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TYPES OF LEXICAL MEANING

A number of stylistic devices are based on the peculiar use of lexical meanings. Therefore it seems to be necessary to define with precision the types of meanings words may have which we meet in stylistic devices.

Words can be approached from multifarious aspects, some of which go beyond the boundaries of pure linguistics, though they are deeply rooted in the texture of the language. The most common and acceptable definition of a word is the following. A word is a language sign that expresses a concept by its forms and meanings. By concept is meant an abstract or general idea of some phenomenon of objective reality including the subjective feelings and emotions of human beings. The forms of a word show its relation to the other words in a sentence. The meaning of a word is the means by which the concept is materialized. The meaning will always direct the mind to the object or objects we think of. The forms of a word will direct the mind to the correlation between the words in a sentence.

The forms of a word are also said to have meanings. Therefore we distinguish between lexical meaning and grammatical meaning, the former referring to the phenomena of objective reality and the latter to the correlation between the words in a sentence.

Both lexical and grammatical meaning may be polysemantic. This means that a word may have a number of meanings. So here we meet the first contradiction in terms. On the one hand a word expresses a concept by its meanings. On the other hand each meaning may denote a separate concept. The contradiction is to some extent removed by introducing the notion of progress in language. The meanings are liable to change. When there is an obvious connection between different meanings, we call them shades of meaning, nuances of meaning and even separate meanings, the latter being on the verge of becoming separate words. When the process of breaking away from the basic meaning has gone so far that we scarcely feel any connection between the meanings, we say that the word has split into two different words which in this case become homonyms.[8]

The meanings of a word are the only means of materializing a concept in language, though some concepts may be materialized not by means of the signs of language but by other signs — by gestures, mimicry, music, painting, sculpture and the other fine arts.[9]

It is of paramount importance in stylistics to bear in mind that concepts of objective reality have different degrees of abstractness. This is adequately manifested in language. Adjectives are more abstract in meaning than nouns. Adverbs may be considered more abstract than adjectives inasmuch as they usually characterize an abstract notion, action or state. Conjunctions and prepositions have a still higher degree of abstractness because it is not objects as such that they indicate, but the correlation of the concepts involved. Therefore we may consider conjunctions and prepositions, and some auxiliary words as well, to be on the border line between lexical and grammatical categories, or in terms of meaning, having a grammatical meaning which suppresses the lexical meaning.

Within the grammatical classes of words there are also different degrees of abstractness. Nouns, as is known, are divided into two large classes, abstract and concrete. But this division does not correspond to the actual difference in the degree of abstractness. This will be explained later when we come to illustrate abstractness and concreteness.

A word, as is known, generalizes. Consequently, a word will always denote a concept, no matter whether it names a definite object or embraces all the objects of a given kind.

The problem of abstractness, and especially the degree of abstractness, is of vital importance in stylistics in more than one respect. Stylistics deals not only with the aesthetic and emotional impact of the language. It also studies the means of producing impressions in our mind. Impression is the first and rudimentary stage of concept. But the concept through a reverse process may build another kind of impression. Impressions that are secondary to concepts, in other words which have been born by concepts, are called imagery.

Imagery is mainly produced by the interplay of different meanings. Concrete objects are easily perceived by the senses. Abstract notions are perceived by the mind. When an abstract notion is by the force of the mind represented through a concrete object, an image is the result. Imagery may be built on the interrelation of two abstract notions or two concrete objects or an abstract and a concrete 'one.

Three types of meaning can be distinguished, which we shall call logical, emotive and nominal respectively.

Logical meaning is the precise naming of a feature of the idea, phenomenon or object, the name by which we recognize the whole of the concept. This meaning is also synonymously called referential meaning 6r direct meaning. We shall use the terms logical and referential as being most adequate for our purpose.

Referential meanings are liable to change. As a result the referential meanings of one word may denote different concepts. It is therefore necessary to distinguish between primary and secondary referential, or logical, meaning.

Thus the adverb inwardly has the primary logical meaning of internally or within. Its secondary logical meanings are: towards the centre, mentally, secretly, which are to some extent derived from the primary meaning.[10] Some dictionaries give a very extended list of primary and secondary logical meanings and it is essential for stylistic purposes to distinguish them, as some stylistic devices are built on the interplay of primary and secondary logical meanings.

All the meanings fixed by authoritative English and American dictionaries comprise what is called the semantic structure of the word. The meanings that are to be found in speech or writing and which are accidental should not be regarded as components of the semantic structure of the word. They may be transitory, inasmuch as they depend on the context. They are generally called contextual meanings.

Let us compare the meanings of the word presence in the following two sentences.

"The governer said that he would not allow thepresenceoffederaltroops on the soil of his State."

"...the General has been faced with a problem as old as France ' spresenceinAlgeria, the stubborn resistance of officers and officials..."

