TABLE OF CONTENTS

 Antonymy meaning in semantics

 Examples of antonymy
 Types of antonyms
 Antonymy in Literature
 Synonymy and antonymy - what's the difference?
 Antonymy - Key takeaways
 Frequently Asked Questions about Antonymy
 Final Antonymy Quiz
The term antonymy in semantics derives from the Greek
words anti and onym, which mean opposite and name. The opposite of
antonymy is synonymy.

Antonymy meaning in semantics

Antonymy in semantics refers to words that have opposite meanings. These are
usually in pairs, for example: hot/cold, tall/short, loud/quiet.

To test yourself, look at the following sentence from Barack Obama's 2008
victory speech and find the antonyms:
It's the answer spoken by young and old, rich and poor, Democrat and
Republican, black, white, Latino, Asian, Native American, gay, straight,
disabled and not disabled - Americans who sent a message to the world that we
have never been a collection of red states and blue states; we are, and always
will be, the United States of America.
The antonyms that are included in the excerpt are: young/old, rich/poor,
Democrat/Republican, black/white, gay/straight, and disabled/not disabled.
A←→B

Examples of antonymy

Antonymy can be found across all parts of speech. For example:

 Adjective: easy/hard, wet/dry, hot/cold
 Nouns: hero/villain, freedom/slavery
 Verbs: answer/ask, discourage/encourage
 Adverbs: now/then, loudly/softly
 Propositions: on/off, above/below
Antonymy can also be found in idioms:
 Although they are twins, their personalities are night and day.
 Things don't always go as you want. You have to learn to take the bad
with the good.
Types of antonyms

There are three types of antonym which are categorized by the relationship
between the opposing words:

Gradable antonyms

Imagine you're looking at a room thermometer. If the indicator is at the bottom

of the thermometer, it tells you that the room is cold. If it is at the top, the room
is hot. However, the thermometer can also indicate warm temperature when the
indicator is in the middle.

Hot and cold are gradable antonyms. Gradable antonyms define words that are
at the opposite ends of a spectrum with some gradation between the two
extremes. In our temperature example we have hot - cold, with warm between
hot and cold. Other examples include empty - full (gradations: half empty or
half full), high - low (gradation: medium), and young - old (gradation:
teenager).

Binary/Complementary antonyms

Complementary antonyms explain an either-or relationship between the

opposite word pairs.
Remember when you have to answer true or false questions on tests? This is an
example of a complementary antonym. There are only two options, either true
or false. There is no half-true or half-false.
Because of this, each complementary antonym can exist independently of the
other and is usually its absolute opposite. Other examples are dead/alive,
exterior/interior, and yes/no.

Relational/converse antonyms

Relational/converse antonyms show a dependent relationship between opposite

words. A word from the pair can't exist without the other. For example,
open/close. A shop owner must first open the shop before they can close
it. Other examples include husband/wife, front/back, and doctor/patient.
Fig. 3 - An example of relational/converse antonyms is absent/present.

Antonymy in Literature

In Literature, antonymy is often used as a device. Antonymy allows writers to

juxtapose words to suggest irony or satire, or to make some words more
prominent than others.¹ Antonymy is used in a number of ways in Literature:

Antithesis

This is a juxtaposition of two logically opposed elements.

To err is human to forgive is divine - Alexander Pope, An Essay on

Criticism (1711).
The err and forgive are relational/converse antonyms. An error needs to exist
first for it to be forgiven. The two contrasting words also juxtapose human and
divine (coming from or connected with God or a god - Oxford English
Learner). The sentence then means 'it is normal for humans to make mistakes
but to forgive is difficult'.

Oxymoron

This is a combination of two contradictory terms.

Why then, O brawling love, O loving hate,
O anything of nothing first 'create!'
O heavy lightness! Serious vanity!
Misshapen chaos of 'well-seeming' forms. - William Shakespeare, Romeo and
Juliet (1597)
Shakespeare expresses Romeo's emotional turmoil by using contradictory
words: brawling love - loving hate. These signify that love and hate can exist at
the same time. The conflicting meanings are further emphasized with heavy
lightness - serious vanity which implies that the brawl may be about nothing
(vanity), but it has serious consequences.

