lecture 4 semantics

1、Chapter Seven Semantics Semantics:A study of meaning Questions to be considered:1.Explain the following concepts by illustrating with your own examples (Note: your examples should not be those in the textbook).Denotation ,connotation, componential analysis, hyponymy, synonymy, antonymy,Homonymy, pol

2、ysemy, 2.Differentiate a word with a bad connotation from a word with a good connotation.3.Identify semantic features shared by a group of words and those that can differentiate one group of words from another group of words.4.Explain semantically ambiguous sentences We make sounds, words , sentence

3、s, not for the sake of making them. We make them in order to mean something, to express some meaning. But meaning is intangible. It is more difficult to study than sound , and the forms of words and sentences. The earlier discussion of the meaning in the history In China, Laozi In Greek, Plato as ea

4、rly as the fifth century before Christ. Two different approaches to meaning: Linguistic semantics: The approach in which more attention is paid to the meaning of linguistic units themselves, words and sentences in particular. Philosophical or logical semantics: The approach more concerned with the r

5、elationship between linguistic expressions and the phenomena in the world to which they refer, and the conditions under which such expressions can be true or falseDefinitions of semanticsSemantics can be simply defined as the study of meaning. (Dai & He, 2002, p. 67)l Term coined by Bréal (

6、1897) for the subdiscipline of linguistics concerned with the analysis and description of the so-called literal meaning of linguistic expressions. (Bussmann, p. 1996, p. 423)l Semantics is the study of linguistic meaning: the meaning of words, phrases, and sentences. (Wen, P. 210)l SEMANTICS is a te

7、chnical term used to refer to the study of the communication of meaning through language. (Hu, Liu and Li, 1988, p. 139) Definitions of meaningl The word “meaning” itself has many different meanings.l The Meaning of Meaning written in 1923 by C. K. Ogden and I.A. Richards, there are 16 major categor

8、ies of them, with sub-categories all together, numbering 22.l What a language expresses about the world we live in or any possible or imaginary world. (Richards, Platt and Platt, 1998, p. 278)l Central semantic notion defined and used differently depending on the theoretical approach. (Bussmann, p.

9、1996, p. 299) 7 types of meaning in G. Leech s Semantics ,first published in 1974. Conceptual meaning : logical ,cognitive, or denotative content; It is denotative in that it is concerned with the relationship between a word and the thing it denotes, or refers to. Denotation and Connotation: Denotat

10、ion is concerned with the relationship between a word and the thing it denotes, or refers to. woman: +human + female + adult tiger: +animal + wild +flesh-eating + having a tawny coat striped with black Connotation refers to some additional, especially emotive , meaning.e.g. politician (derogatory) s

11、tatesman (favorable) Associative meaning:Connotative meaningSocial meaningAffective meaningReflective meaningCollocative meaning Connotative meaning: What is communicated by virtue of what language refers to. woman: frail, prone to tears, emotional, inconstant ;gentle, compassionate, hard working Ho

12、me: home, sweet home, there is no place like home. Cold home ChristmasSpring festival Social meaning (stylistic meaning): What is communicated of the social circumstances of language use. Different use in different social situation:Formal and literaryColloquial Familiar Slang Horse, steed, nag, gee-

13、gee Home , residence , domicile , abode Throw , cast, chuck Horse (normal) steed (poetic) nag (slang) gee-gee (children) Home (normal) residence (formal) domicile (official formal) Abode (poetic) Throw (normal) cast (literary) Chuck (slang) Affective meaning (emotional, expressive, attitude ): What

14、is communicated of the feelings and attitudes of the speaker/writer. To express through conceptual meaning: You are a vicious tyrant and a villainous reprobate and I hate you for it. To express through connotative meaning: Jane is an angel of a girl. That fellow is an ass. To express through intonat

15、ion and tune: Im terribly sorry to interrupt you, but I wonder if you would be so kind as to lower your voices a little . Reflected meaning: What is communicated through association with another sense of the same expression. Taboo words with bad association:Cock, intercourse, ejaculation, erection,H

16、uman language is a tool of social intercourse. Euphemistic expressions replacing the bad association: Belly and abdomen; the arms and legs and the limbs; water closet and washroom. How do you translate the Chinese”干杯！” Collocative meaning: What is communicated through association with words which te

17、nd to occur in the environment of another word。 Pretty and handsome; He mounted his gee-gee. He got on his steed. Rotten tomatoes; addled eggs; rancid bacon or butter; sour milk; accuseof; chargewith; rebukefor Thematic meaning: What is communicated by the way in which the message is organized in te

18、rms of order and emphasis. Mrs. Smith donated the first prize. The first prize was donated by Mrs. Smith . Lets look at the table. This is a crane. She gave a bike to her brother in Shanghai. He waited by the bank. I saw a piece of wood. He found the drill is boring. They are lying on the grass. The

