Íslenskt mál og almenn málfræði - 01.01.2021, Blaðsíða 178

2.5 Semantic classification
The semantic classification used in the dissertation is not dependent on a specific
thesaurus. Rather, it is an original classification. Of course there are terms whose
semantics may fit in more than one semantic field, as pointed out by the second
opponent. The general principle which I tried to follow is one of semantic prior-
ity. In the specific case of the word pair kirkja – guðshús the terms are considered
to pertain to the category “Buildings” (grouped together with “Materials”) before
“Religion”. Note also that the semantic classification does not contemplate a sin-
gle semantic field labelled “Religion” and that is because a more fine-grained classi -
fication of religious terms might have led to significant results. Not knowing
what to expect beforehand, apart from knowing that religious terms might have
been quite different semantically, my choice was as described.
The most significant result in relation to the semantics of the elicited data is
the “law of semantic specificity” described above (§ 4 of the project presentation)
and in the conclusive chapter of the dissertation (pp. 221–222).

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