ABSTRACT
In addition to the exploration reported in Chapter 16, our other principal interest in the forced-choice technique was in using it to investigate the contrasts between pairs of items (chiefly verbs) within a particular semantic field, especially those which are quasi-synonymous. 1 For our purposes, this area can be characterised as follows:
Members of a synonymic pair can be used equivalently in certain environments:
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They cannot generally be conjoined by and then since this provides an unacceptable tautology:
She wandered and then strolled round the town.
He swallowed hard and then gulped hard.
They cannot generally be conjoined in an alternative question, since the distinction this presumes (cf. Quirk et al. 1985, 11.20) is not clear-cut:
Did she wander home or did she stroll home?
Did he chew the bacon or did he munch it?
Did he swallow hard or gulp hard?
They can be made to stand in contrast, with certain constraints, if conjoined by but, particularly if the interpretation of contrast is enforced by an appropriate modal subjunct (Quirk et al. 1985, 8.99ff.):
He chewed the bacon but didn't actually munch it.
She wandered home but didn't actually stroll.
The stranger hurried but didn't actually rush.
