The Semantic Analysis And Rhetoric Interpretation On Morpheme "Yellow" And The Terms Combined With It.

There is a close relationship between the generation or variation of semantic meaning and rhetoric.With the investigation into the morpheme "yellow" and the terms combined with it, we come to realize that the presence and absence of its sememe of color come down to the three phenomenon of reservation, weakening and exfoliation. Among the terms generated by rhetoric approach (mainly as figure of speech and metonymy), the reservation of sememe of color lies in the feature of color while the weakening or exfoliation bases on other features.The generation of rhetoric semantic meaning of the morpheme "yellow" and the terms combined with it mostly make their presence by the figure of speech and metonymy. The paper respectively presents the tenor and its corresponding vehicles, the tenor and its metonymic terms in tabular form, which is for the purpose of visually revealing the generation process of each term.The rhetoric exerts its effect on the term "yellow" during the process of semantic variation from "noble" to "vulgar". As the "yellow news" taken place in America and Oscar Wilde's yellow journal in Britain spread into China, people began to use "yellow" as a reference of sex-related content. The rhetorical usage is recognized and employed in a larger scale for long. The meaning of "vulgar, pornographic" seems to gradually come into the state of immobilization.