l items, ones that were previously assumed too complicated to teach;second, it is an attempt to show that polysemous words, previously considered too difficultto understand, can in fact be easy to comprehend and retain; finally, the conceptualmetaphor-based polysemy teaching method attempts to engage learners in deciphering andretaining a wide array of meanings related to the basic meaning of polysemous words. Thestudy is an empirical study closely integrated with teaching, through which the principle ofcognitive linguistics can be applied to English teaching and learning practice. Effectivenessof cognitive linguistics theory in foreign language teaching needs to be further testified bymultiple empirical researches.
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Chapter Two Literature Review
This chapter mainly discusses about the theoretical studies of polysemy from theperspective of traditional approach to cognitive approach, and then focuses on theempirical studies on polysemous words.
2.1 Theoretical Studies of Polysemy
Etymologically speaking, the term “polysemy” comes from the Greek words “poly”which means “many”, and “semy” which means “meaning”; consequently the two words“poly” and “semy” mean “multiple meaning” or “ many meanings” (Burrow, 1984, p. 244).Fromkin (1998) argues that the polysemy is a word having multiple related concepts orhistorical meanings. Taylor (1989) defines polysemy as “the association of two or morerelated senses with a single linguistic form” (p. 99). In a word, polysemy refers to a wordthat has two or more distinct but related senses. It is a common language phenomenon inthe world. Why do the polysemous words come into being? With respect to the question,Bréal (2005) has pointed out that the phenomenon is caused by the principle of linguisticeconomy. During initial period, a word is only used to refer to a thing or a phenomenon;with the development of society, new things or new phenomena appear, so a word withonly one meaning cannot meet the demand, a new word is needed to fill the vacancy. Whena new meaning appears, the corresponding new word cannot generate immediately, basedon economic principles, the polysemy phenomenon appears.Besides, Croft & Cruse (2006) clarifies that homonymous senses are regarded asdifferent words, but they have the same spelling and/or sound by accident. The meaningsof polysemy are considered to be different meanings of the same word. Taking the word“head” for example, the word “head” is a polysemous word, having two or more relatedmeanings. In the sentence “ She turned her head away from him”，the word “head” refersto the top part of the body; in the sentence “She resigned as head of department”, the word“head” means a leader of a group or organization. Besides, the word “head” can be used torefer to the top part of an object, the top of a piece of writing or the first person or vehiclein the line. It can be seen that the word “head” has two or more related meanings. Withregard to homonymy, for instance, in the sentence “We pedaled north along the east bankof the river”, the word “bank” bears the meaning of the sloping side of a river. While in thesentence “Students should look to see which bank offers them the service that best suitstheir financial needs”, the word “bank” carries a completely distinct meaning. It refers tothe financial institution. So the two words have two unrelated meanings and they are calledhomonyms.To sum up, polysemy refers to a word that has two or more distinct but related senses,but homonymous senses are treated as different words, accidentally having the samespelling and/or sound.
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2.2 Empirical Studies of Polysemey
The basic CL approach holds that learners should be aware of the central meaning ofthe polysemy, and of how particular additional meanings extended from thi
