Chapter 5 Semantics
Contents
1
What is Semantics
2
Meanings of MEANING
3
Sence and Reference
4
Major semantic relations among word
5
Major semantic relations among senten
6
Analysis of Meaning
5.1 What is Semantics?
The definition of semantics
• Semantics can be simply defined as the
study of meaning.
• Semantics is the study of the meaning of
linguistic units, words and sentences in
particular.
What is the “MEANING”?
Meanings “of meaning”
• One difficulty in the study of MEANING
is that the word “meaning” itself has
different meanings.
• Seven types of meaning recognized by G.
Leech in his Semantics (1974, p.23)
Conceptual meaning
Connotative meaning
Social meaning
Affective meaning
Reflected meaning
Collocative meaning
Thematic meaning
概念意义
内涵意义
社会意义
感情意义
反映意义
搭配意义
主题意义
Conceptual meaning
• According to Leech, conceptual
meaning refers to logical
,cognitive or denotative content.
Conceptual meaning is denotative.
• 逻辑认知外延的东西, 概念意义相当
于外延意义
• When the word “root” means “part of
plant that keeps it firmly in the soil
and absorbs water and food from the
soil", the meaning is conceptual
meaning.
• Leech says the first type of meaning –
conceptual meaning –makes up the central
meaning.
• It is “ denotative” in that it is concerned with
the relationship between a word and the things
it denotes.
• 利奇认为，第一种意义是概念意义，它是词义的
核心。这种意义是指“外延意义”，因为它表示
词和它所指事物之间的关系。
• In this sense, conceptual meaning
overlaps to a large extent with the notion
of REFERENCE.
• 从这种意义上说，概念意义在很大程度上
与指称意义相交叉。
• Leech’s conceptual meaning has two
sides: sense and reference.
• The distinction between sense and
reference is similar to that between
connotation and denotation.
• The former refers to the abstract
properties of an entity, while the latter
refers to the concrete entities having
these properties.
• To some extent, every word has a sense,
i.e. some conceptual content; other wise it
cannot be used or understood. But not
every word has a reference.
• G.Leech 的概念意义包括两个方面：涵义
和指称。
• 涵义和指称的区别类类似内涵和外延：
• 前者指的是一个实体的抽象意义，后者指
的是拥有这些属性的具体实体。
• 每个单词都有涵义，即概念意义，否则它
无法被使用或理解，但并非每个单词都有
指称。
• 17
Sense and reference
• Sense is concerned with the inherent meaning
of linguistic form, the collection of all its
features, it is abstract and de-contextualized.
• It is the aspect of meaning dictionary
compilers are interested in .
• 意义指的是语言形式的内在意义。它是语言形式
所有特征的集合，是抽象的，而且与语境无关，
• 是词典编纂者所感兴趣的方面
• Reference means a linguistic form refers
to in the real physical world; it deals with
the relationship between the linguistic
element and non-linguistic world of
experience.
• 指称意指语言形式在现实的物质世界中的
所指的事物，它涉及的是语言成分和非语
言的经验世界之间的关系。
• Leech also uses sense as a briefer term for
his conceptual meaning .
• It may refer to the properties an entity has.
• In this sense, “sense” is equivalent to
“concept”.
• The definition of “desk” as “a piece of
furniture with a flat top and four legs, at
which one reads and writes” may also
called the sense of the desk.
A word having reference
must have sense.
• Explain the difference between sense and
reference from the following four
aspects:
• 幻灯片 9
• To some extent, Every word has a sense,
i.e. some conceptual content; other wise it
cannot be used or understood.
A word having sense
might not have reference.
• But not every word has a reference. There are
linguistic expressions which can never be used
to refer, for example, the words so, very ,maybe,
if, not and all. These words do of course
contribute meaning to the sentences they occur
in and thus help sentences denote, but they do
not themselves identify entities in the world.
They are intrinsically non-referring items.
•And the words like God, ghost and dragon refer to
imaginary things, which do not exist in reality.
A certain sense can be
realized by more than one
reference.
• Some expressions will have the same referent
across a range of utterances, e.g. The Eiffel
Towel or the Pacific Ocean, such expressions
are sometimes described as having constant
reference.
