Semantic Opacity Research Articles

Morphological Analysis Of Hybrid Compounds In Urdu Afsanas (Short Stories)

One of the significant morphological processes in a language is the way separate lexemes combine to form compound words. This process gives birth to Hybrid compound. Hybrid compounds are the compounds which are formed by the combination of one word from the source and one from the target language. As Pakistan and India have been British colonies and English still holds elite status in these regions, Urdu and Hindi have a large number of lexis which borrowed from English. The paper aims at analyzing the existence and nature of hybrid compounds in Urdu Language resulting from borrowing English words. A qualitative study was carried out by researchers and the selected corpus from Urdu short stories of Saadat Hussain Manto, Intazar Hussain, Shafeeq-ur-Rahman, Patras Bukhari, and Nimrah Ahmed was used to explore hybrid compounds in Urdu Literature. Fifty compound words were identified out of which 20 Hybrid compounds were observed. Partial borrowing was observed in short stories which provides evidence of hybrid compounding. Endocentric attributive, coordinative and subordinative and Exocentric attributive and subordinative compounds were observed and analyzed. Semantic transparency has been detected in all endocentric compounds where semantic opacity appears in exocentric compounds with some cultural schema at work.

제한된 연어(restricted collocation)의 의미적 불투명성 양상

In this study, we examine the advantages and disadvantages of the existing limited semantic opacity of idiomatic expressions. To complement this, we aim to differentiate semantic opacity within the relationship between the overall meaning and the meaning of constituent elements based on the principle of semantic agreement and attempt to conduct research that better aligns with linguistic reality through the analysis of linguistic data that incorporates this approach. To achieve this, we intend to propose a new perspective on the semantic opacity of restricted collocations corresponding to the most typical lexical function, Oper, of restricted collocations. Through experimental analysis, it was possible to observe that many restricted collocations have their primary meanings. Indeed, semantical non-transparency of restricted collocations can be categorized into three semantic aspects. First, abstract noun leads semantic opacity of restricted collocations. And whether there are direct or indirect sematic derivations from primary meaning can increase semantic opacity. Last, as metaphorical meaning addition or structural transition occurs, semantic opacity becomes even higher.

Étude sémantique des verbes préfixés en français dans le discours médiatique sur la crise sanitaire

Despite the tendencies of contemporary French to limit lexical creations by derivation, verbal prefixation remains an active means of linguistic innovation, especially during periods of economic or social crises. To shed light on this phenomenon, but also draw its limits, this article proposes a study of verbal prefixation in media discourse on the pandemic crisis based on a corpus taken from the daily Liberation covering the period from 25 to 31 May 2020. Allow for the semantic opacity of verbal prefixes, this article analyzes the semantic properties of the prefixes identified in the corpus and leads to two complementary results. First, from the point of view of prefix productivity, the discourse on the health crisis differs little from other discourses concerning the types of prefixes used and their capacity to construct verbs. Secondly, as it concerns the lexical innovations observed in the corpus, these are above all already existed prefixed verbs to which a new meaning is attributed. Two cases arise: common prefixed verbs used in new contexts; common prefixed verbs with rare meanings in everyday language. Finally, the only neologism identified concerns the verb “déconfiner” which was very often used during the pandemic crisis.

From Imperial to Soviet Power: Interpretation of Zabolotsky’s Creative Quest in the Ararat Collection

