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Semantics and Pragmatics 2019 Solved Short Questions

1. What is the difference between temporal and spatial deixis ?
Ans. Spatial deixis concerns itself with the spatial locations relevant to an
utterance. The locations may be either those of the speaker and addressee or those
of persons or objects being referred to. The most salient English examples are the
adverbs here and there, and the demonstratives this, these, that, and those. Some
example sentences are given below,
I enjoy living in this city.
She was sitting over there.
Temporal deixis concerns itself with the various times involved in and
referred to in an utterance. This includes time adverbs like “now”, “then”, and
“soon”, as well as different verbal tenses. Look at the example sentence below,
It is raining now, but I hope when you read this it will be sunny.

2. What is the difference between denotative and connotative meanings ?

(2019,2017)
Ans. Denotation is the literal meaning of a word, whereas connotation is an
indirect or implied meaning or feeling.
For example, consider the word “gritty”. The definition of gritty is “having
a rough texture.” So, in a literal sense (denotation), we might say:
This sandpaper is gritty.
But, consider this sentence:
That side of town is pretty gritty.
In that sense, we’re not saying that section of the city has a “rough texture”
in a literal sense. Instead, we’re saying it’s a tough neighborhood, perhaps with
issues related to crime and poverty.

3. What is meant by an OPAQUE CONTEXT ? (2019,2017)

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Ans. An opaque context is a linguistic context in which it is not always possible

to substitute “co-referential” expressions (expressions referring to the same
object) without altering the truth of sentences.
For example, “Lois believes x is a hero” is an opaque context because “Lois
believes Superman is a hero” is true while “Lois believes Clark Kent is a hero” is
false, even though ‘Superman’ and ‘Clark Kent’ are co-referential expressions.

4. Is meaningfulness synonymous with informativeness. Briefly explain.

(2019, 2017)
Ans. Meaningfulness is not necessarily synonymous with informativeness as
meaningfulness is the quality of having great value or significance, while
informativeness serves to inform or to provide or disclose information. This
information may or may not have value or significance.

5. What is the difference between reference and sense ?

Ans. The reference of a word is the relation between the linguistic expression
and the entity in the real world to which it refers. In contrast to reference, sense
is defined as its relations to other expressions in the language system. In other
words, the reference of a word is the object it means or indicates, whereas its
sense is what the word expresses.
The classic example cited showing the distinction is the planet Venus. As
a planet it has reference arbitrarily given the name Venus. It is often called the
morning star when seen in the morning, and the evening star when seen in the
evening. Thus, it has two senses, depending on the time of day the object is seen.

6. What is meant by co-text and range of reference ?

Ans. Co-text refers to the words surrounding a particular word or passage within
a text that provide context and help to determine the meaning. For Example a key
to a door a key on a keyboard or a key to solve the problem The words door,
keyboard, and the problem are co-text of the word “ key”.
A range of reference is a collection of all possible entities in the referential
realm denoted by a lexical unit. For example, the range of reference of lexical

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unit “bat” is “a winged, nocturnal animal” and “a piece of sporting equipment

used in baseball.”

7. Explain the sentence in your own words : “every expression that has
meaning has sense but not every expression has reference” ? (2019, 2017)
Ans. The reference of a word is the relation between the linguistic expression
and the entity in the real world to which it refers. In contrast to reference, sense
is defined as its relations to other expressions in the language system. Thus, there
are words that have a sense, but no referents in the real world.
For example, the name “Odysseus” is intelligible, and therefore has a
sense, even though there is no individual object (its reference) to which the name
corresponds.

8. What is a referring expression ? (2019, 2017)

Ans. Referring expression is any expression used in an utterance to refer to
something or someone, namely used with particular referent in the mind of the
speaker.
For example, when I utter “Tom called me last night”; I have a particular
person in my mind when I say ‘Tom’. So, it is a referring expression.

9. What is the difference between extensions and referents ? (2019, 2017)

Ans. A referent is a person or thing to which a name, a linguistic expression or
other symbol, refers. For example, in the sentence Mary saw me, the referent of
the word Mary is the particular person called Mary who is being spoken of, while
the referent of the word me is the person uttering the sentence.
Extension, on the other hand, indicates the range of applicability of a term
or concept by naming the particular objects that it denotes. For example, the
extension of the word “dog” is the set of all (past, present and future) dogs in the
world: the set includes Fido, Rover, Lassie, Rex, and so on.

10. What is meant by prototypes ? (2019, 2017)

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Ans. A prototype is a cognitive reference point or the proto-image of all

representatives of the meaning of a word or of a category. Thus, a robin or a
sparrow can be regarded as a prototype or a “good example” of the category bird,
whereas a penguin or an ostrich is a rather “bad example” of this category.

11. What do you infer by cooperative principle ? (2019, 2017 b, 2015, 2015
b)
Ans. In conversation analysis, the cooperative principle is the assumption that
participants in a conversation normally attempt to be informative, truthful,
relevant, and clear. The concept was introduced by philosopher H. Paul Grice as
he suggested that meaningful dialogue is characterized by cooperation.

12. Can different expressions have the same referent ? Give an example.
Ans. It is possible to use different noun phrases to refer to the same referent. The
classic example for this is the fact that the expressions the morning star and the
evening star both have the same referent, the planet Venus.

13. What is polysemy ?

Ans. Polysemy is the capacity for a word or phrase to have multiple related
meanings. A polyseme is a word or phrase with different, but related senses.
English has many polysemous words. For example, the verb “to get” can
mean “procure” (I’ll get the drinks), “become” (she got scared), “understand” (I
get it) etc.

