Sense relations - identity

Studienarbeit aus dem Jahr 2011 im Fachbereich Amerikanistik - Linguistik, Bayerische Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg, Sprache: Deutsch, Abstract: One possible definition of sense relations is: 'Any relation between lexical units within the semantic system of a language', (Matthews 1997:337). This means that there has to be a relation in meaning between lexical units of a language. It does not matter if this relation expresses some kind of identity or non-identity. One could also define sense relations as 'a paradigmatic relation between words or predicates'. 'Paradigmatic relations are those into which a linguistic unit enters through being contrasted or substitutable, in particular environment, with other similar units', (Palmer 1981:67). In other words, a paradigmatic relation is a relation where an individual lexical unit can be replaced by another. A less scientific approach to sense relations is made by David Crystal: 'We have a sense relation when we feel that lexemes relate to each other in meaning', (Crystal 2003: 164). The most common relations in meaning between lexical units are Synonymy and Antonymy. Whereas the latter one belongs to a group of sense relations which express a non-identity, the first one is the most known type of identity-expressing sense relations. Together with Hyponymy, Crystal calls them the 'chief types of lexical sense relations'. But in the field of semantics, there are far more possibilities of expressing a relation in sense. For example, there are Paraphrase, Homonymy, member-collection and portion-mass relationships, which all express a special kind of identity. In this term paper, the focus lies on sense relations expressing a form of identity, sameness or identical traits.