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The Pros And Cons Of Polysemous Words

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There are several interpretations that could be drawn based on the result in the previous section. As we expected that we can see several distinctive differences of how Oxford English dictionary, Collins and Merriam-Webster dictionary treat polysemous words which are being studied.
First, as reflected from the data, we could see that OED (2011) has listed the most meanings of four polysemous which being studied. This fact shows that the Oxford English dictionary as the most extensive dictionary which covers the most meaning changes of polysemous words from the current use words until the diachronic/obsolete words that no longer use nowadays.
Second, as displayed in the result section, we can observe that all of the dictionaries have listed the core meaning of the words, which indicate that no matter how extensive how comprehensive a dictionary is, lexicographers are still serve the readers to find the core definitions of a word. Moreover, the core meaning of one word could be more than one as indicated that the one meaning to other meanings is also important at the same time can be recognized by English speakers. …show more content…

For instance, an advanced learner or someone who is interested in language and a person who wants to know the particular and archaic meanings of a certain word may be willing to choose the OED as the preference. This is why some archaic meanings were located easily with numerous examples of how and when the obsolete/archaic meanings are being used. We can see a couple examples of the non-linear polysemy definitions as suggested by Cruse (2000) such as polysemy and metonymy. This shows that all dictionaries were succeeded to represent meanings in different elements not only literal but also figurative meanings to be served for

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