Chapter V. Semasiology of sequences (syntagmatic semasiology)

As distinct from syntagmatic semasiology investigating the stylistic value of nomination and renaming, syntagmatic semasiology deals with stylistic functions of relationship of names in texts. It studies types of linear arrangement of meanings, singling out, classifying, and describing what is called here 'figures of co-occurrence', by which term combined, Joint appearance of sense units is understood (compare with the term •figures of replacement' in Paradigmatic Semasiology, Fig. 7).

The interrelation of semantic units is unique in any individual text. Yet stylistics, like any other branch of science, aims at generalizations.

The most general types of semantic relationships can be reduced to three. Meanings can be either identical, or different, or else opposite. Let us have a more detailed interpretation.

1. Identical meanings. Linguistic units co-occurring in the text either have the same meanings, or are used as names of the same object (thing, phenomenon, process, property, etc).

2. Different meanings. The correlative linguistic units in the text are \ lerceived as denoting different objects (phenomena, processes, properties).

3. Opposite meanings. Two correlative units are semantically polar; The meaning of one of them is incompatible with the meaning of the second: the one excludes the other.

It must be underlined here that the first and the third types do not necessarily imply strictly logical, objective identity or, say, contrast, of co-occurrent meanings. More often than not, both the speaker and the listener, under the influence of circumstances, single out only one relation (identity or contrast) from a whole complex of relations. To put it another way, the correlative (co-occurrent) meanings are subjectively thought of as identical, coincident, or as opposed, contrastive. Similarity is treated as identity; identity is ascribed to not quite identical units. Thus the words child, kid, infant, not being "absolute" synonyms and certainly different stylistically, could, under some circumstances, be used alternately in the same text with reference to one and the same object. The identity between the units is relative: much depends on our treatment of the matter, on what we prefer to underline or to neglect, What we regard as identical must be accepted as such (and usually is) by our interlocutor or reader; whenever the speaker (writer) treats synonyms as different from one another, the listener (reader) is usually cognizant of that (see below).

To illustrate the possibility of contrasting notions which stand in no logical opposition to each other (as do antonyms long — short, young — old, up — down, etc) we may resort to O. Henry's famous story A Service of Love in which he mentions a master painter, saying: "His fees are high; his lessons are light — his highlights have brought him renown." Clearly the words high and light are not antonyms, yet charging high fees for his lessons is in obvious contrast with a careless, irresponsible, light manner of teaching (the humour of the sentence attains its culmination in the last clause comprising the compound word highlights that means both 'bright spots in a picture' and 'masterpieces'.

As for the second item discussed (difference, inequality of co-occur- ring meanings), it must be specially underlined that we are dealing here not with any kind of distinction or disparity, but only with cases when carriers of meanings are syntactically and/or semantically correlative. What is meant here is the difference manifest in units with homogeneous functions, e.g. by two or more units characterizing the same referent (object, phenomenon of reality). Thus, in J ask, I beg, I beseech you\ the semantic differentiation of the verbs is obviously quantitative (the growing intensity of 'imploring', or, to be more explicit, not the intensity of action or state shows growth, but rather the degree of emotional expression encoded and emotional impression decoded.

To sum up, sometimes two or more units are viewed by both the speaker and the hearer — according to varying aims of communication — as identical, different, or even opposite.

The three types of semantic interrelations are matched by three groups of figures, which are the subject-matter of syntagmatic semasiology. They are: figures of identity, figures of inequality, and figures of contrast.