1. Lecture 7
Meaning

2. The study of the meaning of linguistic units, in particular, words and sentences, is called semantics.
Meaning is something that is rather intangible and invisible. We cannot cut meaning up into constituents in the way we cut up a syntactic construction. Meaning is also elusive, in that you cannot pin down the meaning of a word or sentence.

3. Study of meaning Semantics: meaning of words and sentences
Pragmatics: meaning of utterances

4. Linguistic semantics vs. logical/philosophical semantics
Logical / philosophical semantics: propositional meaning or compositional meaning, concentrating on a restricted range of sentences (typically, statements, or “propositions”) within a single sentence ;
Linguistic semantics: the properties of meaning in a systematic and objective way, with reference to as wide a range of utterances and languages as possible.

5. 7.1 The meaning of “meaning”
7.2 The referential theory
7.3 Sense relations
7.4 Componential analysis
7.5 Sentence meaning

6. 7.1 The meaning of “meaning”
C. K. Ogden ( ) & I. A. Richards ( ), 1923, The Meaning of Meaning .
They listed 22 meanings of “meaning”.

7. John means to write.
A green light means to go.

8. Health means everything.
His look was full of meaning.

9. What is the meaning of life?

10. What does “capitalist” mean to you?

11. What does “cornea” mean?
The transparent, convex, anterior portion of the outer fibrous coat of the eyeball that covers the iris and the pupil and is continuous with the sclera.

12. Conceptual meaning 概念意义
Geoffery Leech recognizes 7 types of meaning in his Semantics: The Study of meaning (1974, 1981).
Conceptual meaning 概念意义
Connotative meaning 内涵意义
Social meaning 社会意义
Affective meaning 情感意义
Reflected meaning 反映意义
Collocative meaning 搭配意义
Thematic meaning 主题意义
Associative
meaning
联想意义

13. Conceptual meaning is sometimes also called “denotative” meaning or “cognitive” meaning. It refers to the logical, cognitive or denotative content of a linguistic unit. It is concerned with the relationship between a word and thing it denotes, or refers to.

14. By “connotative meaning”, Leech refers to the communicative value an expression has by virtue of what it refers to, over and above its purely conceptual content. It is a multitude of additional, non-criterial properties, including not only physical characteristics but also psychological and social properties, as well as typical features.
The connotative meaning involves the “real word” experience one associates with an expression when one uses or hears it. Compared with conceptual meaning, this meaning is unstable: they vary considerably according to culture, historical period, and the experience of the individual. Any characteristic of the referent, identified subjectively or objectively, may contribute to the connotative meaning of the expression which denotes it.

16. Step mother

19. Social meaning refers to what a piece of language conveys about the social circumstances of its use. The social meaning of an expression varies according to
Dialect 方言, the language of a geographical region or of a
social class
Time 时间, the language of the 18th c., etc.
Province 使用域, the language of law, of science, of
advertising, etc.
Status 等级, polite, colloquial, slang, etc.
Modality 语气, language of memoranda, lectures, jokes, etc.
Singularity 特性, the style of Dickens, Hemingway, etc.

20. domicile: very formal, official
residence: formal
abode: poetic
home: general
steed: poetic
horse: general
nag: slang
gee-gee: baby

21. The five clocks by Martin Joos
Frozen Formal Consultative Casual Intimate
Formal < > Informal

22. Affective meaning reflects the personal feelings of the speaker, including his attitude to the listener, or his attitude to something he is talking about. For example, to ask a person to be quiet, you may say:
I’m terribly sorry to interrupt, but I wonder if you would be so kind as to lower
your voice a little, or
Will you belt up.

23. Reflected meaning arises in cases of multiple conceptual meaning, when one sense of a word forms part of our response to another sense.
“The Comforter” vs. “The Holy Ghost”

24. ‘Colorful’ meaning Commendatory tough-minded resolute, firm shrewd
childlike
wiseman
man of usual talent
portly, stout, solid, plum
slender, slim
Derogatory
ruthless
obstinate
sly, crafty
childish
wiseguy
freak
fleshy, fat, tubby
lean, skinny, lanky, weedy, scraggy

25. Collocative meaning refers to the associations a word acquires on account of the meanings of words which tend to occur in its environment.
Pretty: girl, boy, woman, flower, garden, colour, village, etc.
Handsome: boy, man, car, vessel, overcoat, airliner, typewriter, etc.

