Semantics and Pragmatics

Table of Contents
Introduction to Semantics ............................................................................................................................... 02
Major Concerns of Semantics ......................................................................................................................... 07
Three Perspectives on Meanings .................................................................................................................... 08
Different Types of Meanings .......................................................................................................................... 08
Semantic Properties ........................................................................................................................................ 21
Evidence for Semantic Properties …………………………………………………………………...............27

Proposition, Valency, Thematic Roles……………………………………………………………………….28

Semantic Properties of nouns………...............................................................................................................35

Semantic Features of Verbs …………………………………………………………………………………40

Sense Relation……………………………………………………………………………………………….45

Sense and Reference…………………………………………………………………………………………54

Discourse and Meaning………………………………………………………………………………….......61

Sentential Semantics…………………………………………………………………………………………67

Semantics and Syntax……………………………………………………………………………………......82

Theories of Meanings………………………………………………………………………………………..87

Pragmatics……………………………………………………………………………………………………92

Entailment, Presupposition & Implicature………………………………………………………………….104

Reference……………………………………………………………………………………………………109

Speech Acts…………………………………………………………………………………………………112

Glossary……………………………………………………………………………………………………..124

Oft-Repeated Long Questions………………………………………………………………………………133

This document contains the lecture notes of Semantics & Pragmatics (Eng-223) for the
students of BS (English) 4th Semester enrolled at Govt. Zamindar College Gujrat.

Muhammad Irfan Sabir (Lecturer in English)

Department of English Govt. Zamindar College Gujrat

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 An Introduction to Semantics/ Word Meaning

―Language without meaning is meaningless‖ (Roman Jakobson)

―First learn the meaning of what you say, and then speak.‖ (Epictetus)

Students’ Learning Outcomes:

It is expected that by the end of this lecture, the learners will be able to:

i. Define language
ii. Know various levels of language
iii. Describe what Semantics is
iv. Understand the term Semantics
v. Comprehend different areas of Semantics
vi. Describe history, branches, significance and scope of Semantics

Language

Man communicates with the other members of society via language which comprises
of arbitrary signals. Therefore, language is a tool for communication. Sweet (1896) defines
language by saying that language is a tool to express one‘s ideas and thoughts through
speech sounds that are joined into words. Such words are then combined in the form of
sentences. This combination of ideas, in the form of sentences, is stated into thoughts. Bloch
and Trager (1942) are of the view that a language comprises arbitrary vocal symbols which
help a social group to co-operate with each other. Michael Halliday (2003) calls language a
semiotic system i.e., a system of meaning. Every language has various levels.

Levels of Language

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Here our concern is with Semantics only.

What is semantics?

The noun semantics and the adjective semantic are derived from the Greek word
semantikos (―significant‖). In linguistics, semantics is the subfield that is devoted to the
study of meaning, as borne on the syntactic levels of words, phrases, sentences, and
sometimes larger units of discourse, generically referred to as texts. Semantics is the
technical term used to refer to the study of meaning, and, since meaning is a part of
language, semantics is a part of linguistics. Different scholars have defined Semantics in
different ways. We will limit ourselves to the definitions given by only a few scholars.

According to Dagfinn Føllesdal (1997) ―Semantics is the study of the relationships

between signs and symbols and what they represent.‖

Fromkin (2003) is of the view ―The study of the linguistic meaning of morphemes,
words, phrases, and sentences is called Semantics.‖

―Semantics is the study of meaning‖ (Lyons, 1977)

For Hurford and Heasley (1983), ―semantics is the study of meaning in language.‖

Other scholars define semantics with different or similar perspectives. For example,
Saeed (1997) opines: ―semantics is the study of meaning communicated through
language.‖

According to Lobner (2002), ―semantics is the part of linguistics that is concerned

with meaning.‖

Kreidler‘s (1998) definition is also useful: ―Linguistic semantics is the study of how
language organizes and expresses meaning.‖

Simply we can say that Semantics is the branch of linguistics that deals with the study
of meaning, changes in meaning, and the principles that govern the relationship between
sentences or words and their meanings. This branch of linguistics includes how meaning is
constructed, interpreted, clarified, obscured, illustrated, simplified, negotiated, contradicted,
and paraphrased. (Sentences or phrases that convey the same meaning using different wording are called
paraphras) In it, we not only study the meaning(s) of words but how the meaning(s) of words

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in a sentence are put together to form sentential meaning also. Lastly, it studies meaning(s)
in a systematic and objective (unbiased) way.

Areas of Semantics

Some important areas of semantic theory or related subjects include these:

 Symbol (Any formal item that conveys meaning, especially a conventional piece of a
system. ) and referent ( the person, thing, word or expression denotes, stands for,

or refers to )
 Conceptions of meaning ( seven types of meanings)
 Words and lexemes (basic unit of meaning)
 Denotation (dictionary meanings), connotation (cultural meanings), implication
(inference)
 Pragmatics (study of meanings in relation to context)
 Ambiguity (Sentence or phrases which create obscurity) Tahir got lunch ready for his son
wearing a summer dress.
 Metaphor, simile and symbol
 Semantic fields (A semantic field is a set of words (or lexemes) related in meanings)
 Synonym, antonym and hyponym(It refers to words that have a more specific meaning than
a general term that can be applied to it. For example, a cat is a hyponym of the general term animal)

 Collocation (word(s) that are almost always put together to create a specific meaning),
fixed expressions and idiom
 Semantic change (Any change in the meaning of word over the course of time)
and etymology (the study of origin of words)
 Polysemy (word or phrase having multiple related meanings)
 Homonymy (words with identical pronunciations having same spellings but different
meanings), homophones (words with identical pronunciations but different spellings and

meanings) and homographs (same spellings different pronunciation and different

meanings lead. lead)

 Lexicology (the study of words, their meanings and the relationships between them, their
origins and their structure) and lexicography (the art of compiling dictionaries)

 Thesauruses, libraries and Web portals

 Epistemology (the theory of knowledge concerned with the mind's relation to reality)
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  Colour (in semantics colour denotes standard value states (such as good, bad, or warning)

A Brief History of Semantics

For thousands of years, philosophers have pondered the meaning of meaning, yet
speakers of a language can understand what is said to them and can produce strings of words
that are meaningful to other speakers. Different researches reveal that different disciplines
like psychology, philosophy, etc. have been concerned with the systematic study of
‗meaning‘ for centuries. Although their particular interests and approaches are different, yet
each borrows from and contributes to the others. However, semantics was introduced
formally in literature in the late 1800‘s. Mr. Breal is credited with coining the word
semantics in his Essai de semantique (1883) ‗as a name for philosophical enquiries‘. In
1894 the English word semantics occurred in a paper: ‗Reflected Meanings; a Point in
Semantics’ presented by Charles R. Lanman to the American Philosophical Association.
Later on, after 1930‘s, Leonard Bloomfield tried to form the theoretical basis by equating
semantics to stimulus response formula. Emergence of structuralism on the linguistic scene
marks the watershed in the realm of semantics. In 1966 A.J. Greimas produced Structural
Semantics.

Branches of Semantics

Cruse (2000) lists the followings as the main broadly distinguishable areas of interest
in the study of meaning: lexical semantics, grammatical semantics, logical semantics, and
linguistic semantics. They are not watertight compartments and they may overlap with one
another. Lexical semantics studies the meanings of words; the focus is on 'content' words
like lion, jasmine, selfish and persuade, rather than form/grammatical words like the, of,
than, and so on. Grammatical (phrasal) semantics studies aspects of meaning which have
direct relevance to syntax. For instance, consider the problem of assigning category to the
word yellow. It can be given the category such as adjective, noun and verb as illustrated
below:

She wears a yellow skirt. (Adjective)

He painted the room with a glowing yellow. (Noun)

The leave yellows rapidly in the winter. (Verb)

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 Logical semantics studies the relation between natural language and formal logical
systems. Linguistic semantics is the study of how languages organize and express meanings.

Significance of Semantics

It is a wide subject within the general study of language. An understanding of

semantics is essential to the study of language acquisition (how language users acquire a
sense of meaning, as speakers, writers, listeners and readers).

It is also essential to the study of language change (how meanings alter over time). It
is important for understanding language in social contexts, as these are likely to affect
meaning, and for understanding varieties of English and effects of style. It is thus one of the
most fundamental concepts in linguistics.

The Scope of Semantics

The scope of semantics covers a wide range of issues related to meaning . It is a broad
topic with many layers and not all people that study it study these layers in the same way. It
is a very broad field of inquiry. Therefore, semantics is the most diverse field within
linguistics. In addition, semanticists have to have at least a nodding acquaintance with other
disciplines, like philosophy and psychology, which also investigate the creation and
transmission of meaning.

In the words of Stephen G. Pulman: "A perennial problem in semantics is the

delineation of its subject matter. The term meaning can be used in a variety of ways, and
only some of these correspond to the usual understanding of the scope of linguistic.

POINTS TO REMEMBER

i. Language is a tool of communication. It is also a semiotic system i.e., a system of

meaning. (Halliday, 2003)
ii. Semantics is the branch of linguistics that deals with the study of meaning, changes
in meaning, and the principles that govern the relationship between sentences or
words and their meanings.
iii. This branch of linguistics studies how meaning is constructed, interpreted,
clarified, obscured, illustrated, simplified, negotiated, contradicted, and
paraphrased.
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 iv. Semantics was introduced formally in literature in the late 1800‘s. Mr. Breal is
credited with coining the word semantics.
v. There are four branches of semantics: lexical semantics, grammatical semantics,
logical semantics, and linguistic semantics.
vi. An understanding of semantics is essential to the study of language acquisition i.e.,
how language users acquire a sense of meaning, as speakers and writers, listeners
and readers.
vii. The scope of semantics covers a wide range of issues related to meaning.

Lecture 02 Major Concerns of Semantics

Semantics is associated with different issues related to meaning including naming,
concept, sense and reference. Naming as a semantic process derives from the understanding
that words are names or labels for things. The major problem with this naming view of
semantics is that it is only nouns and nominal expressions that can be analysed semantically.
In addition, abstract nuns like love, hatred, truth will be difficult to explain since they are not
living things.
There is black van outside.
This will have meaning, only if there is black van outside. Thus, sentences that are lies may
not be interpreted.
Concepts mediate between the mind constructs and objects in the real world.
Saussure‘s sign theory and Ogden and Richards, semantic triangle derives from the
conceptual approach to semantics. The approach emphasizes the power of the mind to make
images and to associate these images to objects and ideas. The approach is highly
mentalistic, relying on the ability to associate one thing with another. This ability of
association may not yield universal understanding. That explains why language experts
develop dictionaries to aggregate meaning on a universal basis. Interestingly, the production
of dictionaries relies heavily on denotations and connotations, two major angles to the study
of meaning.
Reference relates to things, people and events in the world. It is the object or entity to
which a linguistic expression relates. Thus, the referent of the word boy is a human being
called boy. If meaning were restricted to reference, many words without obvious referents
will be left out. It will be difficult to explain the meaning of prepositions, conjunctions and
other grammatical unit.
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 Again, several linguistic expressions may relate to single referents. To avoid these
limitations, semanticists use the words denotation and connotation to distinguish between
meaning based on ostensivenss (i.e. pointing) or reference and extension.
Another interesting area of concern for semantics is sense. Sense explains the system
of linguistic relationships which a lexical item contracts with others. If that relationship is
paradigmatic, we have synonymy, antonymy, etc. But if the relationship is syntagmatic, we
have collocation.
Lecture 03 Different Types of Meanings
Students Learning Outcomes
By the end of this lecture, (it is expected that) learners will be able to:
(i) Define the term meaning
(ii) Know about three schools of thought regarding the term meaning
(iii) Learn various types of meanings
(iv) Differentiate b/w multiple type of meanings
(v) Tell different grammatical categories linked with meaning
What is meaning?
Semantics deals with the study of meaning. The verb ‗mean‘ has multiple meanings/
senses in a dictionary. Have a look at the following sentences:
• I mean to be there tomorrow. (Say)
• What I mean to do. (Intention)
• That cloud means thunder‘. (Symbol of lightening or rain)
• A red light means stop‗‗. (Sign break)
The most relevant use of the term for our purpose may be found in the following sentence:
• What does calligraphy mean? (Define)
• Words, phrases, or ideas which are given to understand a certain idea – same meaning
• Finding sameness may be a problem (Palmer, 1997, p. 3)
Nordquist (2018) defines meaning by saying: ―In semantics and pragmatics, meaning
is the message conveyed by words, sentences, and symbols in a context. It may also be called
lexical or grammatical meaning.‖ Meaning is connected to language via the lexicon and
grammar and also to what we do with the language. Sense relations are synonymy, antonymy,
hyponymy, etc. The meaning of an expression is a function of the meaning of its parts and the

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way they are put together. Sometimes, we need to see meaning within the framework of an
academic or scientific discipline; called compositional meanings.
Schools of Thought in Meaning
Both linguists and philosophers agree that meaning is central to semantics. However,
there is considerable disparity (difference of opinion) among different scholars on the exact
conception of meaning. Based on their understanding of the meaning of meaning and
procedures, there are different schools of thought concerning meaning. These are
the naturalists, the conventionalists, and the contextualists.
According to the naturalists with Plato as the chief proponent, the meaning of a word
is the entity or thing it represents. There is an intrinsic relationship between sound and
meaning. The major criticism of this view is that there exist very many words in natural
languages without physical entities.
To the conventionalists, words and their meaning do not necessarily have any direct
link. Whatever connection exists between a word and meaning is through a concept
formed in the minds of the users of the language. Conventionalism is derived from the
works of Aristotle.
According to J. Firth and other contextualists, the meaning of a word derives from its
usage. Each of these approaches has had a profound impact on the practice of linguistics.
Their contributions shall become apparent as the text progresses. Apart from focusing on the
three principal approaches to the study of meaning, there are thematic,
conceptual, and associative types of meaning also.
Types of Meaning

Semantics is concerned with meanings and morpheme, words, phrases and sentences
have meanings, too. So semantics can be defined as the study of the meaning of
morphemes, words, phrases and sentences. While listening to a spoken text or reading a
written text we may feel that there are utterances that convey many types of information or
meaning.

Leech in his book, ‗Semantic- A Study of meaning’ (1981) breaks down meanings
into seven types. They are: conceptual or denotative meaning, connotative meaning,
social meaning, affective or emotive meaning, reflected meaning, collocative meaning
and thematic meaning. He gives primacy (importance) to conceptual meaning. There are

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three basic types of meaning: thematic, conceptual and associative. Associative meaning can
further be divided into connotative, collocative, affective, reflected and stylistic meaning.

1. Thematic Meaning

We may organize or order words or phrases in an utterance to give them focus or

emphasis. For example, when we say,

i. Ali failed in the examination.

ii. In the examination, Ali failed.

Both the sentences have same meanings although the structure is different. In the first
case we give importance to ‗Ali‟ and in the second case we give importance to 'examination'.
In such cases we have thematic meanings. Thematic meaning refers to what is
communicated by the way in which a speaker or a writer organizes the message in
terms of ordering focus or emphasis (Leech 1981). Thematic meaning helps us to
understand the message and its implications properly. The different parts of the sentence also
can be used as subject, object or complement to show prominence. It is done through focus,
theme (topic) or emotive emphasis. Thus a sentence in active voice is different from the
sentence in passive voice though its conceptual meaning is the same. For example, the
following statements in active and passive voice have same conceptual meaning but different
communicative values.

Mrs. Humayun donated the first prize

The first prize was donated by Mrs. Humayun.

In the first sentence ―who gave away the prize ―is more important, but in the second
sentence ―what did Mrs. Humayun give?‖ is important‖. Thus the change of focus changes
the meaning also. The first suggests that we already know Mrs. Humayun (perhaps through
earlier mention) its known/given information while it is new information.