Paradox

This is a contradictory statement that, after closer inspection, is found to

be true.
We die and rise the same, - John Donne, The Canonization (1633)
In his poem, Donne uses the analogy of a phoenix to describe a challenging love
affair. According to mythology, a phoenix is an immortal bird that is reborn
after it dies, from the ashes of its dead body. To convey this, Donne chooses to
die and rise which are complementary antonyms.

Irony

This refers to meaning the opposite of what is said.

The apparent statement or event is undermined by another context to give a
different meaning. Take Percy Shelley's Ozymandias (1818):

I met a traveler from an antique land

Who said: "Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed:
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair! '
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
In this poem, the antonymy/irony relationship is described by contrasting the
past and present. It is reflected by the magnificent power-imagery used about
Ozymandias (king of kings; ye Mighty and despair) which sometime in the
future is turned into its opposite. All that is left of the grandeur described on the
plinth is desolation (half sunk; stamped on these lifeless things). It is therefore
ironic that the statue, which was meant to show his everlasting power, is
decapitated and no longer represents his great accomplishments. Instead, it is
sunken in the desert, partially covered with sand.
Synonymy and antonymy - what's the difference?

Synonymy refers to similar meanings, while antonymy refers to opposite

meanings. In other words, synonymy is the opposite of antonymy.
Here are some side-by-side comparisons of the two terms using the same words:

Synonymy Antonymy

good (adjective) pleasant, useful, reliable bad, poor, inadequate

always (adverb) constantly, regularly, repeatedly never, at no time

question (noun) inquire, investigation answer, reply

receive (verb) accept, collect, take in reject, deny, let go

above (preposition) raised, over below, under

Antonymy - Key takeaways

 Antonymy is a pair of words that have opposite meanings. It is also

known as 'opposition'.

 The term antonymy derives from the Greek words anti and onym, which
mean opposite and name.

 The opposite of antonymy is synonymy (words with the same/similar

meanings).

