“Enantiosemy” in English and Its E-C Translation 英语“同词反义”现象及其翻译初探.doc

英语“同词反义”现象及其翻译初探 “enantiosemy” in english and its e-c translation目 录abstract1摘要2outline3提纲41. introductionxx2. sources of formation of “enantiosemy”xx3. classification of “enantiosemy”xx 3.1 the angle of synchronic linguistics xx 3.2 the angle of diachronic linguisticsxx 3.3 words with appraisementxx 4. translation of “enantiosemy”xx 4.1 disambiguationxx 4.2 maintenancexx 4.3 transformationxx 5. conclusionxx works citedxx “enantiosemy” in english and its e-c translationabstract: this paper firstly introduces the definition of “enantiosemy” and elaborates the development of the phenomenon and the foreign studies. next it proposes the causes of “enantiosemy” according to the recent reseaches. by listing enough instances, it then classifies “enantiosemy” into three kinds. it finally discusses some possible translation-tips in its e-c renderings.key words: enantiosemy; classify; e-c translation英语“同词反义”现象及其翻译初探摘要: 本文首先引进了关于“同词反义”现象的概念，阐述了“同词反义”现象的发展进程以及一些国外已有研究。接着依据相关史料记载以及文献背景，提出“同词反义”现象的成因。根据材料，例证引述，将“同词反义”现象划分为三大类。最后讨论、提出了关于“同词反义”现象在英汉翻译中应秉持的一些要点及原则。关键词：同词反义；分类；英汉翻译 “enantiosemy” in english and its e-c translation1. introductionto begin with i will provide an example to commence my paper. “i saw a play yesterday. its terrific! this sentence can be understood in two ways: the movie was excellent or it was terrible to see. here, the key point which causes the distinctness is the word “terrific”, which contains two entirely opposite meanings. also, therere an army of these words used widely in peoples daily life. the words of this kind, in english linguistics, called “enantiosemy”. it refers to a word which contains two opposite meanings. in english, linguists also gave the existence a name called “enantiosemy” in english. nowadays, according to牛津语言学词典(1997), it is defined as “a case of polysemy in which one sense is in some respect the opposite of another.”in order to reduce the frictions during the intercourse or translation between persons having dissimilar cultures, this paper will first discuss the sources of the formation of “enantiosemy”, then examine the classification of “enantiosemy”, and finally explore the translation tips while facing such cases in daily life.2. sources of formation of “enantiosemy”“enantiosemy”, as a special linguistic phenomenon, is one of the notable formats in semantics. it is an exceptional form in the system of semantics, especially in polysemy and ambivalent words. as the ancient chinese people firstly studied fanxun to be a subject, it might be the first and oldest name of “enantiosemy”. it is a lingual phenomenon, truly exists in almost every language-system. the ancient chinese people have already captured the fact and paid more attention on this aspect, which has its name of “fanxun” in chinese. but i doubted what the proper term for this phenomenon is, and made a call for other examples of this phenomenon in english, chinese, and other languages. additionally, i asked whether a phenomenon that can be rightfully classed with other regular forms of polysemy (metonymy, metaphor) and language change, or is it always a curious accident.finally, i collected six established names for “auto-antonymy”, which christen by the former linguists: dirk geeraerts writes that the phenomenon “is known in the older tradition of historical semantics as antiphrasis or enantiosemy. miriam schlesinger and m. lynne murphy noted that such words are sometimes called “janus word”, after the two-faced greek mythic figure; larry horn, renowned historian of negation, said the phenomenon had been dubbed “antilogy” by john train in his 1980 book “remarkable words with astonishing origins” and “enantiodromia”, which was given from david gamon, was offered for the diachronic process of acquiring an “opposite” meaning. all the information above i got was from mr. alex eulenberg by email. in the first place, lets review some relevant discovers related to the early period of “enantiosemy”: st isidore of seville may well be the source of “lucus a non lucendo,” as paul werth suggests; lepschy, in his book when taking comments on the ideas of abels, described the coincidences of the words which were particularly frequent in the early stages of languages had already got its place during the long tradition in almost every language systems: to the medieval jewish grammarians discussions on parallel phenomena in hebrew, to christian biblical scholars who at least since the 17th century examine cases of “enantiosemy” in the sacred, classical, and modern languages, hebrew “berekh” means he blessed and he cursed; greek “argos” means swift and slow; latin “altus” means high and deep; the german romantics, in the first part of the 19th century, meditated on opposite meanings, “aufheben”, hegels comments on a key term in his logic, means both to eliminate and to preserve( lepschy, a survey of structural linguistics: faber and faber 28-29).does it happen by pure chances or could it be explained in terms of cognitive mapping? as concerning on the causes of formation, there are several scholars who have discussed and summarized this facet before. by summing up their achievements as a whole, however, the general sources can be unified in four aspects as follows:first of all, the dialectic unity, which means the oneness in the contradictory of an object, is a basic concept of the philosophical categories. the rule makes the essence of “enantiosemy” a special and distinguishable representation and tells the origin.the second is from the words meanings. when we look up any word in a dictionary, we will find that almost every word has several items, at least more than one. but each word only has one primary meaning in the beginning. as the society and civilization progresses, the words significations