SEMANTICS

Study of meaning:
a)Study of language acquisition
(how users acquire sense of meaning as speakers, writers,
listeners, readers)

b)Language change
(meanings alter over time)

c)Language in social contexts

(likely to affect meaning)
MEANING: Knowing a language involves recognizing the relation
between words and sentences

• Conceptual Associative
• Literal use of the word Different associations and connotations

• Semantics is that level of linguistics where meaning is

analyzed
• It analyses how meaning is constructed, interpreted,
clarified, obscured, illustrated, simplified, negotiated,
contradicted and paraphrased.
• Meaning is related very closely to human
capacity to think logically and to understand.
• When we try to analyze meaning, we are
trying to analyze our own capacity to think
and understand, our own ability to create
meaning.
• Semantics concerns itself with ‘giving a
systematic account of nature of
meaning’(Leech 1981)
• To put it simply, what is the meaning of the word
‘cow’?

• Its an animal. It’s a concept.

• (why does the word cow mean only that particular animal, is there a
connection between the word, or we have established connection by
convention)
• (or have we attributed to the animal some essential attributes which we
perceive in our mind and our concept of that animal is created)

• Saussure pointed out that the relation between

the word(signifier) and the concept(signified) is
an arbitrary one i.e the word does not resemble
the concept.
 Defining Meaning
• L.K.Ogden and I.A Richards in Meaning of Meaning gave
the following definitions :
1. All intrinsic property of something
2. Other words related to that word in a dictionary
3. The connotations of a word.
4. The thing to which the speaker refers(of that word)
5. The thing to which the speaker of that word should refer
6. The thing to which the speaker of that word believes
himself to be referring.
7. The thing to which the hearer of that word believes is
being referred to.
 ASPECTS OF MEANING
1.Logical/Denotative meaning: It is literal
meaning of a word unit indicating the IDEA or
concept to which it refers.
Symbol and referent: A symbol is something
which we use to represent another thing, it may
be picture, letter or written word; the thing that
the symbol identifies is the referent, this may
sometimes be an object in the physical
world(Tommy is the symbol, a real dog is the
referent)
Example: man: human + male + adult
2. The Connotative meaning: This is additional meaning
that a concept carries, further meaning attached to a
word, which comes from its reference to other things in
the real world.
E.g woman: human +female+ adult but the concept of
weaker sex or fraility can be added.(these are
connotations)
These associations come into use over a period of time in a
particular culture and can change with change in time.
The denotative meaning remains stable(as it defines the
essential attributes of a concept), connotative meaning
changes( as it is based on associations made to the
concept)
Conceptions of Meaning:
Words things: This view is found in Plato’s
Cratylus, words refer to things; such as proper
nouns; but in case of abstracts, verbs and
adjectives, there is no immediately existing
referent(thing) to correspond to the symbol(word)
Words concepts things: no direct
connection of symbol and referent, but an
indirect connection in our minds.
E.g some concepts came before the words: internet,
hovercraft.
3.Social Meaning: the meaning that a word or a
phrase conveys about the circumstances of
its use; it is understood according to different
style and situation. e.g: domicile, residence,
abode ,home.
Social meaning derives from the awareness of
relationship between the speaker and the
hearer: formal, official, casual, polite or
friendly
4. Thematic Meaning: This meaning is
communicated by the way in which a speaker
or writer organises the message in terms of
ordering, focus, emphasis
An active sentence has a different meaning from
its passive sentence, although the conceptual
meaning seems to be the same.
Mrs. Smith donated/gave the prize.
The prize was donated/given by Mrs. Smith.
 THEORIES OF MEANING
• The Componential Theory : It gives an
account of word meaning. The total meaning
of the word/sentence is broken into distinct
components. Each component of meaning is
expressed by a symbol of + or –
• HUMAN:+ human/ - human(animal)
• ADULT: +adult/ -adult(young)
• MALE:+male/ - male(female)
It works where there is a clear distinction.
It brings out logical features which are inherent
in a word.
It excludes some meanings.
It does not explain ‘Fuzzy Meaning’
Advice, threat, warning
The Truth Conditional Theory: (Basic statements)

• This Theory takes up the account of meaning of sentences

• It believes that a basic statement is a logical proposition which
is either true or false

1. Synonymy: Statement X is synonymous with statement Y: if X is

true Y is true; if X is false Y is false. ‘He is married’ is
synonymous with ‘He has a wife/husband’

2. Entailment: Statement X entails statement Y. if X is true Y is

true; if X is false Y is false. ‘He is married’ entails with ‘He has a
wife/or a husband’
3. Inconsistent: Statement X is inconsistent with
statement Y when X is true, Y is false. ‘He is not
married’ is inconsistent with ‘He has a wife’.
4. Tautology: Statement X is invariably true: An orphan
has no father.
5. Contradiction: Statement X is invariably false. An
orphan has a father.
6. Presupposition: Statement X presupposes statement
Y (if X is true Y is true and if X is false Y is false) ‘It
pleases John that the weather is hot’
7. Anomaly or Absurdity: Statement X is absurd in that
it presupposes a contradiction: The orphan’s father is
home. It presupposes a contradiction
• Semantic Roles:
• Agent and Theme
• Instrument and Experiencer
• Location Source and Goal