 There are three types of antonymy: gradable antonyms, complementary

antonyms, and relational/converse antonyms.
  Some antonyms are used for antithesis, oxymoron, paradox, and irony.
¹Nünning, V., & Nünning, A, An Introduction to the Study of English and
American Literature, (2004).
……………………………………………………………………………………
A Linguistic Study of Antonymy in English Texts
(Chunming Gao - School of Foreign Languages, Changchun University of
Science and Technology, China)
Abstract —This paper aims to study antonymy in English texts. The
significance of the study is presented first, then the definition of antonymy and
its classification are elaborated with examples. The focus of the paper is the use
of antonymy in specific English texts from linguistic perspective, in which
abundant examples of antonyms are quoted to help the illustration and prove
that comprehending and investigating into antonymy can help the understanding
of different texts and the rising of literature flavor.
Index Terms—antonymy, antonyms, English text, linguistic study
I. INTRODUCTION
In linguistics, one of the most important fields is semantic relations, in
particular, lexical relation, which includes synonymy, antonymy, hyponymy,
etc. Antonymy, oppositeness of meaning, has long been regarded as one of the
most important semantic relations. Human thinking and language are closely
related, and the significance of antonymy in human thinking is inevitably
reflected in human language. Lyons (1968) says that human beings have a
general tendency to polarize experience and judgment—to think in opposites.
And this would explain the existence of a large quantity of antonyms in the
vocabulary of human languages.
Antonymy is one of the semantic relations that are very useful. Antonym pairs
are often used in texts and in a large number of proverbs and idioms to achieve
rhetorical effects, for example, “a friend to everybody is a friend to nobody”,
no matter it isin common speech or in the literary writing. As a matter of fact, it
is even one of the indispensable factors in those figures of speech such as
oxymoron, paradox, and irony. In addition, antonymy plays a remarkably
significant role in language teaching and learning, which can be shown in many
definitions, for example, “tall” is defined as “not short”, “trivial” is said to be
“not important”. It is often the same case when lexicographers define a word.
Just as Jackson (1988) notes that, antonymy ranks the second (only next to
synonymy), in terms of frequency, among the various semantic relations used in
dictionary definitions.
II. LITERATURE REVIEW
A. The Definition of Antonymy
The word “antonymy” was coined by C. J. Smith as an opposite of “synonymy”.
Since 1867, lots of efforts have been taken to define “antonymy”, but the
problem is that the definition of antonymy tends to illustration rather than
description.
For example, if we would like to tell others what antonymy is, to give some
examples like old/young, tall/short, open/close, bad/good, etc. will be more
effective than to give a definition. However, finding a definition which could
account for every example of antonymy is difficult, even problematic.
Lyons (1977) defines “antonym” as the words which are opposite in meaning
and “antonymy” as the oppositeness between words. For example, “buy” and
“sell” is a pair of antonyms and the relation between these two words is termed
as antonymy. Leech (1981) puts forward the definition of antonym and
antonymy in Semantics that the opposite meaning relation between the words is
antonymy and word of opposite meaning is antonym. And a famous Chinese
linguist HuZhuanglin (2001, p.164) simply says “antonymy is the name for
oppositeness relation”.
Traditional definitions of antonymy only concentrate on the oppositeness of
meaning. Some traditional definitions are as follows:
word of opposite meaning; (Leech, 1981)
word of opposite sense; (Pyles & Algeo, 1970)
words that are opposite. (Watson, 1976)
These definitions are only rough ideas and over ambiguous. First, they don’t
explain the ways of oppositeness very concretely. The antonym pairs like
hot/cold, dead/alive and lend/borrow differ from each other in the way of
oppositeness.
The pair hot/cold belongs to the gradable antonyms; the pair dead/alive belongs
to the complementary antonyms; and the pair lend/borrow belongs to the
relational antonyms. Second, these definitions focus more on the discrepancy of
the antonyms but they ignore the similarity of the grammar and usage of each of
the antonym pairs. Just look at another three pairs, heat/cold, single/married,
and beauty/ugly. Although either of them is opposite in meaning, they could not
be regarded as antonyms in that they are not the same in grammatical units.
Furthermore, people use the antonyms most of the time just for the effect of
contrast. For instance, the juxtaposition of spring and winter can constantly be
found in the English literature, as is presented in Ode to the West Wind, “If
winter comes, can spring be far behind?”
Taking the above factors into consideration, Lyons classifies opposition into
three categories: antonymy, complementarity and converseness in Semantics
(1977) and Introduction to Theoretical Linguistics (1968). Lyons only regards
words that are gradable and opposite in meaning as antonyms. Cruse (1986)
thinks the same way in his Lexical Semantics. So the term “antonym” only
refers to the set of gradable opposites, which are mostly adjectives, for gradable
antonyms reflect one distinguishing semantic feature: polar oppositeness.
However, in our daily life, words like male/female, dead/alive, husband/wife are
also considered as antonym pairs, for these words are also opposite in meaning.
Therefore, the other two categories, complementarity and converseness, are
included in the field of antonymy only in a very broad sense.
In general, there are two criteria in defining antonymy: semantic and lexical.
We explain elaborately the antonymy being semantic above, and yet not all
semantically opposed words are antonyms. Cruse (1986) exemplifies this with
the words tubby and emaciated. Almost all established antonyms have
synonyms which could not constitute the antonym pairs, for example, the
antonym pair of heavy and light is better than weighty and insubstantial;
antonym pair of fast and slow is better opposites rather than speedy and
sluggish; antonym pair of happy and sad is more reasonable than ecstatic
and miserable.
Although both of the antonymy and synonymy link words together in the
lexicon, Gross et al. (1988) argue that antonymy and synonymy are different.
