2014-04-03
Source
" Crystal, David. The Cambridge Encyclopaedia
Introduction to linguitics
of language, pp. 100-106.
Lecture 5: Semantics
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Semantics Meaning
" The study of meaning in language. " But defining the term îmeaning is not easy.
 For some linguists meaning is the most important  Ogden and Richards in their book The Meaning of
aspect of language. Meaning (1923) distinguished 16 different
meanings of the term, e.g.:
" Semantics may concentrate on the meaning
 'intend': I mean to be there.
of words (lexical semantics)
 'suggest, foretell': That cloud can mean thunder.
" or on such matters as sense, reference,
 'signify': What does 'calligraphy' mean?
presupposition and implication (logical
semantics).
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Thought of the
Meaning
referent
(abstract concept)
" When you hear/read the word hen, you think
of a particular bird.
 The mental representation of the word hen is the
meaning of the word.
 The animal in the world that you can meet is the
referent of the word hen.
" The word hen is a sign that allows us to
Referent (real Sign (a word,
connect the meaning and the referent
world object) icon or sounds)
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Types of meaning Sense vs. reference
" Sense  the central (literal) meaning of a " Sense and reference are both parts of
word. meaning, but:
 The sense of cat is: carnivorous animal, with 4
1. A word with a unique sense may have
legs, fangs, claws and excellent eyesight.
different referents in the real world, e.g. chair
" Sense is often contrasted with reference - the
(one sense, many referents)
relation between a word and something in the
real world.
 E.g. îThe board in this room is green.  board
refers to the flat surface on the class wall.
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Sense vs. reference Sense vs. reference
2. The same referent may be pointed to by different
3. All words have sense but not necessarily
words, each with different senses (one referent,
reference (sense, no reference), e.g.
many senses), e.g.:
 îThere s a dragon in my kitchen!
Sense 1: a Polish
philosopher
Sense 2: professor of
ethics at the WU
Sense 3: a feminist
author
Sense 4: Magdalena
Åšroda
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Sense vs. reference Connotative meaning
" Connotation  a type of word meaning (apart
4. Can there be a situation in which there is
from its sense) acquired by associations.
reference but no sense?
 the emotional associations suggested by the word
 Do you know how this thing is called?
" E.g. rugby
 Its central sense:  a particular type of football .
Durian
" But, depending on your experience of rugby,
you may have such associations as:
  large men ,  manliness ,  boorish and bawdy
behaviour , etc.
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Organizing vocabulary Semantic fields
" into fields of meaning (semantic fields): " The semantic field of a given word changes
over time (semantic shift):
 sets of words grouped by meaning.
 In the past, the English word man meant  human
being . Today it means  a human male .
" Within a field, words are interrelated:
" Semantic fields can overlap when words have
 words for parts of the body (head, shoulders,
multiple meanings.
knees, toes, etc.), colour terms, or verbs of
 Such words are often untranslatable, especially
perception  these are examples of semantic
with all their connotations.
fields.
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Semantic fields Sense relations
" Semantic fields are useful in translation, " Synonymy  two words have similar
professional writing or solving crosswords. definitions (are very close in sense), e.g.
 adult vs grown-up
" For a linguist they are rather useless, because
 But perfect synonymy (identical definitions) are
they give no information about sense relations
hard to find.
between words.
" Antonymy  relation of opposition or contrast:
" A better analysis of word meanings involves
 Non-gradable antonymy: dead/alive, female/male
sense relations.
 Gradable antonymy: hot/warm/tepid/cool/cold
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Sense relations
" Polysemy  one lexical item has more than one
definition, e.g.:
 plain = 'clear', 'unadorned', 'obvious', etc.
" Homonymy  two words with different meanings
have the same pronunciation, e.g.:
 pupil, bank.
" Hyponymy: word X is a more specific instance of
word Y, e.g.:
 dog is a hyponym of animal.
 animal is a hyperonym of dog.
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