Alternative grammatical construction also gives thematic meaning. For example,

I like apples most. (It is I not someone else who likes the apples)

Apples I like most. (The subject likes the APPLES)

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It is the apples I like most. (APPLES, not the other fruits the subject likes)

Like the grammatical structures, stress and intonation also make the message
prominent. For example, the stress on the word in the following sentence gives prominence
to the information.

Kamran likes mango fruit.

The kind of fruit that Kamran likes is mango.

Thus sentences or pairs of sentences with similar conceptual meanings differ from
their communicative value. This is due to different grammatical constructions or lexical
items or stress and intonations. Therefore they are used in different contents. In the line ―Ten
thousand saw I at a glance‖, Wordsworth inverts the structure to focus on ‗ten thousand‖,

Sometimes thematic contrast i.e. contrasts between given and new information can be
conveyed by lexical means.

Kamran owns the biggest shop in Gujrat.

The biggest shop in Gujrat belongs to Kamran.

The way we order our message also conveys what is important and what is not. This is
basically thematic meaning. Thematic meaning derives from the organisation of the message
presented in a language. It is the arrangement of the components of communication that
determine the point of emphasis. This arrangement may take the form of passivation,
topicalisation or focus. In the sentences that follow, different items have been made more
prominent by merely re-ordering them.

a. Jamila bought the house – normal SVO order

b. It was Jamila that bought the house – topicalized

c. The house was bought by Jamila – passivized.

d. The house, Jamila bought – focused

In sentence (a) the sentence is in the normal subject-verb-object order without any
special meaning. Sentences (b) and (d) tend to lay emphasis on Jamila, the doer of the action
being referred to. In sentence (c), the emphasis is on the house which was bought. Indeed,
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focused and tropicalized elements in a structure are given prominence within an information
structure. A component of the bit of information can also be made more prominent by
stressing it. Consider further the following:

She BOUGHT my newspaper (She did not STEAL it)

She bought my NEWSPAPER (not my textbook)

SHE bought my newspaper (not any other person)

Conceptual Meaning

Conceptual meaning (Leech 1981:9) is synonymous with primary, central, logical,

cognitive or denotative meaning of a word or literal meaning. It is the first ordinary meaning
listed in dictionaries which is not affected by the context or emotional overtones associated
with the act of communication. There is an assumed shared conceptual meaning of every
word of a language. There is a universal implication of the conceptual meaning. It is widely
assumed to be the central factor in linguistic communication.

Since, conceptual meaning is the essential or core meaning while other six types are
the peripheral. They are peripheral in a sense that they are non-essential. Conceptual
meaning is also called as primary meaning. It is the meaning suggested by the word when it
is used alone. It is the first meaning or usage which a word will suggest to most people when
the word is said in isolation. It is the meaning learned early in life and likely to have
reference to a physical situation. The conceptual meaning of word is its agreed-upon sense -
what it refers to, stands for, or designates. The aim of conceptual meaning is to provide an
appropriate semantic representation to a sentence or statement. A sentence is made of
abstract symbols. Conceptual meaning helps us to distinguish one meaning from the meaning
of other sentences. Thus, conceptual meaning is an essential part of language.

A language essentially depends on conceptual meaning for communication. The

conceptual meaning is the base for all the other types of meaning. It is essential for the
functioning of language. For example, a part of the conceptual meaning of the word needle
may be a ―thin sharp instrument‖.

The organization of conceptual meaning is based on two principles: principle of

contrastiveness and the principle of structure. The conceptual meanings can be studied
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typically in terms of contrastive features. That is, it is possible to express the conceptual
meaning of a word using contrastive semantic features. Such features indicate the attributes
present and those that are absent. If a feature is present, it is specified as [+]; if absent, it is [-
]. These contrastive features specifying the attributes of the words provide the necessary
criteria for the correct use of words. The word woman can be represented as + HUMAN, -
MALE, + ADULT". On the contrary, the word boy can be realized as + HUMAN, + MALE,
- ADULT. The contrastive features which distinguishes woman from boy are +/-MALE and
+/- ADULT. The way of representing meaning based on contrastive feature is known as
principle of contrastiveness.

We know that not only the units of language are contrastive but also they are arranged
sequentially. We can build larger units by combining smaller units and again combining the
outcome of the first combination into still larger units and so on. Look at the example given
below. We combine that and man into that man and a and teacher into a teacher; we
interpret the first phrase that man as subject and a teacher as complement. We again
combine is and a teacher into a larger unit is a teacher; we interpret this as predicate. By
combining subject and predicate we construct a sentence. Now we understand that by the
principle of structure, larger units of language are built up out of smaller units or we are able
to analyze a sentence syntactically into its constituent parts hierarchically till we arrive at the
ultimate constituents or smallest syntactic elements. We can represent this information by
means of a tree-diagram as given below:

Now we understand that the aim of conceptual meaning is to provide an appropriate

semantic representation to a sentence or statement. The conceptual meaning of a word
constitutes a major part of the shared system of a language for all speakers. It is a criteria
element of human communication since it is a major factor in language. The use of this

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process has been described as componential analysis. It is a major process in structural
semantics.

Associative Meaning

The meaning of a word is affected by the context, background, time and the cultural
realities of the users of language also. This type of meaning is not static. It is variable and
open ended. Certain words, structures and styles are usually employed to arouse some
emotional reactions in the listener. Certain attitudes and forms of behaviour are provoked by
the associative meaning of the words used in communication. These different reactions are
derived from the associations which the words cerate in the minds of language users.

As a result of the great variation in associative meaning, it is not always easy to

express that form of meaning in terms of contrastive semantic features. Indeed, associative
meaning reflects individual differences. There are individualized intentions and
interpretations. There is therefore, the need for all participants in communication to share
common reference points, symbols and background for there to be any meaningful
interaction. Associative meaning can be any of the following:

i. Connotative Meaning
ii. Collocative Meaning
iii. Reflected Meaning
iv. Stylistic or Social Meaning

Connotative Meaning

When we explore conceptual or denotative meaning, it will land us into connotative

meaning. We may feel that the given expression gives us more information than what is
encoded in it. That is we may feel that there is connotation apart from denotation. So we
have connotative meaning apart from denotative meaning or conceptual meaning.
Connotative meaning (Leech 1981:12-13) is the communicative value of an expression over
and above its purely conceptual content. It is something that goes beyond mere referent of a
word and hints at its attributes in the real world. It is something more than the dictionary
meaning. Thus purely conceptual content of woman is +HUMAN + FEMALE+ ADULT.
But the physical, psychological and social attributes of woman such as be ‗gregarious‘,
‗having maternal instinct‘ or typical (rather than invariable) attributes of womanhood such as
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‗capable of speaking continuously'‘, 'experts in cooking‘, ‗more emotional less logical‘ etc.,
are connotations or connotative meaning. Still further connotative meaning can embrace
putative (supposed) properties of a referent due to viewpoint adopted by individual, group,
and society as a whole. So in the past woman was supposed to have attributes like frail,
prone to tears, emotional, irrigational, inconstant , cowardly etc. as well as more positive
qualities such gentle, sensitive, compassionate, hardworking etc. Connotations vary age to
age and society to society.

The boundary between conceptual and connotative seems to be analogous.

Connotative meaning is regarded as incidental, comparatively unstable, in determinant, open
ended, variable according to age, culture and individual, whereas conceptual meaning is not
like that . It can be codified in terms of limited symbols.

Connotative meaning contains elements of the conceptual meaning of a word and the
individual‘s personal interpretation of what is communicated. That interpretation is based on
the personal experience of the hearer. This means that connotative meaning varies with the
experience of people in communication. It may also vary from society to society.

There are additional semantic features that are associated with connotative meaning.
Thus, a great deal of the meaning of idioms and figurative expressions derive from
connotation. There are symbols in literature which have different connotations in different
cultures. For instance, the fox or jackal is associated with the cunningness, cawing of crow is
associated with the arrival of guest and cat crossing our way is associated with bad omen.

Collocative Meaning

We might have come across words which occur together mostly in utterances. Such
co-occurrence is referred as collation and the outcome of the collocation gives rise to
collocative meaning. Collocative meaning is the meaning which a word acquires in the
company of certain other words. Words collocate or co-occur with certain words only. For
example, big business is acceptable and not large business or great business. Collocative
meaning refers to associations of a word because of its usual or habitual co-occurrence
with certain types of words. Pretty and handsome indicate ‗good looking‘. However, they
slightly differ from each other because of collocation or co-occurrence. The word pretty
collocates with girls, woman, village, gardens, flowers, etc. On the other hand, the word
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handsome collocates with boys, men, etc. So we have pretty woman and handsome man.
Though handsome woman and pretty man are acceptable, they suggest different kinds of
attractiveness because of the collocative associations of the two adjectives. Hence handsome
woman may mean attractive woman but in a mannish way.

Reflected meaning

We know that a word can have more than one conceptual meaning or multiple
conceptual meaning. If we interpret one meaning for the other, it is known as the
reflected meaning. In such cases while responding to one sense of the word we partly
respond to another sense of the word too. For example, The Comforter and The Holy Ghost
refer to Gabriel (Leech 1981:16). Comforter and Ghost are religious words. They have both
religious and general meaning. But unconsciously even in religious context we may interpret
these terms by their non-religious meaning. We may feel The Comforter sounds warm and
comforting while The Holy Ghost sounds ‗awesome‘ or even ‗dreadful‘. One sense of the
word seems to rub off on another especially through relative frequency and familiarity (e.g. a
ghost is more frequent and familiar in no religious sense.). In poetry too we have reflected
meaning as in the following lines from ‗Futility‘:

Are limbs so dear-achieved, are sides,

Full-nerved still - warm - too hard to stir?

Reflected meaning relates to expressions with multiple meanings. Words with

several meanings (i.e. polysemous words), have reflected meanings. There is, however, a
dominant meaning among these several meanings. As a particular sense of a word begins to
assume prominence, all other senses begin to be de-emphasized and with time, these other
senses disappear.

Stylistic (or Social) Meaning

We know language is spoken in a society. So it is quite natural the language gives clue
to about the society in which it is being spoken or the social context in which it is spoken.
The meaning conveyed by the piece of language about the social context of its use is called
the social meaning (Leech 1981:14). The decoding of a text is dependent on our knowledge
of stylistics and other variations of language. We recognize some words or pronunciation as

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being dialectical i.e. as telling us something about the regional or social origin of the speaker.
Social meaning is related to the social situation in which an utterance is used. It is concerned
with the social circumstances of the use of a linguistic expression. For example, some
dialectic words inform us about the regional and social background of the speaker. In the
same way, some stylistic usages let us know something of the social relationship between the
speaker and the hearer. The following socio-stylistic variations are listed by Leech (Leech
1981:14):

Dialect (the language of a geographical region or social class)

Time (the language of eighteenth century, etc.)

Province (language of law, of science, of advertising, etc.)

Status (Polite, colloquial, slang, etc., language)

Modality (language of memoranda, lectures, jokes, etc.)

Singularity (the style of Dickens, of Hemingway, etc.)

For example the utterance I ain‟t done nothing tells we about the speaker and that is
the speaker is probably a black American, underprivileged and uneducated. Stylistic
variation represents the social variation. This is because styles show the geographical region
social class of the speaker. Style helps us to know about the period, field and status of the
discourse.

When a particular pattern of speech, language variety or speech form is associated

with a specific social context, stylistic or social meaning is achieved. It is common
knowledge that a speaker‘s choice of words and structures reveals his or her social, regional,
geographical or even economic background. The choices can also reveal the level of
familiarity between the speaker and the hearer.

Emphasis is usually on the different stylistic variations open to language users. Based
on the level of familiarity, users have the following possibilities in making requests:

I wonder if I could see we later today (indirect question) used for extreme politeness)

May I see you later today? (Very formal)

17
Can I see you later today? (Causal and less formal)

Affective (Emotive) Meaning:

We use language to expresses our personal feelings, including our attitude to the
listener, or our attitude to something we are talking about. Meaning of this type is called as
affective or emotive meaning (Leech 1981:14). It is often conveyed through the conceptual
or connotative content of the words used. For example, home for a sailor/soldier or expatriate
(refugee) and mother for a motherless child and a married woman will have special effective,
emotive quality. In affective meaning, language is used to express personal feelings or
attitude to the listener or to the subject matter of discourse. To Leech, affective meaning
refers to what is conveyed about the feeling and attitude of the speaker through use of
language (attitude to listener as well as attitude to what he is saying).

Affective meaning is often conveyed through conceptual, connotative content of the

words used. For example, ―we are a vicious tyrant and a villainous reprobation and I hate
you.‖ We are left with a little doubt about the speaker‘s feelings towards the listener. Here
speaker seems to have a very negative attitude towards his listener. This is called affective
meaning.

Affective meaning is related to the feelings and attitudes of the speaker towards
the subject or the audience. This meaning is achieved by the choice of words. Certain
words suggest positive feelings – love, attraction, happiness, exciting etc. Some others stir
up negative reactions – disgusting, nauseating, disappointing, etc. Interjections like ah!, oh!,
uh!, mmn! often suggest the emotional state of the mind. Other words like dear, daddy,
mummy etc. give an impression of endearment.

POINTS TO REMEMBER

i. Nordquist (2018) defines meaning by saying: ―In semantics and pragmatics, meaning is the
message conveyed by words, sentences, and symbols in a context. It may also be called
lexical or grammatical meaning.‖

ii. There are different schools of thought concerning meaning:

the naturalists, the conventionalists, and the contextualists.

18
iii. According to the naturalists, the meaning of a word is the entity or thing it represents.
There is an intrinsic relationship between sound and meaning. To the conventionalists, words
and their meaning do not necessarily have any direct link. Whatever connection exists
between a word and meaning is through a concept formed in the minds of the users of the
language. The contextualists opine, the meaning of a word derives from its usage.

iv. Leech in his book, ‗Semantic- A Study of meaning‘ (1981) breaks down meanings into
seven types: conceptual or denotative meaning, connotative meaning, social meaning,
affective or emotive meaning, reflected meaning, collocative meaning and thematic meaning.

a. Thematic meaning refers to what is communicated by the way in which a speaker or

a writer organizes the message in terms of ordering focus or emphasis.
b. Conceptual meaning is synonymous with primary, central, logical, cognitive or
denotative meaning of a word or literal meaning. It is the first ordinary meaning listed
in dictionaries which is not affected by the context or emotional overtones associated
with the act of communication. The organization of conceptual meaning is based on
two principles: principle of contrastiveness and the principle of structure
c. Associative meaning refers to the connections or associations that a word or phrase
brings to mind. It includes the mental images, memories, or experiences that are linked
to a particular word. For example, the word "beach" may evoke thoughts of sand,
waves, and relaxation. Associative meaning helps us understand the personal and
cultural associations we have with words
d. Connotative meaning refers to the emotional or cultural associations that a word
carries beyond its literal definition. It's like the extra flavor or vibe that a word brings
to a conversation. For example, the word "home" might have connotations of warmth,
comfort, and belonging. Connotative meaning adds depth and richness to language.
e. Collocative meaning refers to associations of a word because of its usual or habitual
co-occurrence with certain types of words.
f. Reflected meaning relates to expressions with multiple meanings. Words with several
meanings (i.e. polysemous words), have reflected meanings.
g. Stylistic or social meaning (also called speaker meaning) refers to the way language
is used to convey social information, such as a person's social status, identity, or group
affiliation. It involves understanding how language choices and variations reflect

19
 social norms, cultural values, and social relationships. For example, the use of slang or
formal language can signal different social contexts or identities. Stylistic or social
meaning helps us understand the social dynamics and shades of language use.
h. Affective meaning is related to the feelings and attitudes of the speaker towards the
subject or the audience. This meaning is achieved by the choice of words.
i. There is also figurative meaning, where words are used metaphorically or
symbolically. Like time is money is a metaphor. Butterfly may symbolize being
innocent or fragile.
j. Pragmatic meaning considers the context and intentions behind the use of language.
To

To infer, it can be said that these different types of meanings assist us understand how
language is used and interpreted.

