homosemous

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/ˌhoʊməˈsiːməs/

adjective

Having the same or identical meaning.

“Near-synonyms: (precisely differentiable) synonymous, synonymic; cognitively synonymous”

Similar
homosemicsynonymoussynonymiccognitively synonymous
Scrabble 17

Meanings

adjectivehomosemous (not comparable)
  1. not comparablephraseterm; or clause; term; or clauseHaving the same or identical meaning.

    Near-synonyms: (precisely differentiable) synonymous, synonymic; cognitively synonymous

    2 more examples

    ...They can say (i) that -s and -en are two different (but homosemous) morphemes expressing plural meaning (sense 1)...

    1990, Martin Haspelmath, “The morph as a minimal linguistic form”, in Morphology, volume 30, →DOI, pages 117–134

    A situation is a specific state of affairs perceived by a Speaker independently of how he wants to communicate it. For example, if a Speaker perceives the following situation: ‘Mary causes the flat part of her hand to come violently into contact with Peter's face’, he can express this situation by saying Mary slapped Peter in the face. For the same situation, another Speaker might say Peter was slapped in the face by Mary, It was in the face that Mary slapped Peter, etc.—depending on how he wants to express this situation. For all these different sentences the situation expressed remains the same. The meaning that corresponds to a situation will be called situational meaning (see also Mel’čuk et al., 1992:11). Two sentences with the same situational meaning will be called homosemous, or said to be linked by a relation of homosemy. The term ‘homosemous’ is proposed instead of the term ‘synonymous’, which we consider distinct from the former. X is synonymous to Y means ‘X is homosemous to Y and X has the same Semantic-Communicative Structure as Y’. Let us now compare sentences (1a) and (1b): (1) a. Peter killed the cat by strangling it. b. The cat died because Peter strangled it.

    1997, Jean St-Germain, “Semantic Communicative Structure of Verbal vs. Conjunctive Causative Expressions (TO KILL/TO CAUSE TO DIE vs. TO DIE BECAUSE P)”, in Leo Wanner, editor, Recent Trends in Meaning Text Theory (Studies in Language companion series), volume 39, John Benjamins Publishing Company, →ISBN, page 76

    Synonyms: homosemic, synonymous, synonymic, cognitively synonymous

Synonyms & antonyms

adjectiveHaving the same or identical meaning.

Similar
homosemicsynonymoussynonymiccognitively synonymous

Origin

Cite this entry
APA

homosemous. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/homosemous

MLA

“homosemous.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/homosemous. Accessed November 4, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “homosemous,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/homosemous.

Source: homosemous on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.