English

Noun

heteronymy ‎(countable and uncountable, plural heteronymies)

1. The condition of being heteronyms; the relationship between two words with different meanings and either the same spelling or the same pronunciation but not both.
   • 1860, Samuel Stehman Haldeman, Analytic Orthography:

     We find also the ancient term ārcūbālīstǎ (or with II,) which, with the aid of otosis, elision, and heteronymy, arising out of the varying use and changing shape of the weapon, will account for all the forms cited.

   • 2013, Gunnel Melchers & ‎Philip Shaw, World Englishes, ISBN 1134672284:

     The result of combined tautonymy and heteronymy can be either faster or slower replacement of non-American heteronyms, as these two examples demonstrate.

   • 2016, Simon Blackburn, The Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy, ISBN 0198735308, page 225:

     Heteronymy in grammar is partial homonymy, as when words have the same sound but different spelling (through, threw).

2. The unrelatedness of words for items that are related by being members of a single category.
   • 1968, Nils Thun, “Germanic Words for Deer”, in Studia Neophilologica, volume 40, number 1, page 2:

     ...phenomenon that is here called sex heteronymy, which implies that the two sexes of animals (or human beings, for instance relatives) are referred to by words which are altogether dissimilar as in bull: cow, {aunt: uncle) Deer.

   • 1979, Dieter Wunderlich, Foundations of Linguistics, ISBN 0521293340, page 250:

     The relations listed here are in fact fundamental: the synonymy relation leads to the analysis of an existing vocabulary into classes of equivalent expressions (these can for instance belong to different sub-languages, or domains of use, or be of different degrees of complexity); the hyponymy rleation leads to a hierarchical analysis of the vocabulary (especially in the domain of general names - and depending on this it yields intersecting classifications of adjectives and verbs, according to the usability of adjectives and verbs with particular groups of nouns); the polarity relations lead to an anyalysis of the vocabulary (especially adjectives) according to particular dimensions and intradimensional classifications; only in the case of heteronymy does there normally exist a superordinate concept for the whole domain (also called a supernym).

   • 2013, Sebastian Loebner, Understanding Semantics, ISBN 1134052782:

     Heteronymy is a matter of more than two expressions. A typical example is the set of terms for the days of the week, the set of basic colour terms (for more on colour terms, see 10.4) or terms for kinds of animals, plants, vehicles, etc.

3. (by extension) Dissimilarity of people in a single group.
   • 1994, Veit Erlmann, “'Africa civilised, Africa uncivilised': local culture, world system and South African music”, in Journal of Southern African Studies, volume 20, number 2:

     Differentiation simply increases, on a grander scale, the heteronymy and chaos that are the historical attribute of this society.

   • 2010 December, L Alvarez, C Mendoza, RM Nogués, MP Aluja, & C Santos, “Biodemographic and genetic structure of Zamora Province (Spain): insights from surname analysis”, in Human ecology, volume 38:

     The highest value of total consanguinity based on random isonymy is observed in Sanabria, which also has the lowest values of heteronymy and the highest intra-population a priori kinship.

4. The use of multiple names for a single person or thing; polyonymy;
   • 1994, Dieter Kastovsky, Studies in Early Modern English, ISBN 311087959X, page 93:

     German dialects show a great deal of heteronymy for spring and autumn, English ones mainly for autumn. This is surprising in view of the fact that historically the English terms for 'spring' show greater heteronymy than those for 'autumn'.

   • 2008, Linda Ben-Zvi & ‎Angela Moorjani, Beckett at 100: Revolving It All, ISBN 0190296038:

     The self-abnegating state of shame proves to be allied with another of the key figures of Agamben's discourse: heteronymy. This notion is understood here in the sense of characters and fictional authors functioning as alter egos of the author or narrator: the multiple names are seen as referring to a single subject.

   • 2012, Jonathan Barnes & ‎Maddalena Bonelli, Logical Matters, ISBN 0191655325, page 303:

     Cases (3) and (4) you might call heteronymies, case (3) being heteronymy in the special sense and case (4) polyonymy.

5. A single word or symbol that can have different but related meanings.
   • 1961, George Edward Moore, Mind, page 240:

     Heteronymies, or propositions false in S by virtue of the meanings of the terms entering in them.

   • 1980, Hansjakob Seiler, ‎Gunter Brettschneider, & ‎Christian Lehmann, Wege zur Universalien Forschung:

     An intensional 'enrichment' of logical language, on the other hand, which might succeed in matching the endogenic heteronymies of ordinary language, can do so only at the price of semantic transparency.

   • 2010, Simon Donger & ‎Simon Shepherd, ORLAN: A Hybrid Body of Artworks, ISBN 1136971297, page 8:

     The Me is plural, unstable, as Pessoa very well demonstrated; there are Mes of distinct heteronymies (Dos Santos Jorge 2005).

6. Resulting from the actions of multiple or external causal agents.
   • 1896, Jacob Gould Schurman, ‎James Edwin Creighton & ‎Frank Thilly, The Philosophical Review - Volume 5, page 297:

     If we are to define emotion as distinctly representative in character, must we not ascribe emotion to all the lower animal forms only by heteronymy ?

   • 1910, Charles De Garmo, Ethical training, page 27:

     Is it passional or rational; is it religious, or legal and social; is it moral heteronymy or moral autonomy; is it moral result or moral intention; is it the authority of self or that of church or of state ?

   • 2005, Alain Badiou & ‎Alberto Toscano, Handbook of Inaesthetics, ISBN 0804744092, page 43:

     Heteronymy itself, construed as a dispositif for thinking, rather than as a subjective drama, directs the composition of an ideal place of sorts in which the correlations and disjunctions of the figures evoke the relationships among the "supreme genera" (or kinds) in Plato's Sophist.