Homonyms can be of 3 kinds:
- 1. Homonyms proper (the sound & the spelling are identical)
- 2. Homophones (the same sound form but different spelling)
- 3. Homographs (the same spelling)
Ex.:
1. bat – bat - flying animal (летучая мышь)
- cricket bat (бита)
2. flower – flour
sole – soul
rain – reign
3. tear [iə] – tear [εə]
lead [i:] – lead [e]
Homonyms proper are words identical in pronunciation and spelling:
- “Ball” as a round object used in game, “ball” as a gathering of people for dancing;
- “Bark” v to utter sharp explosive cries; “bark” n is a noise made by dog or a sailing ship, etc.
Homophones are words of the same sound, but of different meaning, for example:
“Air” – “heir”, “arms” – “alms”, “bye” – “buy” – “by”
One of the sources is its development from polysemy.
At a certain point, variation within a word may bring to a stage when its semantic core is no longer elastic. It can’t be stretched any further & as a result a new word comes into being.
Homonymy differs from polysemy because there is no semantic bond (связь) between homonyms; it has been lost & doesn’t exist.
Homonyms appear as a result of:
1. The phonetic convergence of 2 words of different pronunciation & meaning.
Ex.: race → a) people derives from Old Norwegian “ras”
b) running, from French “race”
2. The semantic divergence or loss of semantic bond between 2 words polysemantically related before.
Ex.: pupil→ a) scholar
b) apple of an eye (зрачок)
