1. The Study of Meaning

„ : „ The meaning of words: Lexical semantics Chapter Five „ The meaning of sentences: Propositional meaning, compositional meaning Meaning „ Linguistic semantics vs. Logical Meaning semantics/philosophical semantics „ : „ The meaning of utterances

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2. Semantic Meaning „ Logicians and philosophers have tended to concentrate on a restricted range of sentences (typically, statements, or ‘propositions’) within „ Semantics is the study of meaning in . a single language. „ Meaning has been studied for thousands of „ The linguistic approach aims to study the years by philosophers, logicians and linguists. properties of meaning in a systematic and E.g. Plato & Aristotle. objective way, with reference to as wide a range of utterances and as possible, ∴ broader in scope.

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3. The meaning of meaning „ Geoffrey Leech (1974, 1981). Semantics: The 3. The meaning of meaning Study of Meaning. Seven types of meaning:

„ C. K. Ogden & I. A. Richards (1923). The Meaning of Meaning. „ Conceptual meaning „ John means to write. „ Connotative meaning „ A green light means to go. „ Social meaning „ Health means everything. Associative „ Affective meaning „ His look was full of meaning. Meaning „ What is the meaning of life? „ Reflected and meaning „ What does ‘capitalist’ mean to you? „ Collocative meaning „ What does ‘cornea’ mean? „ Thematic meaning

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1 3.2 Connotative meaning 3.1 Conceptual meaning

„ The communicative value an expression has by „ ‘ ’ ‘ ’ Also called ‘denotative’ or ‘cognitive’ meaning. virtue of what it refers to, over and above its „ Refers to logical, cognitive or denotative purely conceptual content. content. „ A multitude of additional, non-criterial „ Concerned with the relationship between a properties, including not only physical word and the thing it denotes, or refers to. characteristics but also psychological and social properties, as well as typical features.

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3.3 Social meaning „ ‘ ’ Involving the ‘real world’ experience one „ What a piece of language conveys about the associates with an expression when one uses social circumstances of its use. or hears it. „ Dialect: the language of a geographical region „ Unstable: they vary considerably according to or of a social class. culture, historical period, and the experience „ Time: the language of the 18th c., etc. of the individual. Time: the language of the 18th c., etc. „ Province: language of law, of science, of „ Any characteristic of the , identified advertising, etc. subjectively or objectively, may contribute to advertising, etc. the connotative meaning of the expression „ Status: polite, colloquial, slang, etc. which denotes it. „ Modality: language of memoranda, lectures, jokes, etc. „ Singularity: the style of Dickens, etc. 9 10

3.4 Affective meaning „ domicile: very formal, official „ residence: formal „ Reflecting the personal feelings of the speaker, „ abode: poetic including his attitude to the listener, or his attitude to something he is talking about. „ home: general „ You’re a vicious tyrant and a villainous reprobate, and I hate you for it! „ steed: poetic „ I’m terribly sorry to interrupt, but I wonder if „ horse: general you would be so kind as to lower your voices a little. or „ nag: slang „ Will you belt up. „ gee-gee: baby language

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2 3.5 Reflected meaning 3.6 Collocative meaning

„ „ Arises in cases of multiple conceptual meaning, „ The associations a word acquires on account when one sense of a word forms part of our of the meanings of words which tend to occur response to another sense. in its environment. „ When you hear ‘click the mouse twice’, you „ pretty: girl, boy, woman, flower, garden, colour, think of Gerry being hit twice by Tom so you village, etc. feel excited. „ handsome: boy, man, car, vessel, overcoat, „ Many taboo terms are result of this. airliner, typewriter, etc.

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3.7 Thematic meaning 4. The Theory of Reference

„ Words → Meaning: Words ‘name’ or ‘refer to’ „ What is communicated by the way in which a things -- Platonic speaker or writer organizes the message, in „ Words→Concepts→Things: Ogden & Richards terms of ordering, focus, and emphasis. thought/concept/image „ Mrs Bessie Smith donated the first prize. „ The first prize was donated by Mrs Bessie symbolizes refers to Smith. „ They stopped at the end of the corridor. symbol ------referent „ At the end of the corridor, they stopped. (word) stands for (object)

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5. Sense „ ‘The meaning of a word is its use in the language’. (Ludwig Wittgenstein) „ ‘Meaning’ is not some kind of ‘entity’ „ Meaning is studied by making detailed separate from language. analyses of the way words and sentences are „ That words ‘have meaning’ means only that used in specific contexts. they are used in a certain way in a sentence. „ Reference: how language refers to this There is no ‘meaning’ beyond the meaning external world of individual words and sentences. „ Sense: the way people relate words to each other within the framework of their language

