The Interplay of Synonymy and Polysemy

Goldberg (1995) 
The main argument of Goldberg (1995) is that sentences of English are constructions. 
They exist independently within the language and have meaning. For example, the 
ditransitive is a construction in English which carries its own meaning, namely an agent 
successfully causing a recipient to receive a patient (1995:38). 
Goldberg (1995) focuses primarily on sentential constructions: the ditransitive, the 
caused-motion construction, the resultative and the 
way
construction. Still, Goldberg 
discusses her conception of lexical meaning, since it plays an important role in understanding 
how lexical items and constructions interact. She argues that meaning must be defined 
relative to some background frame or scene (1995:25), based on Fillmore’s frame semantics.
For example, 
ceiling
and 
roof 
differ in construal: 
ceiling
is construed with respect to the 
inside of a building, while 
roof
is construed based on the outside (1995:25).
An important part of the frame semantics of a verb includes the 
participant roles
. 
This refers to the elements that are understood to participate in an action. Participant roles are 
frame-specific (1995:43), and each individual word determines which aspect of its meaning is 
profiled or highlighted (1995:44). The verbs 
rob
and 
steal
can be contrasted:
(5) rob <
robber
victim
goods>
steal <
stealer
source 
goods
>
(1995:48) 
Each verb has its specific roles. The first argument of 
rob
is 
robber
, while the first 
argument of 
steal
is 
stealer
. The verbs also highlight different roles (the ones marked in 
bold). Both verbs profile the first argument. They differ in the other profiled argument. 
Rob
focuses on the victim, while 
steal
profiles the goods.

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