: Oringalieva Nurjayna Orazgalievna📘 : Nexus Global Research Journal of Business And Management (NGRJBM) Volume 2, Issue 3, 2026 (Page : 79- 81)
ABSTRACT:
This article provides an analysis of polysemy and cognitive lexical semantics, focusing on how a single word form can have multiple, related meanings organized in motivated networks. Polysemy is a pervasive feature of natural language, and cognitive linguistics offers a principled account of how word senses are related through metaphorical, metonymic, and other extensions. The article examines the distinction between polysemy and homonymy, the cognitive mechanisms that motivate polysemy, the radial category model of word meaning, the role of image schemas and conceptual metaphors in lexical extension, and the implications of the framework for lexicography, language teaching, and computational linguistics. It is argued that polysemy is not a problem to be solved but a reflection of the dynamic, creative, and embodied nature of human cognition.
Keywords: Polysemy, cognitive lexical semantics, radial categories, conceptual metaphor, metonymy, word meaning, lexical extension, prototypicality, cognitive linguistics.