• Others have their reference totally dependent
on context, expressions like I , you, she, etc. are
said to have variable reference.
A certain reference
can be expressed by
more than one sense.
• There are cases when a reference can be
expressed by more than one sense. Evening star
(a planet -usually Venus- seen at sunset in the western
sky) and morning star (a planet - usually Venus- seen just
before sunrise in the eastern sky)
nearly always refers to
Venus.
• But each of them presents a particular
emotional temperament and a particular sense
of values , meaning , ideals and appreciations.
Conceptualist/ Mentalism
View(概念论)
• Conceptualist view holds that there is no
direct link between a linguistic form and
what it refers to (i.e. between language
and the real world; rather, in the
interpretation of meaning they are linked
through the mediation of concepts in our
mind.
• Mentalism or Conceptualism follows
Saussure’s “sign ” theory ,and considers
the linguistic sign to consist of a signifier
and signified, i.e., a sound image and a
concept ,linked by a psychological
“associative” bond
Concept
Signifier
signified
• This is best illustrated by the classic
semantic triangle or triangle of
significance)
• A theory which explicitly employs the
notion “concept” is the semantic triangle
proposed by Ogden and Richards in The
Meaning of Meaning.
• According to the “semantic triangle”
theory, the relation between a word and a
thing it refers to is not direct .It is
mediated by concept.
THOUGHT/REFERENCE
SYMBOL/FROM
REFERENT
A certain concept in our mind
•
DOG
particular dog
(The dog over there looks unfriendly)
Contexualism 语境论
• They hold that meaning should be
studied in terms of situation, use,
context-elements closely linked with
language behavior.
• A representative of this approach is J.R.
Firth, the leading British linguist of the
period.
• The contextualist view of meaning is
based on the presumption that one can
derive meaning from or reduce meaning
to observable contexts.
• Two kinds of context are recognized: the
situational context and the linguistic
context.
Behaviorism
• Behaviorist attempted to define the
meaning of a language from as “the
situation in which the speaker utters it
and the response it calls forth in the
hearer.”
• This theory ,somewhat close to the
contextualism, is linked with
psychological interest
• This view of meaning proposed by
Bloomfield is illustrated by his story
about Jack and Jill.
Major semantic relations
among words-certain relations
between lexical items
• Synonymy
• Antonymy
• Polysemy
• Homonymy
• Hoponymy
Synonymy
refers to the sameness or close similarity of
meaning.
 Dialectal synonyms-synonyms used in different
regional dialects (BrE & AmE)
 Stylistic synonyms-synonyms different in style,
or degree of formality
 Synonyms that differ in their emotive or
evaluative meaning
 Collocational synonyms
 Semantically different synonyms
• 2. 6.The sense relationship between Kid, child and
stylistic
offspring ________.
(casual ,neutral, formal )
• 6.The sense relationship between buy and purchase
synonymy
is ________
• 10. The sense relationship between autumn and fall
dialectal synonymy
is _________________
.
• 23.The sense relationship between thrifty and stingy
emotive synonymy .
is _________________
• P3 310) boot/trunk
mercury/ quick silver (水银)
• P4 4 3) “Kids” and “children” are synonyms despite
their stylistic difference (T)
Antonymy
• The term antonymy is used for oppositeness of
meaning; words that are opposite in meaning are
antonyms.
 Gradable antonyms (两极之间):some antonyms are
gradable because there are often intermediate forms
between the two members of a pair. it is the matter of
the degree of the two extremes.
 Complementary antonyms（非此即彼）; A pair of
complementary antonyms is characterized by the
feature that the denial of one member of the pair
implies the assertion of the other. It is the matter of
either one or the other.
 Relational opposites（关系颠倒）：Pair of words that
exhibit the rehearsal of the relationship between the
two items called relational opposites.
• 10/22/(P3 2 5):
• The sense relationship between
• (big and small) /(long and short) / (wide and narrow
Gradable antonyms /opposites- gradability
• 12/19 /(P3 3 10)
• The sense relationship between
• (husband and wife)/(teacher and students)
• (borrow and lend) /(over and under)
Converse antonyms (relational opposites)
• 7/13/20/21 /(P3 3 10)
• The sense relationship between
• (dead and alive) /(male and female)
• (before and after)/(relinquish and retain) （放弃/保存
） Complementary antonyms -complementarity
Polysemy
• The same one word may have more than
one than one meaning
• Such word is called a polysemic or
polysemous word.