26. Thematic meanings refers to what is communicated by the way in which a speaker or writer organizes the message, in terms of ordering, focus and emphasis.
Mrs. Bessie Smith donated the first prize.
The first prize was donated by Mrs. Bessie Smith.

27. In everyday conversation, there are four types of meaning of “meaning”:
the object it stands for: This is the commonest way of explaining meaning and it’s the way used when adults teach vocabulary to children.
description of that object: You may describe a desk as “a piece of furniture with a flat top and four legs, at which one reads and writes”.
paraphrase of the word: You may also say “A desk is a kind of table with drawers”.
translation of the word: An English teacher may say to his Chinese student: A desk is 书桌.

28. 7.2 The Referential theory 所指理论
This is a very popular theory. It refers to the theory of meaning which relates the meaning of a word to the thing it refers to or stands for.

29. Problems with the theory

30. “Chair” can mean something beyond the concrete object we see
“Chair” can mean something beyond the concrete object we see. And that something is abstract, which has no existence in the material world and can only be sensed in our minds. This abstract thing is what we call “concept”.

31. The Semantic Triangle: Odgen & Richards
thought/concept/image
refers to
symbolizes
referent
(object)
symbol
(word)
stands for

32. airplane

33. Sense and reference 意义与所指
The difference between sense and reference is that sense refers to the abstract properties of an entity, while reference refers to the concrete entities having these properties. This difference is similar to the difference between connotation and denotation. Then we can say, Leech’s conceptual meaning has two sides: sense and reference.

34. There is another difference between sense and reference
There is another difference between sense and reference. Every word has a sense, that is to say, every word has some conceptual content; otherwise we cannot understand and use the word. But not every word has a reference. Still other words refer to something that is only imaginary, with no existence in reality. And also, it is not always convenient to explain a word in terms of the object it refers to.
When we study meaning, we study in terms of sense rather than reference.

35. 7.3 Sense relations 意义关系
Sense relations refers to the relations between different linguistic units. The sense of a word may be seen as the network of its sense relations with others. In other words, sense may be defined as the semantic relations between one word and another, or more generally between one linguistic unit and another. There are generally three kinds of sense relations recognized, namely, sameness relation, oppositeness relation and inclusiveness relation.

36. 7.3.1 Synonymy 同义关系
buy: purchase
world: universe
brotherly: fraternal

37. There are no real synonyms.
wireless: radio – no longer in use
buy: purchase – appropriateness according to the context
deep: profound; broad: wide – collocation
politician: statesman – connotation

38. thrifty – commendatory
economical – neutral
stingy – pejorative
slender – commendatory
thin – neutral
skinny – pejorative

39. 7.3.2 Antonymy 反义关系
ANTONYMY is the name for oppositeness relation. There are three main sub-types: gradable antonymy, complementary antonymy, and converse antonymy.

40. Gradable antonymy 分级反义
good:bad, long:short, big:small
 First, they are GRADABLE.
Second, antonyms of this kind are graded against different norms.
Third, there is usually a cover term in pairs of words like these.

41. Complementary antonymy 互补反义
male-female, true-false, alive-dead, single-married, pass-fail, boy-girl
Adjectives in this group differ from gradable antonyms in the following aspects:
They cannot be modified by “very”: *That old man is very dead.
They don’t have comparative or superlative degrees. *Tom is more alive than Peter.
He is more dead than alive. – not a true comparative: It’s more correct to say he is dead than to say he is alive. John is more mad than stupid.

43. The norm in this type is absolute
The norm in this type is absolute. It does not vary with the thing a word is applied to. The same norm is used for all the things it is applicable to.
Thirdly, there is no cover term for the two members of a pair.

44. A real exception in this group is “true”, which can be used in some aspects as a cover term.
How true is the story?
The description is very true to the situation.

45. Converse antonymy 逆向反义
This type of antonymy is also known as relational opposites. It is typically seen in reciprocal social roles, kinship relations, temporal and spatial relations.
buy:sell, lend:borrow, give:receive, parent:child, husband:wife, host:guest, employer:employee, teacher:student, above:below, before:after
In this type of antonymy, the members of a pair do not constitute a positive-negative opposition. They show the reversal of a relationship between two entities.

46. In converse antonymy, there are always two entities involved
In converse antonymy, there are always two entities involved. One presupposes the other.
The comparative degrees like bigger: smaller, longer:shorter, better:worse, older:younger also belong here, since they involve a relation between two entities.

