windows, mirror, etc. (kaca).
(4) Water
Application in sentences:
a. My wife prefers to drink water for breakfast.
Water as noun, water in the sentence means air putih.
b. The gardener waters the garden twice a day.
Water as verb, water in the sentence means menyirami.
(5) Apothecary
Application in sentences:
a. My sister is as an apothecary.
Apothecary as noun, apothecary in the sentence means pharmacist.
b. She went to apothecary to buy an aspirin.
Apothecary as noun, apothecary in the sentence means drug store.
(6) Pen
Application in sentences:
a. He writes a letter with a red pen.
Pen in the sentence means an instrument for writing with ink.

b. He has a large sheep pen in back ground.

Pen in the sentence means a small piece of land surrounded by a fence in
which farm animals are kept.
D. CONCLUSION
From the discussion above the writer can conclude that lexical ambiguity
is words or phrases which have more than one meaning based on a good
dictionary and a pervasive problem in natural language processing. The word
which has been formed in the sentence, it wont be riskier to be ambiguous.

BIBILIOGRAPHY

Hornby, A. S. 1995. Oxford Learners Pocket Dictionary. New York: Oxford

University Press.
Pratiwi, Endah. 2010. Semantic. Klaten: Widya Dharma University Press
Ramelan. 1992. Introduction to Linguistics Analysis. Semarang: IKIP Semarang
Press.
www.online.sfsu.edu
www.google.com
Wardhaugh, Ronald. 1977. Introduction to linguistics. New Jersey: Mc GrawHill Book Company.