Lexical Ambiguity

Lexical ambiguity stems from the existence of homophony and polysemy. Homophony occurs when a single word has more than one meaning. For example, the word bank can be used to denote either a place where monetary exchange and handling takes place or the land close river, the bank of the river.

Some other examples of homophony are: The word tin

• This can is made of tin.
• Put the left-overs in the cookie tin.

The word tan

• Anne went to Mexico and got a tan
• My favorite jacket is black with a tan collar.

In these examples the context in which the sentences occur omits confusion that homophony might have caused.

Homophony also occurs when a word that is not necessarily spelled the same but is pronounced the same and used to have different meanings.

For example, the words night and knight are pronounced exactly the same although they are spelled differently, and they have very different meanings.

• It gets very cold here at night.
• The knight in shining armor saved the princess.

Polysemy occurs when a word, or small group of words, has two or more related meanings. This may sound alot like homophony, and it is true that they are related. However, polysemy involves close relations between meanings of a single word, where homophony may involve completely different meanings.

Some example of polysemy are:

The verb to glare

• The sun glared down from the hot desert sky.
• The angry girl glared at the boy who had pulled her hair.

The word bright

• The stars are bright tonight.
• She must be very bright if she made an "A" on the test.

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