Meaning: hit

Illustrative Context

He hit the chair with the stick.

Target Sense

• Most generic and neutral transitive verb for a human agent hitting one object with another object.

• Beware the polysemy of English 'hit'. The target sense is not that of success in hitting a target, i.e. the target sense is not the opposite of 'miss'. So in German, for example, the form is 'schlagen' and not 'treffen'.

• "Most generic and neutral" means that you should avoid close synonyms that are not neutral, and instead have more specific extra connotations, including any of the following:

  • Avoid verbs that connote hitting with special force or resulting in breaking, e.g. 'whack', 'smash'.
  • Avoid verbs with specific connotations of hitting for punishment, e.g. 'beat'.
  • Avoid verbs specifically for repeated 'beating'; select a basic neutral verb that also works for a single hit.
  • Avoid verbs specific to hitting directly with a particular part of the body, especially the fist, e.g. 'punch', 'thump'.
  • Avoid verbs specific to hitting with given types of instrument: e.g. 'club'.

In general this meaning is rather problematic, see: https://github.com/lingdb/IELex2-CognaC/issues/19