Terminologies

Lexical semantics: the meaning of words and the relationships among words.
Sentential (Phrasal) semantics: the meaning of syntactic units larger than one word
Compositional Meaning or Semantics: formulating semantic rules that build the meaning of a
sentence based on the meaning of the words and how they combine – Also known as truth-
conditional semantics because the speaker‘s knowledge of truth conditions is central.
Synonymy refers to a type of semantic relations among words. Technically, it occurs when
two or more linguistic forms are used to substitute one another in any context in which their
common meaning is not affected denotatively or connotatively.
Antonymy is one of a set of SENSE relations recognized in some analyses of meaning. In its
most general sense, it refers collectively to all types of semantic oppositeness.
Hyponymy: Hyponymy is the relationship which obtains between specific and general
lexical items, such that the former is 'included' in the latter. For example, a cat is a hyponym
of an animal.
Utterance: In semantics, an utterance is any act of speech. It can consist of a phrase, a
word, or even a partial word, provided it is language and not just sound. Utterances can be
grammatical or ungrammatical, meaningful or meaningless, but must be made by a particular
person at a particular time. That is to say, utterances must be real, not speech acts in the

20
abstract. They can, however, be recorded or transcribed, provided they were spoken at some
point.

Lecture 04 SEMANTIC PROPERTIES

Students’ Learning Outcomes:
By the end of this lecture, the students will be able to:
i. Define the term semantic properties
ii. Comprehend the idea of being meaningful and meaningless
iii. Know about the semantic features of various words

iv. Identify similarities and differences in SFAs

v. Describe the semantic components of a word

vi. Understand semantic properties help in making meanings of a sentence
Semantic properties are the building blocks of meaning. They are the characteristics of
words or phrases that determine their meanings and enable us to use them in different
contexts. These properties vary depending on the language and culture in which they are
used, but they are essential for effective communication.
In linguistics, semantic properties are described as the attributes or features that
describe a particular word or concept. We may say that semantic properties or meaning
properties are those aspects of a linguistic unit, such as a morpheme, word, or sentence that
contribute to the meaning of that unit. Basic semantic properties include
being meaningful or meaningless – for example, whether a given word is part of a language's
lexicon [A lexicon is often used to describe the knowledge that a speaker has about the
words of a language. This includes meanings, use, form, and relationships with other words.
A lexicon can thus be thought of as a mental dictionary] with a generally understood
meaning; polysemy, [having multiple, typically related, meanings]; ambiguity, [Meanings
which are not necessarily related]; and anomaly. [When the elements of a unit are
semantically incompatible with each other, although possibly grammatically sound] Beyond
the expression itself, there are higher-level semantic relations that describe the relationship
between units: these include synonymy, antonymy, and hyponymy.

For example, a closer look at the following sentences conveys us the idea of being
meaningful or meaningless.
1. The hamburger ate the boy.
21
 2. The car speaks to the man.

3. The horse is reading the book.

4. The cat is cooking the food.

5. Lamp is eating a cake.

6. The boy ate the hamburger.

Although these sentences are grammatically correct but they are giving odd meanings.
After parsing the initial part of the above mentioned sentences from 1 to 5, we notice this
oddness is due to the following reasons:

 The kind of subject for reading must be a ―human‖

 The kind of subject for speaking must be a living being and most probably a
―human being.‖
 The kind of subject for eating must be a living being and as per situation of the
sentence it should most probably be a ―human being.‖
 To solve the problems of oddness we use semantic features or properties.

Semantic properties are often organized hierarchically, with more general properties at
the top and more specific ones at the bottom. For example, the general property of being an
animal encompasses more specific properties such as having fur, being warm-blooded, and
being able to move around. This hierarchical organization reflects the way we categorize the
world and understand the relationships between different concepts.

Following is a semantic feature diagram of some animate and inanimate entities.

The semantic features of a word can be notated using a binary feature notation. A semantic
property is specified in a plus or minus sign indicating the existence or non-existence of that
property.

Book Horse Boy Girl Man Woman

Animate - + + + + +
Human - - + + + +
Male - + + - + -
Female - - - + - +

22
Adult - + - - + +
Besides basic properties of semantics, semantic property is also sometimes used to
describe the semantic components of a word, such as man assuming that the referent
is human, male, and adult, or female being a common component of girl, woman,
and actress.

It can, therefore, be said words and morphemes have meanings too. We shall talk
about the meaning of words, even though words may be composed of several morphemes.
Suppose someone said:
The assassin was stopped before he got to Mr. Thwacklehurst.
If the word assassin is in our mental dictionary, we may know that it was some person
who was prevented from murdering some important person named Thwacklehurst. Our
knowledge of the meaning of assassin tells us that it was not an animal that tried to kill the
man that Thwacklehurst was not likely to be an old man who owned a tobacco shop. In other
words, our knowledge of the meaning of assassin includes knowing that the individual to
whom the word refers is human, murderer and killer of important people. These pieces of
information, then, are some of semantic properties of the word upon which speakers of the
language agree. The meanings of all nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs (the ‗content
words‘) and even some of the ‗function words‘ such as with, or over can at least partially be
specified by such properties. In this sense, semantic properties are used to define
the semantic field of a word or set of words.
The same semantic property may be part of the meaning of many different words. For
example the word ‗female‘ is a semantic property that helps to define
Tigress hen actress maiden
Doe mare debutante widow
Ewe vixen girl woman
The meanings of words have other properties. The word father has the properties of
being ‗male‘ and ‗adult‘, as do man and bachelor; but father also has the property of ‗parent‘,
which distinguishes it from the other two words.
Mare, in addition to ‗female‘ and ‗animal‘, must also denote a property of ‗horseness‘.
Words have general semantic properties such as ‗human‘ or ‗parent‘, as well as more
specific properties that give the word its particular meaning.

23
 The same semantic property may occur in words of different categories. ‗Female‘ is
part of the meaning of the noun mother, of the verb breast-feed, and of the adjective
pregnant.
How Do Semantic Properties Help in Making Meanings of Sentence (s)?
 The----------is reading a newspaper.
 The-----------is teaching the students.
Undoubtedly, in the first sentence it would be a human and in addition it may be a man, a
woman, girl or boy. We would say that ―man‖ [+ human, +adult, + animate – female]. In the
second sentence the answer would be surely a teacher. In addition, if it is a young girl, we
may say ―girl‖ [+ animate, + human+, +female, - adult]
In fact, the semantic features help us know which type of word we have to use and in
which situation it will be used. Through semantic properties we not only can convey our
meaning(s) in a sentence accordingly but we may also use different words at proper places.
Semantic properties also play a crucial role in understanding figurative language, such as
metaphors, idioms, and analogies. Figurative language relies on the use of non-literal
meanings, and understanding the underlying semantic properties is essential to interpret these
expressions correctly. For example, the idiom "break a leg" means "good luck" in the context
of a theater performance. This expression has semantic properties such as being associated
with success and achievement, and we use it to communicate encouragement and support to
someone.

One of the crucial aspects of semantic properties is that they are not fixed or static.
They can change over time, depending on how a word is used and the context in which it is
used. For example, the word "computer" has undergone significant changes in its semantic
properties since its invention in the 20th century. Initially, it referred to a machine that
performed calculations, but now it is associated with a vast array of activities, including
communication, entertainment, and business.

Limitations

For many words this method is not applicable. For example, we may not use it for
feelings [such words are called containers of meanings also] such as happiness, sadness, and
abstract nouns like beauty, advice, threat, etc.
Conclusion
24
 To infer, it can be said that semantic properties or features are a part of semantic
analysis. We use semantic features or properties to solve the problems of abnormality in
sentences. These features aid us to distinguish between various lexical items. In addition, we
realize which category of word we have to use and in which situation it will be used. They
are critical for effective communication, and they enable us to understand and use words and
concepts in different contexts. They are dynamic and reflect the way we categorize and make
sense of the world around us. Understanding semantic properties is essential for interpreting
language accurately and effectively, and it is a crucial aspect of language development and
acquisition.

LECTURE 04 SEMANTIC PROPERTIES (POINTS TO REMEMBER)

 Semantic properties are the building blocks of meaning. They are the
characteristics of words or phrases that determine their meanings and enable us to
use them in different contexts.
 In linguistics, semantic properties are described as the attributes or features that
describe a particular word or concept.
 We may say that semantic properties or meaning properties are those aspects of a
linguistic unit, such as a morpheme, word, or sentence that contribute to the
meaning of that unit.
 The basic semantic properties include being meaningful or meaningless. For
example,
The hamburger ate the boy. Although this sentence is grammatically correct, yet it is
giving odd meanings. After parsing the initial part of the above mentioned sentence,
we may notice its oddness is due to the following reason: The kind of subject for
eating must be a living being and as per situation of the sentence it should most
probably be a ―human being.‖

 To solve the problems of oddness we use semantic features or properties.

 Semantic properties are often organized hierarchically, with more general
properties at the top and more specific ones at the bottom.

Book Horse Boy Girl Man 25

 Animate - + + + +
Human - - + + +
Male - + + - +
Female - - - + -
Adult - + - - +

 The semantic features of a word can be notated using a binary feature

notation. A semantic property is specified in a plus or minus sign indicating the
existence or non-existence of that property.
 Semantic properties are used to define the semantic field of a word or set of
words. The same semantic property may be part of the meaning of many different
words. For example the word ‗female‘ is a semantic property that helps to define
tigress, hen, actress, maiden, mare, widow, ewe, vixen, girl, woman etc.
 Furthermore, semantic properties assist in making meanings of sentence(s). As
we see in the following case: The----------is reading a newspaper. Undoubtedly, in this
sentence it would be a human and in addition it may be a man, a woman, girl or boy.
We would say that ―man‖ [+ human, +adult, + animate – female].
 Apart from this, the semantic features help us know which type of word we have
to use and in which situation it will be used. Through semantic properties we
not only can convey our meaning(s) in a sentence accordingly but we may also
use different words at proper places.
 Semantic properties also play a crucial role in understanding figurative language, as
well such as metaphors, idioms, and analogies.
 One of the crucial aspects of semantic properties is that they are not fixed or static.
They can change over time, depending on how a word is used and the context in
which it is used. For example, the word "computer" has undergone significant
changes in its semantic properties since its invention in the 20th century. Initially, it
referred to a machine that performed calculations, but now it is associated with a vast
array of activities, including communication, entertainment, and business.
 The limitation of semantic properties is that it is not applicable to feelings such as
happiness, sadness, and abstract nouns like beauty, advice, threat, etc.

26
  To infer, it can be said that semantic properties or features are a part of semantic
analysis. We use semantic features or properties to solve the problems of abnormality
in sentences.
 These features aid us to distinguish between various lexical items.
 In addition, with the help of these properties, we realize which category of word we
have to use and in which situation it will be used. This is why they are critical for
effective communication.
Lecture06 Evidence for Semantic Properties

Semantic properties refer to the meaning and interpretation of words and

phrases in a language. These properties are critical for language understanding, and the
evidence for them can be observed in various levels of language processing.

One key factor in determining semantic properties is context. The context in which a
word or phrase is used can heavily influence its meaning. For example, the word "bat" could
refer to both a flying mammal and a piece of sports equipment, depending on the context in
which it is used. This context dependency indicates that semantic properties are not fixed or
absolute but rather can vary and be influenced by various factors.

Another piece of evidence for semantic properties is relatedness. Words that share a
similar meaning or concept are often related, such as "big" and "large." The relatedness
between words suggests that the meaning of a word cannot be understood in isolation but
rather must be understood in the larger context of its semantic environment.

Furthermore, the usage of words is also indicative of their semantic properties. For
example, verbs often describe actions or states, whereas adjectives describe features or
attributes of objects. These patterns and conventions of word usage provide additional
evidence for semantic properties.

Lastly, semantic properties can also be observed through the use of imagery and
metaphor. Many words and phrases in language are based on sensory experiences, and these
sensory experiences can be used to convey abstract or intangible concepts, such as emotions.
Metaphors, in particular, can be used to describe complex concepts in terms of more concrete
concepts, further highlighting the importance of semantic properties in language
understanding.
27
 In conclusion, there are multiple levels of evidence for semantic properties, including
context dependency, relatedness, word usage conventions, and imagery and metaphor.
Understanding these properties is crucial for natural language understanding in human
communication.

Lecture 07 Proposition, Semantic Roles & Valency

Students’ Learning Outcomes

By the end of this lecture, the students will be able to:

1. Identify the structures of propositions
2. Describe argument structure in a sentence
3. Define in detail the phenomena of ‗semantic roles‘
4. Recognize the various types of valencies
A sentence contains certain information, but the same information can be presented in
different sentences and in parts of sentences; the information presented, apart from the
way it is presented, is called a proposition. A proposition can be seen as consisting of a
predicate and various noun phrases (referring expressions), each of which has a different
role. The structures of propositions and the various roles the referents of noun phrases can
have the various roles and the structures of propositions.

A proposition is something abstract but meaningful. It can be expressed in different

sentences and in parts of sentences, perhaps with differences of focus but always with the
same basic meaning. Any sentence can be expressed in different utterances, produced by
different people at different times and in different places.

Schematically:

[Utterance

28
 In semantics, an utterance is any act of speech. It can consist of a phrase, a word, or
even a partial word, provided that it is language and not just sound. Utterances can be
grammatical or ungrammatical, meaningful or meaningless, but must be made by a particular
person at a particular time. That is to say, utterances must be real, not speech acts in the
abstract. They can, however, be recorded or transcribed, provided they were spoken at some
point.]

Inflections

Consider these ways of modifying our original sentence:

We [walk] in the park.

[walked]

[are walking]

[have walked]

[may walk]

[would have walked]

[could be walking]

An English sentence has certain kinds of modification that, together, we call

inflection. Inflection includes tense (the distinction between present walk and past walked,
for instance); aspect [Aspect is a property of a verb that expresses how the action/state/event indicated
by the verb takes place over time] (are walking, have walked), and modality [A speaker or writer can
express certainty, possibility, willingness, obligation, necessity and ability by using modal words and
expressions] (may walk, could walk, should walk, among other possibilities). Tense, aspect

and modality can be combined, as in were walking, should be walking, would have walked.
These are important semantic elements, but we consider Inflection separately from the
Proposition. A general scheme for a simple sentence, then, has these parts:
Inflection +Proposition (+ Focus)
Tense
Aspect
Modality
The description of a sentence is a syntactic analysis. The description of a proposition
is a semantic analysis. A syntactic analysis is an account of the lexemes and function words

29
in a sentence, describing how these combine into phrases, and showing the functions that
these lexemes and phrases have in the sentence. There are somewhat different ways of doing
syntactic analysis, but generally these sentence functions are recognized: subject, predicate,
object, complement and adverbial.

