Semantics
The study of meaning
Anyone who speaks a language has a truly
amazing capacity to reason about the meanings of
texts. Take, for instance, the sentence
" (S) I can't untie that knot with one hand.
Even though you have probably never seen this sentence, you can
easily see things like the following:
" 1) The sentence is about the abilities of whoever spoke or wrote it.
(Call this person the speaker.)
" 2) It's also about a knot, maybe one that the speaker is pointing at.
" 3) The sentence denies that the speaker has a certain ability. (This
is the contribution of the word `can't'.)
" 4) Untying is a way of making something not tied.
" 5) The sentence doesn't mean that the knot has one hand; it has to
do with how many hands are used to do the untying.
1
arrangements of meanings
Not [ I [ Able [ [ [Make [Not [Tied]]] [That knot ] ] [With One Hand] ] ] ]
" The unit [Make [Not [Tied]] here corresponds to the act
of untying; it contains a subunit corresponding to the
state of being untied.
" Larger units correspond to the act of untying-that-knot
and to the act to-untie-that-knot-with-one-hand.
" Then this act combines with Able to make a larger unit,
corresponding to the state of being-able-to-untie-that-
knot-with-one-hand.
" This unit combines with I to make the thought that I have
this state -- that is, the thought that I-am-able-to-untie-
that-knot-with-one-hand.
" Finally, this combines with Not and we get the denial of
that thought.
The meaning of a sentence depends not
only on the words it contains, but on its
syntactic makeup
" The sentence That can hurt you is
ambiguous - it has two distinct meanings
which correspond to two distinct syntactic
structures.
" In one structure `That' is the subject and
`can' is an auxiliary verb (meaning ``able''),
" In the other `That can' is the subject and
`can' is a noun (indicating a sort of
container).
2
What is literal meaning?
approach 1 avoiding the definition
" (1) We can study semantics without
actually referring to meanings. This
approach was popular earlier in the
twentieth century, especially in the 1940s
and 1950s, but hasn't turned out to be very
successful.
What is literal meaning?
approach 2 - appeal to usage
" When an English speaker says `It's
raining' and a Polish speaker says `Pada'
you can say that there is a common
pattern of usage here. But no one really
knows how to characterize what the two
utterances have in common without
somehow invoking a common meaning.
(In this case, the meaning that it's raining.)
So this idea doesn't seem to really explain
what meanings are.
3
What is literal meaning?
approach 3 appeal to psychology
" Here, you would try to explain meanings as
ideas. This is an old idea, and is still popular;
nowadays, it takes the form of developing an
artificial language that is supposed to capture
the "inner cognitive representations" of an ideal
thinking and speaking agent. The problem with
this approach is that the methods of
contemporary psychology don't provide much
help in telling us in general what these inner
representations are like.
What is literal meaning?
approach 4 treat meanings as real objects
" If you say that the meaning of `Mars' is a certain
planet, at least you have a meaning relation that
you can come to grips with. There is the word
`Mars' on the one hand, and on the other hand
there is this big ball of matter circling around the
sun. This clarity is good, but it is hard to see
cover all of language this way. It doesn't help us
very much in saying what sentences mean, for
instance. And what about the other meaning of
`Mars'? Do we have to believe in the Roman god
to say that `Mars' is meaningful?
4
Meaning
" The approach that most semanticists endorse is
a combination of (1), (3), and (4). Using
techniques similar to those used by
mathematicians, you can build up a complex
universe of abstract objects that can serve as
meanings (or denotations) of various sorts of
linguistic expressions.
" Meaning and sense have been used in
linguistics and philosophy and they may be
helpful to refer to when talking about meaning.
Sense, denotation, connotation, reference
" The sense of a word is its cognitive meaning as
determined by its place within the semantic
system of the language.
" The denotation of a word is the relationship
between the word and the set of entities,
situations, and attributes that exist outside the
language.
" The connotation of a word is the emotive
associations that a word evokes.
" Reference is what a word more commonly a
phrase refers to in a particular utterance.
