ANTONYMY AND ITS IMPLICATIONS FOR TEACHING ENGLISH

MÉu b×a bµi tËp c¸c m«n häc Vietnam National University, Hanoi University of Languages and International Studies Post graduate Department Semantics (Final assignment) ANTONYMY AND ITS IMPLICATIONS FOR TEACHING ENGLISH Student Nguyễn Thị Tâm School year 2009 – 2010 Lecturer Dr Hà Cẩm Tâm Deadline 28th June 2010 Hanoi – 2010 TABLE OF CONTENTS Chapter 1 Introduction 1 1 1 Rationale of the study 1 1 2 Research questions 1 1 3 Scope of the study 1 1 4 Significance of the study 1 1 5 Methods of the st.

Post-graduate Department

Semantics

(Final assignment)

ANTONYMY AND ITS IMPLICATIONS FOR

TEACHING ENGLISH

Student : Nguyễn Thị Tâm School year : 2009 – 2010 Lecturer : Dr Hà Cẩm Tâm Deadline : 28th June 2010

Hanoi – 2010

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Chapter 1: Introduction ……….……… 1

1.1 Rationale of the study 1

1.2 Research questions 1

1.3 Scope of the study 1

1.4 Significance of the study 1

1.5 Methods of the study 2

Chapter 2: Development 2.1 Definitions of antonymy……… ………3

2.2 Characteristics of antonyms……… ………… ………4

2.3 Types of antonyms ……… ………5

2.3.1 Conventional classification ……… ……….………5

2.3.2 John Lyon’s classification ……… ….……….6

2.3.3 Other types ……… ……… 7

2.4 Implications for teaching English ……… ……….8

2.4.1 For teaching vocabulary……….8

2.4.2 For teaching writing……… ………9

Chapter 3: Conclusion ……… ………… 11

References ……… ……… …………12

Chapter 1: Introduction

1.1 Rationale of the study

Antonymy is one of the basic structural relations in the vocabularies of any human language The existence of a large number of antonyms in the vocabulary of

a language would seem to be related to a general human tendency to polarize experience and judgment – to think in opposites Yet in most discussion of word meaning the concept has been curiously neglected, although much attention has been given to other semantic relations, such as synonymy

A study on antonymy with its implications for language teaching is needed Therefore, in this research, I would like to explore that slighted dimension of the most important semantic relation

1.2 Research questions

This study addresses four research questions:

1.3 Scope of the study

In the scope of a final assignment, I do not have an ambition to cover all sense relations I have studied in the course I only focus on antonymy and give some suggestions on how it can be used in teaching English

1.4 Significance of the study

This study, to some extent, will help the readers understand one of the most important types of sense relations - antonymy and antonyms clearly Moreover, it can provide teachers of English with some suggestions on teaching vocabulary and writing through antonymy It is hoped that this study will be a good food for thoughts for the teachers and a useful reference material for the further study on the related subjects

1.5 Methods of the study

To complete this study, I have carried out a lot of reading and consulting Firstly, information relating to antonymy is collected from books borrowed from the library, and from some articles available on the Internet The combination of information obtained from reading materials and consultation can help me to draw out the outline of this study

Chapter 2: Development

2.1 Definitions of antonymy

Antonymy has been defined by many different linguists and semanticist; however, in general, these definitions are the same in essence According to wordreference.com dictionary, antonymy is a semantic relation that holds between two words that can (in a given context) express opposite meanings In general, it is concerned with semantic opposition

These follows are some definitions of antonyms which I find the most comprehensible ones Arnold (1986:209) states that “antonyms may be defined as two or more words of the same language belonging to the same part of speech and to the same semantic, identical in style and nearly identical in distribution, associated and often used together so that their denotative meaning render contradictory or contrary notions.”

Antrushina G.B (1985:167) also points out that “we use the term antonyms

to indicate - words of the same parts of speech which have contrasting meanings.”

