SEMANTIC RELATION OF MERONYMY IN LANGUAGES OF DIFFERENT STRUCTURE - (CASE STUDY OF SEMANTICS OF BODY PART NAMES)

Oct 15, 2026

The paper investigates the semantics of human body part names (BPN) across seven languages of different structure, analyzing 438 lexemes (1438 meanings) from Indo-European and Japanese-Ryukyuan language families. Using classical semantics, typology, and contrastive lexical methods with componential analysis, it examines meronymy as a Part-Whole relation and its interdependence with polysemy. The study identifies universal and language-specific mechanisms of semantic change, proposes an index for polysemy development, and supplies statistical evidence. Results support semantic universals, regularities, and a typology of BPN semantic structure.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages9

Reading Time23 min

AccessFree to download

Introduction

Meronymy as Part-Whole relation

Research aims and data

Corpus and language families

Methods: contrastive analysis and componential analysis

Meronymy and polysemy interdependence

Polysemy index and semantic development

Outcomes and applicability

Semantic universals, regularities, and typology

SEMANTIC RELATION OF MERONYMY IN LANGUAGES OF DIFFERENT STRUCTURE (CASE STUDY OF SEMANTICS OF BODY PART NAMES) Olena Materynska Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv, Ukraine [olenamaterynska@ukr.net](olenamaterynska@ukr.net) The present paper investigates semantics of human body part names (BPN) in languages of different structure. The lexemes understudy are characterised by a high level of polysemy, frequent occurrence and primary role in the processes of world perception and categorisation. The empirical data comprise 438 lexemes (expressing 1438 meanings), which were analysed in seven languages of different structure (related and unrelated) from two language families: Indo-European (featuring such language groups as Germanic (English and German), Romance (Spanish), Balto-Slavonic (Latvian, Ukrainian and Russian)) and Japanese-Ryukyuan (featuring Japanese) . The data are analysed within the framework of meronymy relation and highlight the universal features of semantic change in the compared languages, thus presenting a model for more extensive and complex studies of the semantic potential of basic lexical units. The research is based upon the methodology of classical semantics and typology as well as contrastive lexical studies, and is aimed at revealing the nature of semantic universals and regularities in the process of BPN semantic development. The lexical units under analysis are generalised and systematically investigated using contrastive analysis and linguistic description, whilst their semantic structure is thoroughly described with the help of componential analysis. The paper focuses on the classification of their regular semantic change mechanisms and juxtaposes the cross-linguistic similarities as well as differences in semantics of body part names. The relation of meronymy reveals interdependence with that of polysemy. The introduced index of polysemy helps to compare the potential for polysemy development in the languages under analysis. The conducted research enables the formulation of semantic universals and regularities within BPN polysemy development in languages of different structure as well as the creation of a semantic typology of BPN in related and unrelated languages. The analysis is supplemented with the statistical data allowing for the verification of the results. The main principles of this research may be applied to different thematic groups of lexis, contributing to further development of semantic language typology worldwide. Keywords: meronymy; meronym; BPN (body part names); semantic change; polysemy; anthropomorphic metaphor; metonymy; semantic universals and regularities. Introduction One of the fundamental types of semantic hierarchical relations in the lexical system of the language is the meronymic or Part-Whole relation (Goddard, 2001, p. 1190; Heydrich, 1995, p. 51-52), which can be treated as a language universal. The meronymic relation can be expressed by the semantic formula X is apart of Y, for example: Germ. Ohr ‘ear’, Engl. ear; Germ. Teil ‘part ’, Stück ‘piece’, Engl. part, piece. Traditionally remaining in the spotlight of formal logic, mathematics and philosophy, it had been of no interest and irrelevant to linguistics for a fairly long time. The axiomatic characteristics of this type of logical and philosophic relations were introduced by Plato and Aristotle (Aristotle, 2009 ; Platon, 1987) and the formal and ontological premises were formulated later on in the works of E. Husserl (Husserl, 2009) and L. Ridder (Ridder, 2002) . This research supports the assumption that the meronymic type of relations should be treated separately from the hypo-hyperonymic (Cruse, 1979, p. 30; Gorska, 2003, p. 110; Erdeljac & Sekulić Sović, 2018, p. 25) as well as possessive (Heine, 1997, p. 19) relations. Since the 1980-1990s meronymic lexis has been used as a testing material in the studies of semantic universals (Andersen, 1978) as well as in the psycholinguistic and cogni

FAQs

What is the main focus of the paper?

The paper focuses on semantic relations of meronymy in human body part names across languages with different structures, examining how meaning shifts over time.

Which languages and data does the study use?

It analyzes 438 body-part-name lexemes representing 1438 meanings in seven languages, covering Indo-European (including English, German, Spanish, Latvian, Ukrainian, and Russian) and Japanese.

How are meronymy and polysemy treated in the research?

The study shows that meronymy is interdependent with polysemy and introduces a polysemy index to compare polysemy development potential across the studied languages.

Oct 15, 2026

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