Week 9: Semantics I&II

Question 1

Define: SEMANTICS

Answer 1

How meaning is expressed and understood within a language

Question 2

Define: SEMIOTICS

Answer 2

The study of signs

Question 3

Define: INDICES

Answer 3

Signs that are connected to their meaning by way of ‘pointing’ e.g. smoke ‘points’ to fire

Question 4

Define: ICONS

Answer 4

Signs that represent or are a picture of their meaning e.g. the male and female icons on toilet doors

Question 5

Define: SYMBOLS

Answer 5

Signs that are connected to their meaning by convention e.g. musical notes

Question 6

Define: PRINCIPLE OF COMPOSITIONALITY

Answer 6

Combining signs to make more complex meanings

Question 7

Define: PRINCIPLE OF CONTRASTS

Answer 7

Relates to the limits of variation within a sign that ensure the maintenance of meaning e.g. can have different shades of green in traffic lights but not blue

Question 8

Define: REFERENCE

Answer 8

The ‘thing’ that is picked out from all the objects in the world when using a word/expression

Question 9

Define: DENOTATION

Answer 9

All the objects in the world that could potentially be referred to using a word/expression

Question 10

Define: SENSE

Answer 10

An expression is linked by convention to an idea/sense

Question 11

Define: PROBLEM OF CIRCULARITY

Answer 11

Explaining one word by using another word, and then explaining the other word by using the first word

Question 12

Name: THE THREE ASPECTS OF MEANING

Answer 12

• Reference
• Denotation
• Sense

Question 13

Define: REFERENT

Answer 13

The ‘thing’ in the world being referred to

Question 14

Define: DENOTATUM

Answer 14

The ‘thing’ in the world being denoted to

Question 15

Define: SEMANTIC RELATIONS

Answer 15

How meanings of different words relate to each other

Question 16

Define: POLYSEMY

Answer 16

A word that has multiple, but related meanings

Question 17

Define: HOMOGRAPHY

Answer 17

A word that shares the same orthographic form as another, but has a different meaning e.g. ‘to present’ and ‘a present’

Question 18

Define: HOMOPHONY

Answer 18

A word that is pronounced the same (to varying extent) as another word, but differs in meaning

Question 19

Define: SYNONYMY

Answer 19

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

Question 20

Define: ANTONYMY

Answer 20

The sense relation in words which are opposite in meaning

Question 21

Define: MERONYMY

Answer 21

The semantic relation that holds between a part and a whole

Question 22

Define: HYPONOYMY

Answer 22

Words of more specific meanings that have subordinate words under them e.g. ‘fruit’ is a hypernym of ‘apple’

Question 23

Define: HYPERONYMY

Answer 23

Words of more general subordinate meanings that lie under superordinate terms e.g. ‘apple’ is a hyponym of ‘fruit’

Question 24

The THREE types of antonymy

Answer 24

• Gradable
• Complementary
• Incompatible

Question 25

Define: HOMONYMY

Answer 25

When two words are spelled and pronounced the same but have different meanings

Question 26

How do you tell between polysemy and homonymy?

Answer 26

• If there are two lexemes, it’s homonymy
• If the meanings are not related, it’s homonymy
  & vice versa

Question 27

Define: GRADABLE ANTONYMY

Answer 27

A pair of words with opposite meanings where the two meanings lie on a continuous spectrum e.g. big & small

Question 28

Define: COMPLEMENTARY ANTONYMY

Answer 28

A pair of words with opposite meanings where if it is one, it cannot be the other one e.g. dead & alive

Question 29

Define: INCOMPATIBLE ANTONYMY

Answer 29

A pair of words with opposite meanings where as soon as it’s one, it cannot be the other, but it is not necessarily the other e.g. if it’s not yellow, it could be green, but it doesn’t mean it is definitely green