This article examines the role of Zhukovsky, a nineteenth-century ballad author, in Zabolotsky’s creative consciousness. Among the biographical facts and writings of the twentieth-century poet that reveal his constant interest in the canonic figure of his predecessor, the author pays special attention to Zhukovsky’s Ballad (1927) that has a metaliterary title. Zabolotsky included this work which looks like a riddle in the composition of Ararat, his handwritten book, and therefore is considered by the author of the article in the context of this collection. The paper aims to overcome the semantic opacity of Zhukovsky’s Ballad and to determine its place and functions in the structure of the Ararat poetic cycle. Methodologically, the analysis is based on historical poetics, which implies, on the one hand, the identification of a genre basis relevant to both Zhukovsky and Zabolotsky, and on the other hand – the transformations that the ballad underwent in the context of a “new worldview and new art”. Another theoretical reference point is B. M. Gasparov’s Poetics of the Tale of Igor’s Campaign dedicated to the interpretation of the opaque text and based on the analysis of its linguistic and genre-stylistic features. The main sources in this research are the manuscript of Zhukovsky’s Ballad as well as the cover of Ararat with drawings by the writer, and the other poems of the collection. The main result lies in the reconstruction of the cyclical plot implying the unity of all the poems of the collection through the prism of their motifs and imagery, which, in turn, revisits the biblical story of the Flood. The author analyses intertextual connections within the book and specifies their functions. In the first part of Ararat, Zhukovsky’s Ballad which completed the collection was the most conflictual work within a triad of texts dedicated to the end of the old tsarist and imperial way of life. Based on the clarified symmetrical composition of the cycle, in its second half, the author discovers the poem Movement mirroring Zhukovsky’s Ballad. Instead of the tsar in the ballad, there appears a cabman sitting “as if on the throne” as a representative of the new “proletarian” authorities. In the place of a drowned man who lived in the “round village,” the reader now sees a “poor horse” as the driving force of modernity. Thus, Zabolotsky captures the change of the social and everyday life paradigms, bringing the heroes of a new era to the fore.

On the internal structure of Serbian -(n)je nominalizations

Abstract The paper deals with the internal syntactic structure of deverbal -nje nominals in Serbian. The tests from the licensing of event-related modifiers (by-phrases and instrumental DPs) support the hypothesis that -nje nominals are derived from passive participles by adding the suffix -je (Marvin 2002; Simonović & Arsenijević 2014). Building on Simonović & Arsenijević (2014), I further observe that the licensing of referential and non-referential event modifiers exhibits a complex set of correlations with the aspectual properties of the base, phonological faithfulness to the base, and semantic compositionality. Semantic opacity and phonological unfaithfulness do not always go hand in hand, and I treat them as two separate components of a process of lexicalization, which is syntactically constrained (Marantz 1997). I argue that the presence of full VoiceP structure including a v 0 referring to an event diagnosed by the licensing of referential event modifiers (Alexiadou et al. 2014) constitutes a phase, which blocks lexicalization. This structure is present in -nje nominals derived from secondary imperfectives, which always license referential event modifiers and exhibit semantic compositionality and phonological unfaithfulness. Smaller structures derived from perfectives or primary imperfectives do not license referential event modifiers (hence, they do not constitute a full phase), which is what makes them susceptible to lexicalization.

Σημασιολογική ανάλυση των χρωματικών όρων άσπρος/λευκός και μαύρος στη Νέα Ελληνική

This paper examines for the first time the meaning of the terms white (aspros/lefkos) and black (mavros) in Modern Greek, based on Greek Corpora and Greek dictionaries. The results of the study showed that the term mavros has a negative connotation, as opposed to lefkos associated with a positive connotation, confirming the Berlin & Kay’s hypothesis about the existence of semantic universals between languages. Web as a Corpus, also, provides new collocations with a high degree of semantic opacity, which are not contained in Modern Greek dictionaries and are English translation loans deriving from the field of technology.

Translation of metaphorical idioms

AbstractIdioms are one of the most problematic areas of translation. The difficulties in translating them largely come from their semantic opacity due to “the metaphorical use of the words they encompass” (Saeed 2017, 489). This study investigates the strategies used in the translation of metaphorical idioms, specifically idioms with stock metaphors, which have greater metaphorical force and more salient images than dead metaphors. The translation strategies were surveyed in the two English translations of the classic Chinese novel,Hongloumeng(Dream of the red chamber). The results show that the choice of strategies is influenced by the relationship between the source language and the target language, the source text’s status, and the translators’ specific approaches. The images in translated metaphorical idioms received special attention in terms of their removal, retention, and replacement. An analysis of the functions of strategies is also presented. The varied combinations of these strategies further attest to the difficulty in translating metaphorical idioms. Moreover, they also have a role in translators’ style and the effect of the target text.