14. Differentiate between definite noun phrase and indefinite noun phrase.
(2019, 2017)
Ans. In linguistics, definiteness is a semantic feature of noun phrases,
distinguishing between referents or senses that are identifiable in a given context
(definite noun phrases) and those which are not (indefinite noun phrases).
In English, definiteness is usually marked by the selection of determiner.
Certain determiners, such as a, an, many, and some, along with numbers (e.g.,

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four items), typically mark an noun phrase as indefinite. Others, including the,
that, and genitive noun phrases (e.g., my brother) typically mark the noun phrase
as definite.

15. What is an anaphoric reference ?

Ans. Anaphoric reference occurs when a word or phrase refers to something
mentioned earlier in the discourse.
Here’s an example of anaphoric reference: Michael went to the bank. He
was annoyed because it was closed. In this sentence, he refers to Michael and it
refers to the bank.

16. Define degree of a predicate.

Ans. The degree of predicates is a number indicating the number of arguments it
is normally understood to have in simple sentences.
For example, in the sentence, “school is between mall and hospital”,
between is three-place predicate as it has three arguments : school, mall, hospital.
Similarly, comfortable in “our campus is comfortable” is one-place predicate as
it has one argument : our campus.

Semantics and Pragmatics 2019 b Solved Short Questions

1. What is the difference between semantics and pragmatics ? (2019 b, 2016,
2015)
Ans. Although both semantics and pragmatics are two branches of linguistics that
are related to the meaning of language, there is a major difference between the
two. Semantics is involved with the meaning of words without considering the
context whereas pragmatics analyses the meaning in relation to the relevant
context.

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2. Describe lexical and structural ambiguity.

Ans. Lexical ambiguity (semantic ambiguity) occurs when a word in a sentence
has more than one possible meanings. Given below is an example of lexical
ambiguity.
The sentence “Becky cannot bear children” can have two possible
meanings due to the ambiguous nature of the word bear.
• Becky cannot give birth to children.
• Becky cannot tolerate children.
Structural ambiguity (syntactic ambiguity), on the other hand, occurs
when a phrase or sentence has more than one underlying structure. Such a
sentence can be interpreted in more than one way. Given below is an example of
structural ambiguity.
The sentence “Laura hit the boy with a book” can have different meanings
due to the structure of the sentence.
• Laura used the book to hit the boy.
• Laura hit the boy who was holding a booking.

3. Differentiate between intension and extension.

Ans. Intension refers to the logical or definitional conditions that specify the set
of all possible things a word or phrase could describe, while extension refers to
the set of all actual things the word or phrase describes.
For instance, the intensions of the word dog include properties such as
“animal”, “alive”, and “organism”, among others. Whereas, the extension of the
word “dog” is the set of all (past, present and future) dogs in the world: the set
includes Fido, Rover, Lassie, Rex, and so on.

4. How can prototype be differentiated from stereotype ?

Ans. A prototype is a cognitive reference point or the proto-image of all
representatives of the meaning of a word or of a category. Thus, a robin or a

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sparrow can be regarded as a prototype or a “good example” of the category bird,

whereas a penguin or an ostrich is a rather “bad example” of this category.
A stereotype, on the other hand, is a conventional, formulaic, and
oversimplified conception, opinion, or image. For example, “girls should play
with dolls and boys should play with trucks” is a gender stereotype.

5. Tell whether the following utterances are referring expressions or not.

a. The girl with an umbrella is waiting for the bus. (Yes)
b. A car in “John intends to buy a car. ” (No)

6. What is the difference between icon and index ?

Ans. An Icon is a type of signifier that has a physical resemblance to the signified,
the thing being represented. A photograph is a good example as it certainly
resembles whatever it depicts.
An Index, on the other hand, shows evidence of what is being represented.
A good example is using an image of smoke to indicate fire.

7. Is the Universe of Discourse in the following utterances, the real world

or fictitious world:
a. Grandmother to little boy: “If you don't sleep, the dragon will carry
you away.” (Fictitious world)
b. Doctor to patient : “You are suffering from a deadly disorder. ”
(Real world)

8. Write the hyponyms of the following:

a. Flower (rose, sunflower)
b. Animal (dog, horse)
c. Insect (cockroach, cricket)
d. Tree (pine tree, oak tree)

9. What are descriptive synonyms and near synonyms ?

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Ans. Descriptive synonyms are the words that can be used in the same context
without changing the truth-conditions of a sentence but are prevented by social
taboos from being absolute synonyms. Examples of descriptive synonymy are:
fade, die, decease, nibble off, kick the bucket.
Near synonyms, on the other hand, are words, that are almost synonyms.
They are distinguished from descriptive synonyms by the fact, that the
connotations of the pairs are different and therefore they yield different truth
conditions in a given context. For example,
Usama was freedom fighter.
Usama was a terrorist.
These sentences have different truth conditions, though they are referring
to the same subject. The difference lies in the pragmatic or interpersonal
connotations of the user.

10. Do the following pairs have the same or nearly the same sense ?
a. Bachelors prefer red heads / girls with red hairs are preferred by
unmarried man. (Yes)
b. He is standing at the bank of the river / he has an account at the
bank. (No)

11. What is performative hypothesis ?

Ans. The performative hypothesis is the hypothesis that states that every
sentence is associated with an explicit illocutionary act or. is derived from a deep
structure containing a performative verb.
For example, sentence (a) is derived from (b), or perhaps (c):
a) I'll write you next week.
b) I claim I'll write you next week
c) I promise I'll write you next week.

12. How do people tend to regularize their language while speaking ?

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Ans. Regularization is a linguistic phenomenon observed in language acquisition,

language development, and language change typified by the replacement of
irregular forms in morphology or syntax by regular ones.
Examples are “gooses” instead of “geese” in child speech and replacement
of the Middle English plural form for “cow”, “kine”, with “cows”.