Argument Structure [An argument refers to the relationship of a name to the simple
proposition of which it is a part]
We may also notice that Predicates (Verbs) differ in terms of the number and types of
NPs they can take as complements. Transitive verbs such as find, hit, chase, and so on take a
direct object complement, whereas intransitive verbs like arrive or sleep do not. Ditransitive
verbs such as give or throw take two object complements as in John threw Mary a ball. In
addition, most verbs take a subject. The various NPs that occur with a verb are its
arguments. Thus intransitive verbs have one argument: the subject; transitive verbs have
two arguments: the subject and direct object; ditransitive verbs have three arguments: the
subject, direct object, and indirect object. The argument structure of a verb is part of its
meaning and is included in its lexical entry. The verb not only determines the number of
arguments in a sentence, but it also limits the semantic properties of both its subject and its
complements. For example, find and sleep require animate subjects. The well-known
colorless green ideas sleep furiously is semantically anomalous because ideas (colorless or
not) are not animate.
The arguments that accompany the predicate have different semantic functions, or
roles, in the proposition. What roles they have depends partly on the nature of the predicate
and partly on their own meanings. The semantic structure of a proposition can be represented
this way:

Thematic (Semantic Roles)

Semantic roles are a set of abstract concepts that describe the various functions that
nouns and pronouns can serve in a sentence. These roles help us to understand the
relationships between the various elements in a sentence. In fact, thematic role (also called

30
semantic role) is the semantic relationship between the verb and the noun phrases of a
sentence, such as agent, theme, experiencer, location, instrument, goal and source.
[Theta Assignment (thematic role assignment): The ascribing of thematic roles to the
syntactic elements in a sentence]

Thematic roles were introduced in generative grammar during the mid-1960s and early
1970s. In thematic roles, entities are described by the action of the verb. Thematic roles can
be defined as: the roles that referents of the arguments of a verb play in the event or as
the state that the verb denotes. Or

A semantic role is the underlying relationship that a participant has with the
main verb in a clause. Or

The part played by a noun phrase, such as the subject, in a sentence is called
semantic role.

We have already discussed Semantic Roles are also called Thematic Roles. There are
various types of thematic roles. Grammatical relations (subject, object, etc.) are morpho-
syntactic, whereas semantic roles (agent, patient, instrument…) are conceptual notions.
Semantic roles do not correspond directly to grammatical relations.

The first semantic role is called Agent or Doer. An Agent is the doer of an action e.g.
'Ahmad' in the sentence, "Ahmad called me." The second semantic role is called Patient or
Theme. It refers to what is acted upon by the Agent e.g. 'boat' in the sentence, "Jamil steered
the boat." The third semantic role called is Recipient or Receiver. It indicates a receiver in a
situation e.g. 'Ali' in the sentence, "The children sent Ali a postcard." The fourth semantic
role is called Instrument. It identifies the entity that is used to perform an action e.g. 'Razor'
in the sentence, "The boy cut the rope with a razor." The fifth semantic role is called
Experimenter. It is the entity that has the feeling e.g. 'The Boy' in the sentence, "The Boy
feels bad." The sixth semantic role is called Source. It identifies where an entity moves
from e.g. 'The House' in the sentence, "The Boy ran from the house." It is the entity that also
tells us from which something moves, either literally or metaphorically. For example, I took
the pen from the drawer. The seventh semantic role is called Goal. It identifies where an
entity moves to e.g. The Window in the sentence, "The boy walked to the window."
Beneficiary is the entity for whose benefit the action was performed. For example, they
31
baked me a cake. Location is the place where something is situated or has taken place. For
example, the baby was hiding behind the curtain. Stimulus is the entity causing an effect
(usually psychological) during an experience. For example: The noise of the horn frightened
the passengers.

Semantic relations remain the same in the sentences that are paraphrased. In both these
sentences:

The dog chased the cat.

The cat was chased by the dog.
The dog is the agent and the cat is the patient.
Semantic relation may also remain the same in the sentences that are not paraphrased,
as in the following instances;
The owner opened the door with the key.
The key opened the door.
The door was opened.
In all three of these sentences, the door is the patient, the thing that gets opened. In the first
two sentences, the key, despite its different structural role, retains the semantic role of
instrument.
Does a semantic role change in passive voice? No, because nothing changes in the
real world e.g. "John steered the boat" becomes "The boat was steered by John." Still John is
the Agent.

Conclusion

To infer, by identifying these semantic roles, we can better understand the meaning
and relationships between the different elements in sentences. This understanding can be
especially helpful for language learners who are trying to master complex sentence structures
in a new language.

Valency
Different predicates verbs, adjectives, prepositions can be described according to the
number of referring expressions, or arguments that can occur with them and the roles these
arguments have. An account of the number of arguments that a predicate has is called

32
the valency of that predicate. Valency theory is a description of the semantic potential of
predicates in terms of the number and types of arguments which may co-occur with them.
Some predicates, such as break, have variable valency: a valency of one in A window broke
and a valency of two in Tom broke a window.
Let‘s consider the following sentences:
It is snowing.
My brother snores.
Chris is making an omelet.
Agnes is writing her mother a letter.
Each of these four sentences is longer than the one before it because it has more arguments.
The verbs snow, snores, make and write have different valencies respectively, valencies of
zero, one, two and three and each of them is typical of a whole group of predicates.
Valency Zero
It is snowing.
(a) The first sentence in the group above has the verb snow, and the subject is it, but it
doesn‘t name anything. The sentence has a subject because English requires a subject, but
this subject does not correspond to anything in the underlying proposition. We say that snow
is a zero-argument verb. Other zero-argument verbs are seen in the following:
It‘s raining.
It sleeted (yesterday).
It has been thundering (in the west).
English requires the presence of it with weather verbs like rain, snow, sleet, thunder,
but it does not refer to anything. These verbs are among the few in the language that do not
require some referent to be named in the sentence. Tense and aspect must be expressed
(rains, rained; is snowing, has been snowing) and indications of time and place can be added
(yesterday, in the west, etc.) but a sentence is complete without anything being named.
Here are similar sentences with weather adjectives as predicates:
It is windy (today).
It was rainy (all last month).
Valency one
My brother snores.

33
This sentence has the verb snore and a subject my brother. A lot of verbs are like snore: they
have a subject but no object. They are intransitive verbs or, in our terminology, one argument
predicates. Other one-argument verbs appear in the sentences below.
{The dog is sleeping.
Larry laughed.
The earth rotates (on its axis).} Group 1
{Grandfather died (last week).
A volcano erupted.
The cake fell.} Group 2
Now let‘s consider the role or roles that the arguments have. In the first group the
predicates sleep, laugh and rotate express actions; they tell what the dog, Larry and the earth
do, respectively. Consequently, each of these arguments names an actor that carries out the
action.
Turning to the second group, it would be possible to say that Grandfather and a
volcano and the cake did something, and the respective predicates tell what they did, but
these predicates are not like those of the first group. The predicates die, erupt, fall tell of an
event, a change in the condition of the entity named by the argument, and the entity named in
the argument undergoes this change, is affected by it.
Valency two
Chris is making an omelet.
Most verbs take a subject and an object; they are two-argument predicates. One of
them is make, illustrated in sentence above. Other examples are need and use. We can‘t
simply say *Chris is making or *I need or *Sue used. A statement with make must contain a
mention of who makes and what is made, and likewise with need and use.
{The cat killed a rat.
I broke the window.
Bert hit Harry.} 1
{The cat dug a hole.
Chris is making an omelet.
Picasso created a masterpiece.} 2
{Jennie crossed the street.
Jenny entered the room.
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Simon climbed a tree.} 3
The first group of sentences expresses some action by one entity which affects another
entity. The first argument denotes an agent and the second argument names the entity
affected. An agent is involved in an action that has some effect on another entity or entities;
an actor, on the other hand, is involved in some action (e.g. running) that has no necessary
effect on others. In sentences there is a difference. The cat doesn‘t just affect a hole nor
Chris an omelet nor Picasso a masterpiece. The hole, omelet and masterpiece are the result or
effect of the action. They come into existence because of the action. The predicates of the
third group of sentences, also express some action performed by an actor and the action
involves movement with respect to a place. To enter, leave, cross or climb entails some
location (though the place does not always have to be mentioned). The second argument in
each of these sentences has the role of place.
Synopsis
A sentence is defined as a composite of inflection and proposition, and a proposition
consists of a subject and a predicate. Inflection includes agreement and tense; agreement is
the formal bond between subject and predicate, a bond that varies considerably from one
language to another. Tense is a system of contrasts that locates the general meaning of the
proposition in the past, present or future, from the time-perspective of the speaker; and
different languages have quite different tense systems.

A proposition consists of a predicate and varying numbers of arguments or referring

expressions. The number of arguments that accompany a particular predicate is called its
valency. We have examined valencies of zero, one and two. The meaning of a predicate is
partly determined by the valency and by the semantic roles that these arguments have.
Oft-Repeated Questions

Define in detail what are ‗semantic roles‘? How are they useful in understanding the
meaning of an utterance? Explain with help of appropriate examples.

What are the various types of valences? How do they determine meaning in text?
Discuss with the help of appropriate examples.

Lecture 08 Semantic Features/ Properties of Noun

Students Learning Outcomes: By the end of this lesson, the learners will be able to:
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 i. Define the term noun and comprehend various categories of nouns
ii. Make a distinction between the term componential analysis and semantic feature
iii. Identify the term binary opposition and Find the different binary features of nouns
iv. Know how the terms semantic feature and semantic field are related to each other
v. Tell semantic properties of noun

In Semantics, ―noun is defined as word referring to "persons, places, things or ideas.‖

Or a noun is a word that shows a class of words with a naming function, showing contrasts
of countability and number. Followings are some of the types of nouns:

Abstract noun: An abstract noun denotes one or more entities that do not have physical
existence: idea, problem
Concrete noun: A concrete noun denotes one or more physical entities e.g. Chair, food, etc.
Action noun: A noun that expresses something that somebody does: discovery, swimming.
Affected noun: A noun derived from a verb which names an entity that receives the action
of the verb: advisee.
Agent noun: A noun usually derived from a verb, which names a person who performs the
action of the verb: painter, cook.
Animate noun: Said of a word, especially a noun that denotes some living thing: dog, boy,
In-animate noun denotes some non-living thing(s): stone, happiness.
Characterized noun: A noun derived from an adjective and which expresses an entity of
whom the adjective can be predicated: young youngster.
Collective noun: A noun that refers to a group of entities; army, furniture, luggage.
Common noun: A noun that refers to one or more of a class of objects or concepts: cat,
idea.
Countable noun: A noun that has singular and plural forms and which denotes separable
entities: child(ren), house(s).
Definite noun: Said of a noun phrase that refers to an entity or group of entities whose
identity is presumably known to the addressee.
Effect noun: A noun derived from a verb and which expresses the product or outcome of the
action expressed by the verb: song ¬ sing.
Indefinite noun: An indefinite noun is a type of noun that is not specific in its reference. For
example, "a dog" or "a cat" refers to any dog or cat.

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Inhabitant noun: A noun like New Yorker which names the inhabitant of a particular place.
Instrument noun: A noun that refers to an inanimate object by which the action of some
verb is accomplished: brush, projector.
Non-countable noun: A noun that has no plural form: mud, misery, etc.
Proper noun: A noun or noun phrase that labels some specific person, place, building,
historic event, etc. and which lacks the grammatical forms of a common noun.
A semantic feature is a notational method which can be used to express the existence
or non-existence of pre- established semantic properties by using plus and minus signs [+ / -
]. Semantic properties are those aspects of a linguistic unit, such as a morpheme, word, or
sentence that contribute to the meaning of that unit.

According to Leech (1981: 84), the analysis of word senses is often seen as a process
of breaking down the sense of a word into its minimal components which is known as
semantic features or sense components or componential analysis. The meaning of a word is
made up of a set of abstracted characteristics, known as semantic features, which distinguish
this word from other words.

Close to semantic feature is componential analysis. Componential analysis, also called

feature analysis or contrast analysis, refers to the description of the meaning of words
through structured sets of semantic features, which are given as ―present‖, ―absent‖ or
―indifferent with reference to feature.‖

In Componential Analysis, binary feature is used. A binary feature assumes both the
[+] and [-] features. Girl, woman, sister, wife, queen [+ FEMALE] Boy, man, brother,
husband, king [+ MALE] child, person, sibling, spouse, monarch [sex not specified]
(Lobner, 2002:133)

Since semantic features are established on the basis of binary opposition, e.g. binary
semantic features of nouns are featured by [±common] [±concrete] [±countable] [±animate],
etc. Examples of semantic feature of nouns (man): [+common] [+concrete] [+countable]
[+human] [+adult] [+male] Spinster: [+common] [+concrete] [+countable] [+human]
[+adult] [－ male] [－ married]

Componential Analysis Example Man = [+ male], [+ mature] woman = [– male], [+

mature] boy = [+ male], [– mature] girl [– male] [– mature] Child [+/– male] [– mature]
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 By this, we realize that the word girl can have three basic factors (or semantic
properties): human, young, and female.

Semantic Field

Semantic property is also sometimes used to describe the semantic components of

words. For example, the lexical item, man is referent to human, male, and adult and female is
a common component of girl, woman, and actress. In this sense, semantic properties are used
to define the semantic field of a word or set of words. A semantic field is a technical term in
the discipline of linguistics to describe a set of words grouped by meanings in a certain way.
Thus, semantic field refers to a set of words covering a certain area in one language
(Aitchison, 1992:82).

We may notice that nouns are an essential part of language and play a crucial role in
conveying meaning. They are words that represent people, places, things, or ideas. Each
noun carries its own set of semantic properties that help us understand its meaning.
Semantic properties of nouns can be divided into various classes: specificity, animacy,
gender, kinship, social status, physical properties, and function.

i. Specificity is a semantic feature of noun or a noun phrases (NPs) that distinguishes

between entities/nouns/referents that are unique in a given context and those that are not e.g.
Every woman talked to a student.

ii. Boundedness in nouns is associated with countability, which is a fundamental feature of

nouns as entities or mass (count/non-count). Conceptually, count nouns are countable in the
sense that we can count them. Therefore, they are bounded for this reason. Mass nouns
like dirt, water, petrol cannot be counted. So, the mass nouns are unbounded.
iii. Animacy is the semantic property of nouns denoting whether, or to what extent, the
referent of that noun is alive, human-like. Several ways of characterizing the animacy of
such referents have been proposed, the most basic distinction being between animate and
inanimate entities. In such a binary scheme, examples of animate nouns might include author
and dog, while examples of inanimate nouns might include table and rock.

iv. Gender: In English, the four genders of noun are masculine, feminine, common, and
neuter. Masculine nouns refer to words for a male figure or male member of a species (i.e.

38
man, boy, actor, horse, etc.) Feminine nouns refer to female figures or female members of a
species (i.e. woman, girl, actress, mare, etc.) Common nouns refer to members of a species
and don't specify the gender (i.e. parent, friend, client, student, etc.) Neuter nouns refer to
things that have no gender (i.e. rock, table, pencil, etc.)

v. Kinship refers to the words used in a speech community to identify relationships between
individuals in a family. It differs from society to society and culture to culture. All societies
have kinship systems, which can be analyzed in terms of a few semantic features that co-
occur. The features parent, offspring, sibling and spouse are universal. Older and younger
siblings are named differently in some cultures. Gender figures differently in different
systems, so that relations on the mother‘s side may have different names than those on the
father‘s side, and similarly for the bride‘s family as distinct from the bridegroom‘s family.
vi. Social status refers to the honor or prestige attached to one's position in society. It
may also refer to a rank or position that one holds in a group, such as son or daughter,
playmate, pupil, etc. When we talk about the semantic features of nouns, the term "social
status" refers to the position or rank that a noun can indicate within a social hierarchy. It
involves understanding how certain nouns can convey information about a person's social
standing, such as their occupation, education, or societal role. For example, nouns like
"doctor," "professor," or "CEO" indicate a higher social status, while nouns like "janitor,"
"student," or "cashier" may indicate a lower social status. The social status of a noun can
provide important contextual information and contribute to the overall meaning of a sentence
or discourse.

vii. Physical properties refer to how an entity exists in. It can include shape, size, and
material, for example.

viii. The function class of semantic properties refers to noun class markers that indicate the
purpose of an entity or how humans utilize an entity. In relation to the semantic feature of
nouns, the term "function" refers to the role or purpose that a noun serves in a sentence or
within a particular context. It involves understanding how a noun is used and what it
contributes to the overall meaning of a sentence or discourse. For example, a noun can
function as a subject, object, or possessive in a sentence, and its function can affect the
interpretation and meaning of the sentence.