‘My daughter is no angel’: impairments in nominal metaphor comprehension by aphasic patients (‘Mi hija no es un tesoro’: alteraciones en la comprensión de metáforas nominales en personas con afasia)

ABSTRACT This study explored possible impairments in the comprehension of nominal metaphors in five aphasic patients with semantic deficits and two with difficulties in lexical access. To this end, a set of four novel tasks was designed: two oral paraphrasing and two forced-choice tasks. The results support the claims of the Class-Inclusion Model and the Graded Salience Hypothesis, and showed that difficulties in the comprehension of these types of expressions are sensitive to certain features of metaphor vehicles, especially their ambiguity, level of conventionality and degree of semantic opacity. Similarly, they confirmed that metaphors understood as categorization statements require the undamaged processing of low-imageability words, as opposed to analogical metaphors, which comply with the assumptions of the Structural Mapping Model. Generally, patients with lexical impairments do not show difficulties in the processing of metaphorical expressions, while the performance of patients with semantic deficit is affected in accordance with their inability to understand abstract and low-frequency words.

Consumers Perceptions on Semantic Opacity of J.CO Donuts & Coffee Menu

Consumers perception plays a noteworthy role in determining a menu. Without a doubt, the first thing that consumers will look at before deciding on their food choices is that menus and the menus are closely related to consumers perceptions. Therefore, lots of culinary businesses such as cafes and restaurants utilize strategy by creating unique food names in their menu list in order to attract more consumers. However, in opting for unique and appealing food names, the menu planning should consider the compatibility between the meaning and the food name. This study focuses on consumers perception on semantic opacity of J.CO Donuts & Coffee menu. The purpose of the study is to depict the perception of consumers towards semantic opacity menu name as well as the relation of food names, personal reference of food appearance, and meaning. This study applies a descriptive qualitative method by using an interview instrument and uses several theories, namely visual appearance of food by Kramer (1973) and a value triangle by Widyastuti & Astiandani (2020), an adaptation theory from Ogden & Richard (1946). The result shows that the meaning of food is indirectly related to food name since the meaning is not clearly stated to the food.Keywords: consumers perception, semantic opacity, food name, culinary business.

Consumers Perceptions on Semantic Opacity of J.CO Donuts & Coffee Menu

Consumers perception plays a noteworthy role in determining a menu. Without a doubt, the first thing that consumers will look at before deciding on their food choices is that menus and the menus are closely related to consumers perceptions. Therefore, lots of culinary businesses such as cafes and restaurants utilize strategy by creating unique food names in their menu list in order to attract more consumers. However, in opting for unique and appealing food names, the menu planning should consider the compatibility between the meaning and the food name. This study focuses on consumers perception on semantic opacity of J.CO Donuts & Coffee menu. The purpose of the study is to depict the perception of consumers towards semantic opacity menu name as well as the relation of food names, personal reference of food appearance, and meaning. This study applies a descriptive qualitative method by using an interview instrument and uses several theories, namely visual appearance of food by Kramer (1973) and a value triangle by Widyastuti & Astiandani (2020), an adaptation theory from Ogden & Richard (1946). The result shows that the meaning of food is indirectly related to food name since the meaning is not clearly stated to the food.Keywords: consumers perception, semantic opacity, food name, culinary business.

Terminology in medical reports

Abstract Medical reports provide a record of a patient’s diagnostic or therapeutic process while receiving healthcare. It is, therefore, critical that patients have a good understanding of their medical reports, particularly as various studies show that misunderstanding or failing to understand them can have severe consequences for their health. Today’s medical reports are essentially expository documents in which nominalizations proliferate and where verbs are scarce. This favours the presence of specific medical terminology, which is the main obstacle to comprehension. Based on an analysis of a corpus of medical reports, in this article we, first, identify and study the lexical indicators (including terms of Greek or Latin origin, abbreviations, eponyms, etc.) that hinder understanding of a medical report and, then, correlate these indicators with such textual parameters as cognitive load, semantic opacity, semantic confusion and semantic ambiguity.

Is inhibition involved in the processing of opaque compound words?

Abstract We examined whether inhibition skills were recruited during the processing of compound words. Using an individual differences perspective, we analyzed whether participants’ scores on the Stroop test predicted performance on lexical decision tasks involving compound words varying in their level of semantic opacity. The results show that inhibition is involved in the comprehension of fully opaque (e.g., hogwash) and fully transparent (e.g., blueberry) compound words, but we found no evidence for such an effect in the comprehension of partially opaque compound words (e.g., strawberry, jailbird).

