La monosemia nel lessico di alta frequenza: un’indagine sull’italiano
It has long been known in statistical linguistics that there is a strong correlation between the frequency of a word and its polysemy, i. e. that more frequent words tend to have more meanings. There are, however, also high-frequency words that are monosemous. The aim of this work is to investigate...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | deu |
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Bern Open Publishing
2023-08-01
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| Series: | Linguistik Online |
| Online Access: | https://bop.unibe.ch/linguistik-online/article/view/10197 |
| _version_ | 1827871742252548096 |
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| author | Federica Casadei |
| author_facet | Federica Casadei |
| author_sort | Federica Casadei |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description |
It has long been known in statistical linguistics that there is a strong correlation between the frequency of a word and its polysemy, i. e. that more frequent words tend to have more meanings. There are, however, also high-frequency words that are monosemous. The aim of this work is to investigate how many and which monosemous words are found in the Italian high-frequency lexicon, i. e. in the about 7,700 words that constitute the basic vocabulary (Nuovo Vocabolario di Base, NVdB). Confirming the relationship between frequency and polysemy, only 8% of the words in the NVdB are monosemous according to the main Italian dictionary, and a subsequent check in other dictionaries and in corpora further reduces the amount of monosemous words to less than 6%. A semantic analysis shows that the majority of them are technical or technical-like words with a very specific and referentially restricted meaning. (e. g. elettrone, stendibiancheria); but there are also words with a generic meaning (funzionamento), and non-referential words such as grammatical words (sebbene) or interjections (boh). These three classes of words could be considered more or less central cases of monosemy, adopting a prototype definition of this notion.
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| first_indexed | 2024-03-12T16:15:14Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-27e14616696643f9aa5284f1fdb4a98b |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 1615-3014 |
| language | deu |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-12T16:15:14Z |
| publishDate | 2023-08-01 |
| publisher | Bern Open Publishing |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Linguistik Online |
| spelling | doaj.art-27e14616696643f9aa5284f1fdb4a98b2023-08-09T04:37:55ZdeuBern Open PublishingLinguistik Online1615-30142023-08-01122410.13092/lo.122.10197La monosemia nel lessico di alta frequenza: un’indagine sull’italianoFederica Casadei It has long been known in statistical linguistics that there is a strong correlation between the frequency of a word and its polysemy, i. e. that more frequent words tend to have more meanings. There are, however, also high-frequency words that are monosemous. The aim of this work is to investigate how many and which monosemous words are found in the Italian high-frequency lexicon, i. e. in the about 7,700 words that constitute the basic vocabulary (Nuovo Vocabolario di Base, NVdB). Confirming the relationship between frequency and polysemy, only 8% of the words in the NVdB are monosemous according to the main Italian dictionary, and a subsequent check in other dictionaries and in corpora further reduces the amount of monosemous words to less than 6%. A semantic analysis shows that the majority of them are technical or technical-like words with a very specific and referentially restricted meaning. (e. g. elettrone, stendibiancheria); but there are also words with a generic meaning (funzionamento), and non-referential words such as grammatical words (sebbene) or interjections (boh). These three classes of words could be considered more or less central cases of monosemy, adopting a prototype definition of this notion. https://bop.unibe.ch/linguistik-online/article/view/10197 |
| spellingShingle | Federica Casadei La monosemia nel lessico di alta frequenza: un’indagine sull’italiano Linguistik Online |
| title | La monosemia nel lessico di alta frequenza: un’indagine sull’italiano |
| title_full | La monosemia nel lessico di alta frequenza: un’indagine sull’italiano |
| title_fullStr | La monosemia nel lessico di alta frequenza: un’indagine sull’italiano |
| title_full_unstemmed | La monosemia nel lessico di alta frequenza: un’indagine sull’italiano |
| title_short | La monosemia nel lessico di alta frequenza: un’indagine sull’italiano |
| title_sort | la monosemia nel lessico di alta frequenza un indagine sull italiano |
| url | https://bop.unibe.ch/linguistik-online/article/view/10197 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT federicacasadei lamonosemianellessicodialtafrequenzaunindaginesullitaliano |