Conclusion
39
 In a nutshell, it can be said that nouns are an indispensible part of our communication
and language. They have a vital role in conveying meaning. By understanding these
properties, we can better comprehend the meaning and usage of nouns in language.

Bibliography

i. Lobner, S. (2002) Understanding Semantics. London: Hodder Education

ii. Saeed, J. I. (2002) Semantics. 3rd ed. England: Pearson Education Ltd.
iii. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semantic_feature
iv. Yule, G. (2016). The Study of Language. London: Cambridge University Press.

Lecture 09 Semantic Features of Verb

Semantic properties of verbs refer to the various aspects of meaning that are
conveyed through the usage of verbs in language. Verbs are one of the fundamental
components of language, and they are used to describe actions and states. In this lecture, we
will explore the semantic properties of verbs and how they convey meaning in language.

Firstly, we will discuss the two categories of verbs: stative verbs and dynamic verbs.
Dynamic verbs (sometimes referred to as "action verbs") usually describe actions we can
take, or things that happen; stative verbs usually refer to a state or condition which is not
changing or likely to change. The difference is important, because stative verbs cannot
normally be used in the continuous (BE + ING) forms.

Dynamic verbs

There are many types of dynamic verbs, but most of them describe activities or events
which can begin and finish. Here are some examples:

Dynamic Verb Type Examples

play activity She plays tennis every Friday.

She is playing tennis right now.

melt process The snow melts every spring.

The snow is melting right now

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Dynamic Verb Type Examples

hit momentary action When one boxer hits another, brain damage can
result. (This suggests only ONE punch.)
When one boxer is hitting another, brain damage can
result. (This suggests MANY repeated punches.)

Dynamic verbs, as you can see from the table above, can be used in the simple and perfect
forms (plays, played, has played, had played) as well as the continuous or progressive
forms (is playing, was playing, has been playing, had been playing).

Stative verbs

Stative verbs usually refer to a state or condition which is quite static or unchanging. They
can be divided into verbs of perception or cognition (which refer to things in the mind), or
verbs of relation (which describe the relationships between things). Here are some examples:

Stative Verb Type Examples

hate perception I hate chocolate.

believe perception She believes in UFOs.

contain relation The box contains 24 cans of soda.

own relation Yasir owns three motorbikes.

Note that we CANNOT use these verbs in the continuous (progressive) forms; you CAN'T
say "*Yasir is owning three cars." Owning is a state, not an action, so it is always in the
simple form.

Example verbs

Here some common stative and dynamic verbs. The lists may help us to understand what
types of verbs are likely to be stative and what types are commonly dynamic.

Stative love; hate; like; see; hear; sound; think (meaning "have an
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Verbs opinion"); mind (meaning "care about"); recognize; seem; have (meaning
"own"); prefer; doubt; consist of; mean

Dynamic eat; drink; go; type; read; write; listen; speak; watch; say; grow; work; sle
Verbs ep; cook; talk

One of the most important semantic properties of verbs is aspect. Aspect refers to the
way in which verbs depict the temporal structure of events. There are two main aspects in
English: the perfective aspect and the imperfective aspect. The perfective aspect is used to
describe completed events, while the imperfective aspect is used to describe ongoing or
incomplete events.

Another important semantic property of verbs is tense. Tense refers to the way in
which verbs locate events in time. English has three tenses: past, present, and future. The
tense of a verb tells us when the event took place or will take place.

One additional important semantic property of verbs is modality. Modality refers to

the way in which verbs convey the speaker's attitude or degree of certainty about the event
being described. There are several modal verbs in English, including can, could, may, might,
should, will, and would. These verbs are used to express possibility, ability, obligation, and
likelihood.

Another important semantic property of verbs is voice. Voice refers to the way in
which verbs indicate the relationship between the subject of the sentence and the action
being performed. There are two main voices in English: active voice and passive voice. The
active voice places the subject as the agent performing the action, while the passive voice
places the subject as the recipient of the action.

Another, significant semantic property of verbs is transitivity. Transitivity refers to

the number of arguments that a verb takes. Intransitive verbs take only one argument, while
transitive verbs take two or more arguments. The type and number of arguments that a verb
takes can significantly influence its meaning.

It can be further noticed that semantic features are conceptual elements by which a
person understands the meanings of words. Decomposing the meanings of words into

42
semantic features can clarify how certain words relate to other words. This method
represents the meaning of a word in terms of semantic features that make up the word.

Verbs also have other semantic features as part of their meaning. For example, ―cause‖
is a feature of verbs such as darkens, kill, uglify, and so on.

Darken cause to become dark

Kill cause to die

Uglify cause to become ugly

―Go‖ is a feature of verbs that mean a change in location or possession, such as swim, crawl,
throw, fly, give, or buy. Words like swim have an additional feature like ―in liquid,‖ while
crawl is ―close to a surface.‖

Jack swims.

The baby crawled under the table.

The boy threw the ball over the fence.

John gave Mary a beautiful engagement ring

―Become‖ is a feature expressing the end state of the action of certain verbs. For example,
the verb break can be broken down into the following components of meaning: ―cause‖ to
―become‖ broken. Verbal features, like features on nouns, may have syntactic consequences.
For example, verbs can either describe events; such as John kissed Mary/John ate oysters, or
states, such as John knows Mary/John likes oysters. The eventive/ stative difference is
mirrored in the syntax. Eventive sentences still sound natural when passivized, when
expressed progressively, when used imperatively, and with certain adverbs:

Eventives

Mary was kissed by John. Oysters were eaten by John.

John is kissing Mary. John is eating oysters.

Kiss Mary! Eat oysters!

John deliberately kissed Mary. John deliberately ate oysters

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The stative sentences seem peculiar, if not ungrammatical or anomalous, when cast in the
same form.

Statives

Mary is known by John. Oysters are liked by John.

John is knowing Mary. John is liking oysters.

Know Mary! Like oysters!

John deliberately knows Mary. John deliberately likes oysters.

Negation is a particularly interesting component of the meaning of some verbs. Expressions

such as ever, anymore, have a red cent, and many more are ungrammatical in certain simple
affirmative sentences, but grammatical in corresponding negative ones.

*Mary will ever smile. (Mary will not ever smile.)

*I can visit you anymore. (I cannot visit you anymore.)

*It‘s worth a red cent. (It‘s not worth a red cent.)

Such expressions are called negative polarity items because a negative element such as ―not‖
elsewhere in the sentence allows them to appear Consider these data:

*John thinks that he‘ll ever fly a plane again.

*John hopes that he‘ll ever fly a plane again.

John doubts that he‘ll ever fly a plane again.

John despairs that he‘ll ever fly a plane again.

This suggests that verbs such as doubt and despair, but not think and hope, have ―negative‖
as a component of their meaning. Doubt may be analyzed as ―think that not,‖ and despair as
―has no hope.‖ The negative feature in the verb allows the negative feature in the verb allows
the negative polarity item ever to occur grammatically without the overt presence of not.

44
*Negative Polarity Item (NPI): An expression that is grammatical in the presence of
negation, but ungrammatical in simple affirmative sentences. For example; any in ―James
does not have any Money‖ but * James has any money.

In a nutshell, the semantic properties of verbs are multidimensional and can significantly
impact the meaning of a sentence. Aspect, tense, modality, voice, transitivity, events, states,
etc. are all essential aspects of a verb's meaning and should be carefully considered when
using verbs in language.

Lecture 10 SENSE RELATION

Students Learning Outcomes

By the end of this unit, the learners will be able to:

i. Discuss the term sense relation

ii. Define different terms like synonym, antonymy, polysemy, etc.
iii. Differentiate between Paradigmatic, Syntagmatic and Congruence Relations
iv. Know various basic relations for establishing fundamental group of sense relations

Lexical semantics is an academic discipline concerned with the meaning of words.

Lexical semanticists are interested in what words mean, why they mean what they mean,
how they are represented in speakers‘ minds and how they are used in text and discourse.
Outside linguistics proper, lexical semantics overlaps with disciplines such as philosophy,
psychology, anthropology, computer science and pedagogy. Within linguistics, it crucially
overlaps with what is traditionally referred to as lexicology, which is the overall study of the
vocabularies of languages. Here we are concerned with various types of lexical relations
otherwise known as sense relations.

Words have relationship with other words. In our everyday talk, we often explain the
meanings of words in terms of their relationships. For example, if someone is asked the
meaning of the word conceal, the simple reply might be, ―it is same as a hid,‖ or give the
meaning of shallow as ―the opposite of deep,‖ or the meaning of daffodil as ―a kind of
flower.‖ In doing so, we are characterizing the meaning of each word, not in terms of its
component features, but in terms of relationship to other words. This approach is used in the
semantic description of language and treated as the analysis of lexical relations.

45
 Sense relation refers to any of several ways in which the meanings of words may be
related. Words do not have meanings in isolation; instead, the meaning of a word is usually
related in important ways to the meaning of other words. Some of the most prominent of
these relations in meaning are known collectively as sense relations. These relations include:

Synonymy: Synonyms are two or more words with very closely related meanings
Antonymy: Two forms with opposite meanings
Hyponymy: When the meaning of one form is included in the meaning of another
Prototypes: The most common example of a category is called prototype
Homophones: Two or more words with different forms and the same pronunciation
Homonyms: Two or more words with the same form and pronunciation but they have
unrelated meanings
Polysemy: Two words or more with the same form and pronunciation with related
meaning(s)
Metonymy: A container-contents relation
Collocation: Words tend to occur with other words
Paradigmatic and Syntagmatic Relations

From the point of view of structural linguistics, linguistic units can be studied from the
point of two axes: syntagmatic and paradigmatic axes. Similarly meaning of linguistic units
can be studied by means of these two axes oriented relations. Syntagmatic relation is the
relation between words that appear in a sentence. It can be visualized as relation in the
horizontal axis. Paradigmatic relation is the relation between words that can replace a word
that appear in a sentence. It can be visualized as a relation in the vertical axis.

The Boy beats a dog.

Girl kicks snake.

Man hits cat.

Human being hurts animal.

The relation between boy, beat, and dog is syntagmatic relation. The relation between
girl, man and human being that can replace one another or between dog, snake, cat and
animal that can replace one another in a context is paradigmatic relation.

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Congruence Relations

The four basic relations between classes furnish a model not only for establishing
fundamental group of sense relations, but also for defining a set of systematic variants
applicable to virtually all other paradigmatic sense relations (Cruse, 1986:86). The basic
lexical relations are referred as congruence relations.

Identity: class A and class B have same members

A B

Inclusion: class B is wholly included in the class A

A
B

Overlap: class A and class B have members in common but each has members not found in
the other

Disjunction: class A and class B have member in common

Paradigmatic Sense Relations of Identity and Inclusion

The paradigmatic sense relations of identity leads to synonymy and the paradigmatic
relations of inclusion leads to hyponymy-hypernymy and meronymy-holonymy relations.

Synonymy

The lexical items which have the same meaning or which share same componential
semantic features are synonyms and the relationship existing between them is synonymy.
Synonymy does not necessarily mean that the items concerned should be identical in
meaning, i.e. interchangeable in all contexts. Synonymy can be said to occur if lexical items
are close enough in their meaning to allow a choice to be made between them in some
47
contexts, without there being any difference in the meaning of the sentence as a whole. Take,
for examples, the following words He plays the violin very well entails and is entailed by He
plays fiddle very well. The following pairs of words can be considered as synonym pairs:
filbert: hazelnut, couch: sofa, big: large, automobile: car, Water: H20.

Two lexemes are synonyms if they can be successfully substituted for each other in all
situations. If so they have the same propositional meaning. Synonymy is a relation between
senses rather than words. Consider the words big and large. We may consider them as
synonyms when we come across the following examples:

How big is that plane?

Would I be flying on a large or small plane?

But we may hesitate to judge them as synonyms when we come across the following
examples:

Miss Naheed, for instance, became a kind of big sister to Bushra.

Miss Naheed, for instance, became a kind of large sister to Bushra.

The reason is big has a sense that means being older, or grown up; large lacks this
sense. But there are few (or no) examples of perfect synonymy. When reference is made to
lexical relation or close relatedness in the meaning of words, we deal with synonymy. We can
therefore, describe pairs of words that have very close similarities in meaning as synonyms.
For example we can have the following pairs of words as synonyms: Friend: Ally: Boss:
Master; Amiable: Friendly

It has often been observed that words may not always have exact substitutes in all
contexts. This observation means that we may have absolute, complete and total synonyms
when there are exact substitutes as shown by the following examples: everybody: everyone;
bandit: brigand

There are also broad or near synonyms as seen from the following examples: rich:
sumptuous; mature: ripe

Thus, we have different kinds of synonyms: absolute synonymy, propositional

synonymy and near-synonymy (Cruse: 2000:156-160). Absolute synonymy refers to
48
complete identification of meaning. Propositional synonymy can be defined in terms of
entailment. If two lexical items are propositional synonyms, they can be substituted in any
expression with truth-conditional properties without effect on those properties (Cruse:
2000:158). For example, Raja brought a violin entails Raja bought a fiddle. So fiddle and
violin are synonyms.

Antonymy

Antonyms are words which are opposite in meaning. Different types of relationships
that seem to involve words which are at a time related in meaning yet incompatible or
contrasting, some of them are as follow:

1. Simple Antonyms - the negative of one implies the positive of the other - complementary
pairs or binary pairs.

2. Gradable Antonyms - this is a relationship between opposites where the positive of one
term does not necessarily imply the negative of the other.

3. Taxonomy Sisters -antonym sometimes describe words which are at the same level in
taxonomy. Taxonomies are classification systems e.g. the color adjectives in English (i.e.
red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, brown).

4. Reverses - shows reverse relation in between terms describing movements, where one
term describes movement in one direction, and the other the same movement in the opposite
direction, e.g. push/pull, come/go, up/down, in/out, right/left.

5. Converses - describe a relation between two entities from alternate viewpoints, e.g.
own/belong to, above/ below, employer/ employee.

Meronymy

Meronymy relation is otherwise known by the term 'part-whole' relation. It is different

from hyponymy-hyperonymy relation discussed above. For example we can say that 'arm' is
the meronym of the holonymy body; similarly, 'wheel' is the meronym of the holonym
'bicycle'. That is, the relation between 'arm' and 'body' is called meronymy; and conversely
the relation that holds between 'body' and 'arm' is known as holonymy; similarly the relation

49
that holds between 'wheel' and 'bicycle' is meronymy and the relation between 'bicycle' and
'wheel' is holonymy,

The distinction between meronymy-Holonymy relation and homonymy-hyperonymy

relation is clearly distinct in most cases. We cannot say 'arm is a kind of body' or 'wheel is a
kind of bicycle'. We have to say 'arm is a part of a body' and 'wheel is a part of a bicycle.

The part-whole relationship which holds between physically discrete referents is

clearly transitive: if something X is a part of something Y which is a part of something Z,
then X is always describable as a part of Z. For example, if finger is a part of an arm and arm
is the part of a body, then finger is a part of a body.

The fact that one object may be described as a part of another object does not imply,
however, that there is a part-whole relation holding in the vocabulary between the lexemes
used in expressions which refer to these entities. For example we can say 'handle is a part of
a door' and 'door is a part of a house'; but it is odd to say 'handle is a part of a house' or 'this
is house-handle' or 'this handle of the house'. We might therefore inclined to set up a part-
whole relationship between 'handle' and 'door' and between 'house' and 'door', but not
between 'handle' and 'house'.