In general, antonymy is not evenly distributed among the categories of parts

of speech Many words, especially those denoting concrete objects (chair, tree, and tiger) have no antonyms Usually, adjectives denoting qualities, verbs denoting actions or states and abstract nouns have antonyms Most antonyms are adjectives

which are not only natural because qualitative characteristics are easily compared and contrasted such as high - low, wide - narrow, strong - weak, old - young, friendly - hostile Verbs take the second place after adjectives, so far as antonymy is concerned Here are some of them: to lose - to find, to live - to die, to open - to close Nouns are not rich in antonyms, but even so some examples can be given: joy

- grief, heaven - earth Antonymic adverbs can be subdivided into two groups: (a) adverbs derived from adjectives: warmly - coldly, merrily - sadly, and (b) adverbs proper: now - then, here - there, ever - never, up - down, in - out It should be noted here that polysemic words may have different antonyms for different meanings

E.g A dull pupil – a bright pupil

A dull book – an interesting book

A dull knife – a sharp knife Dull color – bright color Many words though having synonyms do not find their semantic opposites For example, these are “read, hit, house, book, power, magazine” That’s the reason why there are a great many more synonyms than antonyms in a language

2.2 Characteristics of antonyms

In this study, I would like to list 4 characteristics of antonyms as follows:

E.g big- small (adjectives about size)

E.g Is she slender/ slim/ thin/ fat?

unmarked member is also the global member of the opposition For example,

in pair “old and young”, “old” is global, unmarked adjective It is used with units of time to express age When we say “the baby is four days old”, we are not saying that the baby is old, and in saying “the box is three inches deep”,

we are not saying that “the box is deep”

corresponding antonyms

E.g cold – hot; cool – warm

2.3 Types of antonyms

2.3.1 Conventional classification

Antonyms are conventionally classified into 2 types: root word antonyms (antonyms proper) and derivational antonyms

meanings

E.g old – young; kind – cruel

negative affix (according to Arnold (1986: 213)) The affix in them serves to deny the quality stated in the term It is not difficult to find examples where contrast is implied in the morphological structure of the word itself

E.g appear – disappear; pleasant – unpleasant

logical – illogical; regular – irregular;

useful – useless; normal – abnormal

There are typical affixes and typical patterns that go into play in forming these derivational antonyms It is significant that in the examples given above prefixes prevail The regular type of derivational antonyms contains negative prefixes: dis-, il-, im-, ir-, mis-, non- and un- Other negative prefixes occur

in this function only occasionally

As to the suffixes, it should be noted that modern English gives no examples

of words forming their antonyms by adding a negative suffix, such as, for instance, less The opposition “hopeless – hopeful”, or “useless – useful” is more complicated, as the suffix -less is not merely added to the contrasting stem, but substituted for the suffix -ful The group is not numerous In most cases, even when the language possesses words with the suffix -less, the antonymic pairs found in actual speech are formed with prefix un- Thus, the antonymic opposition is not selfish - selfless but selfish - unselfish

In general, several features distinguish the two groups of antonyms In words containing one of the above negative prefixes, the contrast expressed morphologically as the prefixed variant is in opposition to the un-prefixed one Therefore, if the morphological motivation is clear, there is no necessity in contexts containing both members to prove the existence of derivational antonyms The word unsuccessful, for instance, presupposes the existence of the word unsuccessful, so that the following quotation is sufficient for establishing the contrast Essex was always in a state of temper after one of these unsuccessful interviews

The patterns, however, although typical, are not universal, so that morphologically similar formations may show different semantic relationships Disappoint, for example, is not the antonym of appoint, neither is unman to deprive

of human qualities’ antonyms of man to furnish with personnel

2.3.2 John Lyon’s classification

John Lyons divided antonyms into 2 types: antonyms proper and complementary antonyms

E.g: hot – warm – cool – cold

ugly – pretty

It is interesting to note that such words as young - old, big - small, good - bad

do not refer to independent absolute qualities but to some implicit norm, they are relative The semantic polarity in antonym proper is relative, the opposition is gradual, and it may embrace several elements characterized by different degrees of the same property The comparison they imply is clear from the context This relation is typically associated with adjectives and has two major identifying characteristics:

- Firstly, there are often intermediate terms so that between the gradable

“hot” and “cold” we can find “hot (warm/ tepid/ cool) cold”

- Secondly, the terms are usually relative So a thick pencil is likely to be thinner than a thin girl

