Editor's Corner

Good morning, good people!

Today, I’m taking a break. It’s summer, and even though it is foggy out right now, I’m pretending to be on vacation! Here is one of Richard Lederer’s articles on English. I’ve heard from some of you about how many words in English have multiple meanings, and here is a take on the same topic from Richard and the San Diego Union-Tribune. The full article is at the link.

DEAR RICHARD: The word buck has nine different definitions as presented in dictionary.com.

This set me to wondering “Is there a definition of words with many definitions? What words in the English language are like this? Which has the most? How does this happen to begin with?” — Michael Stewart, Scripps Ranch

If you need a fancy term for multiple meanings of a word, it’s polysemy, from the Greek poly, “many,” as in polygamy, and sem, “signification, meaning,” as in semantic. Polysemy is common for nouns, verbs, and modifiers because there are more objects and ideas in the world than there are words for them, so many words have to do double (or more) duty.

Take the plain, little word run. Turns out it’s actually our longest word, in the sense that with 645 — you read that right: 645! —meanings, run takes up more room in our fattest dictionaries than any other word. How many meanings can run have beyond “to move rapidly on alternate feet”? Well, you can run a company, run for the school board, run the motor of your car, run a flag up a pole, run up your debts, run your stocking, run your mouth, run a fence around a property, run an idea past a colleague, run the numbers, run an antagonist through with your sword, run an ad in a newspaper, run into a childhood friend, never run out of meanings for run — and your nose can run and your feet can smell.

Run takes up half again as much space as its nearest polysemous competitor, put, which itself is far more polysemous than the third word in this category, set. So the three “longest” words enshrined in our dictionaries are each composed of three letters.

Rounding out the top ten most polysemous words, each but a single syllable are, alphabetically, cast, cut, draw, point, serve, strike, and through.

There you have it! Take that to your local trivia night and win…something. 😊

Kara Church | Technical Editor, Advisory | Technical Publications

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