On the Analogical Suffixation of Paired Antonyms: The Case of English innie and outie

In English, there are a series of paired antonyms ending with the same suffix, particularly in slang or colloquial speech—stardom, regulardom/unknowndom; friendship, enemyship; singlehood, marriedhood, etc. This article looks into the tenets of the analogical suffixation of paired antonyms (ASPA), which is the process that is thought to underlie the mechanisms of morphological analogy and semantic complementation in the structuring of same-suffixed antonymic pairs (APs). In the study of ASPA, the AP innie/outie is used to explore the interconnection of antonymy, suffixation and analogy in the twenty-nine senses identified in the corpora (News on the Web Corpus and Lexis Nexis Academic). This case study shows that the semantic composition of the AP is the result of overlapping categories that involve the bases (in-, out-), the attached suffix (-ie/y), the complementary and coalescent nature of the pairs and the morphological adaptation undergone by the etymons to fit into the pairing markedness. The process of ASPA is a universal and scalar property that depends on the semantic opacity of bases, the sociolinguistic value of the word stock and the concept of lexical creativity. The examination of the morphological analogy of paired antonyms can shed more light on the predictability and performance (profitability) of word-formation mechanisms in both mainstream and peripheral lexis.

A new proposal for the distinction between lexical and syntactic derivation in Functional Discourse Grammar

This paper explores the possibility of classifying traditional affixes as two groups, syntactic or lexical affixes, as proposed within Functional Discourse Grammar (FDG). It is argued that the main challenge for the FDG approach to derivational morphology arises from properties which revolve around the semantic contribution of derivational affixes: i) the fact that derivational processes introduce unpredictable meaning components (semantic opacity), ii) the question of what constitutes lexical meaning vs. grammatical meaning, iii) the intrinsic polysemy of some affixes, and iv) affix competition. The authors conclude that FDG should treat lexical and grammatical affixes similarly, unless a clear distinction can be made in particular cases on clearly specified semantic principles.

Aportaciones de la semántica cognitiva a la formación de palabras por composición

The aim of this research is to show the application of Cognitive Semantics to the description of nominal compounding in American Spanish. Compounding is a productive morphologic process used to create words with a transparent meaning (apoyacabeza ‘head restraint’, destapabotellas ‘bottle opener’ etc.). However, many compounds also have an important level of idiomaticity (ahogabecerro ‘tree’, bienmesabe ‘candy’ etc.). The paper shows that Cognitive Semantics can explain the semantic opacity of these idiomatic compounds on the basis of metaphoric and metonymic processes. The data are extracted from the Diccionario de americanismos published by the Real Academia Espanola.

Spread the word: MMN brain response reveals whole-form access of discontinuous particle verbs

The status of particle verbs such as rise (…) up as either lexically stored or combinatorially assembled is an issue which so far has not been settled decisively. In this study, we use the mismatch negativity (MMN) brain response to observe neurophysiological responses to discontinuous particle verbs. The MMN can be used to distinguish between whole-form storage and combinatorial processes, as it is enhanced to stored words compared to unknown pseudowords, whereas combinatorially legal strings elicit a reduced MMN relative to ungrammatical ones. Earlier work had found larger MMNs to congruent than to incongruent verb-particle combinations when particle and verb appeared as adjacent elements, thus suggesting whole-form storage at least in this case. However, it is still possible that particle verbs discontinuously spread out across a sentence would elicit the combinatorial, grammar-violation response pattern instead. Here, we tested the brain signatures of discontinuous verb-particle combinations, orthogonally varying congruence and semantic transparency. The results show for the first time brain indices of whole-form storage for discontinuous constituents, thus arguing in favour of access to whole-form-stored lexical elements in the processing of particle verbs, irrespective of their semantic opacity. Results are discussed in the context of linguistic debates about the status of particle verbs as words, lexical elements or syntactically generated combinations. The explanation of the pattern of results within a neurobiological language model is highlighted.