13. What is implicature ? Write its types ?

Ans. An implicature is something the speaker suggests or implies with an
utterance, even though it is not literally expressed. Take for example the
following exchange:
A (to passer by): I am out of gas.
B: There is a gas station 'round the corner.
Here, B does not say, but implicates, that the gas station is open, because
otherwise his utterance would not be relevant in the context.
There are two types of implicature : conventional implicature,
conversational implicature.

14. Define entailment with example. (2019 b, 2017 b)

Ans. In pragmatics (linguistics), entailment is the relationship between two
sentences where the truth of one requires the truth of the other.
For example, “Jim rides a bike to school every morning.” entails “Jim can
ride a bike.” If the first sentence is true, then the second sentence must be true as
well. That is, if Jim rides his bike to school every morning, then he must be able
to ride a bike.

15. Defined deixis and point out deixis used in following sentences :
a. The plane landed then. (then is temporal deixis)
b. It touched down there. (there is spatial deixis)
Ans. In linguistics, deixis is the use of general words and phrases to refer to a
specific time, place, or person in context, e.g., the words tomorrow, there, and
they.

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16. What is the difference between direct and indirect speech acts ?
Ans. An utterance is seen as a direct speech act when there is a direct relationship
between the structure and the communicative function of the utterance.For
example, if a speaker asks, “Would you like to meet me for coffee?” and the other
replies, “No, I cannot meet you for coffee” The second speaker has used an direct
speech act to reject the proposal.
In contrast, indirect speech acts happen if there is no relationship between
the structure and the function of the utterance. For example, if a speaker asks,
“Would you like to meet me for coffee?” and the other replies, “I have class.”
The second speaker has used an indirect speech act to reject the proposal.

Semantics and Pragmatics 2017 Solved Short Questions

1. What is the difference between sentence meaning and speaker meaning ?
Ans. There is often a divergence between the meaning of the linguistic expression
a speaker uses (sentence meaning) and the meaning he intends to communicate
by using it (speaker meaning).
For example, "Would you mind getting off my foot" is an inquiry about
whether the hearer would mind doing something, but what the speaker means is
"do that" ("get off my foot"). The use of language cannot be understood by
considering only sentence meaning. Sentences are spoken in a context.

2. What is the difference between denotative and connotative meaning ?

(2019,2017)
Ans. Denotation is the literal meaning of a word, whereas connotation is an
indirect or implied meaning or feeling.
For example, consider the word “gritty”. The definition of gritty is “having
a rough texture.” So, in a literal sense (denotation), we might say:
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This sandpaper is gritty.

But, consider this sentence:
That side of town is pretty gritty.
In that sense, we’re not saying that section of the city has a “rough texture”
in a literal sense. Instead, we’re saying it’s a tough neighborhood, perhaps with
issues related to crime and poverty.

3. What is meant by an opaque context ?

Ans. An opaque context is a linguistic context in which it is not always possible
to substitute “co-referential” expressions (expressions referring to the same
object) without altering the truth of sentences.
For example, “Lois believes x is a hero” is an opaque context because “Lois
believes Superman is a hero” is true while “Lois believes Clark Kent is a hero” is
false, even though ‘Superman’ and ‘Clark Kent’ are co-referential expressions.

4. Is meaningfulness synonymous with informativeness. Briefly explain.

(2019, 2017)
Ans. Meaningfulness is not necessarily synonymous with informativeness as
meaningfulness is the quality of having great value or significance, while
informativeness serves to inform or to provide or disclose information. This
information may or may not have value or significance.

5. What is the difference between sentence and utterance ?

Ans. The main difference between sentence and utterance is that the sentence
coveys a complete meaning, either spoken or written, whereas utterance may or
may not convey a complete meaning. Utterances exist only in the spoken form.
Here is an example of a sentence “He went to school”. On the other hand,
“Well.. you know…. Errr” is an example of an utterance.

6. What is a proposition ? (2017, 2015 b)

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Ans. The term proposition refers to the language-independent core meaning of

sentences which expresses the factuality of a given state of affairs. Thus, a
proposition is the semantic kernel of a sentence that determines its truth
conditions, independent of its syntactic form and lexical realization.
For example, when two speakers say the same thing by uttering different
sentences, like in, ‘get out of here’ and ‘I’ll have to ask you to leave’, there is
some (non-linguistic) thing, a proposition, that each has said.

7. Explain the sentence in your own words : “every expression that has
meaning has sense but not every expression has reference” ? (2019, 2017)
Ans. The reference of a word is the relation between the linguistic expression
and the entity in the real world to which it refers. In contrast to reference, sense
is defined as its relations to other expressions in the language system. Thus, there
are words that have a sense, but no referents in the real world.
For example, the name “Odysseus” is intelligible, and therefore has a
sense, even though there is no individual object (its reference) to which the name
corresponds.

8. What is a referring expression ? (2019, 2017)

Ans. Referring expression is any expression used in an utterance to refer to
something or someone, namely used with particular referent in the mind of the
speaker.
For example, when I utter “Tom called me last night”; I have a particular
person in my mind when I say ‘Tom’. So, it is a referring expression.

9. What is the difference between extensions and referents ? (2019, 2017)

Ans. A referent is a person or thing to which a name, a linguistic expression or
other symbol, refers. For example, in the sentence Mary saw me, the referent of
the word Mary is the particular person called Mary who is being spoken of, while
the referent of the word me is the person uttering the sentence.
Extension, on the other hand, indicates the range of applicability of a term
or concept by naming the particular objects that it denotes. For example, the
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extension of the word “dog” is the set of all (past, present and future) dogs in the
world: the set includes Fido, Rover, Lassie, Rex, and so on.

