Studie z Aplikované Lingvistiky (Nov 2018)
Enantiosémie z perspektivy lingvistických teorií intersubjektivity || Enantiosemy from the Perspective of Linguistic Theories of Intersubjectivity
Abstract
This paper deals with two rather under-researched aspects of enantiosemy, i.e. the state in which one word in a given language has two opposite meanings. First, the paper investigates how is it possible for the second, opposite meaning to emerge (= individual-psychological aspect); second, it focuses on the processes of spreading throughout the language community (= social-psychological aspect). As far as the first aspect is concerned, this paper is based on the Vygotskian trends in SLA (FLT, FLL; see e.g. van Compernolle, 2015; Wertsch, 1994) and conceives enantiosemy as result of an inferring false hypothesis about the meaning of the given word from the input. It shows that these false hypotheses, if not disproved, subsequently transform into rules constituting the new, opposite meanings. As far as the second aspect is concerned, this paper is based on the linguistic theories of intersubjectivity, where meanings are conceptualized as rules, i.e. normative social facts, existing in the so-called intersubjectivity of the language users’ minds (see e.g. Itkonen, 2003; 2008a; Zlatev et al., 2008; Zlatev, 2016; Verhagen, 2015). The spreading of the second, opposite meaning is perceived as a series of consequent individual-psychological acquisitions of the new rule with the new, opposite content (i.e. false hypothesis > new, opposite rule) by the first, second, third etc. language users. From this perspective, it is possible to demonstrate the difference between enantiosemy from the language’s point of view (one part of a language community knows the old meaning only, while the second knows only the new, opposite meaning) and enantiosemy from the user’s point of view (some members of a community knowing both the old and the new, opposite meaning).