An entity could be a meronym of part of different holonyms. For example, a door

could be a part of a house as well as a car. Similarly, a wheel could be a part of a bicycle,
bus, car, cart etc. In this context one could argue that the part-whole relationship is irrelevant
for linguistic semantics. But, there are, however numerous lexemes is the vocabularies of
languages whose meaning cannot be specified independently of some part-whole relation
(Lyons, 1977:314).

The difference between hyponymy and part-whole relations is clear enough in cases
like 'arm': 'body', 'wheel': 'bicycle'; i.e. when the lexemes in question are nouns denoting
discrete physical objects. Most of the discussion of part-whole lexical relations by linguists
has been restricted to such cases.

Mention should also made here about various kinds of collectives such as 'cattle',
'clergy', 'furniture', 'herd', 'flock', 'family', 'library'. Collective nouns are defined,
semantically, as lexemes which denote collections or groups of persons or objects. In
English, they fall into a number of different grammatical classes. For example, 'cattle' and
50
'clergy' are treated as plural and 'furniture' as singular. We are concerned herewith the place
occupied by collectives in the structure of vocabulary. Many of them serve as superordinates
in relation to a set of quasi-hyponyms. For example, 'cattle' is a superordinate to {'cow',
'bull', 'steer', etc} and 'clergy' is superordinate to {'bishop', 'priest', etc.}. There are many such
collectives in the vocabulary of English and other languages which are superodinate to sets
of lexemes in a hierarchical relationship that is ambivalent with respect to the distinction of
hyponymy and the part-whole relation.

Prototype

The prototype of any category is the member or set of members of a category that best
represents the category as a whole. It explains the meaning of certain words in terms of
resemblance to the clearest example. The term semantic feature assists us identify various
prototypes of any category. For example, the clearest example of the words bird, fruit and
furniture are pigeon, apple and chair respectively.
Hyponymy
When the meaning of one form is included in the meaning of another, we have
hyponymy relation. For instance, included in animals are dogs, elephants, goat, etc. We can
also relate hyponymy to professions to include law, medicine, teaching, banking, etc. There
is always a hierarchical relationship drawing from the general to samples. The general term
is usually referred to as superordinate term while the terms that indicate inclusion are
referred to as hyponyms. Simply then, hyponymy is about relations of inclusion.

As such, we can say that flower is a superordinate term while rose, cauliflower,
sunflower, carnation, forget-me-not, etc. are hyponyms of flower. Co-occurring hyponyms
are referred to as co-hyponyms. Thus, table, chair, cupboard, wardrobe, bookshelf, bedstead
are co-hyponyms while their superordinate term is furniture.

Car is a hyponym of vehicle

Dog is a hyponym of animal

Mango is a hyponym of fruit

If X is a hyponymy of Y, conversely, we can say Y is a Hyperonymy of X.

Vehicle is a hyperonym/superordinate of car

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Animal is a hyperonym of dog

Fruit is a hyperonym of mango

The 2 or more words that share the same superordinate term are co-hyponyms.
Dog & horse are co-hyponyms and their superordinate term is animal.
Hyponyms is a transitive relation. If X is a hyponym of Y and Y is a hyponymy of Z,
then X is the hyponym of Z. For example cow is a hyponymy of 'mammal' and 'mammal' is a
hyponym of 'animal'; therefore 'cow' is the hyponym of 'animal'.

Hyponymy is often defined in terms of entailment between sentences which differ

only in respect of the lexical items being tested (Cruse, 2000:151): 'It is an apple' entails 'It is
a fruit'; but 'It is a fruit' does not entail 'It is an apple'; similarly 'Raza slapped Razia' entails
'Raza hits Razia'; but 'Raza hits Razia' does not entail 'Raza slapped Razia'.

Homophones

Two or more words with different forms and the same pronunciation are said to be
homophones. Examples include, bare/bear, meat/meet, flour/flower, pail/pale, right/write,
hole/whole, to/too/two, etc.
Homonyms
Two or more words which have the same form and pronunciation but they have
unrelated meanings. Followings are some of the examples of homonyms:
Bank (of a river) bank (financial institution)
Mole (on skin) mole (small animal)
Pupil (at school) pupil (in the eye)
Race (contest of speed) race (ethnic group)
Homonyms are words that have separate histories and meanings, but accidently have
the same form and pronunciation.
Polysemy (Poly means many and semy entails meanings)
It refers to the two words or more with the same form and pronunciation, and with
related meanings. For example,
Head = the object on top of your body Head = the person at the top of a company or
department.
Foot = of person/ of bed/ of mountain
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 It is possible for two terms to be distinguished via homonymy and via polysemy.
Date = a thing we eat]
Date = a point in time]
Homonyms
Date = a point in time is polysemous in terms of:
A particular day and month (=on a letter)
The date on the letter was 30th August 1962.
What's today's date?
An arranged meeting (= an appointment)
Let's make a date to come over and visit.
A romantic meeting (=with someone we like)
He has got a date with his cousin tomorrow night.
A person (that person we like)
Can he bring his date to the party?
Polysemy 
Collocation
Collocation refers to the tendency for certain words to occur together. A word like
‗clear‘, for example, can be found with a number of nouns, clear sky, clear conscience, clear
idea, clear road. In each term clear has a slightly different meaning because of the word it is
qualifying. It is an arrangement or juxtaposition of words or other elements, especially those
that commonly co-occur, as dead serious, iron will, green with jealously etc.

Bibliography:

1. Horsey, R. (2005). Teach Yourself 101 Ideas in Linguistics. London: Hooder.

2. Trask, R. (2007). LANGUAGE AND LINGUISTICS (KEY CONCEPTS). New York: Routledge.

3. Yule, G. (2020). The Study of Language 7th Ed. Camberidge: Cambridge University Press .

4. Prof. Rajendran Sankaravelayuthan. An Introductory Course on Semantics and Pragmatics

Lecture 11 Sense and Reference

Students Learning Outcomes

By the end of this lecture, the learners will be able to

i. Define sense and reference

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 ii. Know about Referents and Referring Expressions
iii. Discuss various types of referents

Introduction

Linguistic meaning is a special subset of the more general human ability to use signs
to convey meanings, e.g. traffic lights are the combination of colours to instruct the drivers
and even to warn them. It is believed that human language differs in kind more than a degree
from other languages (Palmer, 1997).

Scholars (e.g. Ferdinand de Saussure, 1974) are of the view that linguistics is a part of
the general study of the use of the sign system, which is called Semiotics. Semioticians have
probed the relationship that may be between the sign and the object it represents or in
Saussure‗s terminology, between signifier and its signified (Saeed, 2004).

There are some important terminologies that we should know:

• Signifier: Any material thing that signifies, e.g., words on a page, a facial expression, an
image.

• Signified: The concept that a signifier refers to

• Together, the signifier and the signified make up a meaning.

• Sign: The smallest unit of meaning. Anything that can be used to communicate

Reference and Sense

These terms were introduced by Friedrich Ludwig Gottlob Frege (1848 -1925) in his
treatise entitled ―Uber Sinn und Bedeutung from 1892, translated into English as ―On
sense and reference.

Reference has to do with the relationship which holds between an expression and what
that expression stands for on particular occasions of its utterance (Lyons, 1977). According
to Saeed (2004), Reference is ―relationship by which language looks onto the world is
usually called reference. Thus, reference can be concluded as the meanings of a word in any
language which exist in the real world.

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 In semantics, reference is generally interpreted as the relationships
between nouns or pronouns and objects that are named by them. Hence, the word "John"
refers to the person John. The word "it" refers to some previously specified object. The
object referred to is called the referent of the word. Sometimes the word-object relation is
called "denotation"; the word denotes the object.

Allan describes that ―Sense is a decontextualized meaning, abstracted from

innumerable occurrences in texts. Sense relates to the complex system of relationships
between the linguistic elements themselves (mostly the words). Concerned only with intra-
linguistic relations (Palmer, 1981).

According to Saeed (2009), the ―semantic links between elements within the
vocabulary system is an aspect of their sense. It can be concluded that ―sense exists in the
word and this is a word to word relation.

Referents and Referring Expressions

We may begin with an attempt to clear up some possible sources of confusion:

a. Huzafa is your cousin, isn‘t he?
b. Huzafa is your cousin‘s name, isn‘t it?
1. A referring expression is not a referent; the phrase a carrot can be a referring
expression, but it is not a carrot. This may seem obvious, but throughout history people have
failed to distinguish between lexemes and what lexemes denote. They have treated words as
sacred, beautiful, ugly or horrid depending on how they regard the referent (―Syphilis is an
ugly word‖). Some jokes and riddles achieve their effect by ignoring the distinction between
a lexeme and what it represents (―Where can you always find sympathy?‖ Answer: ―In a
dictionary‖.)
Every lexeme is its own name. When we fail to make the distinction between a lexeme
used to name itself and a lexeme used with reference outside language, we can create
absurdities like this: ―Washington has three syllables and 600,000 inhabitants.‖ If this sort of
thing is meant in fun, there is no harm, but it can lead to sloppy thinking. In writing we can
distinguish between metalinguistic reference–reference to a lexeme or other language
expression and extra-linguistic reference–reference to something outside language by
italicizing or underlining a word when it refers to that expression, as with the name Huzafa

55
in Sentence b, above. Similarly, ―Where can you always find sympathy?‖ ―Washington has
three syllables‖; ―Washington has 600,000 inhabitants.‖ Of course, italics and underlining
have no effect in speech.
2. There is no natural connection between referring expression and referent. Some
ancient philosophers and ancient and medieval etymologists held the opinion that there is or
once was a natural relation between symbol and what is symbolized. But this is simply not
so.
3. The existence of a referring expression does not guarantee the existence of a
referent
in the physical-social world that we inhabit. We can easily use language to create
expressions with fictitious referents such as the skyscrapers of Antarctica, the present
Emperor of Texas, the pain-reliever recommended by 91 percent of all doctors. In fact, we
need such expressions in order to deny the existence of any physical referent.
4. Two or more referring expressions may have the same referent, but they do not
necessarily have the same meaning. Robert Blair the husband of Mildred Stone Blair the
father of Patrick and Robin Blair the city editor of the Morgantown Daily Enquirer, etc. All
these and no doubt other referring expressions may identify the same individual, but they do
not mean the same. Two terms may name the same thing but differ in connotation, like fiddle
and violin, or simply differ in the way they refer. The following example provided by Frege
(1980. In the Northern Hemisphere the planet Venus is visible to the naked eye just before
sunrise at certain times of the year and just after sunset at other times. Consequently, it is
known sometimes as the Morning Star, and sometimes as the Evening Star. These two terms
and also the planet Venus name the same entity, but they do not have the same meaning.
A referring expression is used to identify, but the identification may be valid only
temporarily (the girl in the purple sweater) and it need not be true: you may know who I
mean when I refer to that stupid clown but your ability to identify doesn‘t depend on your
agreeing with my way of referring. We often use metonymy in referring, identifying some
entity, especially a person, by some characteristic associated with the entity, as when we
refer to someone as ‗the horn rimmed glasses‘ or when a waitress asks a group of people
seated at one table, ―Which of you is the tuna salad?‖
Extension and Intension

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 The extension of a lexeme is the set of entities which it denotes. The extension of dog
includes all collies, dalmatians, dachshunds, mongrels, etc., etc. that have ever lived or will
ever live and every fictitious creature that is accepted as being a dog. All the things that can
be denoted by the noun lake are the extension of that lexeme. The lexeme Lake Ontario has a
single item in its extension, and the Dead Sea Scrolls has a single collection of items as its
extension.
The intension of any lexeme is the set of properties shared by all members of the
extension. Thus, everything that is denoted by lake must be a body of water of a certain size
surrounded by land, and everything denoted by island is a body of land surrounded by water
but see below for discussion of some difficulties in applying these definitions. Extension has
to do with reference, but reference, as we know, is not all of meaning: the lexemes violin and
fiddle have the same extension. Extension can change while intension remains the same. The
extension of the referring expression the capital of Australia is a single item, the city of
Canberra. The intension of the same term is ‗city in which the national government of
Australia is located.‘ If the capital should be moved at some future time to another city, the
extension changes but the intension remains the same. The Mayor of Chicago or the Prime
Minister of Great Britain always has the same intension but the extension of each of these
changes from time to time.
In the discussion of hyponymy in the sense relations lecture, we noted that the
denotation of a hyponym like collie is included in the denotation of its superordinate, dog,
but the meaning of the superordinate is included in the meaning of the hyponym. We can
now restate this with the terms ‗intension‘ and ‗extension‘: the extension of the hyponym is
included in the extension of the superordinate (all collies are dogs) but the intension of the
superordinate is included in the intension of the hyponym (the characteristic of being a dog is
part of the
characteristic of being a collie).
Language is a way in which people classify the phenomena in their world, their lives.
The
English language leads us to believe that there is a clear difference between lake and pond,
between bush and tree, hill and mountain, between greenish-blue and bluish-green. Actually,
extensions have fuzzy boundaries because nature does not consist of items discretely

57
separated and clearly differentiated from one another. Sometimes it is the edges that are
fuzzy while from center to center the difference is clear enough.
A prototype is an object or referent that is considered typical of the whole set. Thus, if
we encounter the lexeme door in isolation and immediately think of a door swinging on
hinges rather than one that slides or rotates that kind of door is, for us, the prototype of all
doors. But not everybody is likely to have the same prototype for a particular set. People in
Belize probably do not have the same prototype for tree as people in Scotland.
Some Different Kinds of Referents
The entities that we refer to are of different kinds and a language may have ways of
recognizing different kinds of referents, different reference classes. Three kinds of
differences in referents are:

 Concrete and abstract;

 Unique and non-unique;
 Countable and non-countable

To some extent the differences are in the referents and to some extent in the way English,
or any language, treats the referents.