10. What is meant by prototypes ? (2019, 2017)

Ans. A prototype is a cognitive reference point or the proto-image of all
representatives of the meaning of a word or of a category. Thus, a robin or a
sparrow can be regarded as a prototype or a “good example” of the category bird,
whereas a penguin or an ostrich is a rather “bad example” of this category.

11. What do you infer by an ambiguous sentence ?

Ans. An ambiguous sentence has two or more possible meanings within a single
sentence or sequence of words. This can confuse the reader and make the meaning
of the sentence unclear.
For example, The sentence “Becky cannot bear children” can have two
possible meanings due to the ambiguous nature of the word bear.
• Becky cannot give birth to children.
• Becky cannot tolerate children.

12. What is performative utterance ?

Ans. In speech acts theory, performative utterances are sentences which not only
describe a given reality, but also change the social reality they are describing.
For example, when Paul says “I promise to do the dishes” in an appropriate
context then he thereby does not just say something, and in particular he does not
describe what he is doing; rather, in making the utterance he performs the
promise; since promising is an illocutionary act, the utterance is thus a
performative utterance.

13. What is hyponymy ? (2017 a, 2017 b)

Ans. In linguistics, hyponym, also called a subtype or a subordinate term, is a
term used to designate a particular member of a broader class. The phenomenon
is known as Hyponymy.

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For instance, daisy and rose are hyponyms of flower. Similarly, pigeon,
crow, eagle and seagull are all hyponyms of bird.

14. Differentiate between definite noun phrase and indefinite noun phrase.
(2019, 2017)
Ans. In linguistics, definiteness is a semantic feature of noun phrases,
distinguishing between referents or senses that are identifiable in a given context
(definite noun phrases) and those which are not (indefinite noun phrases). The
prototypical definite noun phrase picks out a unique, familiar, specific referent.
In English, definiteness is usually marked by the selection of determiner.
Certain determiners, such as a, an, many, and some, along with numbers (e.g.,
four items), typically mark an noun phrase as indefinite. Others, including the,
that, and genitive noun phrases (e.g., my brother) typically mark the noun phrase
as definite.

15. What is the theory of semantics-syntax interface ?

Ans. In linguistics, the syntax–semantics interface is the interaction between
syntax and semantics. Its study encompasses phenomena that pertain to both
syntax and semantics, with the goal of explaining correlations between form and
meaning and to determine the extent to which the meaning of an expression
depends on its syntactic properties and the extent to which its syntactic properties
are a function of its meaning.

16. Define prediction as functional application.

Ans. Linguistic prediction is a phenomenon that occurs whenever information
about a word or other linguistic unit is activated before that unit is actually
encountered.
Prediction seems to occur regularly when the context of a sentence greatly
limits the possible words that have not yet been revealed. For instance, a person
listening to a sentence like, "In the summer it is hot, and in the winter it is..."
would be highly likely to predict the sentence completion "cold" in advance of
actually hearing it.

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Semantics and Pragmatics 2017 b Solved Short Questions

1. What does term “semantics” mean ?
Ans. Semantics is the branch of linguistics concerned with meaning. The two
main areas are logical semantics, concerned with matters such as sense and
reference and presupposition and implication, and lexical semantics, concerned
with the analysis of word meanings and relations between them.

2. Define “Hyponymy” with examples. (2017 a, 2017 b)

Ans. In linguistics, hyponym, also called a subtype or a subordinate term, is a
term used to designate a particular member of a broader class. The phenomenon
is known as Hyponymy.
For instance, daisy and rose are hyponyms of flower. Similarly, pigeon,
crow, eagle and seagull are all hyponyms of bird.

3. How are sentence meaning expressed ?

Ans. A “sentence” is a group of words that express a specific thought. Sentence
meaning refers to the meaning of the linguistic expression a speaker uses. The
use of language cannot be understood by considering only sentence meaning.
Sentences are spoken in a context.
For example, “Would you mind getting off my foot” is an inquiry about
whether the hearer would mind doing something, but what the speaker means is
“do that” (“get off my foot”).

4. Define ambiguity and give its types. (2017 b, 2016, 2015, 2015 b)
Ans. Ambiguity refers to the state of having or expressing more than one possible
meaning or something open to more than one possible meaning. It refers to the
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state in which a word or a statement, any linguistic entity, can be understood in

more than one way.
For example, The sentence “Becky cannot bear children” can have two
possible meanings due to the ambiguous nature of the word bear.
• Becky cannot give birth to children.
• Becky cannot tolerate children.
Types of ambiguity include lexical ambiguity, structural ambiguity and
scope ambiguity.

5. Define entailment with examples. (2019 b, 2017 b)

Ans. In pragmatics (linguistics), entailment is the relationship between two
sentences where the truth of one requires the truth of the other.
For example, “Jim rides a bike to school every morning.” entails “Jim can
ride a bike.” If the first sentence is true, then the second sentence must be true as
well. That is, if Jim rides his bike to school every morning, then he must be able
to ride a bike.

6. Define pragmatics.
Ans. Pragmatics is the branch of linguistics dealing with language in use and the
contexts in which it is used, including such matters as deixis, the taking of turns
in conversation, text organization, presupposition, and implicature.

7. What is presupposition ? (2017 b, 2015 b)

Ans. In the branch of linguistics known as pragmatics, a presupposition (or PSP)
is an implicit assumption about the world or background belief relating to an
utterance whose truth is taken for granted in discourse.
Examples of presuppositions include:
• Jane no longer writes fiction.
Presupposition: Jane once wrote fiction.
• Have you talked to Steve?