In the first sentence the word 'presence' merely means '...the state of being present', whereas in the second sentence the meaning of the word expands into '...occupation', i.e. the seizure and control of an area, especially foreign territory, by military forces.

The first meaning is the dictionary meaning of the word. The second meaning is a contextual one. It lives only in the given text and disappears if the context is altered. However there are definite reasons to assume that a number of derivative meanings are given place in dictionaries on the basis of contextual meanings. When the two meanings clearly co-exist in the utterance, we say there is an interaction of dictionary and contextual meanings. When only one meaning is perceived by the reader, we are sure to find this meaning in dictionaries as a derivative one.

Sometimes it is difficult to decide whether there is a simultaneous materialization of two dictionary logical meanings or an interplay of a dictionary and a contextual meaning. The difficulty is caused, on the one hand, by insufficient objective criteria of what should be fixed in dictionaries as already established language facts, and on the other hand, by deliberate political, aesthetic, moral and other considerations on the part of the compilers of the dictionaries.

Thus in Byron's use of the word 'arise' in the line "Awake ye sons of Spain, awake, arise !" the word 'arise' has the long-established meaning of 'revolt'. It is not contextual any longer. But no English or American dictionary fixes this particular meaning in the semantic structure of the word 'arise' and it is left to the ability of the attentive reader to supply the obvious meaning to the word.

The same can be said about the word 'appeasement'. There is an implicit difference in the treatment of the semantic structure of this word in British and American dictionaries. In no British dictionary will you find the new derivative meaning, viz. 'a sacrifice of moral principle in order to avert aggression'. Some modern American dictionaries include this meaning in the semantic structure of the word 'appeasement'. The reason for the difference is apparent — the British prime minister Chamberlain in 1938 played an ignoble role in Munich, sacrificing Chekoslovakia to Hitler's greed. The new meaning that was attached to the word (in connection with this historical event) cannot now be removed from its semantic structure.

A dictionary meaning is materialized in the context; a contextual meaning is born in the context. However, dictionaries, though the only reliable sources of information regarding the meanings of a given word, apply very diverse and even contradictory principles in ascertaining the general acceptability and recognition of some of the shades of meaning which are in process of being shaped as independent meanings. Thus, toexcuseoneself in the meaning of 'to leave', as in 'Soames excusedhimself directly after dinner' (Galsworthy); or the meaning of a thought — 'a little' as in ' Athought more fashionably than usual' (Galsworthy) are fixed as separate meanings in some modern British and American dictionaries, but are neglected in others.

Every word possesses an enormous potentiality for generating new meanings. This power is often underestimated by scholars who regard a word as a unit complete in itself and acknowledge a new-born meaning only when it has firmly asserted itself in language and become accepted by the majority of the language community. But not to see the latent possibilities of a word is not to understand the true nature of this unit of language.

The potentiality of words can also be noted in regard to emotive meaning. Emotive meaning also materializes a concept in the word, but unlike logical meaning, emotive meaning has reference not directly to things or phenomena of objective reality, but to the feelings and emotions of the speaker towards these things or to his emotions as such. Therefore the emotive meaning bears reference to things, phenomena or ideas through a kind of evaluation of them. For example:

I feel so darned lonely. (Graham Green, "The Quiet American".)

He classified him as a man of monstrous selfishness; he did not want to see that knife descend, but he felt it for one greatfleeting instant. (London)

The italicized words have no logical meaning, only emotive meaning. Their function is to reveal the subjective, evaluating attitude of the writer to the things or events spoken of. Men-of-letters themselves are well aware that words may reveal a subjective evaluation and sometimes use it for definite stylistic effects, thus calling the attention of the reader to the meaning of such words. Thus, for example, in the following passage from "The Man of Property" by Galsworthy:

"She was not a flirt, not even a coquette — words dear to the heart of his generation, which loved to define things by a good, broad, inadequate word — but she was dangerous."

Here the words 'flirt' and 'coquette' retain some of their logical meaning. They mean a person (particularly a girl) who endeavours to attract the opposite sex, who toys with her admirers. But both words have acquired an additional significance, viz. a derogatory shade of meaning. This shade may grow into an independent meaning and in this case will be fixed in dictionaries as having a special emotive meaning, as, for example, have the words fabulous, terrifying, stunning, spectacular, swell, top, smart, cute, massive and the like.

Many words acquire an emotive meaning only in a definite context. In that case we say that the word has a contextual emotive meaning.

Stephen Ullmann holds that

"Only the context can show whether a word should be taken as a purely objective expression, or whether it is primarily designed to convey and arouse emotions. This is obvious in the case of words like liberty, and justice, which are frequently charged with emotional implications. But even colourless everyday terms may, in freak contexts, acquire unexpected emotional overtones, as for instance 'wall' in this passage from a Midsummer Night's Dream:

'And thou, O wall, O sweet, O lovely wall,

...Thanks, courteous wall... O wicked wall.'"

