The Study of Category, Function and Meaning of the Conjunction “و” (= "And") in Persian from the Perspective of the Process of Reduction of Signs in Perceptional Semantics Based on the Lyric Poems of Saadi and Hafez

The grapheme “و” in the Persian written system signifies several graphs and linguistic signs. This grapheme signifies both “o” and “va” (=and) in the field of conjunction, and there is no noticeable difference between their grammatical categories, function and meaning in the Persian language system. Pointing to the lexical and conceptual changes of these two words from a diachronic study, this article has tried to prove from the perspective of the reduction process in perceptional semantics that the word “و” has only one linguistic meaning and does not belong to more than one grammatical category. Research corpus is the lyric poems of Saadi and Hafez. Studying this conjunction from the perspective of the process of reducing the signs in perceptional semantics showed that the types of meanings attributed to “و” in the tradition of Persian language and literature studies are related to the meanings of collocating units, or are related to the reduction of companion units in the intra-linguistic context. In this approach, the conjunction “و” does not have any other category, meaning, and function in Persian language; and it is necessary to observe this point in the pragmatic studies related to this conjunction in Persian language and literary texts.
 
Keywords: Conjunction, Category, Function, Grammar, Perceptional Semantics
 
Introduction Materials
Persian language, like any other natural language, is a sign system, and the linguistic signs that make up it have a differential existence, and from this perspective, there is no fundamental difference between linguistic units and grammatical realities. Therefore, knowing each linguistic sign (whether lexical or grammatical) requires paying attention to its oppositional relation with other signs of that language. With such a view and according to the literature review, the present research has examined the category, function and meaning of the linguistic sign "و" in the corpus of lyric poems of Saadi and Hafez. The central problem of the research is confronting polysemy of this conjunction in previous researches, and the main question of the research is whether "و" in the Persian language has another meaning and category other than the linguistic meaning and grammatical category of the conjunction or not. In examining this problem and to achieve this goal, firstly, the lexical and conceptual changes of "و" have been studied in paradigmatic axis, and then by examining the "و" in examples of Saadi and Hafez's sonnets, from the perspective of "reduction of signs" in Perceptional semantics, the category, function and meaning of this word have been discussed in the syntagmatic axis of Persian language, and then, from this point of view, a different result has been obtained that is different from the results of previous investigations.
Extensive studies have been conducted on the types of the conjunction "و" and the types of meanings attributed to it in the Persian language, but the present article is the first research that has examined this word from the perspective of perceptional semantics. In the dictionary of Sokhon, influenced by previous dictionaries and the researches of the last few decades, the number of meanings of the letter "و" and its types has reached twenty, and some of these twenty types has been called adverb and preposition. Rampuri, Mashkoor, Khayampour, Khatib Rehbar and Farshidvard are grammar writers who have mentioned the meanings of letters and their uses in addition to grammatical topics. Among these grammarians, most of all, the opinions of Khatib Rahbar and Farshidvard have been noticed by subsequent researches in the form of theses and articles. Faqihe Malek-Marzaban (2016), Sayadkoh and Raisi (2015), Taqi-pour (2015), Ahmadi Begdali and Qari (2014) and Ghandomkar (as a semanticist) (2022) are among the notable researchers in this field, who despite their commendable scientific efforts, the frontiers of Grammar, semantics and various branches of rhetorical sciences have been ignored and this resulted in adding the types and sometimes, unconventional meanings of this conjunction.
Methods Discussion
By observing the research literature and the need to achieve the identity of the linguistic sign "و" in the systematic structure of the Persian language, the present research has investigated the research problem by using the process of reduction of signs in the approach of perceptional semantics. Perceptional semantics is a sentential semantic approach based on perception that considers the sentence as the unit of study of meaning and studies signs in each sign system in the form of three contexts A, B and C, and it emphasizes that the sentences of these three contexts can be included in the reduction process. Therefore, each context A, after production contains a unit or units that are reduced from the context. Reduced units can be interpreted through the units present in context A, or with the help of sentences in context B and context C. Reduction in this approach is different from the process of omission that leads to disturbance in perception. It is also more inclusive than ellipsis and reminiscent of the term interruptive brevity in literary studies. This term is also closely related to the term redundancy in the science of communication and linguistics, with the concept of predictable information and repeated information in the text. In this sense, it is also reminiscent of the two terms brevity and disgusting periphrasis in the tradition of literary studies.
Result Conclusion
By applying the process of reduction in the study of "و" in the corpus of lyric poems of Saadi and Hafez, it was found that "و" is a conjunction and does not belong to another grammatical category (for example, preposition or adverb). It is a coordinating conjunction and has no subordination function. It is a conjunctive element and does not have the function of a logical disjunction and it has no other meaning except the linguistic meaning, which is the grammatical and categorical meaning of the conjunction. A secondary meaning cannot be given to it as it is proposed in rhetoric. It does not have a specific type; its specificity and signification in some usages and idiomatic sentences of the language, which has led to its specificity in the tradition of Persian language and literature studies, has a close relationship with the reduction of companion units with "و" in coordinate sentences. The highest rate of reduction is also related to the sentences in which "و" is called "Vav-e hazf-o ijaz" (a kind of brevity). This marked word in pragmatic studies, from the perspective of perceptional semantics, and apart from the grammatical category, has no function other than coordination and no meaning other than its linguistic meaning (which is also grammatical).