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Presupposition: Steve exists.

8. Write down the types of paradigmatic relations. (2017 b, 2016)

Ans. Paradigmatic relation is concerned with the way words are grouped together
into categories, like nouns, verbs, adjectives etc. Words in the same group, or
word class, can be exchanged for each other in a sentence:
‘The dog / cat / chimpanzee bit me ‘.
There are different types of paradigmatic relations. Paradigmatic relations
involve substituting a word for another word from the same word class, either
with a similar meaning (synonymy), an opposite meaning (antonymy), or a-
kind-of meaning (hyponymy).

9. What is Grice’s cooperative principle ? (2019, 2017 b, 2015, 2015 b)

Ans. In conversation analysis, the cooperative principle is the assumption that
participants in a conversation normally attempt to be informative, truthful,
relevant, and clear. The concept was introduced by philosopher H. Paul Grice as
he suggested that meaningful dialogue is characterized by cooperation.

10. What is the difference between Agent and Force ?

Ans. Agent is the semantic role of a person or thing who is the doer of an event.
It is usually the grammatical subject of the verb in an active clause. Examples of
agent are given below,
• The boy ran down the street.
• He was chased by the dog.
Force, on the other hand, is the semantic role of an entity that instigates
an action, but not consciously or voluntarily. Force is distinct from agent because
an agent is volitional, while a force is not. Examples of agent are given below,
• The ship was drowned by storm.
• The quake toppled the building.

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11. What is Meronymy ?

Ans. In semantics, a meronym is a word that denotes a constituent part or a
member of something. For example, apple is a meronym of apple tree (sometimes
written as apple < apple tree). This part-to-whole relationship is called
meronymy.

12. What are the different aspects of meaning of a word ?

Ans. Different aspects of meaning of a word include discoursal, lexical,
morphological, propositional, syntactic, rhetorical, and functional meaning.

13. How semantic field is different from lexical field ?

Ans. A semantic field is the range of words that is employed to discuss some
common topic. For example, the semantic field for hiking might include words
like backpack, incline, terrain, wildlife, navigate, GPS, and boots.
A lexical field is then the range of words which could apply in a given
position of a sentence, each with a slightly different connotation. Consider the
following sentence:
On the trail, I met a hiker.
Let’s assume the range of possibilities for the word hiker: its lexical field.
In this same sentence, we might choose to use the words backpacker, explorer,
climber, alpinist, or adventurer. Each of these words conveys a similar meaning
to the word hiker; this is a lexical field for that idea.

14. What are general felicity conditions?

Ans. In pragmatics and speech-act theory, the term felicity conditions refers to
the conditions that must be in place and the criteria that must be satisfied for a
speech act to achieve its purpose. General felicity conditions are given below,
a. Propositional content
b. Essential conditions
c. Sincerity conditions
d. Preparatory conditions

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15. What is a locutionary act ?

Ans. In speech-act theory, a locutionary act is the act of making a meaningful
utterance.
Good examples for sentences which are locutionary acts are any utterances
which simply contain a meaningful statement about objects. For example: “the
baby is crying” or “the sky is blue”.

16. What is Exophoric reference ?

Ans. Exophoric reference occurs when a word or phrase refers to something
outside the discourse. Here is an example of exophoric reference:
Speaker A : “They‘re late again, can you believe it?”
Speaker B : “I know! Well, they’d better get here soon or it‘ll get cold.”
In this conversation, they refers to some people outside the discourse
known to both speakers. It also refers to something that both speakers know about
(perhaps the dinner).

Semantics and Pragmatics 2016 Solved Short Questions

1. What is the difference between linguistic meaning and utterance
meaning? (2016, 2015 b)
Ans. Linguistic meaning is the broader term that refers to any type of meaning
in the study of linguistics. Linguistic meaning has different types like sentence
meaning, utterance meaning, and speaker’s meaning.
Utterance meaning is a type of linguistic meaning that deals with the
meanings of utterances (a bit of spoken language that may or may not convey a
complete meaning.)

2. Differentiate between Semantics and Pragmatics. (2019 b, 2016, 2015 )

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Ans. Although both semantics and pragmatics are two branches of linguistics that
are related to the meaning of language, there is a major difference between the
two. Semantics is involved with the meaning of words without considering the
context whereas pragmatics analyses the meaning in relation to the relevant
context.

3. What is a Paradigmatic relation ? (2017 b, 2016)

Ans. Paradigmatic relation is concerned with the way words are grouped together
into categories, like nouns, verbs, adjectives etc. Words in the same group, or
word class, can be exchanged for each other in a sentence:
‘The dog / cat / chimpanzee bit me ‘.

4. Differentiate between Meronymy and Hyponymy. (2016, 2015 b)

Ans. In semantics, a meronym is a word that denotes a constituent part or a
member of something. For example, apple is a meronym of apple tree (sometimes
written as apple < apple tree). This part-to-whole relationship is called
meronymy.
In contrast, a hyponym, also called a subtype or a subordinate term, is a
term used to designate a particular member of a broader class. The phenomenon
is known as Hyponymy.
For instance, daisy and rose are hyponyms of flower. Similarly, pigeon,
crow, eagle and seagull are all hyponyms of bird.

5. What is Referent ? Give examples.

Ans. A referent is a person or thing to which a name, a linguistic expression or
other symbol, refers.
For example, in the sentence Mary saw me, the referent of the word Mary
is the particular person called Mary who is being spoken of, while the referent of
the word me is the person uttering the sentence.

