4. It should be noted as a counterpoint that the lexicographer,Charles Ruhl(1989),argues that virually all polysemy is an illusion. He means that if you get abstract enough you can find a single “general” meaning for each word,which holds regardless of context. We will return to this notion when we consider prepositions, and will thus explore it more fully in Chapter 21.
5. Sometimes English speakers will assign feminine gender to nonliving nouns such as cars, ships, and countries.