They say while synonymy is “a relation between lexical concepts”, antonymy is
“a relation between words, not concepts”. Justeson and Katz (1991) also refer to
antonymy as a lexical relation, “specific to words rather than concepts”. As a
matter of fact, the definition of antonymy must be lexical as well as semantic.
Antonyms need to have “oppositeness of meaning”, but they also need to have a
strong, well-established lexical relationship with one another.(Jackson, 1988)
Lexicographer Egan (1968) makes a rather satisfying definition of “antonymy”
based on her understanding of the nature of the antonymy: “An antonym is a
word so opposed in meaning to another word; it’s equal in breadth or range of
application, that is, negates or nullifies every single one of its implications”.
This definition shows clearly what makes two words be antonyms. The antonym
pairs are equal in breadth or range of application but opposed in meaning. And
the words which contrast in meaning may not be antonyms because they may be
different in their breadth or range of application. Therefore, we can draw a
conclusion that Egan’s definition of antonymy may be fitter or easier to be
employed into the actual cases than the theories and definitions of antonymy
that have been referred to above.
B. The Classification of Antonymy
There are generally three kinds of sense relations, that is, sameness relation,
oppositeness relation and inclusiveness relation. Antonymy is the name for
oppositeness relation. And there are three main types of antonymy, that is,
gradable antonymy, complementary antonymy, and converse antonymy. (Hu,
2001, p.164-168)
(1) Gradable Antonymy
Gradable antonymy is the commonest type of antonymy. The antonym pairs like
hot/cold, big/small and tall/short all belong to the gradable antonyms. We can
find that they are mainly adjectives. The gradable antonymy has three
characteristics: first, as the name suggests, they are gradable, that is, the
members of a pair differ in terms of degree; second, antonyms of this kind are
graded against different norms; third, one member of a pair, usually the term for
the higher degree, serves as the cover term. (Hu, 2001, p.164)
As for the first characteristic, it also means that if you deny one thing, you do
not necessarily assert the other. And the antonym pairs may have the
comparative and superlative degrees. For example, “good” and “bad”, both of
these two words have the comparative and superlative degrees: “better”/“best”
and “worse”/“worst”. Therefore, being not good is not necessarily bad; and
being not bad is not necessarily good. Between “good” and “bad”, we can find a
degree that is “so-so”. Look at other examples, between the two extremes of the
size “big” and “small”, there is a degree that is “medium”; between the two
extremes of the temperature “hot” and “cold”, there are degrees that are “warm”
and “cool”.
From the information referred to above, we can see that the gradable antonyms
differ in terms of degree.
Look at the second characteristic, it means that there is no absolute criterion by
which we tell an object is “big” and another is “small”. The criterion is relative
but not absolute. As we all know, a small car is always bigger than a big apple.
This is why the antonyms of this kind are graded based on different norms.
As for the third characteristic, one of the antonym pairs is the cover term, which
is known as “unmarked”. “Unmarked” is used more widely than “marked”. We
may ask “how old are you” or “how tall is she” instead of “how young are you”
or “how short is she”. In that, “old” and “tall” are cover terms, “unmarked”; and
“young” and “short” are marked. The distinction between “unmarked” and
“marked” reflect the potential value system that the speech community holds.
People want to be tall rather than short.
(2) Complementary Antonymy
Antonyms like awake/asleep, married/single, pass/fail, alive/dead and
male/female are of this type. Complementary antonyms also have three
characteristics: first, they divide up the whole of a semantic field completely;
second, the norm in this type is absolute; third, there is no cover term for the
two members of a pair. (Hu, 2001)
As for the first characteristic, unlike the gradable antonyms, the complementary
antonyms share a semantic field. But between the two complementary
antonyms, there is no intermediate ground. As Cruse (1986) describes it, the
essence of a pair of complementary antonym is that between them they
exhaustively divide some conceptual domain into two mutually exclusive
compartments, so that what does not fall into one of the compartments must
necessarily fall into the other. The members of the antonym pairs of this kind is
complementary to each other. For instance, “He is more female than male”.
Actually, he is a male but not female. He is a male but he is closer to the state of
being female. The denial of male is the assertion of female and the assertion of
female is the denial of male. They don’t have the comparative and superlative
degrees. And they don’t have the intermediate degree between these two words
of an antonym pair.
The second characteristic is that the norm in this type of antonymy is absolute,
that is, the norm is the same when it is used for all the things it is applicable to.
The criteria to tell male from female is the same when we refer to the human
beings and the animals. And the death of human beings is the same as that of
any animal.
As for the third characteristic, in the complementary antonymy, there is no
cover term or covered term. We can not ask somebody’s sex like age. It means
we cannot say “how boy/male is it” like “how old are you”. We should ask “Is it
a boy or a girl”. That’s a normal question.
(3) Converse Antonymy
The antonym pairs like husband/wife, doctor/patient, teacher/student, buy/sell,
above/below and employer/employee are all converse antonymy. They show a
reversal relationship. A is B’s husband means B is A’s wife. A is B’s doctor
means B is A’s patient. A is B’s teacher means B is A’s student. It is also
known as relational opposites.
Egan (1968) describe these antonym pairs as pairs of words which include such
a relationship that one of them cannot be used without suggesting the other.
Therefore we can see that there is a huge difference between converse
antonymy and the other two subtypes of antonymy, that is, one should
presupposes the other as for the two members that involved in an antonym pair.
If there is a buyer, then there must be a seller. We cannot say he is a husband,
we must say he is whose husband, because one can not be a husband if he has
no wife. Just like the parent who can not be a parent if he has no child.