6. What is Semantic Field Theory ? (2016, 2015, 2015 b)

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Ans. Semantic Field Theory (Lexical field theory) states that words acquired
their meaning through their relationships to other words within the same word-
field. An extension of the sense of one word narrows the meaning of neighboring
words, with the words in a field fitting neatly together like a mosaic. If a single
word undergoes a semantic change, then the whole structure of the lexical field
changes.

7. How are grammatical meaning expressed in a sentence ?

Ans. Grammatical meaning (structural meaning) is the meaning conveyed in a
sentence by word order and other grammatical signals. Words grouped together
randomly have little meaning on their own. For example, each of the following
words has lexical meaning at the word level but they convey no grammatical
meaning as a group:
School went I to.
However when a special order is given to these words, grammatical
meaning is created because of the relationships they have to one another.
I went to school.

8. What are types of ambiguity in meaning ? (2017 b, 2016, 2015, 2015 b)

Ans. Ambiguity refers to the state of having or expressing more than one possible
meaning or something open to more than one possible meaning. It refers to the
state in which a word or a statement, any linguistic entity, can be understood in
more than one way.
For example, The sentence “Becky cannot bear children” can have two
possible meanings due to the ambiguous nature of the word bear.
• Becky cannot give birth to children.
• Becky cannot tolerate children.
Types of ambiguity include lexical ambiguity, structural ambiguity and
scope ambiguity.

9. What do you mean by Semantic Narrowing ? (2016, 2015 b)

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Ans. Semantic narrowing is a type of semantic change by which the meaning of

a word becomes less general or inclusive than its earlier meaning. Also known as
specialization or restriction. The opposite process is called broadening or
semantic generalization.
For example, the word girl originally denoted a child or young person of
either sex, then the meaning gradually narrowed down to denote a female child
or a young woman.

10. Define ANAPHORA.

Ans. In linguistics, anaphora is the use of an expression whose interpretation
depends upon another expression in context (its antecedent or postcedent).
For example, look at this sentence : Michael went to the bank. He was
annoyed because it was closed. In this sentence, he refers to Michael and it refers
to the bank.

11. How would you define Principle of Compositionality ? (2016, 2015)

Ans. In semantics, the principle of compositionality is 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. It means that, in a meaningful
sentence, if the lexical parts are taken out of the sentence, what remains will be
the rules of composition.
Take, for example, the sentence "Socrates was a man". Once the
meaningful lexical items are taken away—"Socrates" and "man"—what is left is
the pseudo-sentence, "S was a M". The task becomes a matter of describing what
the connection is between S and M.

12. What is Superordinate ? What is its relationship with Hyponym ? (2016,

2015)
Ans. A superordinate (hypernym) is a word with a broad meaning constituting a
category into which words with more specific meanings (hyponyms) fall. For
example, colour is a hypernym of red. And red, orange blue, and yellow are
hyponyms of colour.

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13. What is the difference among Goal, Source and Location ? (2016, 2015)
Ans. Goal as a thematic role is the direction towards which the action of the verb
moves. For example,
• John swam to the raft.
• He threw the book at me.
Source as a thematic role is the direction from which the action originates.
For example,
• John fell off the chair.
• The mother told her child a story.
Location as a thematic role is the location where the action of the verb
takes place.
• The cookies were eaten in the kitchen by the baker.
• John fell off the chair in the class.

14. What are Paraphrase in Semantics ? (2016, 2015)

Ans. In the linguistics, paraphrases are sentences or phrases that convey the same
meaning using different wording. They have an approximate equivalence of
meaning. For example, the dog chased the cat paraphrases the cat was chased by
the dog.

15. What is Deixis ? (2016, 2015 b)

Ans. In linguistics, deixis is the use of general words and phrases to refer to a
specific time, place, or person in context, e.g., the words tomorrow, there, and
they. Here are some sentence examples,
• I enjoy living in this city.
• It is raining now, but I hope when you read this it will be sunny.

16. Differentiate between Agent and Experiencer. (2016, 2015 b)

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Ans. Agent as a thematic role is the entity that intentionally carries out the action
of the verb. For example,
• The boy ran down the street.
• He was chased by the dog.
Experiencer, on the other hand, is the semantic role of an entity (or
referent) which receives, accepts, experiences, or undergoes the effect of an
action.

Semantics and Pragmatics 2015 Solved Short Questions

1. What is the difference between Semantics and Pragmatics ? (2019 b, 2016,
2015)
Ans. Although both semantics and pragmatics are two branches of linguistics that
are related to the meaning of language, there is a major difference between the
two. Semantics is involved with the meaning of words without considering the
context whereas pragmatics analyses the meaning in relation to the relevant
context.

2. How would you define Principle of Compositionality ?

Ans. In semantics, the principle of compositionality is 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. It means that, in a meaningful
sentence, if the lexical parts are taken out of the sentence, what remains will be
the rules of composition.
Take, for example, the sentence "Socrates was a man". Once the
meaningful lexical items are taken away—"Socrates" and "man"—what is left is
the pseudo-sentence, "S was a M". The task becomes a matter of describing what
the connection is between S and M.

3. What is Conceptual Meaning ?

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Ans. In semantics, conceptual meaning is the literal or core sense of a word. There
is nothing read into the term, no subtext; it’s just the straightforward, literal,
dictionary definition of the word. The term is also called denotation or cognitive
meaning.
For example, A cougar has different meanings in the contexts about people
and not concerning , but it’s meaning in the dictionary is a big cat, which is it’s
conceptual meaning.

