Choose the option that contains the homonym of the highlighted word in the given sentence. Please make sure to write your full home address, including the apartment number and zip code, on the top of the application form.
- (a)After living in the city for ten years, Sarah had to notify the post office that her permanent address was changing to a rural farmhouse.
- (b)The celebrity requested that her residential address be kept private and removed from all public search directories for security reasons.
- (c)Millions of people tuned in to watch the president’s televised address regarding the new economic policies.
- (d)The delivery driver called me because he was having trouble finding my address on the GPS due to the new construction in the neighborhood.
Answer
Why
Correct — C. In the given sentence address means where someone lives: it has an apartment number and a zip code, and it goes on a form.
A homonym is the same word with a different meaning. A televised address is a formal speech, watched here by millions. That is option (c).
Why the others are wrong
- (a)After living in the city for ten years, Sarah had to notify the post office that her permanent address was changing to a rural farmhouse. — permanent address is the place where Sarah lives, the post-office sense. It has the same meaning as the given sentence, so it is not a homonym.
- (b)The celebrity requested that her residential address be kept private and removed from all public search directories for security reasons. — residential address is where the celebrity lives, kept out of directories. That is the given sentence's meaning again, not a different one.
- (d)The delivery driver called me because he was having trouble finding my address on the GPS due to the new construction in the neighborhood. — my address on the GPS is a location the driver is trying to find. The meaning matches the given sentence, so this is no homonym.
Concept
Homonyms are words with the same form but different meanings: the bank of a river and a bank that holds money.
Address has two noun meanings in play here: the details of where someone lives, and a formal speech to an audience.
The words around it decide. Apartment number, zip code, post office and GPS point to a place; televised, tuned in and president point to a speech.
On the response sheet the word address is printed in bold in the given sentence; that is the highlighted word the question refers to.
Key facts
- Address (noun): the details of where someone lives or where something is.
- Address (noun): a formal speech to an audience, such as a president's televised address.
- Address (verb): to speak to someone, or to deal with a problem (address the issue).
Study next
Common traps
- Picking a sentence because its setting looks different, when address still means a place.
- Confusing homonyms with homophones such as flour and flower, which sound alike but are spelt differently.
The same frame appears at 21 Sep 2025, 16:00, English Q.19: stern in a stern warning (strict) finds its homonym in the stern of the ship (the back of a boat), keyed against sentences where stern still means strict.
Related PYQs
No directly related past PYQ was found.