Semantic field

In linguistics, a semantic field is a related set of words grouped semantically (by meaning) that refers to a specific subject. The term is also used in anthropology, computational semiotics, and technical exegesis.

Brinton (2000: p. 112) defines "semantic field" or "semantic domain" and relates the linguistic concept to hyponymy:

A general and intuitive description is that words in a semantic field are not necessarily synonymous, but are all used to talk about the same general phenomenon. Synonymy requires the sharing of a sememe or seme, but the semantic field is a larger area surrounding those. A meaning of a word is dependent partly on its relation to other words in the same conceptual area. The kinds of semantic fields vary from culture to culture and anthropologists use them to study belief systems and reasoning across cultural groups.

Andersen (1990: p.327) identifies the traditional usage of "semantic field" theory as:

The origin of the field theory of semantics is the lexical field theory introduced by Jost Trier in the 1930s, although according to John Lyons it has historical roots in the ideas of Wilhelm von Humboldt and Johann Gottfried Herder. In the 1960s Stephen Ullmann saw semantic fields as crystallising and perpetuating the values of society. For John Lyons in the 1970s words related in any sense belonged to the same semantic field, and the semantic field was simply a lexical category, which he described as a lexical field. Lyons emphasised the distinction between semantic fields and semantic networks. In the 1980s Eva Kittay developed a semantic field theory of metaphor. This approach is based on the idea that the items in a semantic field have specific relations to other items in the same field, and that a metaphor works by re-ordering the relations of a field by mapping them on to the existing relations of another field. Sue Atkins and Charles J. Fillmore in the 1990s proposed frame semantics as an alternative to semantic field theory.

The semantic field of a given word shifts over time. The English word "man" used to mean "human being" exclusively, while today it predominantly means "adult male," but its semantic field still extends in some uses to the generic "human" (see Mannaz).

Overlapping semantic fields are problematic, especially in translation. Words that have multiple meanings (called polysemous words) are often untranslatable, especially with all their connotations. Such words are frequently loaned instead of translated. Examples include "chivalry" (literally "horsemanship", related to "cavalry"), "dharma" (literally, "support"), and "taboo".

Semantic field theory has informed the discourse of Anthropology as Ingold (1996: p. 127) relates:

• Hyponymy
• Metonymy
• Polysemy
• Semantic class
• Thesaurus