1. Semantics Sense vs. reference Phrasal semantics
LING 200
Spring 2003
Reading: Files 7.2, 7.4

2. Sense vs. reference 1. --‘What does [kuutib] mean?’
--‘Let’s ask Joyce.’
vs. --‘Let’s ask the TA who studied Arabic.’
2. ‘I want to be the president of the U.S.’
vs.
‘I want to be George W. Bush.’

3. Sense vs. reference
Reference (‘extension’): identity of real world object
Sense (‘intension’): (compositionally determined) meaning
Same referent, unequal sense
‘Anya’ vs. ‘the TA who speaks Russian’
‘Anya’ has no inherent meaning (female given name)
cf. ‘the TA who speaks Russian’

4. Sense vs. reference Reference but not sense. Many proper names
‘Anya’
‘George W. Bush’
Sense without reference
‘the queen of the United States’
‘the B wing elevator in Padelford Hall’

5. Iconic vs. non-iconic reference
Arbitrariness of sound  meaning
[hEr] ‘hair’ vs. ‘hare’
Onomatopoeia
to neigh, meow, bark, moo, oink, etc.

6. Iconic vs. non-iconic reference

7. Prototypical reference
For many common nouns, the set of possible referents are clustered around a prototype.
E.g. ‘bird’
Prototypical exemplars of a category are more readily processed than atypical exemplars.

8. Reference and prototypes
Prototypes vs. set of possible referents:
some set overlap possible:
‘bowl’ vs ‘cup’

9. Reference and prototypes
‘a few’ vs ‘several’
‘blue’ vs ‘green’

10. Coreference Grammatical encoding of reference
Pronoun form. Reflexive pronouns:
singular
plural 1
myself
ourselves 2
yourself
yourselves 3
himself, herself, itself
themselves

11. Coreference Aixa asked if Joyce could excuse herself.
‘herself’ must be coreferential with another NP in the same sentence
‘her’ must not be coreferential with another NP in the same sentence

12. Coreference Joyce burped.
Aixaj asked S[if Joycei could excuse herselfi].
Aixa burped.
Aixaj asked S[if Joycei could excuse herj].

13. Sentence (phrasal) semantics
How do the meanings of lexical items combine?
What are the rules for determining the relationships between complex meanings?

14. Sentence (phrasal) semantics
Compositionality
Anomaly
Entailment

15. Compositionality Synonymous phrases
It's hard to find a good latte.
= A good latte is hard to find.
Principle of Compositionality/Frege's Principle:
Sentence meaning is determined by morpheme meaning and syntactic structure
Meaning of
Dave loves Rose. vs.
Rose loves Dave.

16. Non-compositionality
Idioms/proverbs: literal vs. figurative (noncompositional) meaning (‘free translation’)
idiom
phrasal category
noncompositional meaning
to spill the beans VP
‘to divulge an important secret’
to split hairs
‘to insist on minute detail’
to put one’s foot in one’s mouth
‘say something stupid, regrettable, insensitive’

17. More idioms to go down VP ‘to occur (important or dangerous event)’
to run up
‘to incur a large expense’
dead end NP
‘termination of street with no connection to another street’
black market
‘illegal trading or exchange’

18. Idioms in other languages: Sekani
phrasal category
literal meaning
noncompositional meaning
tche/ nikl VP
‘it wagged its tail’
‘he/she/it died’
thìtshìsni/õ
‘he/she put my head in the water’
‘he/she criticized me’
thehkhahce ilà/ NP
‘frog hand’
‘slow, clumsy hands’

19. Idioms in other languages: Witsuwit’en
phrasal category
literal meaning
noncompositional meaning
[yX ste] VP
‘he/she stays home’
‘she is pregnant’
[nyzil util/y/]
‘he/she/it likes your smell’
‘he/she/it is used to you’
[c’t’xwts’y il] NP
‘bird backpack’
‘large wet snowflake’
[lyap t/at p yininye] S
‘the devil fought with his wife’
‘there was a hail storm’

20. Anomaly Semantically ill-formed phrases
meanings that cannot combine with each other
The slideshow amused the students vs.
#The slideshow amused the projector.
Syntactic well-formedness independent of semantic well-formedness
‘Colorless green ideas sleep furiously’

21. Anomaly Anomalous expression = ‘oxymoron’
Sign in a London department store: Bargain basement upstairs
On a church door: 'This is the gate of Heaven. Enter Ye all by this door.' (This door is kept locked because of the draught. Please use side door.)
Outside a disco: Smarts is the most exclusive disco in town. Everyone welcome.

