How Do You Spell LEMMA?

Pronunciation: [lˈɛmə] (IPA)

The spelling of the word "lemma" can be tricky. It is often mistaken for "lema" or "leema". But the correct pronunciation is /ˈlɛmə/, with a short "e" sound in the first syllable and a schwa sound in the second syllable. The word "lemma" is commonly used in mathematics and linguistics to refer to a word that represents a larger group of words with similar meanings. It comes from the Greek word "λῆμμα" which means "something taken, a remnant."

LEMMA Meaning and Definition

  1. A lemma is a term commonly used in linguistic and computational contexts, referring to the base or dictionary form of a word. It is used to classify and analyze the various inflected forms and variations of a particular word. In the field of linguistics, a lemma serves as the canonical or citation form of a word that represents its fundamental meaning and morphological pattern.

    The concept of a lemma is especially useful in morphology and lexicography as it helps to organize and categorize related words. For instance, in English, the lemma for the verb "run" would be "run" itself, while its various forms like "runs," "ran," and "running" would be considered inflected versions of the lemma. Similarly, for nouns like "cat," the lemma would be "cat," and variations like "cats" or "catnip" would be derived forms.

    In computational linguistics, a lemma plays a crucial role in natural language processing tasks such as part-of-speech tagging, machine translation, and information retrieval. By associating various inflected forms with a single lemma, it allows for efficient language processing and analysis. Lemmatization, the process of determining the lemma for a given word, is utilized to reduce the dimensionality of data and improve accuracy in computational applications.

    In summary, a lemma represents the base or dictionary form of a word, serving as a reference point to identify and classify its inflected forms. This concept not only aids in linguistic analysis but also facilitates computational language processing and understanding.

  2. In math., a preparatory proposition.

    Etymological and pronouncing dictionary of the English language. By Stormonth, James, Phelp, P. H. Published 1874.

Top Common Misspellings for LEMMA *

* The statistics data for these misspellings percentages are collected from over 15,411,110 spell check sessions on www.spellchecker.net from Jan 2010 - Jun 2012.

Other Common Misspellings for LEMMA

Etymology of LEMMA

The word "lemma" originates from the Greek word "λῆμμα" (lemma), which means "something received or taken". It comes from the verb "λαμβάνω" (lambanō), meaning "to take or to receive". In the context of linguistics and mathematics, a "lemma" refers to a proposition or assumption taken to be true or proved, serving as a starting point for further reasoning or analysis.

Similar spelling words for LEMMA

Plural form of LEMMA is LEMMAS

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