9.9. Antonyms

Ants = 2 / more Ws of the same language belonging to the same part of speech & the same semantic field, identical in style & nearly identical in distribution, associated & often used together so that their denotative meanings render contradictory / contrary notions. Contradictory notions are mutually opposed & denying one another: alive ‘not dead’ & impatient ‘not patient’. Contrary notions are also mutually opposed but they are gradable: old & young are the most distant elements of old :: middle-aged :: young.

Morphological approach: absolute (right :: wrong) & derivational Ants (happy :: unhappy).

V. Komissarov: 2 Ws are Ants if they are regularly contrasted in actual speech. Absolute Ants = Ws regularly contrasted as homogenous sentence members connected by copulative, disjunctive / adversative Conjs / identically used in parallel constructions, in certain typical contexts.

The 1^st of the Ants – A, the 2^nd – B, & the Ws they qualify – X & Y.

1. If you’ve obeyed all the rules good & bad…The formula: A & (/) В = all

2. He was alive, not dead (B. Shaw). Not A but (on the contrary) В

3. You will see if you were right / wrong (A. Cronin). A / В

4. The whole was big, oneself was little (J. Galsworthy). X is A, & Y, on the contrary, В

Another important criterion by V. Komissarov: the possibility of substitution & identical lexical valency.

There is so much good in the worst of us, & so much bad in the best of us.

Members of the same Ant pair reveal nearly identical spheres of collocation. Hot in its figurative meaning ‘angry’ & ‘excited’ is combined with names of unpleasant emotions: anger, resentment, scorn. Its antonym cold occurs with the same Ws. The diagnostic force of valency is weaker than that of regular co-occurrence.

Ants do not differ in style, emotional colouring / distribution. They are interchangeable at least in some contexts. The result of this interchange depends on the context. 1) No change of meaning if ill & well change places in: But whether he treated it ill / well, it loved nothing so much as to be near him (Wells). 2) A whole sentence receives an opposite meaning: You may feel he is clever :: You may feel he is foolish.

Marked & unmarked Ants. The unmarked member is more widely used & very often includes the referents of the marked member but not vice versa → Their meanings have some components in common. In old :: young the unmarked member is old. How old is the girl? How wide is it? In the Ant opposition love :: hate, there is no unmarked element.

J. Lyons: Ants proper & complementary Ants. Ants proper are regularly gradable → represent contrary notions. Grading is based on the operation of comparison. One can compare the intensity of feeling as in love – attachment – liking – indifference – antipathy – hate. Young :: old; big :: small; good :: bad refer to some implicit norm, they are relative.

The Elephant

When people call this beast to mind,

They marvel more & more

At such a little tail behind

So large a trunk before.

The semantic polarity in Ants proper is relative, the opposition is gradual, it may embrace several elements characterised by different degrees of the same property. The comparison they imply is clear from the context. The same referent which may be small as an elephant is a comparatively big animal, but it cannot be male as an elephant & female as an animal.

Complementaries are regularly contrasted in speech (male & female), the elements have similar distribution. The assertion of a sentence containing an antonymous / complementary term implies the denial of a corresponding sentence containing the other Ant / complementary: The poem is good → The poem is not bad (Ants proper). This is prose → This is not poetry (complementaries). Negation is optional with Ants proper: by saying that the poem is not good the speaker does not always mean that it is positively bad. Complementaries are a subset of Ants taken in a wider sense.

If the root of the W involved in contrast is not semantically relative, its Ant is derived by negation. Absolute / root Ants are contrasted to those containing some negative affix.

Derivational Ants. The affixes serve to deny the quality stated in the stem: known :: unknown; appear :: disappear; happiness :: unhappiness; logical :: illogical; pleasant :: unpleasant; pre-war :: post-war; useful :: useless.

Regular negative prefixes: dis-, il-/im-/in-/ir-, поп- & un-.

ME gives no examples of Ws forming their Ants by adding a negative suffix. In hopeless :: hopeful, useless :: useful the suffix -less is substituted for -ful. The group is not numerous.

In Ws with a negative prefix the contrast is expressed morphologically, the prefixed variant is in opposition to the unprefixed one. The morphological motivation is clear, there is no necessity in contexts containing both members to prove the existence of derivational Ants. Unsuccessful presupposes the existence of successful.

Morphologically similar formations may show different semantic relationships: disappoint is not the Ant of appoint, unman ‘to deprive of human qualities’ isn’t the Ant of man ‘to furnish with personnel’.

The difference between absolute & derivational Ants is semantic as well. A pair of derivational Ants form a privative (указывающий на отсутствие) binary opposition. Absolute Ant are polar members of a gradual opposition: beautiful :: pretty :: good-looking :: plain :: ugly.

Many Ants are explained by the negative particle: clean – not dirty, shallow – not deep. Syntactic negation is weaker than the lexical antonymy: not happy :: unhappy; not polite :: impolite; not regular :: irregular; not to believe :: to disbelieve. I am sorry to inform you that we are not at all satisfied with your sister. We are very much dissatisfied with her.

Almost every word can have 1 / more Syns. Comparatively few have Ants. This type of opposition is characteristic of qualitative Adjs. They are mostly Ws connected with feelings / state: triumph :: disaster; hope :: despair. Ant pairs, irrespective of part of speech, concern direction (hither & thither), & position in space & time (far & near).

Ants occupy an important place in the phraseological fund: backwards & forwards, far & near, from first to last, in black & white, play fast & loose. Set expressions can be grouped into Ant pairs: by accident :: on purpose; up to par :: below par.

Ants form mostly pairs, not groups like Syns: above :: below; absent :: present; alike :: different; asleep :: awake; back :: forth; bad :: good; big :: little.

Polysemantic Ws may have Ants in some of their meanings & none in the others. Criticism ‘blame’ / ‘censure’ :: praise; ‘writing critical essays dealing with the works of some author’, can have no Ant. W. Maugham’s pun: People ask you for criticism, but they only want praise.

In different meanings a W may have different Ants: a short story :: a long story but a short man :: a tall man; be short with smb :: be civil with smb.