In terms of both oral and written language, everything we say needs to make sense, needs to be clear. Otherwise, we can run the risk of being misunderstood, can't we?
Well, these two little words -hyperonymy and hyponymia, although they seem unknown to you, it has everything to do with what we have just stated. Take a look:
Imagine that you are asked to talk about some types of sport. You will probably say:
The words volleyball, basketball and soccer represent hyponymia
We found that through a single word – sport, several words appeared associated with it. But imagine you said any of them that didn't belong to that semantic universe, that is, the group that logically encompasses words that have a meaningful relation to each other, then yes you it wouldn't really be clear, as it would leave your interlocutor (the person we spoke to) totally confused. Hence the need to be objective, always.
Now that we are a little more familiar, how about defining the concept of hyperonymy and hyponymia? Let's go then:
Hyperonymy has a broad sense, and hyponymia... more restricted
the hyperonymy it is represented by those words that give the idea of a whole, that is, of a broader meaning. In the example we saw, the word "sport" is characterized as the hyperonymy.
already the hyponymia represents the group of words that are associated with the one with the comprehensive meaning. Still talking about the previous example, the words “volleyball, basketball and football” integrate the sporting modalities that exist - which means to say that it is about the hyponymia.
As you could see, this is not something that unknown, nor very complicated, do you agree? Now here's a tip for you to put into practice everything we could learn together: invite your colleagues to play that old popular game known to everyone, called adedonha and... unleash your imagination!!!
By Vânia Duarte
Graduated in Letters