47. 7.3.3 Hyponymy 上下义关系
This is the term for the relation of inclusiveness. It is a matter of class membership.
desk < furniture
rose < flower
tiger < animal

48. The name for the class, which is the upper term in this sense relation, is called SUPERORDINATE (上坐标词), and the lower terms, the members, HYPONYMS (下义词). A superordinate usually has several hyponyms. These members of the same class are CO-HYPONYMS (同下义词)

49. Sometimes a superordinate may be a superordinate to itself.
From another point of view, animal is a hyponym of itself. In this sense, it is called auto-hyponym (自我下义词).

50. Auto-hyponyms
chicken: cock, hen, chicken;
dog: dog, bitch, puppy.

51. Sometimes there will be only hyponyms, without a superordinate.
Colored
Dear White Fella
                  Couple things you should know—
                  When I born, I black
                  When I grow up, I black
                 When I go in sun, I black
                  When I cold, I black
                  When I scared, I black
                  When I sick, I black
                  And when I die—I still black
                  You White Fella
                  When you born, you pink
                  When you grow up, you white
                  When you go in sun, you red
                  When you cold, you blue
                  When you scared, you yellow
                  When you sick, you green
                  And when you die, you grey
                  And you have the cheek
                  To call me colored

52. Hyponyms may also be missing, for example, snow
 Hyponyms may also be missing, for example, snow. In contrast to Chinese, there is only one word in English for the different kinds of uncles: 伯伯、叔叔、舅舅、姑父、姨父. The word rice is also used in the different senses of 稻、谷、米、饭.

53. 7.4 Componential analysis 成分分析
Human
Man (ADULT, MALE)
Woman (ADULT, FEMALE)
Boy (YOUNG, MALE)
Girl (YOUNG, FEMALE)

54. Animal words male female non-adult bull cow calf ram ewe lamb
boar sow piglet

55. The components YOUNG and ADULT may be combined together as ADULT, with YOUNG represented as ~ADULT; MALE and FEMALE may be combined together as MALE, with FEMALE represented as ~MALE.

56. Domestic animals bull ram boar cow ewe sow calf lamb piglet
male
adult

57. English motion verbs natural hurried forward one foot always on ground
walk
march
run
limp

58. Words like father, mother, son and daughter are more complex examples
Words like father, mother, son and daughter are more complex examples. They involve a relation between two entities and can be shown by expressions in logic:
 father = PARENT (x, y) & MALE (x)  mother = PARENT (x, y) & ~MALE (x)  son = CHILD (x, y) & MALE (x)  daughter = CHILD (x, y) & ~MALE (x)

59. Verbs can also be analysed in this way, for example,
take = CAUSE (x, (HAVE (x, y))) give = CAUSE (x, (~HAVE (x, y))) die = BECOME (x, (~ALIVE (x))) kill = CAUSE (x, (BECOME (y (~ALIVE (y))))) murder = INTEND (x, (CAUSE x, (BECOME (y, (~ALIVE (y))))))　

60. Componential analysis may help us to understand sense relations.
If two words, or two expressions, have the same semantic component, they are synonymous with each other.
Bachelor (+human, +male, +adult, -married)
Unmarried man (+human, +male, +adult, -married)

61. Words which have a contrasting component, on the other hand, are antonyms.
Boy (+human, -adult, +male)
Girl (+human, -adult, -male)
Man (+human, +adult, +male)
Woman (+human, +adult, -male)
 take = CAUSE (x, (HAVE (x, y)))     give = CAUSE (x, (~HAVE (x, y)))

62. Words which have all the semantic components of another are hyponyms of the latter:
Boy (+human, -adult, +male)
Girl (+human, -adult, -male)
Child (+human, -adult)

63. These semantic components will also explain sense relations between sentences. Sentences are self-contradictory, as there are words, or expressions, which have contradictory semantic components in them.
a. *John killed Bill but Bill didn't die.
  kill = CAUSE (x, (BECOME (y (~ALIVE (y))))) b. *John killed Bill but he was not the cause of Bill's death.
  kill = CAUSE (x, (BECOME (y (~ALIVE (y))))) c. *John murdered Bill without intending to.
murder = INTEND (x, (CAUSE x, (BECOME (y, (~ALIVE (y))))))
d. *The bachelor is married to Mary.
(-married)
e. *His type-writer had had intentions.
(-animate) (+animate)

64. Entailment 蕴含
This is a sense relation between a pair of sentences in which the truth of the second sentence follows from the truth of the first while the falsity of the first follows from the falsity of the second rather than the other way round.
a. There are three students in the room.
b. There are three people in the room.

