Draw trees for these sentences.
Yesterday Emma bought a book.
Yesterday Emma bought a book about cooking.
Yesterday Emma bought a book in a bookstore.
(ambiguous)
Draw trees for these sentences.
Yesterday Emma put a book on the table.
Yesterday Emma put a book about cooking
under the table.
Yesterday Emma put a book about cooking on
the table in the hall. (ambiguous)
“The study of the linguistic meaning of
morphemes, words, phrases, and
sentences is called semantics.”
Fromkin, Victoria, Robert Rodman & Nina Hyams. 2011. An Introduction to
Language, 9th edition. Wadsworth, Cengage Learning, p. 140.
Lexical semantics
 Phrasal or sentential semantics
 Pragmatics
Fromkin, Victoria, Robert Rodman & Nina Hyams. 2011. An Introduction to
Language, 9th edition. Wadsworth, Cengage Learning, p. 140.
Semantics
Words
Phrases
Sentences
Lexical Semantics
Phrasal Semantics
Sentential Semantics
Pragmatics
Discourse
Pragmatics
(Meaning in Context)
Fromkin, Victoria, Robert Rodman & Nina Hyams. 2011. An Introduction to
Language, 9th edition. Wadsworth, Cengage Learning, p. 140.
Word
 meaningful 
 ambiguous 
 synonymous 
 opposites

 reference

 sense

 truth value X
 entailment
X
Sentence





(can)



Fromkin, Victoria, Robert Rodman & Nina Hyams. 2011. An Introduction to
Language, 9th edition. Wadsworth, Cengage Learning, p. 140ff.
“Learning a language includes learning the
agreed-upon meanings of certain strings of
sounds and learning how to combine these
meaningful units into larger units that also
convey meaning.”
“All speakers of a language share a basic
vocabulary—the sounds and meanings of
morphemes and words.”
[My emphasis.]
Fromkin, Victoria, Robert Rodman & Nina Hyams. 2003. An Introduction to
Language. Boston, MA: Wadsworth, p. 173.
 Pronunciation
 Meaning
(including Semantic Properties)
 Relationship to other words
 Grammatical category
 How to use it in sentences.
 Potential collocations and idioms
 Spelling
 Truth
 Entailment / Logic
 Ambiguity
Fromkin, Victoria, Robert Rodman & Nina Hyams. 2011. An Introduction to
Language, 9th edition. Wadsworth, Cengage Learning, pp. 140-143.
“…our knowledge about the truth value
of sentences [is a function of] taking
the meanings of words and combining
them according to the syntactic
structure of the sentence.”
Fromkin, Victoria, Robert Rodman & Nina Hyams. 2011. An Introduction to
Language, 9th edition. Wadsworth, Cengage Learning, p. 146.
All the Individual Word Meanings
+
Syntax
=
Sentence Meaning
Fromkin, Victoria, Robert Rodman & Nina Hyams. 2011. An Introduction to
Language, 9th edition. Wadsworth, Cengage Learning, p. 144ff.
 Anomaly
 Metaphor
 Idioms
Fromkin, Victoria, Robert Rodman & Nina Hyams. 2011. An Introduction to
Language, 9th edition. Wadsworth, Cengage Learning, pp. 147-152.
 Lexical item with more than one word.
 Meaning of the idiom cannot be inferred.
 They must be LEARNED (like other
words, morphemes).
 They must be stored in the Mental
Lexicon.
Fromkin, Victoria, Robert Rodman & Nina Hyams. 2011. An Introduction to
Language, 9th edition. Wadsworth, Cengage Learning, pp. 151-152.
 Reference
 Sense
 Mental image
 Various lexical relations
Fromkin, Victoria, Robert Rodman & Nina Hyams. 2011. An Introduction to
Language, 9th edition. Wadsworth, Cengage Learning, pp. 154-156.
(Boldfaced items may be debatable)
a. T
e. S
i. S
m. S
q. C
u. C
y. S
b. C
f. C
j. S
n. T
r. C
v. S
z. C
c. S
g. S
k. T
o. C
s. C
w. C
d. S
h. T
l. S
p. S
t. S
x. C
a.
b.
c.
d.
e.
f.
g.
h.
i.
j.
T
C
S
S
S
C
S
T
S
S
Queens are monarchs.
Kings are female.
Kinds are poor.
Queens are ugly.
Queens are mothers.
Kings are mothers.
Dogs are four-legged.
Cats are felines.
Cats are stupid.
Dogs are carnivores.
k.
T
l.
S
m.
n.
o.
p.
q.
r.
s.
S
T
C
S
C
C
C
George Washington is George
Washington.
George Washington is the first
president.
George Washington is male.
Uncles are male.
My aunt is a man.
Witches are wicked.
My brother is a witch. ??
My sister is an only child.
The evening star isn’t the evening
star.
t.
u.
v.
w.
x.
y.
z.
S
C
S
C
C
S
C
The evening star isn’t Venus.
Babies are adults.
Babies can lift one ton.
Puppies are human.
My bachelor friends are all married.
My bachelor friends are all lonely.
Colorless ideas are green.
a. We laughed at the colorful ball.
Lexically ambiguous:
ball (toy children play with); (dance party)
b. He was knocked over by the punch.
Lexically ambiguous:
punch (using the fist to hit someone);
(drink at a party)
Structurally ambiguous:
He was next to the punch when he was
knocked over.
The punch knocked him over.
c. The police were urged to stop drinking
by the fifth.
Lexically ambiguous:
fifth (5th day of the month); (a fifth of a
gallon of whiskey??)
Structurally ambiguous:
when they should stop drinking
They should not drink a whole fifth of
whiskey when they drink.
d. I said I would file it on Thursday.
Lexically ambiguous:
file (folder containing information); (tool
for smoothing rough surfaces)
Structurally ambiguous:
I said it on Thursday.
the filing will be done on Thursday
k. run down
l. violin case
m. bill/Bill; house/House
n. stud tires; out
o. dog bite victim
p. lack of brains
q. death (whose?)
r. eye drops (N); eye drops (NP VP)
s. try; shooting defendant (Adj N) or (V NP)
t. Queen Mary (person or ship)