Derivational Potential of Polysemy in the Tatar Language
50th Annual Meeting of the PIAC, Kazan 2007
The word-stock of the Modern Tatar language is represented nowadays by a rich and wide system of words and their meanings. In the process of historical development of the language words acquire new meanings and shades of meanings, which increase their semantic volume and enrich the lexical system of the language. This way of development of the lexical system is considered to be economical. It enables the language to increase its vocabulary on the basis of already existing words without turning to the help of word-building means or borrowings. According to the evidence of written monuments polysemantic words were already found in the Old Turkic languages. So, Mahmud Kashgary pointed to the figurative meaning of the word “lachin” (“falcon”). He wrote: “brave men are also called falcons” (Tatar Grammar, volume 1, 1993, p. 192). Old Turkic basic words have survived practically unchanged, and their derivatives also form the basis of Modern Tatar word-stock.
Today rather a big experience has been accumulated in the study of changes of semantics of the word. Analysis of its multi-sided structure has made it possible to bring out the mechanism of semantic derivation inside the word. Having a complex semantic structure, a polysemantic word constitutes a many-folded derivational field, the volume and structure of which depend upon a number of facts.
Analysis of the semantic derivation in the Tatar language showed the dependence of the volume of the derivational field of a polysemantic word on its word building activity. Non-derivational polysemantic words proved to possess the highest derivational potential, that is the words which are, in the first place, of longer use in the language,
secondly, they are native by origin (names of the parts of the body, people’s relations, animals and birds, some plants and food products),
thirdly, they are most frequently used, and
fourthly, these words have no less than three lexico-semantic variants in their structure, a literal meaning including
Among different types of derivative lexico-semantic variants (LSV) metaphorical meanings are characterized by the highest derivational potential, fixing transfer by resemblance of form, appearance, place, quantitative marks and some others, i.e. those metaphorical transfers which are most regular and typical in the system of a polisemantic noun. Metonymical figurative meanings are characterized by a weaker activity. These are the meanings, fixing the following associative connections: an animal — its fur, a container — the thing it contains, a tree or a plant — its fruit, etc.
We maintain that semantical nominative derivation is one of the most important factors, lying in the basis of the development of both polysemy and semantic homonymy. Having principally the same mechanism based on analogy, semantical derivational processes result in the appearance of two new nominations: either an LSV of the old word, or a semantic homonym, formed by a semantic split of the meaning of the word.