65. In terms of semantic components, we can say it is because sentence a contains words which have all the semantic components of a word used in sentence b.
1. a. John killed Bill.  kill = CAUSE (x,
(BECOME (y (~ALIVE (y)))))     b. Bill died. 2. a. I saw a boy. Boy (+human, -adult, +male)      b. I saw a child. 3. a. John is a bachelor. Bachelor (+human,
+male, +adult, -married)      b. John is unmarried.

66. Disadvantages
Some words are polysemous. They have more than one meaning, and thus have different sets of semantic components.
Man (+male)
Man (+male) Man is mortal.
Man (-male) Mrs. Thatcher was the only man in the parliament.

67. Secondly, some semantic components are seen as binary taxonomies
Secondly, some semantic components are seen as binary taxonomies. MALE and FEMALE is one, and ADULT and YOUNG is another. But the opposition between MALE and FEMALE is different from that between ADULT and YOUNG.

68.  Thirdly, the examples we have seen are only concerned with the neatly organized parts of the vocabulary. There may be words whose semantic components are difficult to ascertain. Then there is the question of whether they are really universal, whether the vocabulary of every language may be analysed in this way. And even if the answers to these questions are all positive, there is still the question of how to explain the semantic components themselves.

69. 7.5 Sentence meaning
Sentence meaning is related to the meaning of words used in it, but it is not a simple sum total of it. There are different cases:
Same words, different word order, different meaning
The man chased the dog.     The dog chased the man.
Similar denotative meaning, different thematic meaning:
I've already seen that film.    That film I've already seen.
Linear order and hierarchical structure:
The son of Pharaoh's daughter is the daughter of
Pharaoh's son.

70. 7.5.1 An integrated theory
The idea that the meaning of a sentence depends on the meanings of the constituent words and the way they are combined is usually known as the principle of COMPOSITIONALITY组合性.

71. Katz & Fodor (1963): The structure of a semantic theory
Katz & Fodor (1963): The structure of a semantic theory. This is a 40-page long paper published in Language. The method itself is years out of date, but the debate about the principle of compositionality is by no means over (Cruse, 2004: 77). The idea behind the principle was to solve the problem of generating grammatical but incorrect sentences like Colorless green ideas sleep furiously. The purpose was to wage an attack on Chomsky’s basis assumption that correct sentences could be generated by syntactic transformation alone, disregarding the semantic rules at Surface structure.

72. Their basic idea is that a semantic theory consists of two parts: a dictionary (词典) and a set of projection rules (投射规则). The dictionary provides the grammatical classification and semantic information of words. The projection rules are responsible for combining the meanings of words together.

73. semantic markers 语义标记: (Male), (Female), (Human), (Animal)
distinguishers 辨义成分:
Bachelor
a. [who has never married] b. [young knight serving under the standard of another knight] c. [who has the first or lowest academic degree] d. [young fur seal when without a mate during the breeding time]

75. Although many semanticists turned away from Chomsky by developing formal semantic theories by themselves, Chomsky did admit soon that semantic rules would be found at Deep Structure as well as Surface Structure (Extended Standard Theory) and later on placed semantic rules/representation in the Surface Structure altogether (since Revised Extended Standard Theory). Other ideas were also incorporated into Chomsky’s later models of grammar, e.g. the concept of projection.

76. According to the principle of compositionality, each word in the lexicon is equipped with certain components and combinations of words into sentences must go through certain selection restrictions 选择限制 in order to produce acceptable sentences. Thus we can say colorful ball because
colorful {Adj}
(Color) [abounding in contrast or variety of bright colors] < (Physical Object) or (Social Activity)>
(Evaluative) [having distinctive character, vividness, or picturequeness] < (Aesthetic Object) or (Social Activity)>
Ball {Nc}
(Social Activity) (Large) (Assembly) [for the purpose of social dancing]
(Physical Object) [having globular shape]
(Physical Object0 [solid missile for projection by engine of war]

77. John hit the colorful balls .
We had a colorful ball last night.

78. Problems in the theory
First, the distinction between semantic marker and distinguisher is not very clear. And eventually Katz dropped this distinction completely.