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3 The family tree 6. Sense Relations

„ 舅父 = ‘mother’s brother’ „ Synonymy „ 叔叔 = ‘father’s younger brother’ Gradable „ 伯父 = ‘father’s elder brother’ „ „ 姨母 = ‘mother’s sister’ Antonymy Complementary „ 姑母 = ‘father’s sister’ Converse „ Hyponymy

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6.1 Synonymy 6.2 Gradable antonymy

„ good ------bad „ buy/purchase „ long ------short „ thrifty/economical/stingy „ big ------small „ autumn/fall „ Can be modified by adverbs of degree like „ flat/apartment very. „ tube/underground „ Can have comparative forms. „ Can be asked with how.

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6.3 Complementary antonymy 6.4 Converse antonymy

„ alive : dead

„ male : female „ buy : sell „ teacher : student „ present : absent „ lend : borrow „ above : below „ innocent : guilty „ give : receive „ before : after „ odd : even „ parent : child „ host : guest „ pass : fail „ husband : wife „ employer : employee „ boy : girl „ hit : miss

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4 6.5 Hyponymy Animal „ Inclusiveness „ A is included in / a kind of B. bird fish insect animal „ Cf.: chair and furniture, rose and flower „ Superordinate/hypernym: the more general term human animal „ Hyponym: the more specific term „ Co-hyponyms: members of the same class tiger lion elephant ...

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7. Componential Analysis 7.1 Animal words

„ HUMAN MALE FEMALE NON-ADULT „ man (ADULT, MALE) „ woman (ADULT, FEMALE) bull cow calf „ boy (NON-ADULT, MALE) ram ewe lamb „ girl (NON-ADULT, FEMALE) boar sow piglet

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7.2 Domestic animals 7.3 English motion verbs ONE FOOT NATURAL HURRIED FORWARD ALWAYS ON bull ram boar cow ewe sow calf lamb piglet GROUND walk + ━ + + M + + + — — — ± ± ± march ━ + + +

run ━ + + ━ F — — — + + + ± ± ± limp ━ ━ + +

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5 7.4 More complex ones 8. Meaning & Syntactic Structure

„ The meaning of a sentence is obviously related „ father: PARENT (x, y) & MALE (x) to the meanings of the words used in it, but it „ x is a parent of y, and x is male. is also obvious that sentence meaning is not „ take: CAUSE (x, (HAVE (x, y))) simply the sum total of the words. „ x causes x to have y. „ give: CAUSE (x, (~HAVE (x, y))) „ x causes x not to have y.

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8.1 Compositionality „ The cat is chasing the mouse. „ The mouse is chasing the cat. „ An integrated theory „ Katz & Fodor (1963): The structure of a „ I have read that book. semantic theory. A 40-page long paper published in Language. „ That book I have read. „ The method itself is years out of date but the debate about the principle of compositionality „ The daughter of Queen Elizabeth’s son is is by no means over (Cruse, 2004: 77). the son of Queen Elizabeth’s daughter.

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„ „ The idea behind the principle was to solve the Although many semanticists turned away from problem of generating grammatical but Chomsky by developing formal semantic incorrect sentences like Colorless green ideas theories by themselves, Chomsky did admit sleep furiously. soon that semantic rules would be found at Deep Structure as well as Surface Structure „ The purpose was to wage an attack on (EST) and later on placed semantic Chomsky’s basis assumption that correct rules/representation in the S-Structure sentences could be generated by syntactic altogether (since REST). Other ideas were also transformations alone, disregarding the incorporated into Chomsky’s later models of semantic rules at Surface Structure. grammar, e.g. the concept of projection.

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6 „ According to the principle of compositionality, „ colorful {Adj} each word in the lexicon is equipped with a. (Color) [abounding in contrast or variety of certain components and combinations of bright colors] <(Physical Object) or (Social words into sentences must go through certain Activity)> selection restrictions in order to produce b. (Evaluative) [having distinctive character, acceptable sentences. Thus we can say vividness, or picturesqueness] <(Aesthetic colorful ball because Object) or (Social Activity)>

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„ ball {NC} „ Then it is possible to work out four readings a. (Social Activity) (Large) (Assembly) [for the of the combinations of color and ball, and purpose of social dancing] further combinations with other words b. (Physical Object) [having globular shape] (projections) will determine which of the four c. (Physical Object) [solid missile for projection is the actual meaning in the sentence John by engine of war] hit the colorful balls and We had a colorful ball last night.

