Antonymy

Abstract

This article offers a Cognitive Semantic approach to antonymy in language and thought. Based on a series of recent empirical investigations using different observational techniques, we analyze (i) the nature of the category of antonymy, and (ii) the status of its members in terms of goodness of opposition. Our purpose is to synthesize these empirical investigations and provide a theoretical framework that is capable of accounting for antonymy as a mode of thought in language use and meaning-making. We show that antonymy has conceptual basis, but in contrast to other lexico-semantic construals, a limited number of words seem to have special lexical status as dimensional protagonists. Form–meaning pairings are antonyms when they are used as binary opposites. Configurationally, this translates into a construal where some content is divided by a BOUNDARY. This configuration (or schema) is a necessary requirement for meanings to be used as antonyms and all antonyms have equal status as members. In contrast to categorization by configuration, categorization by contentful meaning structures forms a continuum ranging from strongly related pairings as core members toad hoccouplings on the outskirts. In order to explain why some lexico-semantic couplings tend to form conventionalized pairs, we appeal to their ontological set-up, the symmetry of the antonyms in relation to the boundary between the meaning structures, their contextual range of use and frequency.

Lexical Semantics

“…Antonyms are similar in that they are aligned along the same conceptual dimension, but they are maximally different in expressing the opposite properties of that particular dimension (Paradis & Willners, 2011). For instance, good and bad may be used as antonyms along the dimension of MERIT, and long and short along the dimension of LENGTH (Figure 3).…”

Semantic profiles of antonymic adjectives in discourse

“…Antonymy is grounded in similarity of usage (Paradis and Willners 2011). These findings allow us to explain the close relationship between antonyms through their pairwise similarities, which is the kind of tacit knowledge that speakers build up through life and which becomes entrenched in memory, i.e., the total meaning and use potential of a lexical item as posited by Paradis (2003Paradis ( , 2005Paradis ( , 2016.…”

“…Construal operations are the source of all readings, conventional as well as ad hoc contextual readings. A leading idea of this approach is that lexical items evoke meanings rather than have meanings; lexical meanings emerge in actual language use in human communication (Cruse 2002;Paradis 2003Paradis , 2005Paradis , 2008Paradis , 2016Paradis and Willners 2011). The notion usage-based is fundamental to all cognitively oriented approaches to meaning.…”

“…Moreover, the members of these pairs elicit one another strongly in elicitation experiments. They are assessed to be excellent antonyms in judgment experiments, and they have facilitating effects on each other in psycholinguistic and neurolinguistic experiments Paradis and Willners 2011;Crutch et al 2012;van de Weijer et al 2012;van de Weijer et al 2014).…”

A model of trust-repair discourse

“…Human beings cannot conceive of trust without seeing it in contrast to distrust (Linell and Marková, 2013;Marková and Gillespie, 2008). This opposition may be viewed along a scale from trust to distrust (Paradis and Willners, 2011), featuring degrees of trustworthiness with respect to the trustee's ability, integrity and benevolence. In the case of a catastrophe like the one we are analyzing here, there is good reason for the trustee to fear that there is a risk of potential loss of trust from the trustor.…”