What characteristic of antonyms does the following pair of sentences demonstrate? A） How tall is his brother? B） How short is his brother?
【正确答案】：Antonyms differ in semantic inclusion. Pairs of antonyms are seen as marked and unmarked terms respectively. In many pairs we find one member is more specific than the other and the meaning of the specific is included in that of the general. So far as the meaning is concerned, sentence A includes the meaning of sentence B. the use of tall does not exclude the possibility of his brother being short. but sentence B is much more restricted in sense and is considered semantically abnormal unless the speaker is particularly interested in the shortness of his brother.
【题目解析】：反义词作为语义关系中的一个大的类别有很多的应用，它有一下特点：语义相反程度不同，就有不同的分类；一个词可以有多个反义词；反义词在语义包容上有所不同，因此有有无标记的区分；相对意义的反义词有级别性差异。题干中涉及tall 和short这一对反义词，在问到某个人的身高时，tall可以指很高，也可以指很矮，它是没有标记（marked）的,而short 虽然也是在问及身高，但是它强调了“矮”这个意义，short这个词是有标记（marked)的，在正常提问的时候，选用无标记的词比有标记的词内容上会更包容一些，选用有标记的词就会显得有些异样的感觉，如果说话的人不是故意突出有标记的词的特性，就应该选用无标记的形容词更适合表达。