Ullmann's point of view is only partly true. There are, of course, words which as we have pointed out may acquire emotive meaning in a context. Ordinarily though, and particularly when taken as isolated lexical units, they can hardly be said to possess emotive meaning. But Ullmann's opinion that only the context can inject emotional meaning into words, contradicts the facts. In the vocabulary of almost any European language there are words which are undoubtedly bearers of emotive meaning. These are interjections, oaths or swear-words, exclamatory words (variants of interjections) and a great number of qualitative or intensifying adjectives some of which have already been mentioned. The emotive meaning of some of these classes of words is so strong that it suppresses the co-existing logical meaning, as for example in stunning and smart. It is significant that these words are explained in dictionaries by means of synonymous words charged with strong emotional implications, i.e. words that direct the mind not to objective things, ideas or phenomena but to the feelings. Thus the word smart is explained in "The Penguin English Dictionary" thus: "stinging, pungent, keen; vigorous, brisk; clever, intelligent; impertinent; shrewd; witty; spruce, neat, gay, fashionable!"

Other classes of words with emotive meaning have entirely lost their logical meaning and function in the language as interjections. Such words as alas, oh, ah, pooh, darn, gosh and the like have practically no logical meaning at all; words like thedevil, Christ, God, goodnessgracious, etc., are frequently used only in their emotive meaning. The same can be said about the words bloody, damn and other expletives.

Contrary to Stephen Ullmann, we think that emotional meaning is inherent in a definite group of words and adherent to many words denoting emotions and feelings even when taken out of the context.

Ullmann's example of the word wall as bearing strong emotional meaning does not stand scrutiny. He overlooks the real bearers of emotional meaning, viz. the words preceding or following it: O,sweet, lovely (these three words are repeated several times), courteous, wicked. It goes without saying that these words strongly colour[11] the word wall, but no emotional meaning as a counterpart of logical meaning can be observed here.

Emotive meaning of words plays an important role in stylistics. Therefore it should never be underrated. A very keen eye or ear will always distinguish elements of emotive meaning. Emotional colouring may be regarded as a rudimentary stage of emotive meaning, which is generally fixed as an independent meaning in good dictionaries. Anything recognizable as having a strong impact on our senses may be considered as having emotive meaning, either dictionary or contextual.

And finally we come to nominal meaning. There are words which, while expressing concepts, indicate a particular object out of a class. In other words these units of the language serve the purpose of singling out one definite and singular object out of a whole class of similar objects. These words are classified in grammars as proper nouns. The nature of these words can be understood if we have a clear idea of the difference between the two main aspects of a word: "nomination" and "signification". These aspects are also called "reference" and "signification" or "denotation" and "connotation". The difference can roughly be illustrated by the following example.

Let us take the word table. The first thing that appears in our mind is thegeneralnotion deprived of any concrete features or properties. This is the signification. But by the word table we may also denote adefinitetable. In this case we use a definite article and the meaning becomes nominating. But we may also fix a definite name to the object which we want to be recognized as a unique object because of its peculiar properties. In this way proper names appear. Their function is not to single out one of the objects of the class for one particular occasion, as in the case with the use of the definite article, but to make it the bearer of the properties which our mind has attached to it. Thus nominal meaning is a derivative logical meaning. To distinguish nominal meaning from logical meaning the former is designated by a capital letter. Such words as Smith, Longfellow, Everest, BlackSea, Thames, Byron are said to have nominal meaning. The logical meaning from which they originate may in the course of time be forgotten and therefore not easily traced back. Most proper names have nominal meanings which may be regarded as homonyms of common nouns with their logical or emotional meanings, as Hope, Browning, Taylor, Scotland, Black, Chandler, Chester (from the Latin word castra — 'camp'). Hence logical meanings which nominate an object, at the same time signify the whole class of these objects. Nominal meanings which nominate an object are deprived of the latter function because they do not represent a class. It must be remembered however that the nominal meaning will always be secondary to the logical meaning. The process of development of meaning may go still further. A nominal meaning may assume a logical meaning due to certain external circumstances. The result is that a logical meaning takes its origin in a nominal meaning. Some feature of a person which has made him or her noticeable and which is recognized by the community is made the basis for the new logical meaning. Thus dunce — ('a dullard, a stupid person') is derived from the personal name — DunsScotus, a medieval scholastic; hooligan — ('a ruffian') is probably derived from the name of a rowdy family, cf. the Irish name Houligan, in a comic song popular about 1885; boycott ('refuse to do business with,' 'combine together against a person by breaking off all relations with him'). The verb boycott was first used in 1880 to describe the action of the Land League towards Captain Boycott, an Irish landlord. The nominal meanings of these words have now faded away and we perceive only one, the logical meaning. But sometimes the process of attaching nominal meaning to a word with a logical meaning takes place, as it were, before our eyes. This is done for purely stylistic purposes and is regarded as a special stylistic device (See p. 161).

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