macho man

[Lynne Murphy]

--On Tuesday, February 12, 2002 3:03 pm +0800 Laurence Horn
<laurence.horn at YALE.EDU> wrote:

> At 12:16 PM -0600 2/12/02, Yerkes, Susan wrote:
>> Male man, on the other hand, would be a pleonasm under the definition
>
> But I'm not sure what it would mean to say "male man" is a pleonasm

But "male man" is a pleonasm--it's a redundant phrase.  Now, it's certainly
not lexicalized like 'bunny rabbit', but it's still a pleonasm if someone
wants to say it.

Hyponym, as you say, is a relational term.  A word (or phrase) can't be
deemed a 'hyponym' on its own, just like a word can't be deemed an
'antonym' on its own--only in relation to something else.

But considering that the great number of pleonasms probably involve
hyponymy, I'd say we need a word for hyponym-free pleonasms (the marked
case) more than we need a term for the unmarked situation of hyponym-ful
pleonasms!

Sincerely yours truly,
Lynne


Dr M Lynne Murphy
Lecturer in Linguistics
Acting Director, MA in Applied Linguistics
School of Cognitive and Computing Sciences
University of Sussex
Brighton BN1 9QH
UK

phone +44-(0)1273-678844
fax   +44-(0)1273-671320