1. Unique and Non-Unique Referents

a. We swam in Lake Ontario.
b. We swam in a lake.
Both of the underlined noun phrases are referring expressions. They might have the
same referent, but a lake can refer to various bodies of water whereas Lake Ontario always
refers to the same body of water. A referring expression has fixed reference when the
referent is a unique entity or unique set of entities, like Lake Ontario, Japan, Boris Yeltsin,
the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Philippine Islands. A referring expression has variable reference if
its referent may be different every time it is used: that dog, my uncle, several people, a lake,
the results. When a referring expression has fixed reference, knowledge of it is part of one‘s
general knowledge; we either know what the Dead Sea Scrolls are or we don‘t know (though
of course we may learn what they are from the context in which the Dead Sea Scrolls
occurs). Recognizing the referent when the expression has variable reference is a matter of
specific knowledge; one has to identify that dog, my uncle or the results from the physical or
linguistic context, including knowledge of the speaker, perhaps.
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 Again, let‘s note the fluidity of language. Nouns with fixed reference can be used with
variable reference: ―Every city has a Greenwich Village‖; ―This fellow is an Einstein‖; ―We
need a new Magna Carta.‖ The name of a person, for example Shakespeare, which
necessarily has concrete, fixed reference, acquires variable reference when applied to other
people (―No Shakespeare wrote this play‖) and abstract reference for the works produced by
that person (―We‘re reading Shakespeare‖).
2 Concrete and Abstract Referents
Lexemes such as dog, door, leaf, stone denote concrete objects, which can be seen or
touched; the objects denoted by lexemes like idea, problem, reason, knowledge are abstract;
they cannot be perceived directly through the senses. This is not a linguistic difference in
itself; there is nothing in the pronunciation of raisin and reason, for instance, that indicates
which lexeme has an abstract denotation and which has a concrete one. But lexemes with
different kinds of denotation generally occur in different kinds of utterances and then may
have different effects on other lexemes. Consider these contrasts:
the key to the front door the key to success
a bright light a bright future
Here the lexemes key and bright have literal meanings when they occur in concrete
contexts and figurative meanings in abstract contexts. Language is fluid, so lexemes which
typically have concrete denotations can be given abstract ones, and vice versa. A character
is, first, a kind of mark or sign, something that appears on paper or other surfaces, and is
therefore concrete; character is also the totality of qualities that define a person or thing, in
other words something abstract. Likeness is similarity, the quality of being like something
(abstract), such as a picture or other representation a likeness of someone (concrete).
3. Countable and Non-Countable Referents
Noun phrases in English are either countable or non-countable. Both countable and
non-countable noun phrases may be concrete or abstract. Concrete countable expressions
refer to items that are separate from one another, like apples, coins, pens and toothbrushes,
which can ordinarily be counted one by one. Abstract countable phrases have such nouns as
idea, problem, suggestion. Non-countable phrases, if their references are concrete, have three
kinds of reference. Some refer to continuous substances, such as apple sauce, ink, mud and
toothpaste, which do not consist of natural discrete parts. Others name substances that
consist of numerous particles not worth counting, like sand and rice. A few non-countables
59
are like furniture, jewelry, luggage, collections whose parts have quite different names. Then
there are abstract non-countables such as advice, information, beauty, which are treated, in
the English language, as indivisible.
Countable noun phrases show a distinction between singular and plural while non-
countable noun phrases do not:
an apple, a coin, a pen, a toothbrush
some apples, some coins, some pens, some toothbrushes
some apple sauce, some mud, some ink, some toothpaste
The singular countable noun phrase must have an overt specifier; the plural countable
and non-countable may have a zero specifier; the specifier some can be replaced by zero in
the last two lines above. We do not say that there are countable and non-countable nouns
because, as Allan (1986) has shown, nouns display a range of ‗countability.‘ At one extreme
there are nouns that occur almost exclusively in countable expressions: coin, pen and
toothbrush are good examples. Then there are nouns which in countable phrases indicate
(what are linguistically treated as) items and in non-countable phrases denote (what are
treated as) substances.
an apple, some eggs some apple, some egg on the plate
a hair, a piece of string, hair, string, fire, light
a fire, some lights
Certain animals are named in countable phrases but when considered as food the
names appear in non-countable phrases.
(a) chicken, (a) lobster, (a) turkey
In contrast, there are animal names of Anglo-Saxon origin such as cow, calf, pig,
sheep, deer all countable nouns matched by food names of Norman-French origin: beef, veal,
pork, mutton, venison, which are non-countable.
Some nouns name substances when they occur in non-countable phrases and in
countable phrases designate items originally made from those substances.
glass, iron, paper, straw a glass, an iron, a paper, a straw
What is regarded as a substance, and therefore generally treated as non-countable, may
appear in a countable phrase to indicate a certain quantity or type of the substance.
a coffee a good wine several cheeses various soups

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 At the non-countable end of the continuum are nouns that name collections of items—
furniture, jewelry, luggage—which are always non-countable. The specific items included in
these collections are indicated by countable nouns—chair, bed; necklace, ring; trunk,
suitcase. In other instances, there are matching nouns: shrubbery and shrub, rain and
raindrop, snow and snowflake, including some that have no formal relationship: foliage and
leaf.
There are a few nouns which occur only as plurals:
scissors, pliers, tweezers; trousers, shorts, jeans, etc.; shavings, filings, earnings, savings.
This language distinction seems to mirror a distinction found in nature: apples, babies,
coins, leaves and pebbles are isolable, while dirt, sand, milk, rice and water appear to be
continuous entities or composed of such small particles that we don‘t consider the particles
worth counting. However, note the inconsistency of suds, a plural countable, and foam, a
non-countable; of the plural countable oats and the non-countable wheat, rye, barley, corn.
These distinctions concrete/abstract, unique/non-unique, countable/ non-countable
seem to reflect differences that exist in nature, but only partly so. All languages have
reference classes which may be ‗natural‘ to some degree. We take it for granted that
countable nouns should be singular or plural, but nature does not have two categories, a
category consisting of one single item and another category that consists of all numbers from
two to infinity.
Lecture 12 Discourse and Meaning

Students Learning Outcomes

By the end of this lecture, the students will be able to

i. Introduce and define the term discourse

ii. Identify the relationship between the term discourse analysis and meaning
iii. Know how sentence and discourse are interlinked
iv. Tell three linguistic levels of a sentence

Introduction

When we use language, we combine words to form phrases and we combine phrases
to form clauses and sentences. Sentences may also be combined to form larger stretches of

61
language known as 'discourse' (for example, conversations, stories, jokes, letters and so on).
Linguists are interested in the ways in which discourse is structured and used.

There are three particular aspects of discourse investigated by linguists. First,

discourse may be seen as a verbal exchange made in a social and cultural context.
Sociolinguists investigate how people negotiate turn-taking, the beginning and end of a
conversation and shifts in topic within the conversation. Second, the linguistic content of the
discourse may be analysed. This is known as 'discourse analysis', and tries to formulate rules
governing how sentences may be combined (for example, the ways in which expressions
such as she, it, therefore, or the aforementioned may be used to create links between different
parts of the discourse). Third, the investigation of discourse is important in pragmatics. Here,
the focus is on uncovering principles of human communication. Of particular interest is how
discourse enables information to be communicated in particular contexts. For example, if
someone asks 'Would you like tea or coffee?', the reply 'Coffee keeps me awake' might be
interpreted as a request for tea in certain contexts (e.g. late at night before going to bed), but
a request for coffee in others (e.g. late at night while studying for an exam).

Discourse Analysis and Meaning

Discourse analysis studies the meaning in language at contextual level. The meaning
can be analyzed in two kinds of context: the extra-linguistic, which deals with that of the
external world, and the intra-linguistic, where that piece of language occurs. For example,
we can sec that words occur within a sentential context, and sentences occur within a context
consisting of other sentences. In the analysis of language at level of discourse, the intra-
linguistic context is very much significant.

Discourse analysis includes all the three linguistic levels in a sentence, such as sound,
lexis and syntax. We are required to distinguish discourse from sentence because these three
levels are essential for the above two contexts. The sentence is a grammatical aspect formed
with the combination of words under certain rules of grammar. These rules of sentence-
connection create cohesion in the text. Discourse involves meaning and utterance as it is
included in the semantic or pragmatic aspect.

Sentences have a force which is vital for understanding their meaning. These forceful
utterances combine to create coherence. We can say that the text is created by sentence
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cohesion while the discourse by coherence. Hence, discourse may be defined as a stretch of
language-use which is coherent in its meaning, which includes both grammar and coherence.
Look at the following sentences which are both .cohesive and coherent:

John: Can you lend me some money today'?

Peter: Yes, I can.

Here, the interchange is cohesive as Peter does not repeat the whole of the first
sentence in his reply. Instead of the whole sentence I can lend you some money today, he
only says Yes, I can, omitting the rest. It shows that the second sentence is linked to the first
in sequential order. It is also coherent because Peter has given an appropriate response to
John's question which implies the sense of request. Look another example:

John: Can you lend me some money today?

Peter: There is a strike in the bank

These sentences are not cohesive because the second sentence is not linked to the first
grammatically and nor they have any connection in apparent way. But they are coherent as
Peter's reply gives some information that 'there is a strike in the bank', and therefore, it is not
possible to fulfill the request of John today. Hence, this exchange is coherent, but not
cohesive.

Discourse is a level higher than that of the sentence. It includes all the other linguistic
levels sound, lexis, syntax. All these continue to make up a discourse. But here we must
distinguish between the grammatical aspect and the semantic/ pragmatic aspect of discourse.
The former creates a text and the latter creates a discourse. In the former, words continue to
form sentences; sentences combine to form a text. Just as there are rules for combination of
words, there are certain relations between sentences and rules by which they may be related.
These rules of sentence-connection create cohesion in the text. At the same time, these
sentences are also utterances, i.e. they have a force which is vital for understanding their
meaning, which are combined to create coherence. Thus we may distinguish between text
and discourse in that text is created by sentence-cohesion and discourse is created by
coherence. A discourse may be defined as a stretch of language-use which is coherent in its

63
meaning, It will of course include grammar and cohesion. The following is an example of
discourse which is both cohesive and coherent:

A: Can you go to Karachi tomorrow?

B: Yes, I can.

The interchange is cohesive because the second sentence does not repeat the whole of
the first sentence. Instead of the whole sentence: 'I can go to Karachi tomorrow', B says only:
I can', omitting the rest. This indicates that the second sentence is linked to the first in
sequential order. It is also coherent because B has given an appropriate response to A from
A's request. However, in the following example:

A: Can you go to Karachi tomorrow? B: There is a general strike.

The two sentences are not cohesive because the second sentence is not linked to the
first sentence in a grammatical sense. There is no repetition or obvious connection between
the two sentences. But they are coherent, because B replies to A's request in a sentence
which gives some information implying that it may not be possible to go to Karachi. Thus,
this exchange is coherent but not cohesive.

In order to analyse discourse, it may be necessary to consider all aspects of language:

the grammatical as well as the semantic and pragmatic (not forgetting the role of intonation).
Grammatical forms which are used to link sentences and create cohesion can be of several
kinds: logical connectors such as 'and', 'but'; conjuncts such as 'also', 'equally', 'furthermore,
contrasts such as 'instead' and similarly, 'for' 'thus'.

Apart from grammatical features, discourse is constituted of features which are

particular to the mode, tenor and field or domain of that discourse. The mode may be spoken
or written. In spoken discourse there will be features of inexplicitness, lack of clear sentence
boundaries and sentence-completion, repetition, hesitation, interaction and maintenance
features, e.g. 'well', 'you know', while in written discourse there will be features of
explicitness, clear sentence boundaries and more complex sentences, formal features but no
interactional and monitoring features.

The tenor of discourse refers to features relating to the relationship between the
speaker and the addressee in a given situation-these features reflect the formality or
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informality, degree of politeness, a personal or impersonal touch. Thus, if the relationship is
a polite one, there will be respectful terms of address, e.g. 'Sir', and indirect requests rather
than commands. If the relationship is one of familiarity, the features will include terms of
friendship e.g. 'dear, direct requests and imperatives.

Lastly, field or domain of discourse pertains to the area of activity to which that
discourse belongs, eg. whether the discourse is in the field of religion, science, law.
journalism, advertising. In each field, the discourse will be characterized by a particular kind
of vocabulary and sentence structure, e.g. sports commentary uses present tense: advertising
uses many adjectives. Literary discourse often freely combines features from many kinds of
discourse and occupies a different status from other types of discourse.

All the grammatical, and pragmatic -aspects should be considered to analyze

discourse. To create cohesion in sentences, some grammatical forms are used to link them,
which are as follows:

Logical connectors and, but, etc.

Conjuncts also, equally, further more, etc.

Contrast instead, etc.

Similarity for, thus, etc.

Substitutes for noun he, she, they, one, etc.

Ellipsis exclusion or deletion of a part of the sentence.

Deictic here, there, etc.

These grammatical forms are important in creating cohesion and coherence in

sentences. They are the grammatical features. Discourse is also constituted of the following
features: mode, tenor and field or domain.

Mode may be spoken or written. In spoken mode, there will be features of

inexplicitness, or the sentence may not be clear and easy to understand. It lacks completion,
repetition, hesitation, interaction and maintenance features, e.g. 'well', 'you know', etc. The
written discourse has explicitness of sentence or clear and easy to understand. The sentences
may be complex with formal features, but they lack interactional and monitoring features.
65
 Tenor studies the features of the relationship between the speaker and the addressee in
a given situation. These features reflect formality or informality, degree of politeness, and a
personal or impersonal touch. If the relationship is polite, the speaker may use the respectful
term, such as 'Sir', and the indirect request rather than command. If the relationship is
familiar, the speaker may use the term 'dear'.

Field or domain is involved in the area of activity to which the discourse belongs. The
field of discourse may be that of religion, science, advertising, law, etc. To express each field
of discourse there is a particular kind of vocabulary and sentence structure.

Discourse and Meaning (In Simple Words)

Discourse and meaning are two intertwined concepts that are crucial in understanding
language and communication. Discourse can be defined as a stretch of language use that
pervades a social context and is characterized by a unity of purpose. It is a term used to refer
to the use of language in communication. Discourse can take many forms, such as a
conversation, an argument, a speech, or a written text. What is important about discourse is
that it is not just a collection of words or sentences, but rather a meaningful interaction
between speakers or writers and their audience.

Meaning, on the other hand, is the significance or sense that is conveyed through
language. It refers to the information or message conveyed by language use. The meaning of
language is not fixed or absolute, but rather dependent on the context in which it is used. For
example, the word ‗bank‘ can have different meanings in different contexts, such as a
financial institution, the side of a river, or a hitting action in a game.

Discourse and meaning are interrelated in various ways. The discourse in which
language is used affects the meaning of the language, and vice versa. The meaning of
language is dependent on the discourse context in which it is used. For example, the meaning
of the word ‗bank‘ in a financial discourse context is different from its meaning in an
environmental discourse context.

In addition, meaning can also be shaped and influenced by the social and cultural
contexts in which it is used. This is known as the sociolinguistic aspect of meaning. For
instance, the word ‗kind‘ has different connotations in different cultural settings; in some
cultures, it can refer to physical appearance, while in others, it can refer to personality traits.
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 Furthermore, discourse can be used to create and enforce social norms and values, as
well as to challenge them. This is known as the discursive aspect of meaning. For example,
in a political discourse, the use of certain language can frame an issue in a particular way,
and create a particular understanding of the problem. Similarly, in a social discourse, the use
of certain language can reinforce stereotypes or challenge them.

To infer, discourse and meaning are two intertwined concepts that are crucial in
understanding language and communication. Meaning is dependent on the discourse context
in which it is used, and can be shaped by sociolinguistic and discursive factors. Discourse, on
the other hand, can be used to create and enforce social norms and values, and can frame
issues in a particular way. Understanding the relationship between discourse and meaning is
essential in interpreting language and communication, and in creating effective
communication strategies.

Lecture 13 GRAMMATICAL (SENTENTIAL) SEMANTICS

Students Learning Outcomes

After studying this lecture, the students will be able to

i. Know about Grammatical semantics

ii. Differentiate between Lexical meaning and grammatical meaning
iii. Tell the meaning of major grammatical categories
iv. Describe the Grammatical meaning associated with nouns and noun phrases
v. State the Grammatical meaning associated with the verb
vi. Explain the Adjectives and its properties
vii. Explain paraphrase, ambiguity, contradiction, presupposition

Lexical meaning and Grammatical Meaning

We have studied lexical meaning as the meaning of word without paying attention to
the way that is used or to the words that occur with it. Grammatical meaning refers to that
part of meaning which indicates grammatical relationship or functions, such as tense
meaning, singular meaning, etc. Grammatical meaning consists of word class, for example,
modern (adjective), modernize (verb) and modernization (noun), and inflectional paradigm,
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for example, grammatical meaning of plurality (e.g. desks, data). Lexical meaning is
dominant is content word, whereas grammatical meaning is dominant is function words, but
in neither grammatical absent. Take for example love, laugh, take and work; they are
different from the point of view of lexical meaning, whereas they are same form the point of
view of grammatical meaning (i.e. all are verbs). Similarly, boy and boys are same from the
point of view of lexical meaning, but are different from the point of view of grammatical
meaning (i.e. boys contain plural marker). Lexical meaning is studied in lexicon whereas
grammatical meaning is studied in grammar. But grammar and lexicon are interrelated.
Grammar reflects the ways in which lexicon operates as means of communication and as
instruments of thought. Part of the meaning of the lexicon is encoded in the grammatical
structure of languages. The grammatical system makes possible the expression of meaning
like the following:

1. Statement vs. Question

A dog barked vs. Did a dog barked?