enlarge a lot, and are more diversiform than it used to be. the very key lies in that some words primevally have their original meanings very indistinct. after such long time, the items of some words, especially the enantiosemy, turn into the current forms we see today.table 1. some examples in variances of the meanings (websters revised unabridged dictionary (1913) web1913original meaningitems list in the dictionary nowterrificvery bad: frightfulvery bad: frightful; extraordinary; magnificentdeserveto be worthy of: meritto be worthy of: merit; to be worthy of (something due, either good or evil）inhabitednot habitablenot habitable; having inhabitants, lived infurthermore, the direct inducements of sudden language situations makes it, “enantiosemy”, becomes a real existent farther. such direct inducements impulse the words meanings, which have already mentioned above.also the causes of formation were steered by human psychological factors, such as mores, habits, and humans instantaneous feelings etc.trace to its source, objectivity dominates the subjective thinking. hence, we can say the inherent headspring of “enantiosemy” in being and developing comes from contradictory unity. we could not change the indwelling character deeply in the heart of “enantiosemy” and some irreformable facets, such as customs, mores etc. but we could alter the changeable exterior conditions to overcome them, which would been referred to in section 4. 3. classification of “enantiosemy”this section devoted on the classifications of this phenomenon. there have been a lot of editions on the aspect of “enantiosemy”, which are depending on different standards and considerations. above all, a brief review of the great former academician, jules levin, is given with great regard to the type or the class of “enantiosemy” with at least three members:1) words that mean both movement and inability to move. examples like fast, bolt, and bound;2) the last word yielded one of the all-time great movie song lyric puns, from the title of “road to morroco”: “like websters dictionary, were morroco-bound”;3) also the following word has not been mentioned: it now seems to mean to both illuminate, clarify, and also to cast a shadow over with a view to the english linguistic scholars in china, they put more attentions and pivots on the distinguishability of the part of speech, the opposite meanings in a word and the usages etc. for instance, it was once classed into four parts by the standard of the part of speech: the term of noun, verb, adjective, and the combination between preposition and adverb. it listed lots of instances to support the view, such as “kindness”(the use of kind-hearted and cold-blooded in the proverb “as clod as charity”); “hit”(with the meaning of to come into contact with forcefully; strike in “hit a man when he is down” but while in the proverb “hit it off” it changed into the sense of happy and comfortable in each others presence); “up”, has the meaning of be about to do something, like “the sun is up”, however, while in the sentence “your time is up.” the meaning turn to the opposite side meaning at the end, till (林家修 et al 274-275)also, it could be typed into right aspects for as much as the sources of formation:1) words with subjective emotions and external justness.taking “appropriate” for an instance, it has two levels of meanings: use properly and to peculate.2) words that is related by the inherent logic.“drinking to the dregs” (enjoyment or having hard time), while in the same phrase, the meaning will change if the objects are different or the part of speech is not the same.3) the function of irony.4) words decided by the vocational characters.5) words decided by the objects specifically attribute.6) the relativity of the notion of orientation.7) the localization in the development of language.8) words as the product of the historical transitional society.(冯凭 103-104)united all the materials on the classification of “enantiosemy” i have searched before, i conclude my thought in the aspect with three parts as follows: 3.1 the angle of synchronic linguisticsbefore the part begins, firstly lets defining the exact signification of synchronic linguistics. it is the description of a language at some point in time and is a synchronic study. in the case of such synchronic angle, lets take examples from oxford english dictionary (all the following examples would be chosen from o.e.d but to the exception of clear indications.)the words which belong to this class have the most in “enantiosemy”:1) oversight vt. . an unintended failure to notice or do something (c.e.d.) c.e.d. means collins english dictionary . general and careful watchfulness(c.e.d.)e.g. this is the result of an oversight.we can understand the sentence as follows: . this is the result of an carefulness. . this is the result of neglect. 2) oversee vt. . to fail or omit to see or notice; . to supervisethe two opposite meanings of the word “oversee” in morden english is rare to see, but it, indeed, belongs to “enantiosemy” in the history. in one of william congreeves famous comics, “the way of the world”, theres a sentence as follows:“i was for my ease to oversee and wilfully neglect the gross advance made him by wife.”here “oversee” takes the first meaning. lets see the next sentence, which was written by jonathan swift, the words means the second meaning:“can i oversee my workman and a school too?”similar words like: overlook, overhear etc.3) cleave vt. . to bring together; . to cut aparte.g. . one should cleave to ones principles. . the airplane cleaved the clouds.involving the words talked above, there also have been a lot of other examples to support the class, such as: splice, clip, sanction (means a punitive action as a noun and as a verb means to endorse), let etc. till now, these words still act an indispensable role in daily life and were used to enrich our language while we desire conveying or representing messages to others. 