4. How Affective Meanings are different from Social Meanings ?

Ans. Affective meaning refers to emotive association or the effects of words that
are evoked in reader or listener. It is the emotional aspect connected to words.
For example, “home” for a soldier and “mother” for motherless child. Look at
this sentence example,
Hitler was a vicious tyrant and villainous dictator and I hate him.
Social meaning, on the other hand, refers to the meaning conveyed by the
piece of language about social context of its use. Sometimes, the use of specific
words and pronunciation can tell a lot about the social or regional origin of
speaker. For example, following sentence tells us that the speaker is young Indian
or Pakistani.
Come on yaar, let’s play cricket. Don’t be a lallu.

5. What is Semantic Field Theory ? (2016, 2015, 2015 b)

Ans. Semantic Field Theory (Lexical field theory) states that words acquired
their meaning through their relationships to other words within the same word-
field. An extension of the sense of one word narrows the meaning of neighboring
words, with the words in a field fitting neatly together like a mosaic. If a single
word undergoes a semantic change, then the whole structure of the lexical field
changes.

6. Define Sentential Semantics.

Ans. Sentence semantics (sentential semantics), as well as phrasal semantics,
deals with the meaning of syntactic units larger than words, i.e. phrases, clauses,
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and sentences, and the semantic relationships between them. Propositions play an
important role in analyzing the meaning relations among sentences.

7. What are types of ambiguity in meaning ? (2017 b, 2016, 2015, 2015 b)

Ans. Ambiguity refers to the state of having or expressing more than one possible
meaning or something open to more than one possible meaning. It refers to the
state in which a word or a statement, any linguistic entity, can be understood in
more than one way.
For example, The sentence “Becky cannot bear children” can have two
possible meanings due to the ambiguous nature of the word bear.
• Becky cannot give birth to children.
• Becky cannot tolerate children.
Types of ambiguity include lexical ambiguity, structural ambiguity and
scope ambiguity.

8. Differentiate between reference and referent. (2015, 2015 b)

Ans. In semantics, reference is a relationship in which a symbol or sign (a word,
for example) signifies something; the referent is the thing signified. The referent
may be an actual person or object, or may be something more abstract, such as a
set of actions.
For example, in the sentence Mary saw me, the referent of the word Mary
is the particular person called Mary who is being spoken of, while the referent of
the word me is the person uttering the sentence.

9. What is Paul Grice’s Cooperative Principle ? (2019, 2017 b, 2015, 2015 b)

Ans. In conversation analysis, the cooperative principle is the assumption that
participants in a conversation normally attempt to be informative, truthful,
relevant, and clear. The concept was introduced by philosopher H. Paul Grice as
he suggested that meaningful dialogue is characterized by cooperation.

10. Define discourse meanings. (2015, 2015 b)

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Ans. In linguistics, discourse refers to a unit of language longer than a single

sentence. So, discourse meaning refers to the meaning of a piece of language that
is longer than a single sentence.

11. Define referential theory of meaning.

Ans. Referential theory of meaning, also know as direct reference theory is a
theory of language that claims that the meaning of a word or expression lies in
what it points out in the world. In other words, the best way of indicating the
meaning of a word is to refer to the object represented by that word. The object
denoted by a word is called its referent.

12. What is superordinate ? What is its relation with hyponym ? (2016, 2015)
Ans. A superordinate (hypernym) is a word with a broad meaning constituting a
category into which words with more specific meanings (hyponyms) fall. For
example, colour is a hypernym of red. And red, orange blue, and yellow are
hyponyms of colour.

13. Define semantic roles.

Ans. In certain theories of linguistics, thematic relations, also known as semantic
roles, are the various roles that a noun phrase may play with respect to the action
or state described by a governing verb, commonly the sentence’s main verb.
Semantic roles include agent, patient, theme, location, experiencer, instruments,
goal, and source.

14. Differentiate between homophone and homograph.

Ans. Homophones are words that sound the same but are different in meaning
and spelling. For example, to, too, and two sound same but are spelled differently
and have different meanings.
Homographs are spelled the same, but differ in meaning and
pronunciation. For example, bow (of a ship) and the bow (that shoots arrows) are
spelled alike but have different meanings and pronunciation.

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15. What is the difference among Goal, Source and Location ? (2016, 2015)
Ans. Goal as a thematic role is the direction towards which the action of the verb
moves. For example,
• John swam to the raft.
• He threw the book at me.
Source as a thematic role is the direction from which the action originates.
For example,
• John fell off the chair.
• The mother told her child a story.
Location as a thematic role is the location where the action of the verb
takes place.
• The cookies were eaten in the kitchen by the baker.
• John fell off the chair in the class.

16. What are paraphrases in semantics ? (2016, 2015)

Ans. In the linguistics, paraphrases are sentences or phrases that convey the same
meaning using different wording. They have an approximate equivalence of
meaning. For example, the dog chased the cat paraphrases the cat was chased by
the dog.

Semantics and Pragmatics 2015 b Solved Short Questions

1. What is difference between explicit performative and implicit
performative ?
Ans. An explicit performative is one in which the utterance inscription contains
an expression that makes explicit what kind of act is being performed. It includes

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a performative verb and mainly therefore, it removes any possibility of

misunderstanding behind an utterance. In contrast, implicit performative is the
one which is ambiguous and doesn’t contain any performative verb. For example,
look at following sentences,
• I order you to leave.
• Will you leave?
In the first example, the speaker utters a sentence with the purpose to make
the hearer leave. The message is clear here. The second utterance is rather
ambiguous without an appropriate context. It can be understood in two different
ways: it can be either taken literally, as a yes/no question, or non-literally as an
indirect request or even command to leave.

2. What is the difference between linguistic meaning and utterance

meaning? (2016, 2015 b)
Ans. Linguistic meaning is the broader term that refers to any type of meaning
in the study of linguistics. Linguistic meaning has different types like sentence
meaning, utterance meaning, and speaker’s meaning.
Utterance meaning is a type of linguistic meaning that deals with the
meanings of utterances (a bit of spoken language that may or may not convey a
complete meaning.)

