NORMA SEMANTIKE DHE SHMANGIET PREJ SAJ
THE SEMANTIC NORM AND SEMANTIC ERRORS

Summary/Abstract: One of the basic features of every language is creativity, i.e. the ability to “make infinite use of finite means”. Nevertheless, creativity is controlled by grammaticalness, which on its side is confined by acceptability. But in a standard language, which is characterized by norms, even acceptability is controlled by normativity. Among the norms of the standard, the semantic norm, taken in its broader sense, has as its object the choice of lexical items and their meanings. For the sake of clarity, it must be pointed out that there is a difference in the choice of normative lexical items and of normative meanings, so there is reason to speak of a strictly lexical norm, that acts on the choice of lexical items, and of a semantic norm that has as its object their meanings. The lexical norm has mainly a statistical character: a lexical item is evaluated as normative and included in the vocabulary of the language if it is used by the most part of the speakers of a language. The semantic norm, on the other side, depends partly on semantic universals (you can’t say “the rock sings”), and partly on semantic features characteristic of a given language, that make it different firom other languages.

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