22. Entailment If X entails Y, then whenever X is true Y is also true.
X: Last night I did the dishes and straightened the living room.
entails:
Y: Last night I did the dishes.
X: Mike Price was fired.
Y: Someone was fired.

23. Entailment Mutual entailment = complete synonymy
‘Put off’ is synonymous with ‘procrastinate about’ If
The professor put off writing the paper. entails
The professor procrastinated about writing the paper.
and
The professor procrastinated about writing the paper. entails
The professor put off writing the paper.
Then
is synonymous with

24. Predicting entailment
1. Factive verbs: be sorry, regret, stop
Factive verbs entail the truth of their complements.

25. I’m sorry you were late. entails You were late.
I regret the incident. entails
There was an incident.
When did you stop beating your wife? entails
You were beating your wife.
compare other complement taking verbs, like think: I think the party is over. The party is not necessarily over.

26. Complements of factive verbs cannot be ‘cancelled’
Aixa is sorry the party is over (#but it’s still going on).
Complements of non-factive verbs can be cancelled
Aixa said the party is over (but it’s still happening).
Aixa thinks the party is over (but it’s actually still in full swing).

27. Predicting entailment
2. Dictum de Omni
If sentences X and Y differ only in that X contains a hyponym (special case) of Y, then X generally entails Y.

28. Dictum de Omni dill pickle is a hyponym of pickle
X: Dave ate a dill pickle. entails
Y: Dave ate a pickle.
Japanese car is a hyponym of car
X: Anya bought a Japanese car. entails
Y: Anya bought a car.

29. Predicting entailment
But:
celebrity boxing is a hyponym of boxing
X: Darva Conger enjoys celebrity boxing.
does not entail:
Y: Darva Conger enjoys (all forms of) boxing.
Actually, Y entails X!

30. Predicting entailment
3. Dictum de nullo
If sentences X and Y differ only in that X contains a hypernym (general case) found in Y, then X generally entails Y.
Syntactic conditions under which Dictum de Nullo applies instead of Dictum de Omni:
Negative sentences
Conditional sentences
Sentences containing ‘all’, ‘every’; habitual sentences

31. Negative sentences Seattle is a hypernym of Ballard
X: ‘Bill Gates doesn't live in Seattle.’ entails
Y: ‘Bill Gates doesn't live in Ballard.’

32. Conditional sentences
sports car is a hypernym of German sports car
X: If Bill bought a sports car, then it must be a nice car. entails
Y: If Bill bought a German sports car, then it must be a nice car.

33. Sentences with 'every'
boxing match is a hypernym of celebrity boxing match
X: Darva Conger watched every boxing match entails
Y: Darva Conger watched every celebrity boxing match.

34. Habitual sentences boxing is a hypernym of celebrity boxing
X: Darva Conger enjoys boxing. entails
Y: Darva Conger enjoys celebrity boxing.

35. Entailment summary
Possible to predict when some sentences entail other sentences.
Depends on
whether sentence contains a factive verb or not
which sentence contains hypernym vs. hyponym
type of sentence: positive vs. negative /conditional / ‘every’, habitual

36. “It’s just semantics” Semantics overlaps with morphology, syntax
Semantic competence
Lexical semantics
Cross-linguistic variation in the number of morphemes to encode concepts
Semantic relations: antonymy, synonymy, ambiguity, hyponymy, entailment
Sense vs. reference, coreference
Compositional and non-compositional aspects of linguistic meaning