Transfert dans l’acquisition des expressions idiomatiques en français langue étrangère

Introduction: Cette recherche examine dans quelle mesure les apprenants non-natifs utilisent la connaissance de leur L1 afin de comprendre et de produire les expressions idiomatiques de la L2. Méthodologie: Vingt-six Colombiens apprenants de français (niveau B2) et vingt-six hispanophones vivant à Toulouse (niveau C1) ont participé à cette étude. Trente expressions idiomatiques du français ont été testées, classées en trois catégories : a) identiques en forme et en sens à une expression équivalente en espagnol, b) similaires à une expression équivalente en espagnol, c) différentes à une expression équivalente en espagnol. Quatre tests ont été administrés: deux tests de production, un test d’acceptabilité et un test de compréhension. Résultats: Pour vérifier l’hypothèse du transfert linguistique selon laquelle les expressions identiques sont faciles à comprendre et à produire, alors que les expressions différentes présentent plus de difficultés dans les deux compétences (compréhension et production), la catégorie des expressions similaires viendrait ainsi nuancer l’hypothèse du transfert et ce, notamment en termes d’opacité sémantique, de fréquence, de structure et de lexique. Conclusions: Les propositions didactiques en cours de Français langue étrangère (fle) devraient partir de ce qui est connu par les apprenants pour, au fur et à mesure de leurs processus d’acquisition de la L2, aborder les particularités ou les différences entre la L1 et la L2.

A Practice-Based Enquiry into the Academic Disciplines

The present study sets out to investigate the meanings associated with the term practice across specialised domains and, particularly, the patterns of language use and aspects ofsemantic variation that distinguish the academic disciplines. A corpus of English research articles in various domains was investigated qualitatively and quantitatively, paying attention to lexical patterns and collocates of practice, with a focus on adjectives and verbal processes. The analysis of the collocational patterns with a prominently linking nature has highlighted the relational and highly context-bound meaning of practice, also reinforced by the adjectives modifying practice (e. g. cultural, social, etc.) that contribute to the semantic opacity of this word because of their shifting framework-related meanings. Moreover, a tension between a mainly concrete meaning and a conceptual one has been identified within the disciplines as each practice is characterised by the combination and overlapping of mechanical procedures and cognitive aspects. The main findings suggest that in academic discourse practice, far from being removed from theory, actually integrates it, pointing to a constant interplay between action and discipline-based knowledge. In line with the foundations of scientific enquiry, the main focus of all kinds of academic practice appears to be placed on the epistemological dimension, i. e., on the research, theory, method, interpretation and evaluation coming into play in any scientific study. The pedagogical implications are considered and it is suggested that a context-based lexical analysis of high-frequency words can yield significant insights into the epistemological frameworks of the disciplines.

Case report: Elonis v. United States

The U.S. Supreme Court’s 2015 decision in Elonis v. United States (575 U.S. __ (2015)), a case about threats, and the underlying trial and appellate decisions, are analysed. Threats can be perlocutionary or illocutionary. When they are illocutionary, they are always indirect speech acts, requiring a Gricean chain of reasoning to infer their threatening nature. This has the consequence that every putative threat has, also, a non-threat interpretation, making it sometimes difficult to prove that an utterance was a threat. In this report, Anthony Elonis’s Facebook postings of allegedly threatening items are analysed pragmatically; the sophisticated linguistic reasoning used by the appeals court after Elonis’s conviction – involving semantic opacity – is described; and the final outcome of Elonis’s case, the Supreme Court’s decision, is analysed. That decision is both frustrating, because it leaves unresolved what the standard for proof is for threatening, and interesting, because the majority opinion, and, in particular, the dissent by Justice Alito, adduce a factor – recklessness – unnecessary to the linguistic analysis of threatening but relevant to the legal standard of proof for conviction for unlawful threatening.

Picking up polysemous phrasal verbs: How many do learners know and what facilitates this knowledge?

Abstract This study investigates L2 learners' knowledge of highly frequent polysemous phrasal verbs in English, and the effect of a number of factors on this knowledge. 128 students on BA English/TEFL courses were recruited to take a productive test in the form of a gap-fill task. The results show that only 40% of phrasal verb meaning senses were known on average, with the chances of knowing all the different meaning senses of each phrasal verb tested being quite low at only around 20%. The factors of semantic opacity, previous L2 instruction, immersion in L2 environment, and year of BA study did not have any effect on knowledge. Conversely, corpus frequency was found to predict knowledge, along with time spent reading per week, and time spent social networking per week. No relationship was found between phrasal verb knowledge and the hours spent listening to music and watching films in English. The study confirms that phrasal verbs are a problematic feature of English vocabulary for many learners, and consequently deserve more attention – either via instructed contexts or outside the classroom in L2 language engagement.