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Changes in Meaning
" The causes of change
A. External history
B. Euphemism
C. Intensification
D. Collocation
E. Technical and general use
" Processes of semantic change
A. Generalization and specialization
B. Pejoration and amelioration
C. Metaphoric extension
D. Metonymic extension
The causes of change - history
" the term public school in England for a certain
type of private fee-paying school not under the
control of the state or the local government can
be explained by the changes in the management
of these schools.
" When it was felt that sex over-emphasized the
biological differences between males and
females because the word was also used for
'sexual intercourse', the grammatical term
gender acquired the additional role of signifying
a more neutral division.
6
The causes of change - technology
" Car, once used to denote a carriage, cart,
or wagon, is used particularly in British
English for a vehicle powered by an
internal-combustion engine (also called
motor car and particularly in American
English automobile), when this type of
vehicle became the usual means of private
transport.
The causes of change - euphemism
" The body and bodily processes attract
euphemisms
bottom, box, (family) jewels, knockers, tail
sleep with, score, swing
pass water, break wind, tinkle, the runs, be
excused
toilet, lavatory, bathroom (American),
geography of the house (British)
period, (be) expecting, (be in) labour
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The causes of change - intensification
rotten party
marvellous play (originally miraculous, supernatural)
fabulous speech (originally from a fable)
awful meal (originally full of awe)
smashing story (originally crushing)
fantastic dress (originally form fantasy)
" Successive generations seek out new terms.
Among recent expressions of approval are
awesome, bad, brilliant (also brill), cool, radical
(also rad), wicked.
The causes of change - collocation
" The tendency for words to collocate co-occur frequently with other
words - can result in a particular word being used alone with the
meaning of the pair of words.
Private derives from the collocation private soldier,
Wellington from the collocation Wellington boot.
In appropriate contexts, the pill will be understood as referring to the
contraceptive pill.
To propose to somebody is to propose marriage to that person.
" Examples of recent words used with the meaning of the collocation.
The omitted words of the full forms are given in parentheses:
cable (television)
laptop (computer)
(shopping) mall
Patriot (missile)
soap (opera)
(space) shuttle
8
Causes of semantic change
- technical and general use
" Some technical terms have come into more
general use they have acquired a different
meaning among non-specialists:
in general use the psychological term complex
denotes an obsession, while inferiority complex refers
simply to a sense of inferiority;
the legal term alibi has been extended to mean an
excuse of any kind;
the mathematical term parameter is commonly used
for a measurable or quantifiable feature;
spectrum, a term in physics and optics, is in general
use to mean a wide range.
Processes of semantic change -
generalization and specialization
" Generalization involves a shift in the
meaning of a word that makes it more
inclusive.
marathon refers to any activity involving
difficulty and long duration.
" Specialization results in a restriction of
meaning.
starve used to refer to dying by any means
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Processes of semantic change
pejoration and amelioration
" Pejoration is moving to a less favourable
connotation and amelioration to a more
favourable connotation.
the acquisition of pejorative connotations by
propaganda and appeasement
the current slang terms bad and wicked are
striking instances of amelioration.
Processes of semantic change
metaphoric extension
" The formal similarity may be in shape:
bulb (of electric lamp) hand (of clock)
cake (of soap) leg (of table)
eye (of needle) mouse (for computer)
fork (of road) mouth (of river)
" The similarity may be evaluative, as in these expressions when
they are applied to people:
angel
arse-hole
baby
bitch
cat
cow
heel
honey
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Processes of semantic change -
metonymic extension
" Another common process is metonymy. A word acquires
a new meaning as an entity or attribute that is
substituted for something with which it is associated.
Here are common kinds of metonymic relationships that
have resulted in new meanings.
" part for whole:
(new) blood ('people'), (new) face ('person'), (another) hand
('person')
" concrete for abstract:
bench ('judiciary'), brain ('intellect'), crown ('monarchy'), seat
('membership')
" abstract for concrete:
falsehood ('lie'), performance ('event'), terror (referring to a
person), trust ('organization')
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