LING 2003 Semantics: Meaning and Grammar
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Tutorial Assignment 1
Answer question 1 or question 2.
Word limit: 800 words
Assignment due in class on Monday Oct 10. Or in tutorial for Monday 1pm groups.
1. Consider the following entry for ghost in Roget’s Thesaurus and the entry for gui in
A Dictionary of Chinese Symbols.
NOUN:
1. A supernatural being, such as a ghost: apparition, bogey, bogeyman, bogle,
eidolon, phantasm, phantasma, phantom, revenant, shade, shadow, specter, spirit,
visitant, wraith. Informal: spook. Regional: haunt. See BEINGS, SUPERNATURAL. 2.
A slight amount or indication: breath, dash, hair, hint, intimation, semblance,
shade, shadow, soupçon, streak, suggestion, suspicion, taste, tinge, touch, trace,
whiff, whisper. (Roget’s II: The New Thesaurus, Third Edition. 1995.)
Gui. In general, the Chinese word gui denotes a demon of whom we have every reason to feel
scared… Gui wear hemless garments. They themselves cast no shadow, and their voices sound
strange to us. They are very short-sighted and see only a red glow; we see them as a sort of dark
cloud. (from A Dictionary of Chinese Symbols by Wolfram Eberhard)
(a) Describe the meaning of the English word ghost in terms of sense, reference and
lexical relations.
(b) Does the Chinese word gui have the same sense and/or reference as ghost? (use your
own knowledge as well as the above quotation.)
2. Consider the following dictionary definitions and quotation.
destiny: that which is destined to happen; FATE. (Shorter Oxford English Dictionary)
fate: destiny or fortune apparently determined by fate. (Longman Dictionary of the
English Language.)
fate: the principle, power or agency by which events are predetermined... (Shorter OED)
If I had not gone to see Peanut, if I had not stopped to read a silly magazine… one minute
later, and our lifetimes would have missed each other. I ask you, isn’t that fate meant to be?
How lucky we were that fate brought is together. But your father did not think it was fate,
at least not the Chinese idea of ming yuan.
“Fate”, he told me, “is somebody else deciding your life for you. Our love was greater
than that.” And he used the American word “destiny”, something that could not be prevented.
Well, that sounded the same as fate to me. He insisted it was different, an important difference…
Maybe we were both right, it was my fate and his destiny. (Amy Tan, The Kitchen God’s Wife)
(a) Describe the meaning of the English words destiny and fate in terms of sense,
reference and lexical relations.
(b) Does the Chinese word ming yuan have the same sense and/or reference as destiny
and/or fate?
GhostPhantom
 Ghost
 Apparition
 Spirit
 Spectre
 phantasm
Spirit
 ghost
 ghoul
 phantom
 apparition
 spectre
Ghoul
 ghost
 phantom
 spectre
 spirit
Spectre
 ghost
 apparition
 phantom
 spirit
 presence
 image
 vision
Poltergeist
 ghost
 Mischievous spirit
 Manifestation
 Apparition
 Spectre
 Phantom
 Presence
Banshee
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Phantom
Spirit
Ghoul
Spectre
Poltergeist
980. Demon.
N. demon, daemon, demonry[obs3], demonology; evil genius, fiend, familiar,
daeva[obs3], devil; bad spirit, unclean spirit; cacodemon[obs3], incubus, Eblis,
shaitan[obs3], succubus, succuba; Frankenstein's monster; Titan, Shedim,
Mephistopheles, Asmodeus[obs3], Moloch, Belial, Ahriman[obs3]; fury, harpy; Friar
Rush.
vampire, ghoul; afreet[obs3], barghest[obs3], Loki; ogre, ogress; gnome, gin, jinn, imp,
deev[obs3], lamia[obs3]; bogie, bogeyman, bogle[obs3]; nis[obs3], kobold[obs3],
flibbertigibbet, fairy, brownie, pixy, elf, dwarf, urchin; Puck, Robin Goodfellow;
leprechaun, Cluricaune[obs3], troll, dwerger[obs3], sprite, ouphe[obs3], bad fairy, nix,
nixie, pigwidgeon[obs3], will-o'-the wisp.
[Supernatural appearance] ghost, revenant, specter, apparition, spirit, shade, shadow,
vision; hobglobin, goblin, orc; wraith, spook, boggart[obs3], banshee, loup-garou[Fr],
lemures[obs3]; evil eye.
merman, mermaid, merfolk[obs3]; siren; satyr, faun; manito[obs3], manitou, manitu.
possession, demonic possession, diabolic possession; insanity &c.503.
[in jest, in science] Maxwell's demon.
[person possessed by a demon] demoniac.
Adj. demonic, demonical, impish, demoniacal; fiendish, fiend-like; supernatural, weird,
uncanny, unearthly, spectral; ghostly, ghost-like; elfin, elvin[obs3], elfish, elflike[obs3];
haunted; pokerish [obs3][U.S.].
possessed, possessed by a devil, possessed by a demon.
Adv. demonically.