1. English Lexicology
Meaning Relations

2. We are going to discuss
 Words that have the “same” meaning:
synonymy
 Words that have “opposite” meaning:
antonymy
 Hierarchies of meaning:
hyponymy and meronymy
 Meaning and word combination:
collocation

3. Synonymy
 Synonymy is a relationship of ‘sameness of
meaning’ that may hold between two words.
 Synonyms are traditionally defined as words
having different form but identical or similar
meaning.

4. Problems with the definition
 It is possible that a polysemous word just shares
one meaning with another word. Are the two
words synonyms?
There are no such
the top of thing as true
something synonymy.
freedom
head: the mental
of choice
upper part ability
of the
body
a person a headmaster 1) chief
a person who 2) boss
leads
3) leader

5. Problems with the definition
 Besides the denotative meaning, a word may also
have connotative meaning, stylistic meaning, and
affective meaning.
adult: [+human, +adult] formal
grown-up: [+human, +adult] Informal/colloquial
Denotative meaning is the same, but the
stylistic meaning is different. Can they be
called synonyms?

6. Strict (absolute) synonymy
 Linguists make a distinction between ‘strict’ or
‘absolute’ synonymy and ‘loose’ or ‘relative’
synonymy.
 Strict synonyms refer to two words which are
identical in meaning in all its aspects. They are
interchangeable in all contexts.
 Strict synonyms are very rare, and some linguists
even argue that strict synonyms do not exist.

7. Strict (absolute) synonymy
 Strict synonymy is uneconomical; it creates
unnecessary redundancy in a language.
 When two words are in danger of becoming strict
synonyms, one of them would either
 change its meaning, or
 fade away from the language and become an
archaic word.

8. Loose (relative) synonymy
 When we speak of synonymy, we mean ‘loose’ or
‘relative’ synonymy, where we find not only a
significant overlap in meaning between two words, but
also some contexts where they cannot be used
interchangeably.
discover: be the first one to come across something
find: experience something in some way
John found/discovered the basketball in the grass.
Maria Curie discovered radium in 1898.
*Maria Curie found radium in 1898.

9. Differences between loose synonyms
 We often take the following things into
consideration when we try to find the differences
between synonyms.
 Different English dialects
 Different stylistic meanings
 Different connotative meanings

10. Synonyms from different dialects
 Some synonym pairs differ in that they belong to different
dialects of English. Here are some examples of synonyms
from British and American English:
BrE AmE BrE AmE
lift elevator farm ranch
lawyer attorney biscuit cookie
rubbish garbage pavement sidewalk

11. Synonyms with different
stylistic meanings
 One of a pair of synonyms may be used in a more formal
context than the other. Here are some examples of
synonym pairs.
Informal Formal Informal Formal
die decease daddy father
blame chide guy man
west occidental praise eulogy

12. Synonyms with different connotative
meanings
 Synonyms may have different emotive associations
(connotative meanings).
famous notorious misuse abuse
(disreputably (of privilege or
) power)
ambiguous equivocal new novel
(deliberately) (strikingly)
hate loathe obtain procure
(with disgust) (with effort)

13. Source of synonyms
 Why are there so many synonyms in English?
 The primary reason for this has to do with the heavy
borrowing from other languages, especially from French
and Latin.
English French Latin
ask question interrogate
time age epoch
begin commence
buy purchase

14. Antonymy
 Antonymy is a relationship of ‘meaning
opposition’ that may hold between two words.
 Antonyms can be defined as words which are
opposite in meaning.
 Major types of antonyms ：
 Gradable antonyms
 Contradictory or complementary antonyms
 Converse antonyms

15. Gradable antonyms
 Gradable antonyms include pairs like the following:
These pairs are called
beautiful ugly gradable antonyms
expensive cheap because they do not
represent a more/less
fast slow
relation. The words can
hot cold be the end-points of a
long short continuum ( 连续体 ).
rich poor Since they are gradable,
they allow comparison.
wide narrow

16. Contradictory (complementary)
antonyms
 Contradictory antonyms include pairs like the
following:
These pairs are called
asleep awake contradictory antonyms because
dead alive they represent an either/or
on off relation.
remember forget If you permit some behavior,
win lose then it is not forbidden.
true false Since they are not gradable, they
do not allow comparison.

17. Converse antonyms
 The following are examples of converse antonyms ：
Lend is the converse of borrow
lend borrow and vice versa; i.e. the
husband wife substitution of one member for
above below the other does not change the
before after meaning of a sentence if it is
behind in front of accompanied by the change of
buy sell subject and object.
give receive
parent child John lent Mary five dollars.
speak listen
Mary borrowed five dollars from John.

18. Contradictory antonyms
vs. Converse antonyms
Converse antonyms are
The bridge is above the river. relational antonyms.
The river is below the bridge.
Contradictory antonyms are
This behavior is allowed. either/or antonym.
This behavior is not prohibited.
Mary is John’s wife. John is Mary’s husband.
? ？ Mary is not John’s husband.
I don’t forbidden you to
I allow you to introduce Mary. introduce Mary.
*You forbidden me to introduce Mary.

19. Hyponymy
 Hyponymy is the sense relationship that relates
words hierarchically. The underlying observation
is that some words have a more general meaning,
while others have a more specific meaning, while
referring to the same entity.
We are not going to have any food today.
FOOD We are not going to have any vegetables today.
MEAT VEGETABLE

20. superordinate They are subordinate terms.
They are hyponyms of the
superordinate term FOOD.
FOOD
FRUIT MEAT VEGETABLE
They are subordinate terms.
They are hyponyms of the
BEEF PORK MUTTON
superordinate term MEAT.
CABBAGE CELERY SPINACH
APPLE PEACH ORANGE
Reading from the bottom of the
hierarchy, ORANGE is a ‘kind
of’ fruit, which is a kind of

21. Meronymy
 Metonymy ( 借喻修辞手法 )
 simile; metaphor; metonym
 Meronymy (the part-of relation)

22. Metonymy
 Different from the kind-of relation displayed by
hyponymy, meronymy involves part-whole
relation between words.
arm: body An arm is part of a body;
wheel: car A wheel is part of a car.

23. 排球队 (volleyball team)
二传 主攻 副攻 接应 自由人
Setters Outside Middle Opposite Liberos
hitters hitters hitters
排球队员 (volleyball player)
Hyponyms of ??? 【 kind-of 】
Meronyms of ??? 【 part-of 】

24. Collocation: a structural relation
 Collocation refers to a structural or syntagmatic
relation. It refers to meaning relations that a word
has with other words in the same sentence.
 If the noun ‘kettle’ occurs in a sentence, there is a
high chance that the verb ‘boil’ will also occur, e.g.
I will boil a kettle.
Is the kettle boiling now?

25. Collocation
 Collocation
 Grammatical collocation (e.g. fond+of, want+to, etc.)
 Meaning collocation (our focus)
 Collocation refers to a meaning relation of
predictable co-occurrence. There is a mutual
expectancy between two collocated words. The
force may be weak or strong. We can use corpus
to identify the collocation patterns.

26. Syntagmatic and paradigmatic relations
… of his political life in …
private
professional
A word has the academic A word has the
syntagmatic paradigmatic relation
…
relation with its with other words
neighboring which can be used in
words. It is a kind the same position in a
of collocation sentence. It is a kind
relation. of substitution
relation.