3.2 the angle of diachronic linguisticsdiachronic linguistics means the description of a language as it changes through time is a diachronic study. it requires one of the words meanings must be lost now and the other remains in our daily life. words of this kind, which one of the two opposite meanings has disappeared or was labeled by “abolish”. most of the words meaning, which were disused once, can hardly be seen in the modern dictionaries. 1) inhabitable not habitable; having inhabitants, lived in.it has two entirely opposite meanings in old english, when words that contain opposite meanings play an indispensable role in the whole vocabulary:in shakespeares play charles ii, the hero charles ii once said such a sentence: “ i would allow him odds/and meet him, were i tried to run afoot/ever to the frozen ridges of the alps, /or any other ground inhabitable/where ever englishman durst set his foot.” (vol.4 307) according to the paraphrases in o.e.d, “inhabitable” here means not habitable.sir william herchel, the english astronomer who was burn in german, used the word “inhabitable” too. but the meaning he took is entirely opposite from that shakespeare took: “if stars are suns, and suns are inhabitable, we see at once what an extensive field for animation opens itself to our view.”obviously, “inhabitable” in the sentence means having inhabitants, lived in. otherwise, the original mean could not be well and correctly understood.2) inexistent adj. . existing or having its being in something else; . not existing, having no existence.tucker once said “the idea of pain, ignorance, doubt are too frequently inexistent in the minds of man.” here “inexistent” is the meaning of .“inexistent” also was used by sir richard steele (1672-1729) in his comedy, lying lover, was the opposite meaning to the first one: “still in the dowry arms embrace my friend, nor loose him from his inexistent trance.”3) invertible adj. .that cannot be turned or reversed; .that can be inverted.t. adams, lived in the 17th century, has wisdom that: “the will of the devil is invertible.” the following sentence reflects the second meaning of the word, means the japanese are very agile and changeful: “there is a sort of invertible quality in the japanese which makes them train horses to gallop uphill.”4) investigable vt. . capable of being traced, traced out or searched into; .incapable of being traced, undiscoverable, unsearchable.george gillespie (1613-1648) ever said: “it is investigable by the very light and guidance of natural reason.” “investigable” means capable of being traced, traced out or searched into.”samuel sewall (1652-1730), in his work dairy, wrote the words “the providence of our sovereign lord is very investigable.”, which means that incapable of being traced, undiscoverable, unsearchable.the most noticeable is, it is very infrequent now in english to see such characters in the words that prefixed to “in”. we usually use the meaning “having inhabitants, lived in.” of the word “inhabitable”, and “not existing, having no existence.” of “inexistent” etc. hence, do pay attention to the english passages which contain these words of the kind and the writing background, then there will be useful for us to understand the original ideas more well.3.3 words with appraisementaccording to the crosshead, this part is related to the words with appraisement, some phrases that contain opposite meanings, and caused by the different custom.first of all, list some caused by the dissimilar properties that contain persons fancy and hate:1) pride adj. . a feeling of honor and self-respect(collins); .excessive self-esteem(ibid). e.g. he has a certain pride in himself. . it can be understood as he feels certain and confidence to himself. . it also means he has some excessive self-esteem.“proud” is deriving from “pride” so its fit for the type too.2) ambitious adj. full of the drive to succeed, or to gain fame, power, wealth etc.there is a sentence that can be comprehended into two ways: she is a very ambitious woman. 3) envy adj. a feeling of grudging or somewhat admiring discontent aroused by the possessions, achievements, or qualities of another(collins).“envious”, the adjective of “envy”, belongs to the type too.in the next part, there are some words which used by different people but spoke in the same phylum and made by the alien usages. 1) public school . it stands for the private school, in england, which the parents must give tuition fees so that the child can go to school. . contrarily，in u.s.a, it suggests that the schools were established by the country and the children can go to school for free.2) table vt. . bre: to submit for discussion or consideration(w.r.u.d.) w.r.u.d. is abbr. for websters revised unabridged dictionary (1913); . ame: to postpone indefinitely the discussion or consideration of (a legislative bill, motion etc.) (ibid) owing to the entirely opposite use between americans and british, there used to be some misconceive in an international meeting. in the disarmament congress in 1962, while the delegate from u.k. asked to “table a british motion”, the american delegate refused at once. the two sides begun to dispute on the matter. at last, when the american delegate said “but its a good motion, why do you want to table it?”, they all came to realise that they misunderstanding each other. the similar ones like: on the table, lie on the table, lay on the table etc.last but not the least, “enantiosemy” has always appeared in some phrases:1) a(the) hell of . the devil and all: we had a hell of trip on that bumpy road. very good, very well: he got three minutes of applause after giving a hell of speech.2) out of harms way. not i