Hi Karl, I'm afraid there's a bit of "around and around"-ness in our emails back and forth, so I guess, to use the old cliché, on some things, we'll just have to agree to disagree. But there are a couple of things I'd like to clarify.
(1) There's a bit of inconsistency in your posts, in that, on the one hand, you say that you reject the methodology of defining by semantic domains; yet, on the other hand, you say that your dictionary, unlike other lexicons, has an "extensive cross-referencing of synonyms." But this is one of the very things that semantic domain lexicons try to do. They try to understand words by looking at how they fit in with other words that are in the semantic field. In fact, your attempt to refer to refer to a "commonality of action" has much more to do with a semantic domain than it does to "meaning." So by criticizing semantic domain work, you're really undercutting and undermining what, in at least some respect, you are trying to do yourself. (2) Also, please recognize that you are using the word "meaning" very idiosyncratically. Meaning is simply not the same thing as "commonality of action" or similarity of concept. When a batter can stand at a plate, not even swing at the ball, and yet that be called a strike, that is simply an entirely different meaning of the word "strike" versus those contexts where the word actually refers to the action of hitting something. Sure, the two usages are united in that the one usage, by a series of developments, is derived from the other. But the word "strike" in those two usages, simply do no mean the same thing. "Strike," referring to hitting the ball, and "strike" referring to missing the ball, simply are not the same thing, and they are not the same meaning. (3) Another problem in your posts is a rather idiosyncratic usage of the terms "form" and function." You say that you are concerned with function, while the other lexicons and dictionaries are concerned with forms. But I don't think you could ever get any of these lexicographers to agree with your mischaracterizations of their work. They are not at all fixated on form; rather, their concern is the function that words perform in their different contexts, recognizing, of course, that these functions are not can be very different in different contexts. These function, these usages, are the meanings of the words. (4) Finally, one of your complaints has been, "why bring up idiomatic uses as an argument, as has been done in this discussion?" This very question, in my opinion, betrays a profound linguistic misunderstanding. When an, admittedly, original idiomatic usage, becomes a commonality in a language, it is no longer tenable to dismiss it as idiomatic. "Strike," referring to the action of missing the ball, is no longer idiomatic. Rather, it is one of the meanings, one of the usages, one of the functions, of the lexeme "strike." What is important about a word is not its underlying commonality of references, but its usage in its different contexts. This is the very reason so many dictionaries now name themselves as, e.g., "Dictionary of American English Usage." Meaning is found in usage, not in some long lost underlying concept. Blessings, Jerry Jerry Shepherd Taylor Seminary Edmonton, Alberta [email protected] >
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