Polysemy

 

Polysemy is the association of one word with two or more distinct meanings.

A polyseme is a word or phrase with multiple meanings. 

Adjective: polysemous or polysemic.

In contrast, a one-to-one match between a word and a meaning is called monosemy. 

Homonymy is the relation between words with identical forms but different meanings that is, the condition of being homonyms. A stock example is the word bank as it appears in "river bank" and "savings bank." 

Homonymy and polysemy both involve one lexical form that is associated with multiple senses and as such both are possible sources of lexical ambiguity. But while homonyms are distinct lexemes that happen to share the same form, in polysemy a single lexeme is associated with multiple senses. The distinction between homonymy and polysemy is usually made on the basis of the relatedness of the senses: polysemy involves related senses, whereas the senses associated with homonymous lexemes are not related.

Examples of polysemy:

Man

1. The human species (i.e., man vs. animal).

2. Males of the human species ( i.e., man vs. woman).

3. Adult males of the human species (i.e., man vs. woman).

This example shows the specific polysemy where the same word is used at different levels of a taxonomy. Example 1 contains 2, and 2 contains 3.

Mole 

1. A small burrowing mammal.

2. Consequently, there are several different entities called moles. Although these refer to different      things, there names derive from 1. :e.g. A mole burrows for information hoping to go undetected. 

 

Bank 

1. A financial institution.

2. The building where a financial institution offers services.

3. A synonym for 'rely upon' (e.g. "I'm your friend, you can bank on me"). It is different, but related, as it derives from the theme of security initiated by 1. 

However: a river bank is a homonym to 1 and 2, as they do not share etymologies. It is a completely different meaning. River bed, though, is polysemous with the beds on which people sleep.

Book 

1. A bound collection of pages.

2. A text reproduced and distributed (thus, someone who has read the same text on a computer has read the same book as someone who had the actual paper volume).

3. To make an action or event a matter of record (e.g. "Unable to book a hotel room, a man sneaked into a nearby private residence where police arrested him and later booked him for unlawful entry.").

Newspaper 

1. A company that publishes written news. 

2. A single physical item published by the company. 

3. The newspaper as an edited work in a specific format (e.g. "They changed the layout of the newspaper's front page"). 

The different meanings can be combined in a single sentence, e.g. "John used to work for the newspaper that you are reading."

Milk 

The verb milk (e.g. "he's milking it for all he can get") derives from the process of obtaining milk.

Wood 

1. A piece of a tree.

2. A geographical area with many trees.

 

Crane

1. A bird.

2. A type of construction equipment.

3. To strain out one's neck.