In this relationship, one can not talk about A without B.
However, there is something special to the “child”. Child and parent is an
antonym pair if the child means the parent’s son or daughter. But when it refers
to somebody under the age of eighteen, child is the antonym of adult. It is the
same as the word “teacher”. Teacher is a single word when it refers to an
occupation. Only when it means one is a teacher only to his student, can this
word constitute an antonym pair with “student”.
III. ANTONYMY IN SPECIFIC ENGLISH TEXTS
Antonymy helps achieve textual cohesion. It reveals the opposition and the
unity of objects in languages. Employing antonyms in English texts correctly
reveals the oppositeness of objects and produces a strong sense of comparison.
Therefore, writers are fond of and good at employing antonyms in their
literature works, because it makes the works artistically charming and
powerfully convincing.
A. Antonymy Used in Poetry
Antonyms are widely used in poetry. English poet Alfred Tennyson had the
famous lines in his Ulysses “Though much is taken, much abides; and though/
We are not now that strength which in the old days/ Moved earth and heaven;
that which we are, we are;/ One equal-temper of heroic hearts,/ Made weak by
time and fate, but strong in will/ To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.”
How encouraging it is! Even a man in despair can get the power from the lines.
And what makes the lines memorable and powerful is the use of antonyms.
In Romeo and Juliet, Romeo has the poem, “O loving hate,/ O anything, or
nothing first created!/ O heavy lightness, serious vanity,/ Misshapen chaos of
well-seeming forms,/ Feather of lead, bright smoke, cold fire, sick health,/ Still-
waking sleep, that is not what it is!”
B. Antonymy Used in Dramas
Antonymy is also widely used in dramas. It can be seen obviously from the
works of William Shakespeare. In Romeo and Juliet “My only love sprung from
my only hate. Too early seen unknown, and known too late. Prodigious birth of
love it is to me, that I must love a loathed” In the quotation, four antonym pairs
are there and they constitute the well known figures of speech in English,
oxymoron and paradox. When we read the words at first, we may think them
very ridiculous, illogical and raving. However, when we explore the plot of the
drams, we can find that the drama uses these antonym pairs and corresponding
figures of speech to depict the contradictory mind of Juliet on the occasion.
Juliet says this in Act 1 Scene 5 when she finds out who Romeo is. She’s
expressing a bunch of information and emotion all at once here—she’s fallen in
love with Romeo, but she’s upset that he is a member of the rival family. She
saw him first (too early) and fell for him before she found out who he was (too
late). Love now seems very strange to her, that she can love someone she’s
supposed to hate.
Antonyms for the most of time are used to make irony and oxymoron. In The
Tragedy of Julius Caesar, Caesar states, “I thank you for your pains and
courtesy.” Different listeners interpret it differently. Caesar meant one thing; to
the audience, who knows that Caesar will soon be killed, the statement means
something entirely different. Oxymoron is formed whenever two words that are
contrary in normal usage are combined together. (Watson, 2006, p.29) The
master of the oxymoron was William Shakespeare. In the Act 5 Scene 1 of
Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Theseus remarks about the
choices for the entertainment in the evening: “A tedious brief scene of young
Pyramus/ And his love Thisby; very tragical mirth./ Merry and tragical? tedious
and brief?/ That is hot ice and wondrous strange snow.
How shall we find the concord of this discord? ”
C. Antonymy Used in Novels
In the process of writing novels, numerous novelists are very good at employing
antonyms. The following is excerpted from A Tale of Two Cities written by
Charles Dickens. “It was the best times, it was the worst times, it was the
age of wisdom, it was the age of the foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it
was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of
darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had
everything before us, we has nothing before us.” It uses six pairs of antonyms to
depict the complicate and dangerous atmosphere before the French revolution.
These six antonym pairs are parallel and overwhelming.
In Maxwell Anderson’s Lost in the Stars, you will read “That you are all lost
here, black and white, rich and poor, the fools and the wise!” In O. Henry’s The
Duel, you will read “I despise its very vastness and power. It has the poorest
millionaires, the littlest great men, the haughtiest beggars, the plainest beauties,
the lowest skyscrapers, the dolefulest pleasures of any town I ever saw.” In T.
Dreiser’s Sister Carrie you will read “there was an audible stillness, in which
the common voice sounded strange.” Every famous novelist without exception
has a good master of antonyms.
D. Antonymy Used in Speeches
When antonymy is used in a speech, a clear-cut stand and a clear point of view
are easily made. The language has stronger rhythm and helps being persuasive.
As a result, many people employ antonymy in their speeches to state their
opinions, justify their positions and influence the public opinion. This can be
best seen from the speeches of American presidents.
Observing Barack Obama’s first victory speech in 2008, we are easy to read
following lines: “It's the answer spoken by young and old, rich and poor,
Democrat and Republican, black, white, Latino, Asian, Native American, gay,
straight, disabled and not disabled — Americans who sent a message to the
world that we have never been a collection of red states and blue states; we are,
and always will be, the United States of America.”… “In this country, we rise
or fall as one nation — as one people.”… “our stories are singular, but our
destiny is shared, and a new dawn of American leadership is at hand. To those
who would tear this world down: We will defeat you. To those who seek peace
and security: We support you.”… “And tonight, I think about all that she's seen
throughout her century in America — the heartache and the hope; the struggle
and the progress”… “because after 106 years in America, through the best of
times and the darkest of hours, she knows how America can change. Yes, we
can.”
Abraham Lincoln once in his Address at Gettyburg had “The brave men, living
and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, for above our poor power to
