Semantics Flashcards
semantics
subfield of linguistics that studies linguistic meaning and how expressions convey meanings
lexical semantics
deals with the meanings of words and other lexical expressions, including the meaning relationships behind them
compositional semantics
concerned with phrasal meanings and how phrasal meanings are assembled
sense
to have some mental representation of a words meaning
reference
knowing the relationship of the word to the world
referents
particular entities in the world to which some expression refers
mental image
representation in a person’s mind of the physical world outside that person
hyponomy
shows the relationship between a generic term (hypernym) and a specific instance of it (hyponym)
hyponym
a word of more specific meaning than a general or super-ordinate term applicable to it
hypernym
a word with a broad meaning that more specific words fall under; a super-ordinate
sister terms
if a words’ reference is on the same level in the hierarchy
synonymy
when two words have exactly the same reference
antonymy
when words must have meanings that are related, yet must contrast with each other in some significant way
complementary antonyms
word pairs whose meanings are opposite but whose meanings do not lie on a continuous spectrum (push, pull)
gradable antonyms
represent points on a continuum, so while something can be one of the other but not both, it can also easily be between the two
reverses
pairs of words that suggest some kind of movement, where one word in the pair suggests movement that “undoes” the movement suggested by the other
converses
have to do with two opposing points of view or a change in perspective: for one member of the pair to have reference, the other must as well
truth value
ability to be true or false
truth conditions
conditions that would have to hold in the world in order for some proposition to be true
entailment
the principle that under certain conditions the truth of one statement ensures the truth of a second statement
mutual entailment
when two propositions entail one another
incompatible
it would be impossible for both propositions to be true; that is, the truth conditions for one are incompatible with the truth conditions for the other
principle of compositionality
the meaning of a sentence is a function of the meanings of the words it contains and the way in which these words are syntactically combined
compositonal
predictable from the meanings of words and their syntactic combination
idioms
a group of words established by usage as having a meaning not deducible from those of the individual words
pure intersection
relationship between the reference of an adjective and a noun it modifies such that each picks out a particular group of things, and the reference of the resulting phrase is all of the things that are in BOTH the reference set of the adjective and the reference set of the noun
intersective adjectives
adjective whose reference is determined independently from the reference of the noun that it modifies
relative intersection
type of relationship between adjective and noun reference where the reference of the ADJECTIVE is determined relative to the NOUN reference
non-intersection adjective
adjective whose reference is a subset of the set that the noun it modifies refers to, but that does not, in and of itself, refer to any particular set of things.
anti-intersection adjective
adjective whose referents are not in the set referred to by the noun that it modifies.