- Thirdly, with gradable pairs, the negative word of one member of the pair

is not synonymous with the other For instance, “unhappy” doesn’t necessarily mean “sad”

- Lastly, it is true of gradable antonyms that more of one is less of the other For example, “more happy” means “less sadness”

presuppose that the assertion of one is the negation of the other If one of the pair is true, then the other cannot be true They are mutually exclusive and admit no possibility between them They are non-gradable

E.g Male – female; dead – alive

Present – absent; boy – girl

Same – different

2.3.3 Other types

from different points of view with a reversal of the order of participants and their roles; display symmetry in their meaning

E.g Buy – sell; give – tale; parent – child; left – right; lock – unlock The relation is closely connected with grammar, namely with grammatical contrast of active and passive The substitution of a conversive does not change the meaning of a sentence if it is combined with appropriate regular morphological and syntactical changes and selection of appropriate prepositions He gave her flowers She received flowers from him = She was given flowers by him

Some linguists classify conversives as a subset of antonyms; others suggest that antonyms and conversives together constitute the class of contrastives Although there is parallelism between the two relations, it seems more logical

to stress that they must be distinguished, even if the difference is not always clear- cut The same pair of words e.g fathers and sons may be functioning as antonyms or as conversives

between terms describing movement, where one term describes movement in one direction, and the other the same movement in the opposite direction, for example the terms “push and pull on a swing door”, which tell you in which direction to apply force Other such pairs are come/go, go/return, and ascend/descend When describing motion the following can be called

reverses: (go) up/down, (go) in/out, (turn) right/left By extension, the term is also applied to any process which can be reversed: so other reverses are inflate/ deflate, expand/contrast, full/empty

2.4 Implications for teaching English

2.4.1 For teaching vocabulary

It can be denied that teaching vocabulary plays an important role in second or foreign language teaching “Without grammar very little can be conveyed; without vocabulary nothing can be conveyed.” (Wilkins, 1972:111) “The more one considers the matter, the more reasonable it seems to suppose that lexis is where we need to start from, the syntax needs to be put to the service of words and not the other way round.” (according to Widdowsen in Lewis, 1993:115)

Many researchers and practitioners have seen the relationship between antonyms and teaching vocabulary Teaching antonyms strengthens a learner’s concept of words and develops her vocabulary Therefore, it’s advisable for teachers

to teach related words together so that students will remember the new words easily for a longer period of time While teaching reading lessons, the teachers can occasionally stop and point out a particular word and ask the students to think of a word that has an opposite meaning This will help them learn both of words at the same time and in a simple but effective way Not all words have antonyms, but thinking about for those that do, opposite requires students to evaluate the critical attributes of the words in question

To revise and review vocabulary, teachers also can create many kinds of exercises and activities basing on antonymy such as matching or fill-in-opposites activities in a motivating way in order for students to commit them to their memory

As an example, teachers divide the class into 2 groups: A and B Next, he/she reads aloud words one by one and each group takes turn giving their antonyms of these

words Each right antonym will equal to 2 points Two groups will compete with each other to find the winner

Besides, teachers can organize some funny and interesting games using antonymy to teach their students vocabulary such as crossword game and word uncramble She can divide the class into smaller groups of 4 or 5 members Each group will receive a paper containing many letters which can be combined with each other horizontally, vertically or diagonally into antonyms The group which can find all right antonyms in the shortest time is the winner

Such activities and techniques require students to think of new words or recall the vocabulary they have learned Brainstorming and using antonyms are great ways to increase their vocabulary and expose them to different words that are above their grade level

2.4.2 For teaching writing

It is necessary for students to acquire a flexible way of expressing and supporting their ideas In teaching writing, teachers should raise their students’ awareness of using different words or expressions to avoid repeating and to make their writing more compelling She/he needs to remind them to think up antonyms when they write because they can always use a “negative sentence” with an antonym

to express the same, or a similar idea

For example:

Peter did not accept my invitation = Peter refuse my invitation

As another illustration, if students are looking to express a relationship between the quality of parenting and the education of the child, they could write either something like:

“With good care, his parents gave him such a headstart In life, learning in school was so easy for him, teachers assumed he was smart.”