What is Semantics?

Question 1

Semantics

Answer 1

The study of linguistic meaning

Question 2

Lexical semantics

Answer 2

A subfield of semantics that studies meanings of lexical expressions

Question 3

Compositional semantics

Answer 3

A subfield of semantics that studies the meanings of phrasal expressions and how those meanings arise given the meanings of the lexical expressions they contain and how they are syntactically combined

Question 4

Sense

Answer 4

The mental representation of an expression’s meaning

Question 5

Reference

Answer 5

A component of linguistic meaning that relates the sense of the expression to entitles in the outside world. The collection of all the referents of an expression.

Question 6

Referent

Answer 6

An actual entity or an individual in the world to which some expression refers

Question 7

Mental image definition

Answer 7

A conception of a word’s sense as a picture in the mind of the language user that represents its meaning

Question 8

Usage-based definition

Answer 8

A characterization of a word’s sense based on the way that the word is used by speakers of a language

Question 9

Hyponymy or Hyponym

Answer 9

A meaning relationship between words, where the reference of some word X is included in the reference of some other word Y. X is then said to be a hyponym of Y, and conversely, Y is said to be a hypernym of X

Question 10

Sister terms

Answer 10

Words that, in terms of their reference, are at the same level in the hierarchy, i.e. have exactly the same hypernyms

Question 11

Synonymy or Synonym

Answer 11

A meaning relationship between words where their reference is exactly the same

Question 12

Antonymy or Antonym

Answer 12

A meaning relationship between words where their meanings are in some sense opposite

Question 13

Complementary Antonym

Answer 13

Pair of antonyms such that everything must be described by the first words, the second word, or neither

Question 14

Gradable Antonyms

Answer 14

Words that are antonyms and denote opposite ends of a scale

Question 15

Reverses

Answer 15

Antonyms in which one word in the pair suggests movement that “undoes” the movement suggested by the other

Question 16

Converses

Answer 16

Antonyms in which the first word of the pair suggests a point of view opposite to that of the second word

Question 17

Proposition

Answer 17

The sense expressed by a sentence. Characteristically, propositions can be true or false, i.e. have truth values

Question 18

Truth value

Answer 18

Either true or false. The reference of a sentence.

Question 19

Truth conditions

Answer 19

The set of conditions that would have to hold in the world in order for the proposition expressed by some sentence to be true

Question 20

Entailment

Answer 20

A relationship between propositions where a proposition p is said to entail another proposition q just in case if p is true, q has to be true as well

Question 21

Mutual entailment

Answer 21

The relationship between two propositions where they entail one another

Question 22

Incompatibility

Answer 22

The relationship between two propositions where it is impossible for both of them to be true simultaneously

Question 23

Principle of compositionality

Answer 23

The notion that the meaning of a phrasal expression is predictable from the meanings of the expressions it contains and how they were syntactically combined

Question 24

Compositional Meaning

Answer 24

The meaning of phrasal expression that is predictable from the meanings of smaller expressions it contains and how they are syntactically cobined

Question 25

Idiom

Answer 25

A multi-word lexical expression whose meaning is not compositional

Question 26

Pure intersection

Answer 26

The 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

Question 27

Relative intersection

Answer 27

Type of relationship between adjective and noun reference where the reference of the adjective is determined relative to the noun reference

Question 28

Subsective adjectives

Answer 28

Adjective whose reference is included in the set of things that noun they modify refers to

Question 29

Non-intersection Adjective

Answer 29

An 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

Question 30

Anti-intersection adjectives

Answer 30

An adjectives whose referents are not in the set referred ti by the noun that it modifies