Department of Ancient Studies

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Browsing Department of Ancient Studies by Subject "'al"

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    The semantic potential of 'al in Genesis, Psalms, and Chronicles
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2012-12) Mena, Andrea K.; Van der Merwe, C. H. J.; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Ancient Studies.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This thesis offers a description of the semantic potential of the Biblical Hebrew lexeme '7l! in Genesis, Psalms, and Chronicles according to a cognitive linguistic perspective. This specific linguistic approach offers a theoretical framework of how humans cognitively organize lexical meaning, which is advantageous for highly polysemous lexemes, such as '7lJ. The need for this study arises because existing Biblical Hebrew resources do not utilize such a framework as is evidenced by their lists of translation equivalents, rather than full descriptions of meanings, and their lack of a clearly defined semantic model underlying their lexical treatment. However, they do provide a starting point that can be built upon with a cognitive linguistic based methodology. Such a methodology is found in Tyler and Evans (2007) case study of over, a frequent English translation of '7lJ. Tyler and Evans (2007) present how to determine the most prototypical semantic sense (i.e., the Proto-Scene) and how to distinguish between other distinct semantic senses, all of which represent the lexeme's semantic potential. This thesis heuristically utilizes this methodology while strongly considering three other factors. First, the syntactic frame surrounding '7l! is evaluated to assess how syntactic information, specifically verbal valency, contributes to the preposition's semantic value. Second, the frequency of each semantic category is assessed to determine possible insight into prototypicality within the defined corpus. Third, a radial structure is proposed to represent the semantic relationships between the prototypical and nonprototypical categories. This type of organization illustrates a clearly defined semantic model underlying the lexical treatment. This study first describes the Proto-Scene, which involves one entity over or upon another. Then, fifteen other distinct semantic categories of '7l! are presented within a radial structure (i.e. The Vertical Cluster: More, Superior, and Control; Contingent Locative; Accompaniment, In, To, Oppositional, For, Frontal, Causal, Norm, Focus of Attention, Instrumental, and Psalms Titles). Finally, the various senses for the morphologically complex lexemes are proposed. These include '7l!1;1 (i.e. From Upon, Away From, Above, and Contingent Locative) and '7l!=? (i.e. As Concerning).