add or detract. The world will little note nor long remember what we say
here, but it can never forget what they did here. ”. The effect achieved by the
use of these antonyms is rather striking.
With the beautiful language forms with the use of antonymy the persuasive
power of the speakers are strengthened greatly and the audience are more likely
to be convinced to a greater extent. Examples are many, not only in presidential
speeches, like Barack Obama, Abraham Lincoln. Martin Luther King had “one
hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of a poverty in the midst
of vast ocean of material prosperity.”
E. Antonymy Used in Proverbs
Proverb is a form of language with the presentation of each figure of speech,
which is a fixed short verse naturally coming from the usual use of some
composition of the language. (Xu, 2009) Proverb is simple; meanwhile, it
entertains a thought deeply. When antonyms are used in proverbs, the rhetorical
effect of phonological harmony, formal beauty and conciseness are achieved.
Several examples are given as follows. “More haste, less speed.” “Easy come,
easy go.” “Art is long, life is short.”
“An idle youth, a needy age.” “Small sorrows speak; great sorrows are silent.”
Very famous people are more skilful of using antonymy in proverbs. George
Herbert has “Love makes all hard hearts gentle”. And George Eliot has “It is
surely better to pardon too much than to condemn too much”. All these
examples listed above are neat in the construction of the sentences. No matter
visually or phonologically, a kind of beauty of harmony can be sensed, which
helps convey profound messages.
IV. CONCLUSION
Antonyms are words with opposite meaning. And antonymy refers to the
relationship of oppositeness. Antonyms are exceedingly valuable in defining the
exact meaning of a given word and its synonyms. Antonyms enable us to
express briefly the opposite of a particular thought, often for the sake of
contrast.
From the linguistic point of view, one of the main concerns of studying
antonymy is to determine the boundaries of antonymy. Antonymy has been
divided into three different types by the linguists, that is, gradable antonymy,
complementary antonymy and converse antonymy. Gradable antonymy is
described as a relation, that is, “not A” doesn’t equal B. There is an intermediate
form between A and B. Complementary antonymy is a relation that “not A”
equals B. There is no intermediate ground between them. Converse antonymy
refers to a kind of reversal relationship.
Antonymy plays rather important roles in specific English texts, especially in
poetry, novels, dramas, speeches and proverbs. Antonymy helps the English
textual cohesion. Employing antonyms in texts correctly reveals the
oppositeness of the things and produces the strong sense of comparison.
Therefore, writers are fond of and are good at employing the antonyms in their
literature works, and it contributes to achieve characterization, scene
description, statement of opinions, discussion and refutation.
The linguistic study of antonymy in English texts helps readers understand and
appreciate authors’ intention much more easily. Teachers who emphasize the
study of antonymy in class will find their students have a higher reading
ability. However, the study of antonymy should not stop at linguistic level.
Probing into the rhetorical function of antonymy may help us improve the
ability of using language and heighten the effect of language output.
REFERENCES
[1] Cruse, D.A. (1986). Lexical Semantics. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press.
[2] Egan, R.F. (1968). Survey of the History of English Synonymy. Spingfield,
MA: Merriam-Webster.
[3] Gross, Derek, Fischer, Ute & Miller, George A. (1988). Antonymy and the
Representation of Adjectival Meanings. Cognitive
science laboratory report 13, Dept. of Psychology, Princeton University.
[4] Hu, Zhuanglin. (2001). Linguistics. A Course Book. Beijing: Beijing
University Press.
[5] Jackson, H. (1988). Words and Their Meaning. London: Longman Inc.
[6] Justeson, John S. & Katz, Slava M. (1991). Co-occurrences of Antonymous
Adjectives and Their Contexts. Computational Linguistics, 17, 1-19.
[7] Leech, Geoffrey. (1981). Semantics (2nd edition). Harmondsworth: Penguin
Books.
[8] Lyons, John. (1968). An Introduction to Theoretical Linguistics. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
[9] Lyons, John. (1977). Semantics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
[10] Pyles, Thomas & Algeo, John. (1970). English: An Introduction to
Language. New York: Harcourt, Brace and World.
[11] Watson, Owen. (1976). Longman Modern English Dictionary. London:
Longman Group Limited.
[12] Watson, Robert W. (2006). Studies in Poetry. Georgia: Smarr Publishers.
[13] Xu, Yiyun. (2009). The Analysis of English Antonymy in Features and
Functions. Journal of Jiangxi Normal University, 42, 136-141.
Chunming Gao was born in 1979 in Jilin Province, China. She received her
M.A degree in linguistics and applied linguistics in
foreign languages from Changchun University of Science and Technology in
2006 and then worked there as a lecturer ever since.
Her major research interests include applied linguistics and cross-cultural
communication.
Qianzhen Zheng was born in 1992 in Zhejiang Province, China. She received
her B. A. degree from Changchun University of
Science and Technology in 2013. She is currently a graduate student in the
School of Foreign Languages, Jilin University, China. Her
major research interest is linguistics and applied linguistics in English.
……………………………………………………………………………………
Romeo and Juliet is a play about the conflict between the main characters’ love,
with its transformative power, and the darkness, hatred, and selfishness
represented by their families’ feud. The two teenaged lovers, Romeo and Juliet,
fall in love the first time they see each other, but their families’ feud requires
they remain enemies. Over the course of the play, the lovers’ powerful desires
directly clash with their families’ equally powerful hatred of each other.
Initially, we may expect that the lovers will prove the unifying force that unites
the families. Were the play a comedy, the families would see the light of reason
and resolve their feud, Romeo and Juliet would have a public wedding, and
everyone would live happily ever after. But the Montague-Capulet feud is too
powerful for the lovers to overcome. The world of the play is an imperfect
place, where freedom from everything except pure love is an unrealistic goal.
Ultimately, the characters' love does resolve the feud, but at the price of their
lives.