3. What is a syntagmatic relation ?

Ans. A syntagmatic relationship involves a sequence of signs that together create
meaning. The words in a sentence are all syntagms and together they form a
syntagmatic relationship that creates meaning. If you change the order of
syntagms in a sentence it can change the meaning significantly.
John ate an octopus.
An octopus ate John.
Two sentences using the exact same words (syntagms), but very different
meanings because the order (the syntagmatic relationship) of the words changed.

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4. What is a proposition ? (2017, 2015 b)

Ans. The term proposition refers to the language-independent core meaning of
sentences which expresses the factuality of a given state of affairs. Thus, a
proposition is the semantic kernel of a sentence that determines its truth
conditions, independent of its syntactic form and lexical realization.
For example, when two speakers say the same thing by uttering different
sentences, like in, ‘get out of here’ and ‘I’ll have to ask you to leave’, there is
some (non-linguistic) thing, a proposition, that each has said.

5. What is semantic field theory ? (2016, 2015, 2015 b)

Ans. Semantic Field Theory (Lexical field theory) states that words acquired
their meaning through their relationships to other words within the same word-
field. An extension of the sense of one word narrows the meaning of neighboring
words, with the words in a field fitting neatly together like a mosaic. If a single
word undergoes a semantic change, then the whole structure of the lexical field
changes.

6. Differentiate between grammatical restriction and lexical restriction.

Ans. Lexical restrictions are not matter of rules but of tendencies, not of yes or
no but of more or less when judge in term of deviance.
Grammar is not restricted to the study of form of function of words. It is
concerned with the categories such as tense, gender, number and syntactic
functions such as subject and object.

7. What is generative theory of meaning ?

Ans. Theory of generative grammar states that the deep structure of a sentence is
equivalent to its semantic representation, from which the surface structure can
then be derived using only one set of rules that relate underlying meaning and
surface form rather than separate sets of semantic and syntactic rules.

8. What are types of ambiguity in meaning ? (2017 b, 2016, 2015, 2015 b)

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Ans. Ambiguity refers to the state of having or expressing more than one possible
meaning or something open to more than one possible meaning. It refers to the
state in which a word or a statement, any linguistic entity, can be understood in
more than one way.
For example, The sentence “Becky cannot bear children” can have two
possible meanings due to the ambiguous nature of the word bear.
• Becky cannot give birth to children.
• Becky cannot tolerate children.
Types of ambiguity include lexical ambiguity, structural ambiguity and
scope ambiguity.

9. Differentiate between reference and referent. (2015, 2015 b)

Ans. In semantics, reference is a relationship in which a symbol or sign (a word,
for example) signifies something; the referent is the thing signified. The referent
may be an actual person or object, or may be something more abstract, such as a
set of actions.
For example, in the sentence Mary saw me, the referent of the word Mary
is the particular person called Mary who is being spoken of, while the referent of
the word me is the person uttering the sentence.

10. What do you mean by semantic narrowing ? (2016, 2015 b)

Ans. Semantic narrowing is a type of semantic change by which the meaning of
a word becomes less general or inclusive than its earlier meaning. Also known as
specialization or restriction. The opposite process is called broadening or
semantic generalization.
For example, the word girl originally denoted a child or young person of
either sex, then the meaning gradually narrowed down to denote a female child
or a young woman.

11. What is Paul Grice’s Cooperative principle ? (2019, 2017 b, 2015, 2015
b)

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Ans. In conversation analysis, the principle is the assumption that participants in

a conversation normally attempt to be informative, truthful, relevant, and clear.
The concept was introduced by philosopher H. Paul Grice as he suggested that
meaningful dialogue is characterized by cooperation.

12. Define discourse meaning. (2015, 2015 b)

Ans. In linguistics, discourse refers to a unit of language longer than a single
sentence. So, discourse meaning refers to the meaning of a piece of language that
is longer than a single sentence.

13. Define presupposition. (2017 b, 2015 b)

Ans. In the branch of linguistics known as pragmatics, a presupposition (or PSP)
is an implicit assumption about the world or background belief relating to an
utterance whose truth is taken for granted in discourse.
Examples of presuppositions include:
• Jane no longer writes fiction.
Presupposition: Jane once wrote fiction.
• Have you talked to Steve?
Presupposition: Steve exists.

14. What is Deixis ? (2016, 2015 b)

Ans. In linguistics, deixis is the use of general words and phrases to refer to a
specific time, place, or person in context, e.g., the words tomorrow, there, and
they. Here are some sentence examples,
• I enjoy living in this city.
• It is raining now, but I hope when you read this it will be sunny.

15. Differentiate between Meronymy and Hyponymy. (2016, 2015 b)

Ans. In semantics, a meronym is a word that denotes a constituent part or a
member of something. For example, apple is a meronym of apple tree (sometimes

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written as apple < apple tree). This part-to-whole relationship is called

meronymy.
In contrast, a hyponym, also called a subtype or a subordinate term, is a
term used to designate a particular member of a broader class. The phenomenon
is known as Hyponymy.
For instance, daisy and rose are hyponyms of flower. Similarly, pigeon,
crow, eagle and seagull are all hyponyms of bird.

16. Differentiate between Agent and Experiencer. (2016, 2015 b)

Ans. Agent as a thematic role is the entity that intentionally carries out the action
of the verb. For example,
• The boy ran down the street.
• He was chased by the dog.
Experiencer, on the other hand, is the semantic role of an entity (or
referent) which receives, accepts, experiences, or undergoes the effect of an
action.

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