On Lexical Ambiguity

张艳琴

Abstract： This thesisfocuses on the study of lexical ambiguity and then makes a systematic study of lexical ambiguity in terms of its factors， disambiguation.

Key words： lexical ambiguity factors disambiguation

1. Introduction

Ambiguity is a universal linguistic phenomenon existing in all natural languages. Of course， English is no exception. Here we generalize that ambiguity is a linguistic phenomenon that a word， phrase or clause can have more than one possible interpretation.

2. Factors leading to lexical ambiguity

First， homophones mainly cause thephonological ambiguity. At lexical level， only complete homonyms and homographs are concerned. Complete homonyms refer to words that are identical both in pronunciation and spelling， but different in meaning.homographs refer to words that are identical in spelling form but different in pronunciation.

Second， an overwhelming majority of English words are polysemous. In general， we can determine its meaning in certain context.

Third， idioms include demotivated idioms and motivated idioms. Motivated idioms may cause ambiguity because of the differences between words original meanings and extended meanings.

3.Disambiguation of lexical ambiguity

Firstly， the proper context can be provided. Context is very important for us to understand a word， sentence or passage. One of the factors that some words or sentences are ambiguous is the lack of context. In fact， contexts furnish us with much potential information that is helpful to accurately understand the word or sentence.According to Hu Zhuanglin， contexts include linguistic context， situational context and cultural context.

Secondly， we can change the structures of word groups i.e. changing pre-modifiers into post-modifiers is a better way to avoid ambiguity.，

Thirdly， modifiers can be added. One important factor that a sentence is ambiguous is the meaning of some words in it lacks restriction， as a result， having a wide range of choices. Since modifiers can narrow down the choice， we may add proper modifiers to avoid ambiguity.

4. Conclusion

This thesis gives a systematic introduction of lexical ambiguity in terms of its factors， disambiguation.

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