Romeo and Juliet begin the play trapped by their social roles. Romeo is a young
man who is expected to chase women, but he has chosen Rosaline, who has
sworn to remain a virgin. The way Romeo speaks about Rosaline suggests he is
playing a role rather than feeling true, overpowering emotion. He expresses his
frustration in clichés that make his cousin Benvolio laugh at him. Romeo is also
expected to be excited by the feud with the Capulets, but Romeo finds the feud
as miserable as his love: “O brawling love, O loving hate” (1.1.). When we meet
Juliet, she is in her bedroom, physically trapped between her Nurse and her
mother. As a young woman, her role is to obediently wait for her parents to
marry her to someone. When her mother announces that Paris will be Juliet’s
future husband, Juliet’s response is obedient, but unenthusiastic: “I’ll look to
like, if looking liking move.” (1.3). These early scenes reveal Romeo and
Juliet’s characters and introduce the themes of love, sex, and marriage that
dominate the remainder of the play.

The incident which sets the plot in motion is Romeo’s decision to attend the
Capulets’ party. This decision is Romeo’s first attempt to free himself from the
role that confines him. Benvolio has advised him to get over Rosaline by
checking out other women. By going to the Capulets’ home, Romeo is also
temporarily ignoring his social role as a Montague who must feud with the
Capulets. Unfortunately, Tybalt sees Romeo’s presence as an “intrusion” and
swears revenge: “this intrusion shall, / Now seeming sweet, convert to bitt’rest
gall” (1.5.). Tybalt’s anger raises the stakes for Romeo’s presence at the party
and foreshadows their eventual duel. In the very next line after Tybalt’s exit,
Romeo and Juliet meet. Now Romeo has equally high stakes for staying at the
party as for leaving. If he stays he risks Tybalt’s further wrath, but if he leaves,
he won’t get to spend more time with Juliet. He risks his life for love,
establishing the high stakes of the lovers’ relationship. When Romeo and Juliet
talk, they reinforce the extraordinariness of their new love by using the religious
language of “pilgrims,” “saints,” and “prayers,” suggesting their love will
escape earthly limitations.
After the party, Romeo returns to find Juliet. Their love gives both lovers a
sense of freedom. Romeo feels like he is flying with “love’s light wings” (2.2).
Juliet feels that her love is “as boundless as the sea” (2.2). She believes that love
can liberate them both from their families: “be but sworn my love / And I’ll no
longer be a Capulet” (2.2.). In the next scene, we meet Friar Lawrence, who
reminds us that however good something seems, it can never be entirely
untainted by evil: “Virtue itself turns vice, being misapplied” (2.3). By the end
of the scene, however, even Friar Lawrence is swept up in the lovers’
excitement. He believes their love can end the Montague-Capulet feud, and he
agrees to marry them. The next few scenes are more like a Shakespearean
comedy than a tragedy. Mercutio and the Nurse make bawdy jokes. Romeo and
Juliet come up with a cunning plan to get married under their parents’ noses. It
seems as if the feud between their families really might end. At the end of Act
Two, the lovers marry.

