Abstract This article proposes a methodology for addressing three long-standing problems of near synonym research. First, we show how the internal structure of a group of near synonyms can be revealed. Second, we deal with the problem of distinguishing the subclusters and the words in those subclusters from each other. Finally, we illustrate how these results identify the semantic properties that should be mentioned in lexicographic entries. We illustrate our methodology with a case study on nine near synonymous Russian verbs that, in combination with an infinitive, express TRY. Our approach is corpus-linguistic and quantitative: assuming a strong correlation between semantic and distributional properties, we analyze 1,585 occurrences of these verbs taken from the Amsterdam Corpus and the Russian National Corpus, supplemented where necessary with data from the Web. We code each particular instance in terms of 87 variables (a.k.a. ID tags), i. e., morphosyntactic, syntactic and semantic characteristics that form a verb's behavioral profile. The resulting co-occurrence table is evaluated by means of a hierarchical agglomerative cluster analysis and additional quantitative methods. The results show that this behavioral profile approach can be used (i) to elucidate the internal structure of the group of near synonymous verbs and present it as a radial network structured around a prototypical member and (ii) to make explicit the scales of variation along which the near synonymous verbs vary.

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Ways of trying in Russian: clustering behavioral profiles

In this paper we will look into questions that concern what may be considered two of the central meaning relations in semantics, i.e. polysemy or the association of multiple meanings with one form and synonymy, i.e. the association of one meaning with multiple forms. In the domain of polysemy, cognitive semanticists typically {ace issues which center on the questions of how to determine whether two usage events are sufficiently similar to be considered instantiations of a single sense and how to establish the prototypicality of a sense/several senses; we adopt Evans's (2005: 33, n. 2) definition of sense as those meanings which have achieved conventionalization and are instantiated in semantic memory. In the domain of near synonymy, semanticists need to uncover among other things what syntactic, semantic and/or pragmatic d ifferences there are between near synonyms and what the semantic and/or functional relation is between near synonyms in a semantic space. In order to solve these problems they need to be able to measure the degree of similarity bet ween senses and/or words and to decide how and where to connect a sense/word to another sense/word in a network. Several solutions to these problems have been put fin·ward in the literature, in particular for polysemy-related issues. One such solution for polysemy-related issues is the fullspecification approach inspired by Lakoff and his collaborators ( cf. e.g. Norvig and Lakoff 1987; LakoJf 1987) where minimal percei\'ed differences between usage events constitute different senses and image schemas. Related to this is Kreitzer's (1997) partial-specification approach where information from three different levels of schematization the so-called component, relational, and integrative levels is integrated, yet minimally different usage events need not constitute dilrerent senses. Both of these approaches suiTer from methodological inadequacies and representational problems, however. As for the former approach, information provided by the context the word under study occurs in is not taken into account (cf. Sandra and Rice 1995; Tyler and Evans 2001), there is no

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Behavioral profiles: A corpus-based approach to cognitive semantic analysis

Near synonyms as co-extensive categories: ‘high’ and ‘tall’ revisited

...............................................................................................iii Lay Summary..........................................................................................iv Preface..................................................................................................v Table of

The struggle for coexistence : Peter Kropotkin and the social ecology of science in Russia, Europe, and England, 1859-1922

This paper provides experimental evidence to support the existence of mental correlates of lexical clusters. Data were collected by means of a sorting task and a gap filling task designed to study the cognitive reality of clusters of near synonyms as well as of the properties that have high predictive power for subcategorizing near synonyms. The results for nine near-synonymous verbs expressing ‘try’ in Russian confirm the linguistic account of the synonym structure that was proposed on the basis of corpus data in Divjak and Gries (2006). We conclude that speakers learn and retain exemplars from which they extract distributional patterns that help shape the arrangement of verbs in lexical space. Consequently, a corpus-based behavioral profile approach to lexical semantics is strengthened as it provides a firm basis for cognitively realistic language descriptions.

/pdf/clusters-in-the-mind-converging-evidence-from-near-synonymy-4lgvozu6vk.pdf

Clusters in the mind?: Converging evidence from near synonymy in Russian

On Lying in Russian.

This engaging book explores the formation and duration of one of the most enduring myths related to the Jews of the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union, that of Jewish Odessa. Tanny demonstrates wh...

City of Rogues and Schnorrers: Russia's Jews and the myth of old Odessa

Beyond the Boundary: Vasilii Rozanov and the Animal Body

Focusing on the correlation between humans and dogs in traditional belief systems and cultural productions, this book shows that the dog incorporates various often-paradoxical meanings – moral, social and philosophical. This study contributes to the unfolding cultural history of human-animal relations across cultures.

Henrietta Mondry

Papers

On Lying in Russian.

City of Rogues and Schnorrers: Russia's Jews and the myth of old Odessa

Beyond the Boundary: Vasilii Rozanov and the Animal Body

Political Animals: Representing Dogs in Modern Russian Culture

Vasily Rozanov and the Body of Russian Literature