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8.2. Noncompositional meaning „ Frozen metaphors: a class of idiom-like „ Idioms: cannot be built up as the sum of its expressions which may show some of the parts. Idioms are phrases derived by metaphor features of syntactic frozenness typical of and other types of semantic extension. idioms, such as resistance to modification, „ get up on the wrong side of the bed transformation, and so on, but which differ „ in the doghouse from idioms in an important respect: the effect „ green with envy of synonym substitution is not a complete collapse of the non-literal reading. „ kick the bucket „ face the music

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7 The ball’s in your court now. I gave him a piece of my mind. on your side of the net part conceptual system A cat can look at a queen. He drives me up the wall. mouse an archbishop forces room partition I can read her like an open book. He has a bee in his bonnet about it. decipher hornet helmet He has one foot in the grave. both feet tomb one leg coffin

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8.4 Collocations 8.5 Clichés

great heavy high extreme deep severe „ I’ve made my position absolutely clear. „ I’ve given an unambiguous exposition of my frost － ＋ － ？ － ＋ views. „ It’s raining dogs and cats. rain － ＋ － － － － „ He arrived safe and sound. wind ？ － ＋ － － －

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8.6 Noun compounds 8.7 “Active zones”

„ a red hat: whole hat is red „ pocket knife: knife that can be carried in the „ a red book: outside covers are red pocket „ a red apple: a significant portion of outer skin is „ kitchen knife: knife for use in the kitchen red „ a yellow peach: inner flesh is yellow „ meat knife: knife for cutting meat a yellow peach: inner flesh is yellow „ a pink grapefruit: inner flesh is pink „ tablecloth: cloth used to cover a table „ a red traffic sign: symbols only are red „ dishcloth: cloth used to wipe dishes „ a red pencil: (1) red on outside; (2) writes red „ red eyes: ‘white’ of eyes is red „ blue eyes: iris is blue

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8 9. Propositional Logic Those aspects of the meaning of a sentence which determine its truth conditions are collectively known as the propositional content of „ Truth condition: conditions which must hold the sentence. Two sentences with identical for the sentence to be used to make a true propositional content will yield statements with statement (at least if it is used literally). Thus, the same truth values on all occasions of use, as before we can truthfully say, on some occasion, for instance, John caressed Mary and Mary was The cat is on the mat, there must be some caressed by John. By the same token, if two relevant feline occupying a specific position sentences have different propositional content, relative to an appropriate item of floor covering. there will necessarily exist some conceivable situation in which they will yield statements with opposite truth values.

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9.1 Logical relations „ Proposition: a statement, with a truth value (true or false), eg „ Not﹁/～: ¬P „ The earth is flat. „ And ∧: P∧Q „ The earth goes around the sun. „ Or ∨: P∨Q, ﹁P∨Q „ All teachers are female. „ If … then →: P→Q „ Equals to ↔ : P↔ Q

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9.1.1 Truth value: Not ¬ 9.1.2 Truth value: And ∧

∧ P ¬P P Q P Q F F F T F F T F T F F F T T T T

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9 9.1.3 Truth value: Or ∨: P∨Q 9.1.4 Truth value: Or ∨: ¬P∨Q

P Q P∨Q ¬P Q ¬P∨Q F F F F F T F T T F T T T F T T F F T T T T T T

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9.1.5 Truth value: If…then → 9.1.6 Truth value: Equals to ↔

P Q P→Q P Q P↔Q F F T F F T F T T F T F T F F T F F T T T T T T

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9.2 Predicate Logic

„ One-place predicate: run „ Argument and Predicate „ Two-place predicate: love „ John runs. Æ runs’ (John’) or R(j) „ Three-place predicate: give „ John loves Mary. Æ loves’ (John’, Mary’) or L(j, m) „ John gave Mary a book. Æ gave’ (John’, Mary’, book’) or G(j, m, b)

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10 „ Quantifiers: all Æ∀ , some Æ∃ „ All teachers are female. ∀ x (T(x)ÆF(x)) „ All teachers are female. „ Baohui is a teacher. T(b) „ ∀ x (T(x) Æ F(x)) = For all x, if x is a „ ∴ teacher, x is female. Hence, Baohui is female. F(b) „ Some teachers are female. „ ∃ x (T(x)∧F(x)) = There are some x’s that are both teachers and female.

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