No sooner are the lovers happily married than the play shifts from comedy to
tragedy. Tybalt still seeks revenge for Romeo’s decision to attend the Capulets’
ball. Romeo, believing himself freed from the feud by his secret marriage to
Juliet, refuses to fight Tybalt. But Romeo’s freedom is an illusion. Tybalt
provokes Mercutio and Mercutio challenges him. They fight, and Mercutio dies.
Now Romeo’s duty to his new in-laws, the Capulets, comes in conflict with his
duty to avenge his friend’s death. Romeo kills Tybalt. Although he was
provoked into the murder, and he would have been killed had he not killed first,
he is no longer an innocent, blameless character. It now seems unlikely that
Romeo and Juliet will be able to live happily together. Romeo is banished from
Verona. Before he leaves, he and Juliet spend their first—and last—night
together. The scene is bittersweet and moving because they know they will soon
be parted, and the audience understands this may be the last moment the lovers
see each other alive. At dawn, both Romeo and Juliet try to believe that morning
hasn’t come, since the new day brings nothing but grief: “More light and light,
more dark and dark our woes” (3.5).

In the final scenes, Romeo and Juliet are more trapped than ever. Neither
character can go back to who they were before they met, but the possibility of
them being together is very slim. The situation feels impossible, and reality
intrudes on all sides. For Romeo, reality takes the form of his banishment to
Mantua. For Juliet, the reality is her impending marriage to Paris. The two
lovers’ separate fates close in on them. In a desperate attempt to escape her
marriage to Paris, Juliet fakes her own death, using a sleeping potion given to
her by Friar Lawrence. Reality intrudes once more in an outbreak of plague in
Mantua, which prevents Romeo from getting the news that Juliet’s only asleep.
Romeo rushes to Juliet’s tomb, where he finds Paris. Romeo, surrendering to
the circumstances that have trapped him in his tragic role, kills Paris, then enters
Juliet’s tomb and kills himself moments before she wakes. When Juliet finds
Romeo dead, she stabs herself with his dagger. By killing themselves, the lovers
accept that they are trapped by their fate. At the same time, they escape from the
world that has kept them apart.

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