Semantics and Pragmatics Flashcards
semantics
scientific study of the meaning of linguistic expressions, includes words, phrases, sentences
aspects of meaning
- grammatical vs lexical
- semasiology vs onomasiology
- sense vs. reference
grammatical semantics
grammatical meaning (function words, inflectional affixes, word order)
lexical semantics
lexical meaning (content words, derivational affixes)
semasiology
“What is the meaning of word X?”
onomasiology
“Which linguistic forms express meaning Y?”
sense (language internal)
descriptive meaning, independent of particular utterance or situational context
reference (language external)
relation between entities/referent in the extra-linguistic world and lexemes which refer to them
denotation
objective meaning of an expression
connotation
“secondary meanings” - culture-dependent
intention (language-internal)
set of semantic properties that define an expression
extension (language-external)
class of objects to which a linguistic expression is applied, i.e. potential referents
paradigmatic approach
words with similar meaning can be substitued
syntagmatic approach
‘the company the word keeps’
meaning of words -> which other words can co-occur
collocations
‘the company the word keeps’
e.g. blond hair, to fall ill
selection restrictions
in extreme cases, certain lexemes can only be combined with certain other lexemes
principle of compositionality
the meaning of a phrase/sentence is determined by the meaning of its component parts and the syntactic relations between these parts
semantic feature theory
describing semantic similarities and differences between members of a lexical fiels as a bundle of semantic features
boy = +human, -female, -adult
lexical field theory
-group of words which cover different or partly overlapping areas within the same extralinguistic domain
-structuring the information stored in our mental lexicon
-infinite number of lexical fields
hyponymy
‘type-of’ relationship
apple - fruit
meronymy
part-whole relationship
hand - finger
synonymy
same meaning
brave - courageous
antonymy
semantic opposites
types of antonymy
- complementary (male - female)
- gradable/contrary (hot - cold)
- relational opposites (teacher - pupil)
- directional opposites (open - shut)
polysemy
one lexeme, several historically/semantically related meanings
(river mouth, mouth as a part of a body)
homonymy
two or more lexemes have the same form but unrelated meanings
(race as speed, race as human categorization)
homophone
same sound, different spelling
homograph
same spelling, different sound
conceptual metonymy
- producer for product (“Can I borrow your Shakespeare?”)
- pars pro toto (“There is a new face in my class.”)
- place for institution (“Berlin has announced an embargo.”)
semantics
“What does X mean?”
pragmatics
“What does the speaker mean/want to achieve?”
deixis
deictic expression allow speakers to refer to aspects of immediate contexts
deictic dimensions
- place deixis
- time deixis
- social deixis
- discourse deixis
speech acts
- locution - pure content
- illocution - communicative intention of the speaker
- perlocution - effect on the listener
classification of illocutionary act
- representatives/assertives - describe the world (true/false)
- directives - ask the listener to perform an action
- commissives - commit the speaker to an action
- expressives - express emotional states
- declarations - directly change the state of affairs in the real world
maxims of conversation
- quality
- quantity
- relation
- manner
