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I was reading a book to my granddaughter about homonyms and discussing various homonyms. I said to her that Turkey is a homonym because it is a bird and a country. She added that she has a friend named London which is also the name of a city so it must be a homonym. I agreed, then she mentioned other names of people who have the same names of places. This started to sound very wrong to me. It could be extended to the point that Salem, Mass. and Salem, Ore. are homonyms. Certainly not!! Or are they? My question is, "May any proper noun be a homonym?" If not, is there a rule limiting what may or may not be homonyms? I really fell like the two turkeys are homonyms but one of those is not a proper name. Does anyone have a rule about this?
I never thought about it before. A quick search brought me to the new concept of capitonyms which are words that are spelled the same, with one as a proper noun. For a capitonym, unlike a true homonym, the pronunciation does not have to match.
Polish vs. polish
Turkey vs. turkey
Nice vs. nice
Tangier vs. tangier (more tangy)
I don't see anything wrong with calling Turkey and turkey homonyms.
However, I do also balk at calling identical place names as homonyms simply because they refer to a different place. Then nearly every given name would be a homonym. It's not very useful.
However, it does bring up an advanced topic of linguistics, semiology/semiotics, namely semantics, in which the ideas of reference and referent / signifier and signified are central.
As for homonyms, I would pass a personal judgment that proper nouns referring to similar referents are not homonyms. (e.g., Hayden Christensen and Hayden Panettiere do not serve as evidence that Hayden is a homonym, despite crossing gender boundaries.) Proper nouns are simply a special class. But I might accept your granddaughter's example of a place name London and a personal name London. And while I would reject your multiple Salems as examples of homonyms, I would accept the city Salem with the cigarette brand Salem as a fair example, albeit one I might avoid pointing out for pedagogic clarity. It is much clearer if at least one of the set of homonyms is not a proper noun.
It seems to me that for your granddaughter to point this problem out at such an early age indicates you have a linguistic prodigy on your hands. Buckle up.
Checking the dictionary, I find that what I thought was a homonym is actually a homophone. Perhaps the voters ought to get a partial refund on their land taxes.
Count Alfred Korzybski, in writing Science and Sanity, the book on which General Semantics, pointed out that when someone says chair, we envision a chair. But if the speaker is talking about a ladder-back wooden kitchen chair, and I'm envisioning a La-Z-Boy recliner-rocker, I'm hearing something the speaker didn't intend. The word chair has one etymology. Would it be homonymic with itself? Lancaster, Ohio and Lancaster, California were named for Lancaster, Pennsylvania, but the one in Pennsylvania is Lank-a-stir, while the other two are Lan-cast-er. One etymology, but they aren't homophones?
The dictionary says that two words are homonyms if they have different word origins but have the same spelling or pronunciation, and gives lead as an example; the metal is pronounced ledd, and the rope attached to the collar is leed.
I question the value of wasting the limited resource of teacher's and children's attention spans on such an unproductive lesson. It's fine that wordies like us learn those terms, and lexicographers, of course, but let's teach kids how to figure out how big their 40x120 lot is, so they know much 10-10-10 fertilizer to use.Proper names are not generic labels. They point to SPECIFIC instances. And they don't have etymologies. Chelsea Clinton may have been conceived in the Chelsea Hotel, but the name didn't devolve to Ms Clinton, any more than the Chelsea Hotel's name devolved from the affluent neighborhood in London. Instead, those names are inspired by the earlier proper name.And with no etymology, a word cannot be a homonym. Spoken with certainty by someone who didn't know what a homonym was just 12 hours ago.
Martha Barnette
Grant Barrett
Grant Barrett
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