2018
Lidia Kolzoun et al., « An avalanche of problems : towards a lexicographic description of nouns meaning ‘avalanche’ in Russian and French », HAL-SHS : linguistique, ID : 10670/1.05o24d
This paper deals with subtle semantic differences between French and Russian lexical units which have important consequences on these units’ combinatorial behaviour in sentences and, therefore, that are a challenge in the context of foreign language learning/teaching. We analyse the specific case of the Russian noun LAVINA ‘avalanche’ and its French counterpart AVALANCHE, which leads us to show that there semantic difference lies in a “communicative inversion” of the central component of their meaning. We show how this difference can be modelled in the lexicographic definition of both nouns. Finally, we examine the consequences this difference has on the polysemy of the corresponding Russian and French vocables.