In every language there are words that cause bewilderment among foreigners. Such lexical units have one unique feature: they are identical in writing and pronunciation. From the school course of the Russian language, you probably remember that such components of native speech are called homonyms. To understand in more detail what homonyms are, what properties they have, this article will help.
We meet such unusual words every day in everyday life, but we do not attach any importance to them. The simplest examples of these lexical units are the bow as a plant and the bow as a weapon. Such nouns are a clear demonstration of complete homonymy. This means that the presented words coincide in absolutely all grammatical forms. This category can also include such a noun as a key: an object that helps to open a door lock, and a spring - a source of drinking water.
The definition of what homonyms are cannot be unambiguous, if only because there are many subcategories of this lexical section. One of them is incomplete homonymy, that is, the coincidence of words that belong to a single part of speech only in some word forms. The simplest illustration of this group is the word "factory". As you know, a factory is a manufacturing enterprise. On the other hand, the watch may have a factory. Partial homonymy in this case is manifested in the fact that this word has no plural form in the second meaning.
Thus, polysemantic words and homonyms are, in certain situations, identical lexical units. The main thing is not to confuse that homonyms are always words with a large number of different meanings, but on the contrary, this is far from always the case.
What are homonyms, for example, the British understand perfectly well. In their native language, there are also words that are spelled and pronounced exactly the same. The most common example is bat. On the one hand, it's a bat, and on the other, it's a baseball bat. But, despite the similarity of lexical phenomena in the language, it can be extremely difficult for foreigners to correctly interpret the meaning of Russian homonyms.
Homonyms in Russian, as in many other world dialects, can be distinguished from each other only in context. If, for example, we are talking about how to properly water and fertilize onions, it will immediately become clear to everyone that we are talking about a plant. In the event that it describes how to pullbowstring, meaning weapon.
There is another group of words that is on a par with homonymy. It combines words that are pronounced the same but are spelled differently. Cat - code, bow - meadow and many other lexical units have identical phonetic analysis, but different meanings and spelling, and are called homoforms.
The Russian language is a storehouse of amazing phenomena, many of which are difficult to understand and study. But after reading this article, you took a step towards studying your native speech and learned what homonyms and homoforms are, so you can be congratulated: our great and mighty has already revealed some of his secrets to you!
