SEMANTICS (SYNONYM, ANTONYM, HOMONYM, HYPONYM, POLYSEME, IDIOMS)

1. SEMANTICS“Language without Meanings is Meaningless” (Roman Jakobson)

2. What is “Semantics”? Semantics is the study of meaning that is used tounderstand human
expression through language.

3. Semantics is perhaps the most difficult part of the grammar of a language to learn. The reason
is because, basically, meanings in a language are indefinite/undetermined. Remember that
language is arbitrary (one of the characteristics of languages). It is arbitrary because the
relationship between forms and their meanings are sometimes cannot logically proved.

4. Although a form can have more than one meaning, there is always a primary or original
meaning that is expresses. The original meaning of a form in a language is normally called
“denotation”. With respect to words (lexical terms), the primary (original) meaning is the
meaning that we can find in a dictionary. Example: “Rose” “A garden plant with thorns on its stem
and pleasant-smelling flowers, or a flower from this plant”.

5. Besides, there are additional meaning, which is known as “connotation”. With respect to
words, connotation or additional meanings of a word are not listed in a dictionary; and therefore
we cannot find them in a dictionary. Normally, a person expresses a connotative meaning
through a word, phrase, clause or sentence based on certain characteristics of the entity or event
that he/she is referring to. Example: one may call a beautiful girl a “rose” or a “lily”.

6. Under the subject of semantics, we shall deal with the concepts of: Polysemy Synonymy
Antonymy Hyponymy Idiom which are the lexical components that can be compared based on the
semantic relation.

7. (1) POLYSEMY Polysemy is the state or phenomenon in which the words that have more than
one meaning. In other words, it can be described as multiple meanings of words. The words are
considered to be related etymologically. The concrete form of polysemy is called “polyseme”.
Examples: Simple (e.g. English is extremely plain subject). Plain With nothing added/not
decorated in any way (e.g. This blouse is too plain).

8. (2) SYNONYMY Synonymy is the state or phenomenon in which the words that sound different
(different in pronunciation) but have the same or identical meaning as another word or phrase.
The concrete form of synonymy is called “synonym”. Examples: small = little big = large
mother and father = parents politician = statesman

9. (3) ANTONYMY Antonymy is the state or phenomenon in which the words have the sense
relation which involve the opposite of meaning. The concrete form of antonymy is called
“antonym” (opposite). The word pairs of antonym can be divided into several types: a. Implicitly
Gradable Pairs (Graded Antonym); b. Complementary Pairs (Complementarity); and c. Relational
Pairs (Converseness).

10. (a) Implicitly Gradable Pairs (Graded Antonym) refers to the words related to the object they
modify. The words themselves do not provide an absolute scale. Examples: big >< small good ><
bad Relatively fast >< slow comparable young >< old Thus, when we say that “a fly is bigger than
another”, we imply that „big‟ is to be understood in the context of „flies‟. Another fact dealing
with this type is that “a small elephant”, for example, is much bigger that “a big mouse”. A big
mouse A small elephant

11. Another characteristic of certain pairs of gradable antonyms is that one is marked and the
other is unmarked. The unmarked member is the one used in questions of degree. We ask,
ordinarily, “how high is the mountain?” (not “how low is it?”). We answer, “ten thousand feet
high”, but never “ten thousand feet low”, except humorously or ironically or the topic of the
conversation is in the particular context.

12. Thus, „high‟ is the unmarked member of „high/low‟, similarly „tall‟ is the unmarked member
of „tall/short‟, or „fast‟ is the unmarked member of „fast/slow‟. High Tall Fast unmarked
unmarked unmarked High / Low Tall / Short Fast / Slow marked marked marked

13. (b) Complementary Pairs (Complemetarity) refers to the existence of pairs that the denial of
one, implies the assertion of the other. Examples: male >< female alive >< dead Incomparable
present >< absent objects awake >< asleep Thus, if one is not male, then one is certainly female; if
one is not present, then he/she must be absent, and so on.

14. Related to complementary pairs, sets of terms like colors or numbers where the assertion of
one member implies the negation of all the others. Thus, if we have a set of such as: green, yellow,
brown, red, blue when we say: “This is green”, for instance, it means that it is not yellow,
brown, red, or blue.

15. (c) Relational Pairs (converseness) refers to the pair of words that display symmetry in their
meaning. If X gives Y to Z, then Z receives Y from X Relationships between certain semantic
features can reveal knowledge about antonyms. Consider: A word that is [+married] is [-single] A
word that is [+single] is [-married]These show that any word that bears the semantic property
“married”,such as „wife‟, is understood to lack the semantic property “single”; andconversely, any
word that bears the semantic property “single”, such as„bachelor‟, will not have the property
“married”.

16. Other commonly relational pairs are: buy >< sell push >< pull command >< serve give
>< take teach >< learn master >< servant teacher >< pupil doctor >< patient, etc. In the
context of sentence, occasionally the same verb can be supposed as a relational pair. Example:
John married Mary >< Mary married John.

17. In English, there are a number of ways to form antonyms. You can add the prefix {un-}:
Examples: likely >< unlikely able >< unable or you can add {non-}: Examples: entity >< nonentity
descript >< nondescript or you can add {in-}: Examples: tolerant >< intolerant visible >< invisible
Other prefixes may also be used to form negative words morphologically, such as {mis-} or {dis-}.

18. (4) HYPONYMY Hyponymy is the state or phenomenon that shows the relationship between
more general term (lexical representation) and the more specific instances of it. The concrete
forms of sets of word (the specific instances) are called “hyponyms”. Example: The lexical
representation of: red, yellow, green, blue, purple, black, is [+color]. Thus, we can say that: “red” is
a hyponym of “color”, and so on.
19. Sometimes there is no single word in the language that encompasses as set of hyponyms.
Example: clarinet, guitar, piano, trumpet, violin are hyponyms because they are “musical
instruments”, but there is not a single word meaning “musical instrument” that has these words as
its hyponyms.• The relationship between the general term and the specific instances is often be
described using a hierarchical diagram, called “taxonomy”.

20. Example of Taxonomy: vegetable greens pulses roots tuberscabbage spinach peas beans
carrots turnips potatoes yams

21. Look at the following list: Tea Black coffee coffee Milk White coffee Beverage From
the list, we can make the taxonomy as follow: Beverage tea coffee milk Black coffee White coffee

22. (5) IDIOM An idiom is a group of words in which the meaning cannot be explained in terms of
the habitual meanings of the words that make up the piece of language. Idioms are similar in
structure to ordinary phrases except that they tend to be frozen in form and do not readily enter
into other combinations or allow the word order to change. Idioms involve the non-literal use of
language and they can be categorized as follows:

23. (1) Alliterative Comparisons: dead as a dodo (dead as in extinct). fit as a fiddle (in good health).
as good as gold (well behaved).(2) Noun Phrases: a blind alley (route that leads nowhere, a false
trail). a close shave (a narrow escape). a red letter day (a day that will never be forgotten).

24. (3) Prepositional Phrase: at sixes and sevens (unable/unwilling to agree). by hook or by crook
(by whatever methods prove necessary). in for a penny, in for a pound (involved irrespective of
cost).(4) Verb + Noun Phrase: kick the bucket (die). pop your clogs (die). spill the beans (reveal a
secret).

25. (5) Verb + Preposition Phrase: be in clover (be exceptionally comfortable). be in the doghouse
(be in disgrace). be between rock and a hard place (have no room for manoeuvre).(6) Verb +
Adverb: give in (yield). put down (kill). take to (like).