39. Antonymy

Antonymy - A word having a meaning opposite to that of another word.

Oppositeness is perhaps not such a pervasive (глубокое) meaning relation in the vocabulary of English as synonymy, but it has an important role in structuring the vocabulary of English. This is especially so in the adjective word class, where many words occur (встречаются) in antonymous pairs, e.g. long – short, wide – narrow, new – old, rough – smooth, light – dark, straight – crooked, deep – shallow, fast – slow. While antonymy is typically found among adjectives it is not restricted (не ограничены) to this word class only: bring – take (verbs), death – life (nouns), noisily – quietly (adverbs), above – below (prepositions), after – before (conjunctions or prepositions).

English can also derive (получать) antonyms by means of prefixes and suffixes. Some negative prefixes such as dis-, un-, or in- may derive an antonym from the positive root, e.g. dishonest, unsympathetic, infertile (неплодородный). Similarly, the suffixes –ful, -less may derive pairs of antonyms, e.g. useful – useless, thoughtful – thoughtless.

40. CO-OCCURANCE (совместное появление) OF ANTONYMS

It is often the case that antonyms occur together, either within the same sentence. One reason is that certain expressions are structured in this way (a matter of life and death (вопрос жизни и смерти), from start to finish, neither friend nor foe [fou] (ни другу, ни врагу), wanted dead or alive). A second reason is that antonyms may be used redundantly (чрезмерно) to emphasize a point (It was a remark made in private, not in public), or to make a rhetorical flourish (выражение) (Is this the beginning of the end or the end of the beginning?). Another context in which antonyms are typically employed (применяются) is where reference (упоминание) is to change of state (The museum opens at nine and closes at four).

We generally think of antonymy as a relation holding btwn words belonging to the same word class, but since antonymy is a semantic relation, it may hold btwn words that belong to different word classes (in “Lighten our darkness, we pray”, a verb and a noun form an antonym pair. In “She remembered to shut the door but left the window open”, a verb and an adjective are in a relation of antonymy).

41. Types of antonyms

Gradable antonyms include pairs like the following: beautiful – ugly, expensive – cheap, fast – slow, hot – cold, increase – decrease, long – short, love – hate, rich – poor, sweet – sour, wide – narrow.

1.) These pairs are called gradable antonyms because they do not represent an either/or relation but rather a more/less relation. The words can be viewed as terms at the end-points of a continuum or gradient. The more/less relation is evident in a number of ways: the terms allow comparison (сравнение). e.g. “My arm is longer/shorter than yours”; the adjectives can be modified by “intensifying” (усилением) adverbs, e.g. very long, extremely hot, extraordinary beautiful. The terms do not represent absolute values; for the adjectives the value depends on the noun being described (The length of arms is on a different scale of the length of roads). In such pairs of adjectives, one of them is usually a marked term, the other is unmarked. Asking “How short is the street?” already assumes that the street has been identified as short.

2.) The following are examples of contradictory or complementary antonyms: asleep – awake, dead – alive, on – off, permit – forbid, remember – forget, shut – open, true – false, win – lose.

These pairs of antonyms are in an either/or relation of oppositeness. An animate (одушевленное) being can be described as either dead or alive. The assertion (утверждение) of one implies (подразумевает) the deny (отрицание) of the other member of the pair: if you permit (позволишь) some behavior, then it is not forbidden; if you lose a contest (столкновение), then you have not won it; if a switch is on, then it is not off.

3.) The following are examples of converse antonyms: above – below, before – after, behind – in front of, buy – sell, give – receive, husband – wife, parent – child, speak – listen.

For each pair of antonyms, one expresses the converse (противоположное) meaning of the other. In the case of sentences with buy and sell, for example, the same transaction (в-д-вие) is expressed from different (converse) perspectives: Lydia bought the car from Kristen - Kristen sold the car to Lydia. Similarly with nouns such as husband and wife, a sentence may express the relationship in one of two, converse, ways: Margaret is Malcolm’s wife. Malcolm is Margaret’s husband. And the same is also true for prepositions like above and below: The spaghetti is on the shelf above the rice. The rice is on the shelf below spaghetti.