79.  Second, there are cases in which the collocation of words cannot be accounted for by grammatical markers, semantic markers or selection restrictions.

80. The most serious defect concerns the use of semantic markers like (Human) and (Male), which, more usually called semantic components as we mentioned in the last section, are elements of an artificial meta-language. To explain the meaning of man in terms of (Human), (Male) and (Adult), one must go on to explain the meaning of these semantic markers themselves, otherwise it means nothing.

81. 5.5.2 Logical semantics
PROPOSITIONAL LOGIC命题逻辑, also known as propositional calculus 命题演算or sentential calculus句子演算, is the study of the truth conditions for propositions: how the truth of a composite proposition is determined by the truth value of its constituent propositions and the connections between them. We may very loosely equate the proposition of a sentence with its meaning.

82.  Proposition: a statement, with a truth value (true or false), e.g.
The earth is flat.
The earth goes around the sun.
All teachers are female.

83. Logical relations Not¬ /~: ¬P And &: P & Q Or ∨: P ∨ Q, ¬P ∨ Q
If … then → : P→ Q
If and only if … then ↔ /≡: P≡ Q

84. p q
p & q
p ∨q
p →q
p ≡q
T T T
T F F
F T
F F

85. Predicate logic谓语逻辑
Propositional logic treats a simple proposition as an unanalyzed whole. This is inadequate for the analysis of valid inferences like the syllogism below:
    All men are rational.     Socrates is a man.     Therefore, Socrates is rational.

86. To explain why these inferences are valid, we need to turn to PREDICATE LOGIC, also called PREDICATE CALCULUS谓语演算, which studies the internal structure of simple propositions.
Socrates is a man.
argument predicate

87. The truth value of a proposition varies with the argument
The truth value of a proposition varies with the argument. When Socrates is indeed a man, M (s) is true. On the other hand, as Cupid is an angel, the proposition represented by the logical formula M (c) is false. If we use the numeral 1 to stand for “true” and 0 for “false”, then we can represent these two examples as the formulas: M (s) = 1, M (c) = 0.

88. Argument主目 and Predicate谓语
John runs. → runs’ (John’) or R(j)
John loves Mary. →loves’ (John’, Mary’) or L(j, m)
John gave Mary a book. →gave’ (John’, Mary’, book’) or G(j, m, b)

89. One-place predicate一位谓语: run
Two-place predicate二位谓语: love
Three-place predicate三位谓语: give

90. Quantifiers量词 The universal quantifier全称量词: all All men are rational.
∀x (M(x) → R(x)).
For all x, it is the case that, if x is a man, then x is rational

91. The existential quantifier存在量词: some
Some men are clever
∃ x (M(x) & C(x))
There are some x's that are both men and clever
There exists at least one x, such that x is a man and x is clever

92. The universal and existential quantifiers are related to each other in terms of negation. One is the logical negation of the other.
∀x (P(x)) ≡ ~∃x (~ P(x)) All men are mortal. ≡ There is no man that is not mortal.
 ~∀x (P(x) ≡ ∃x (~ P(x)) Not all men are rational. ≡ There are some men that are not rational.
 ∃x (P(x)) ≡ ~∀x (~ P(x)) Some men are rational. ≡ Not all men are not rational.
  ~∃x (P(x)) ≡ ∀x (~ P(x)) Some men are rational. ≡ All men are not rational.

93. All men are rational. Socrates is a man
All men are rational. Socrates is a man. Therefore, Socrates is rational.
∀x (M(x) → R(x))  M(s)  ∴R(s)

94. *∀x (M(x) → R(x))   R(s)   ∴M(s) * ∃x (M(x) & C(x))    M(s)    ∴C(s)

95. Set theory 集合论

96. Define:
Conceptual meaning, denotation, connotation, reference, sense, synomymy, gradable antonymy, complementary antonymy, converse antonymy, relational opposites, hyponymy, superordiante, semantic component, compositionality, propositional logic, proposition, predicate logic, logic connective

97. Discuss: 1. What are the different types of antonyms?
2. Some people maintain that there are no true antonyms. Do you agree? Why? What type of meaning are we talking about when we say two words are synonymous with each other?
There is a saying that “to some extent, any two words of the same part of speech may become antonyms, as long as the meaning difference between them is what needs to be emphasized in the particular context.” What’s your opinion? Discuss in relation to the two examples:
You have to peel a raw potato but you can skin a boiled one.
He is no statesman, but a mere politician.