• Semantic Features:
• We analyze meaning in terms of semantic features.
The hamburger ate the boy.
horse boy hamburger
Animate + + -
Human - + -
Female - - -
Adult + - -
 LEXICAL AND GRAMMATICAL MEANING
• Lexical or word meaning is the meaning of
individual lexical (word) items

• Open class items Close class items

• (nouns verbs and adjectives) (prepositions,conjunctions and determiners)
• Closed class items have meaning only in relation to
other words in a sentence; This is called Grammatical
meaning. It can be understood from a consideration
of the structure of sentence
• E.g
The tiger killed the elephant.
3 open class items: tiger, killed, elephant
1 closed class item: the, it has no independent
reference and can have meaning only when
placed before nouns.
This distinction helps in understanding
ambiguity, there can be lexical or a
grammatical ambiguity.
• I saw him near the bank.
There is lexical ambiguity: financial institution or
bank of a river
• The parents of the bride and groom were
waiting.
There is grammatical ambiguity; ‘parents of the
bride’ and ‘the groom’ or ‘the parents’ and ‘of
the bride and groom’
• Churchill flies back to front.
• Messe back under ban threat.
• A real life forensic example : Derek Bentley was
hanged for murder after his accomplice Craig(too
young to hang) shot a policeman. Bentley
shouted to Craig: “Let him have it". Did this
mean( as prosecution claimed and jury believed)
“shoot him”(the victim)or (as the defence argued)
“give it [the gun] to him [the policeman]
 LEXICAL RELATIONS
• Words can be treated as containers of
meanings or as fulfilling roles in events; they
also have r’ship with each other.
• R’ship of words to each other is treated as
analysis of lexical relations.
1. Synonymy: word closely related in meaning
are called synonyms. They can often, though
not always, be substituted for each other in
sentences.( we must keep in mind that the
idea of sameness is not total sameness.)
2. Antonymy: Words opposite in meaning are
called antonyms.
Alive/dead big/small fast/slow

Antonyms

Gradable antonyms Non-gradable antonyms

(opposites along a scale) (direct opposites)
Gradable: big/small comparative constructions
Bigger, biggest; smaller, smallest

Negative of one member of gradable pair does

not necessarily apply other.

My car isn’t new. ;

doesn’t imply My car is old.
Non-gradable antonyms: male/female ;
married/single , true/false complimentary pairs
Comparative constructions are not used.

Negative of one member of non gradable pair

does imply the other.

My grandparents aren’t alive. ; does imply

My grandparents are dead.
Reversives:
We usually take the negative test to identify non
gradable antonyms.

Pack is the opposite of unpack but it does not

mean ‘not pack’.
Such antonyms are called reversives.
Lengthen/shorten ; tie/untie; enter/exit.
Hyponymy: When the meaning of one form is
included in the meaning of another.

Animal/dog
Vegetable/carrot

The concept of inclusion involved in a r’ship.

When we consider hyponymous connections we
are essentially looking at the meanings of words
in some type of hierarchical r’ship.
• Living thing

creature plant

Animal insect vegetable flower tree

Dog ant carrot rose pine
Horse cockroach
• Prototypes: some words convey the
characteristic instance of a category these are
known as prototypes.

• Dove, parrot, robin are birds.

The concept of prototype helps explain the
meaning of certain words like birds not in terms
of component features( feathers, beak) but in
resemblance to the clearest example.
• Homophones and Homonyms

• Bare/bear , meat/meet, right/write

same pronunciation homophones

Bank two or more unrelated meanings

Bat homonyms.
Mole
Pupil
Race
• Polysemy
Two or more words with the same form and
related meanings Polysemy
Multiple meanings
Head
Foot
If a word has multiple meanings, there will be a
single entry with numbered list of different
meanings.
• Word play
• Homophones, Homonyms and Polysemy allow
a great word play.

Mary had a little lamb.

 Mary had a little lamb, some rice and
vegetables.

Why are the trees often mistaken for dogs?

Bark
Why is 6 afraid of 7?
789
• Metonymy
(relatedness of meaning found in polysemy is
based on similarity: head)

Another type of relationship between words

based on close connection in everyday life
• Water/bottle
• Can/juice
• President/ The White House
• Boiling a kettle
• Collocation
(Our knowledge of words has got nothing to do with
dictionaries)
Hammer
Table
Bread
Needle
Salt
We organize words(knowledge) simply on basis of
collocation; frequently occurring together