Thursday, June 7, 2012

single word requests - Describing a concept as exhibiting polysemy



I am writing an essay where I argue, in part, about the different meanings a concept can take depending on the context and/or the person it is being applied by. (In my case, it's the concept of 'goodness'/virtue).



I stumbled upon the following word which seemed to define the idea quite succinctly.



Dicitonary.com defines the word Polysemy as:




a condition in which a single word, phrase, or concept has more than one meaning or connotation.





However, it seems that polysemic is not an actual word. Would it be correct to use it in this context, regardless of that fact. Or is there a better alternative?



The sentence:




Bertolt Brecht introduces the polysemic nature of 'goodness' in his play...



Answer




I think it is:



Polysemic (adjective):





  • having more than one meaning; having multiple meanings; also called polysemous





(Dictionary.com)



Both adjectives are used, see Ngram



Another less common variant is polysemantic, see Ngram


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