24.The word screen has many different
meanings such as in a fire screen ,a
polysemy
television screen. This is called________.
polysemous words
P3 3 10).boot/trunk_________________.
Homonymy同音异义
• Homonymy refers to the phenomenon that
words having different meanings have the same
form ,i.e. different words are identical in sound
or spelling, or in both.
• Homophones (identical sound)
• Homographs (identical spelling)
• Complete homonyms (identical sound and
spelling)
• 4.The phenomenon that words having
different meanings have the same form is
homonymy
called________.
• 14.The sense relationship between see
homonymy
and sea is_________.
homonyms
• P3 3 10)tale/tail:_________.
homonymy
• P4 5 1) flour-flower:________.
Hyponymy
• Hyponymy refers to the sense relations
between a more general ,more inclusive
and a more specific word.
• The word which is more general in
meaning is called the superordinate (上坐
标词), and the more specific words are
called its hyponyms(下位词).
• 5.The sense relationship between furniture
and desk is________.
hyponymy
• 15. The sense relationship between color and
yellow is _________.
hyponymy
• P3 3 5) Terms like “desk” and “stool” (凳子)are
hyponyms
________ of the term “furniture”
hyponymy
• P3 3 10) satellite/moon fabric/rayon :________
• P4 4 1)The meaning relationship between
MAN and GROWN-UP hyponymous because
the semantic features of MAN are included in
those of GROWN-UP. (T)
• P4 4 2) Semantically ,BEEF is excluded in
MEAT. (F)
• P4 4 9) “Tulip”, “rose”, and “violet ”are all
included in the notion of “flower” ,
therefore they are superordinates of “
flowers”. (F)
hyponymy
• P4 5 1) tree-maple, birch:_________
Major semantic relations among
sentences(certain relationships between
sentences and also the constituents of the same
sentence)
• Of the five semantic relations among
sentences: paraphrase ;entailment;
contradiction; presupposition ;and
tautology.
• The meaning of a sentence is the result of
the meanings of the words used in it and
its syntactic structure.
• 句子意义是词语意义和句子结构共同作用
的结果
• Logical semantics studies how the truth
of a composite proposition is determined
by the truth value of its constituent
propositions and the connections
between them.
• 逻辑语义学研究成分命题真值及成分命题
之间的关系如何决定复合命题真值。
Paraphrase (真真假假)
• 1)X is synonymous with Y
• In terms of truth condition, if X is true, Y is
true, and if X is false, Y is false. (two
sentences mutually entail each other)
Entailment is an entailment of
X)
• In terms of truth condition, if X is true, Y
is necessarily true
• If X is false, Y may be true or false
Presupposition (Y is a
prerequisite of X)
• In terms of truth condition, if X is true,
Y must be true
• if X is false, Y is still true.
Contradiction /tautology
• If two sentences can not be true at the
same time and in the same situation, they
can be contradictory of each other.
• The unnecessary and usually
unintentional use of two words to
express one meaning
• P3 2 1)The sense relationship between
“John plays the violin” and “John plays a
entailment .
musical instrument” is_________
• 2) “Semantics is the scientific study of
tautology .
meaning” is a _________
• P4 4 4)In the following pair of sentences,
Sentence (b) presupposes Sentence (a):
John managed to finish in time. (b) John
tried to finish it in time. (T)
• P4 5 3 Of the five relations among
sentences : paraphrase, entailment,
contradiction, presupposition, and
tautology, which of these relations is
exemplified in each of the following pairs
of the sentences or sentences?
• A.I saw Timothy at the anniversary party.
It was Timothy that I saw at the anniversary party.
• B. The orphan has no father.
• C. Jules is Mary’s husband. Mary is married.
• D. Vera is an only child.
Olga is Vera’s sister.
• E. The mayor of Manchester is a woman.
There is s mayor in Manchester.
• A. paraphrase
• B. tautology
• C. entailment
• D. contradiction
• E. presupposition
Analysis of Meaning
• Componetial Analysis-a way to analyze
lexical meaning
• Predication Analysis-a way analyze
sentence meaning