19、 referential theory The theory of meaning which relates the meaning of a word to the thing it refers to, or stands for, is known as the referential theory Views on meaningl Naming Proposed by ancient Greek scholar Plato: linguistic symbols are just names of labels for things. Limits: cannot explain

20、things that do not exist and words representing abstract notions.l Conceptualist view Proposed by ancient philosophers and linguists, illustrated by the semantic triangle suggested by Ogden and Richards.F semantic triangle Thought / Reference Symbol / Form.ReferentØ Limits: What is the link bet

21、ween the symbol and the concept? What does “thinking of the concept” mean? People do not actually see the image of something in their minds eye every time they come across a linguistic symbol. mind “moon” . the actual moon in the physical world mind “ red” the quality found in all red things in the

22、physical world mind “Good “.positive feeling in the subjective world mind “ghost”an imagined thing in the symbolic worldl ConceptualismF Representatively proposed by the British linguist J. R. Firth who had been influenced by the Polish anthropologist Malinowski and the German philosopher Wittgenste

23、in. It holds that meaning should be studied in terms of situation, use, context elements closely linked with language behavior. the meaning of a word is its use in the languageØ Two kinds of context should be considered: the situational context and the linguistic context. The specific meaning o

24、f a word is determined by different factors in the two situations. Examples: “black air” and “black coffee” (linguistic context) The seal could not be found. (situational context)l Behaviorism Based on contextualist by Bloomfield, Behaviorists attempted to define the meaning of a language form as th

25、e “situation in which the speaker utters it and the response it calls forth in the hearer.” (Bloomfield,1933) Bloomfield argued that meaning consists in the relation between speech indicated by small letters r . s and the practical events represented by the capitalized letters S and R that precede a

26、nd follow them respectively: Jill Jack S _ r s _R Lexical meaningSense and referencel Sense: Sense is concerned with the inherent meaning of the linguistic form. It is the collection of all the features of the linguistic form; it is abstract and de-contextualized.l Reference: Reference means what a

27、linguistic form refers to in the real, physical world; it deals with the relationship between the linguistic element and the non-linguistic world of experience. l Synonymy: refers to the sameness or close similarity of meaning.Ø Dialectal synonyms: synonyms used in different regional dialects&#

28、216; Stylistic synonyms: synonyms differing in styleØ Synonyms that differ in their emotive or evaluative meaningØ Collocational synonyms: what words they go together withØ Semantically different synonyms: differ from the words themselves Autumn and fall; lift and elevator; luggage an

29、d baggage; lorry and truck; petrol and gasoline; flat and apartment; torch and flash light. Kick the bucket, pop off, die, pass away, decease Collaborator and accomplicel Polysemy(多義現(xiàn)象): While different words may have the same or similar meaning, the same one word may have more than one meaning. e.g

30、. table, cranel Homonymy(同音異義): 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.Ø Homophones (同音異義): rain / reign; night / knight; piece / peace; leak / leekØ Homographs (同形異音異義)

31、: bow v. / bow n.; tear v. / tear n.; lead v. / lead n. l Hyponymy(下義關(guān)系): Hyponymy refers to the sense relation between a more general, more inclusive word and a more specific word. (superordinate, hyponyms, co-hyponyms)l Antonymy(反義現(xiàn)象): The term antonymy is used for oppositeness of meaning; words t

32、hat are opposite n meaning are antonyms.Ø Gradable antonyms: old and young, hot and coldØ Complementary antonyms: either one or the other, e.g. alive or dead, male or femaleØ Relational opposites (converse): husband and wife, father and son, teacher and pupil, doctor and patient. Anal

33、ysis of meaningComponential analysisl Componential Analysis (known as CA): meaning is composed of meaning components called semantic features. Plus and minus signs are used to indicate whether a semantic feature is present or absent in the meaning of a word. e.g. F woman +HUMAN, +ADULT, +ANIMATE, -

34、MALEF man +HUMAN, +ADULT, +ANIMATE, +MALEF boy +HUMAN, - ADULT, +ANIMATE, +MALEComponential AnalysisA way to the “inside” of meaning man: (+HUMAN, +MALE, +ADULT) woman: (+HUMAN, _ MALE, +ADULT) boy: (+HUMAN, + MALE, _ADULT) girl: (+HUMAN, _ MALE, _ADULT) Ambiguity(歧義) and Vagueness（語(yǔ)義含混）They saw her

35、 duck.John drove to the bank.Tony said that he had passed the exam.This is Janes picture Classification of Ambiguity Lexical AmbiguityShe drove to the bank.He was seated by the Chairman.B. Grammatical AmbiguityThey saw her duck.The husband looked harder than his wife.C. Phonological AmbiguityMy younger brother had a /greid ei/.M