Making Sense out of Meaning: An Essay in Lexical Semantics

265 Pages·2013·6.063 MB·English

by  Walter H. Hirtle

Making SenSe out of Meaning
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Making Sense out
of Meaning
an essay in Lexical Semantics
walter hirtle
Mcgill-Queen’s university Press
Montreal & kingston • London • ithaca
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© McGill-Queen’s University Press 2013
ISBN 978-0-7735-4205-1 (cloth)
ISBN 978-0-7735-8917-9 (ePDF)
ISBN 978-0-7735-8918-6 (ePUB)
Legal deposit fourth quarter 2013
Bibliothèque nationale du Québec
Printed in Canada on acid-free paper that is 100% ancient forest free
(100% post-consumer recycled), processed chlorine free
McGill-Queen’s University Press acknowledges the support of the
Canada Council for the Arts for our publishing program. We also
acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada
through the Canada Book Fund for our publishing activities.
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Hirtle, W. H. (Walter Heal), 1927–, author
Making sense out of meaning: an essay in lexical semantics / Walter Hirtle.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Issued in print and electronic formats.
ISBN 978-0-7735-4205-1 (bound). – ISBN 978-0-7735-8917-9 (ePDF). –
ISBN 978-0-7735-8918-6 (ePUB)
1. Polysemy. 2. Semantics. 3. Discourse analysis. 4. Cognitive
grammar. 5. Metaphor. 6. Psycholinguistics. I. Title.
P325.5.P65H57 2013 401'.43 C2013-904658-5
C2013-904659-3
This book was typeset by Interscript in 10.5 / 13 Baskerville.
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To the memory of Roch Valin
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Contents
Acknowledgments ix
Introduction 3
i situating the question
1 Language as a Human Phenomenon 11
2 Linguists and the Tradition 24
3 Meaning: An Object of Scientific Enquiry? 33
ii making words
4 Coming to Grips with Meaning 43
5 How Access “Got Verbed” 57
6 Wording 73
iii lexemes of verbs
7 Monosemy and Polysemy 87
8 Discerning Different Senses of See 111
9 Grammatical (In)compatibility with Other Verbs 128
10 Do, Be, Have 139
11 Working Out the Right Sense 146
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viii Contents
iv lexemes of substantives
12 Common and Proper 159
13 ‘Unbounded’ and ‘Bounded’ 172
14 Metaphor 182
v the grammatical connection
15 Making Lexemes into Nouns 199
16 Space Words, Time Words, and Adverbs 214
vi concluding remarks
Conclusion 223
Glossary 227
Notes 231
References 241
Index 251
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acknowledgments
If I have risked venturing into an area of language that has not been
explored in any detail from the viewpoint adopted here, that of
Gustave Guillaume’s theory of the word, it is because of Roch Valin.
Some years before his illness, I was hesitant about applying
Guillaume’s method to some problem in English we had never
envisaged. Roch’s reaction was something like “Go ahead! Dive in!”
Coming from him, this gave me the confidence I needed to set to
work on it, and on subsequent problems. His recent death reminded
me of this turning point in my career and of how highly he was
esteemed by those who worked with him for his view of language.
For him, language was man’s most important creation, the word its
central component, and meaning the heart of the word. Any value
this essay may have is a tribute to his inspiration and of course to
Guillaume’s teaching, which inspired all he did in linguistics.
I owe much to discussions with my colleagues in the Fonds Gustave
Guillaume at l’Université Laval and am particularly grateful to
Claude Guimier for comments on an earlier version of this study.
Finally, the very fact that this essay has resulted in a publication is
due in large part to the encouragement and support of my wife.
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