Semantics Vocabulary

Question 1

semantics

Answer 1

the study of meaning in language

Question 2

metaphor

Answer 2

a semantic change based on a similarity in form or function between the original concept and the target concept named by a word

Question 3

metonymy

Answer 3

a figure of speech (or trope) in which one word or phrase is substituted for another with which it’s closely associated

Question 4

synecdoche

Answer 4

turns of meaning within one and the same semantic field: a term is represented by another term, the extension of which is either semantically wider or semantically narrower

Question 5

syntagmatic relations

Answer 5

the relations that hold among elements that can occur in combination with one another, in well-formed syntagms

Question 6

paradigmatic relation

Answer 6

a relation that holds between elements of the same category, i.e. elements that can be substituted for each other

Question 7

synonymy

Answer 7

occurs when two or more linguistic forms are used to substitute one another in any context in which their common meaning is not affected denotatively or connotatively

Question 8

hyponymy

Answer 8

a word or phrase whose semantic field is more specific than its hypernym

Question 9

antonymy

Answer 9

semantic qualities or sense relations that exist between words (lexemes) with opposite meanings in certain contexts

Question 10

incompatibility

Answer 10

the most general type of semantic relation between lexical items, the meaning of which entails exclusion

Question 11

homonymy

Answer 11

the relationship between words that are homonyms—words that have different meanings but are pronounced the same or spelled the same or both

Question 12

polysemy

Answer 12

the association of one word with two or more distinct meanings, and a polyseme is a word or phrase with multiple meanings

Question 13

compositional semantics

Answer 13

the principle that the meaning of a complex expression is determined by the meanings of its constituent expressions and the rules used to combine them

Question 14

reference (extension)

Answer 14

the relationships between nouns or pronouns and objects that are named by them

Question 15

sense (intension)

Answer 15

relation to other expressions in the language system

Question 16

possible worlds semantics

Answer 16

a complete and consistent way the world is or could have been

Question 17

Principle of Compositionality

Answer 17

the principle that the meaning of a (syntactically complex) whole is a function only of the meanings of its (syntactic) parts together with the manner in which these parts were combined

Question 18

denotative meaning

Answer 18

the relationship between a linguistic sign and its direct content. often considered the primary meaning of the sign

Question 19

connotative meaning

Answer 19

getting meaning from a word, phrase, or sentence according to what it suggests, or what we associate the word with, that goes beyond its formal definitions

Question 20

social meaning

Answer 20

what an expression conveys about the contexts or social circumstances of its use

Question 21

thematic meaning

Answer 21

what is communicated by the way in which a speaker or a writer organizes the message in terms of ordering focus and emphasis

Question 22

Theory of Naming

Answer 22

the view that the meaning or semantic content of a proper name is identical to the descriptions associated with it by speakers, while their referents are determined to be the objects that satisfy these descriptions

Question 23

Conceptual Theory of Meaning

Answer 23

the literal or core sense of a word

Question 24

Behavioristic Theory of Meaning

Answer 24

established link between word and object

Question 25

collocation

Answer 25

a meaningful word combination that typically occurs in natural language

Question 26

homography

Answer 26

when a set of words are spelled identically but have different meanings

Question 27

analytic sentence

Answer 27

a sentence that is necessarily true, because of the senses of the words in it

Question 28

contradictory sentence

Answer 28

a sentence that is necessarily false, because of the senses of the words in it.

Question 29

synthetic sentence

Answer 29

a sentence that is not analytic or contradictory, but which may be true or false depending on the way the world is

Question 30

entailment

Answer 30

the principle that under certain conditions the truth of one statement ensures the truth of a second statement

Question 31

hypernym

Answer 31

a word whose meaning includes the meanings of other words