Use the following groups of phrases to illustrate the definition and the overlapping feature of collocative meaning.
a) pretty girl, pretty flower, handsome boy, handsome car.
b)pretty woman, handsome woman
Collocative meaning consists of the associations a word acquires in its collocation. In other words. it is that part of the word-meaning suggested by the words beforeor after the word in discussion. Pretry and handsome share the conceptual meaning of "good-looking", but are distinguished by the range of nouns they collocate with, such as pretty girl, prett' flower. handsome boy, handsome car. It may be noted that there is some overlap between the collocations of the two words, such as pretry woman and handsome woman. Though both are correct, yet they suggest a different kind of attractiveness. A pretty woman stresses the attractiveness of facial features while handsome woman may not be facially beautiful, yet is attractive in other respects: a slender figure, posture, behavior. etc.
