The metonymic potential of adjectives that signify emotions ans physical states in the Turkish language

Abstract

In this work the adjectives indicating emotions and psychophysical states are analysed with regard to their combination with nouns that represent body parts. The first section of the work is a presentation of traditional semantics’ results and principles of the Componential analysis. It includes special emphasis on adjective lexemes, which is the main subject of the work.

The semantics of adjective and metonymic transformations occurring in adjective lexemes should be observed through a complex interaction between adjective and nominal structures. The second section consists of an analysis of metonymic potentials consisting of various combinations of adjectives signifying emotions and psycho-physical states and the nouns that represent body parts. As the analysis shows, these metonymic expressions confirm the status of the metonymic theory as a reference point.