2. Affirmative vs. negative

A dog barked. A do did not bark. No dog barked.

3. Past vs. present

A dog barked vs. A dog barks

4. Singular vs. plural

A dog baked vs. Some dogs barked.

5. The indefinite vs. definite

A dog barked vs The dog barked.

The meaning of major grammatical categories

Traditionally, syntactic categories are defined semantically: nouns are defined as

words referring to "persons, places or things", verbs are "doing words", that is, they refer to
actions, whereas adjectives are "describing words" (Cruse, 2000: 267).

Grammatical meaning associated with nouns and noun phrases

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 Certain types of meaning are typically carried by grammatical elements, the most
important of these are: definiteness, number, animacy, gender and functional roles (Cruse
2000: 269).

Definiteness

In linguistics, definiteness is a semantic feature of noun phrases (NPs), distinguishing

between referents/entities that are identifiable in a given context (definite noun phrases) and
entities which are not (indefinite noun phrases). In English, for example, definite noun
phrases preclude asking "which one?" There is considerable variation in the expression of
definiteness across languages and some languages do not express it at all. For example, in
English definiteness is usually marked by the selection of determiner. Certain determiners,
such as a/an, many, any, either, and some typically mark an NP as indefinite. Others,
including the, this, every, and both mark the NP as definite. In some other languages, the
marker is a clitic that attaches phonologically to the noun (and often to modifying
adjectives), e.g. the Hebrew definite article ha- or the Arabic definite article al-. In yet other
languages, definiteness is indicated by affixes on the noun or on modifying adjectives, much
like the expression of grammatical number and grammatical case. In these languages, the
inflections indicating definiteness may be quite complex.

Number

Number is an inflectional category of nouns or noun phrases, which is not found in all
languages. Semantically, number system are concerned, one way or another, with how many
there are of some item. Number system are no to be confused with numerical system, which
are linguistic devices for counting (one, two, forty-three, one hundred and ninety, etc.);
obviously numerals are syntactically and semantically distinct from number markers.

The number system in English has only two terms: singular and plural. A majority of
languages have three-term number system including dual, used for just two things. A very
small minority have four-term systems, in which the fourth term is either a trial (for three
things) or a paucal (for a few things).

Count nouns and mass nouns

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 In linguistics, a mass noun, uncountable noun, or non-count noun is a noun with the
syntactic property that any quantity of it is treated as an undifferentiated unit, rather than as
something with discrete subsets. Non-count nouns are distinguished from count nouns.
Given that different languages have different grammatical features, the actual test for which
nouns are mass nouns may vary between languages. In English, mass nouns are
characterized by the fact that they cannot be directly modified by a numeral without
specifying a unit of measurement, and that they cannot combine with an indefinite article (a
or an). Thus, the mass noun "water" is quantified as "20 liters of water" while the count noun
"chair" is quantified as "20 chairs". However, both mass and count nouns can be quantified
in relative terms without unit specification (e.g., "so much water," "so many chairs"). Some
mass nouns can be used in English in the plural to mean "more than one instance (or
example) of a certain sort of entity"—for example, "Many cleaning agents today are
technically not soaps, but detergents." In such cases they no longer play the role of mass
nouns, but (syntactically) they are treated as count nouns. Some nouns have both a mass
sense and a count sense (for example, paper).

In English (and in many other languages), there is a tendency for nouns referring to
liquids (water, juice), powders (sugar, sand), or substances (metal, wood) to be used in mass
syntax, and for nouns referring to objects or people to be count nouns. This is not a hard-and-
fast rule, however; mass nouns such as furniture and cutlery, which represent more easily
quantified objects, show that the mass/count distinction should be thought of as a property of
the terms themselves, rather than as a property of their referents. For example, the same set
of chairs can be referred to as "seven chairs" and as "furniture"; although both chair and
furniture are referring to the same thing, the former is a count noun and the latter a mass
noun. The Middle English mass noun peas has become the count noun pea by morphological
reanalysis.

For another illustration of the principle that the count/non-count distinction lies not in
an object but rather in the expression that refers to it, consider the English words "fruit" and
"vegetables". The objects that these words describe are, objectively speaking, similar (that is,
they're all edible plant parts); yet the word "fruit" is (usually) non-count, whereas
"vegetables" is a plural count form. One can see that the difference is in the language, not in
the reality of the objects.

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 Many English nouns can be used in either mass or count syntax, and in these cases,
they take on cumulative reference when used as mass nouns. For example, one may say that
"there's apple in this sauce," and then apple has cumulative reference, and, hence, is used as a
mass noun. The names of animals, such as "chicken", "fox" or "lamb" are count when
referring to the animals themselves, but are mass when referring to their meat, fur, or other
substances produced by them. (e.g., "I'm cooking chicken tonight" or "This coat is made of
fox.") Conversely, "fire" is frequently used as a mass noun, but "a fire" refers to a discrete
entity. Substance terms like "water" which are frequently used as mass nouns, can be used as
count nouns to denote arbitrary units of a substance ("Two waters please") or of several
types/varieties ("waters of the world"). One may say that mass nouns that are used as count
nouns are "countified" and that count ones that are used as mass nouns are "massified".
However, this may confuse syntax and semantics, by presupposing that words which denote
substances are mass nouns by default. According to many accounts, nouns do not have a
lexical specification for mass-count status, and instead are specified as such only when used
in a sentence. Nouns differ in the extent to which they can be used flexibly, depending
largely on their meanings and the context of use. For example, the count noun "house" is
difficult to use as mass (though clearly possible), and the mass noun "cutlery" is most
frequently used as mass, despite the fact that it denotes objects, and has count equivalents in
other languages:

Grammatical meaning associated with the verb

Tense, aspect and mood are associated with the verb. Tense–aspect–mood, commonly
abbreviated TAM and also called tense–modality–aspect or TMA, is the grammatical system
of a language that covers the expression of tense (location in time), aspect (fabric of time – a
single block of time, continuous flow of time, or repetitive occurrence), and mood or
modality (degree of necessity, obligation, probability, ability).

Tense

Tense is a term that refers to the way verbs change their form in order to indicate at
which time a situation occurs or an event takes place. For finite verb phrases, English has
just one inflectional form to express time, namely the past tense marker (-ed for regular
verbs). Therefore, in English there is just a contrast between present and past tense. Needless

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to say, non-finite verb phrases (to-infinitives and –ing forms) are not marked for tense. When
occurring with modals, verb phrases are used in their base form, with no tense marker. Each
tense can have a simple form as well as be combined with either the progressive or perfective
aspect, or with both of them:

(a) I work; I‘m working; I have worked; I have been working (present)

(b) I worked; I was working; I had worked; I had been working (past)

Sentences can also be used in the passive voice (note that the perfect-progressive is not
normally found in the passive):

(a) I am told; I‘m being told; I have been told

(b) I was told; I was being told; I had been told

There are three basic primary tenses, past (event occurs before time of speaking);
present (even occurs concurrently with speaking time, or includes it); and future (event
projected to occur after the time of speaking) (Cruse 2000: 274):

Aspect

Aspect is a grammatical category that reflects the perspective from which an

action/situation is seen: as complete, in progress, having duration, beginning, ending, or
being repeated. English has two aspects, progressive (also called continuous) and
perfect(ive). Verbs that are not marked for aspect (the majority of them are not) are said to
have simple aspect.

In British English, the perfective aspect is much more common than in American English,
since Americans often use the past simple where Britons use the present perfect. Verb
phrases can be marked for both aspects at the same time (the perfect progressive, however, is
infrequent). The following combinations are possible: present progressive; past progressive;
present perfective; past perfective; present perfective progressive; past perfective
progressive:

(a) He‘s sleeping; He was sleeping

(b) He has slept; He had slept

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(c) He has been sleeping; He had been sleeping

Progressive aspect

The progressive aspect, either in the present or past tense, generally refers to an action/event
(usually of limited duration) in progress at a particular time, to an uncompleted activity, to a
temporary state of affairs or a temporary habit. The present progressive is formed by the
present tense of the verb be + the -ing form of the lexical verb, the past progressive by
was/were + the -ing form of the lexical verb.

There are various types of verbs like eventives, statives, etc.

Stative verbs are verbs of ―being‖. Since they refer to ―states‖, they are normally used
with the simple aspect. On the contrary, dynamic (eventives) verbs are verbs of ―doing‖, they
refer to activities, events and processes. They can occur in both the simple and the
progressive aspects, depending on the meaning speakers wish to convey.

Stative verbs indicate possession and describe thoughts, beliefs, feelings, wishes,
preferences, perceptions of the senses, as well as states of being. Verbs that typically occur
with stative senses are:

(1) verbs of perception, such as: appear, feel, hear, see, seem, smell, sound and taste;

(2) verbs that refers to mental, emotional and cognitive states, such as: adore, assume,
believe, care, consider, desire, detest, dislike, doubt, envy, expect, fear, find (meaning
―consider‖), forget, forgive, guess, hate, hear (meaning ―to be told‖), hope, imagine, intend,
know, like, love, mean, mind, notice, prefer, realize, recall, recognize, refuse, regard, regret,
remember, see (meaning ―understand‖), want, wish, wonder;

(3) verbs that contain the idea of ―being‖ and ―having‖, that refer to situations which cannot
easily be imagined ashaving a time limitation: be, have (meaning ―possess‖), belong,
compare (meaning ―be similar to‖), concern, consist, contain, cost, depend, deserve, differ,
equal, exist, fit, hold, include, interest, involve, lack, matter, measure, need, owe, own,
possess, remain, require, resemble, suit.

As we have already stated, dynamic (eventives) verbs indicate activities. They can
occur in both the progressive and non-progressive form. They include verbs indicating a

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temporary situation or an activity having some duration (for example cooks, jog, live, read,
study, work): I was living in New York at that time. I‘m making a cake

Perfective aspect

The perfective aspect is used to refer to a state or action which has taken place before
the time of speaking, as well as to a state or action (or series of actions) occurring in a period
of time we imagine as continuing until the present or until a certain moment in the past (until
now or until then), or that has just ended. The perfective aspect is also used to indicate the
completeness of an action, to see events as a whole: I have tidied my room. She had just
found a solution to the problem

Some linguists distinguish a counterpart to the perfect, but involving the future, called
the prospective. A gloss of this would be: the present relevance of a future event. Consider
the difference between the following:

Rameez will leave tomorrow.

Rameez is leaving/is going to leave tomorrow.

One explanation is that the first sentence can be a pure prediction, and can apply to an event
which is not under the control either of Rameez or of the speaker. The second sentence, on
the other hand, implies that the event is under the control of one or the other, and the
decision and arrangements are currently complete. in other words, things are currently in a
state such that, if all goes according to plan, Rameez will leave tomorrow.

Voice

In grammar, the voice (also called diathesis and (rarely) gender (of verbs)) of a verb
describes the relationship between the action (or state) that the verb expresses and the
participants identified by its arguments (subject, object, etc.). When the subject is the agent
or doer of the action, the verb is in the active voice. When the subject is the patient, target or
undergoer of the action, the verb is said to be in the passive voice.

For example, in the following first sentence the verb "ate" is in the active voice.
However, in the second sentence the verbal phrase "was eaten" is passive.

The cat ate the mouse. p/v The mouse was eaten by the cat.
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 In following example, in the first sentence the verb "killed" is in the active voice, and
the doer of the action is the "hunter". A passive version of the sentence is where the verbal
phrase "was killed" is followed by the word "by" and then by the doer "hunter".

The hunter killed the bear.

The bear was killed by the hunter.

Functional roles

Consider the sentence John opened the door. There are two main participants in the
event: John and the door. These, however, have different relationships to the act of opening.
John is the doer, the agent and supplies the force needed to open the door; the door is
passive, is affected by the action, and undergoes the designated change of state. These
relationships are variously called functional roles, case roles, deep cases, participant roles,
thematic roles (Cruse, 2000: 281). In linguistics, grammatical relations (also called
grammatical functions, grammatical roles, or syntactic functions) refer to functional
relationships between constituents in a clause. The standard examples of grammatical
functions from traditional grammar are subject, direct object, and indirect object.

Adjectives and properties

Noun modification is primarily associated with the syntactic category ―adjective.‖

Followings are some of the types of adjectives.

Descriptive adjectives (Ex. big, heavy)

Relational adjectives (Ex. economic‘, fraternal)

Reference modifying adjectives (Ex. old, former)

Descriptive adjectives

A descriptive adjective is one that ascribes a value of an attribute to a noun. For

example, ‗that luggage is heavy‘ presupposes that there is attribute ‗WEIGHT‘ such that
weight (‗luggage‘) = ‗heavy‘. In the same way ‗low‘ and 'high‘ are values of HEIGHT. The
word net has to link the descriptive adjectives with the appropriate attributes. The descriptive
adjectives require a semantic organization which differs drastically form that of nouns. The
hyponymic relation that builds nominal hierarchies is not available for adjectives. It is not
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possible to say that one adjective ‗is a kind of‘ some other adjective. Relating descriptive
adjectives with the particular noun they pertain to is known by the term pertainymy.

Antonymy in adjectives

Antonymy is the basic semantic relation that exists among descriptive adjectives. The
word association testes reveal the importance of antonymy in adjectives. As the function of
descriptive adjectives is to express values of attributes, and that nearly all attributes are
bipolar, antonymy becomes important in the organization of descriptive adjectives.
Antonymous adjectives express opposing values of an attribute. For example, the antonym of
‗heavy‘ is ‗light‘ that expresses a value at the opposite pole of the WEIGHT attribute.
Antonymy, like synonymy, is a semantic relation between word forms. The problem is that
the antonymy relation between word forms is not the same as the conceptual opposition
between word meanings.

Similarity in adjective

The adjectives lacking antonyms are similar in meaning to adjectives that do have
antonyms. Swift, dilatory, prompt, sluggish, alacritous, fast, slow, leisurely, quick, tardy,
rapid, laggard, Overwhelmingly, association data and co-occurrence data indicate that big
and little are considered as a pair and large and small are considered as a pair. These pairs
demonstrate that antonymy is a semantic relation between words rather than concepts.

Gradation in adjectives

Most discussions on antonymy distinguish between contradictory and contrary terms.

This terminology is originated in logic, where two propositions are said to be contradictory if
the truth of one implies the falsity of the other and are said to be contrary if only one
proposition can be true but both can be false.

‗alive‘ – ‗dead‘ (Contradictory terms)

‗fat‘ –‗thin‘ (Contrary terms)

Contraries are gradable adjectives, contradictories are not. Gradation, therefore must also be
considered as a semantic relation organizing lexical memory for adjectives.

warmth: very hot, hot, warm, cold

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age: old, middle aged, young

Gradable and non-gradable adjectives

There are two major dichotomies in the classification of adjectives. The first separates
gradable from non-gradable adjectives. This has grammatical consequences, because
prototypically, the degree inflections occur only in connection with gradable adjectives; if an
adjective is basically non-gradable, then it has to be reinterpreted when inflected for degree:

Hamza was very married

Rimsha is very alive.

Markedness in adjectives

Binary oppositions frequently have a marked term and an unmarked term. That is, the
terms are not entirely of equivalent weights, but one (the unmarked one) is neutral or positive
in contrast to the other. Marked/unmarked distinction is found in polar oppositions such as :
'high‘: ‗low, 'old': 'young', 'long': 'short, wide: narrow.

Reference-modifying and referent-modifying adjectives

Distinction has to be drawn between reference modifying and referent-modifying

adjectives. For example old in the phrase my old friend does not refer the referent who is a
person as old, but attributes the friendship as old, whereas old vessel attributes directly the
vessel itself. Similarly, in the following phrase, both the adjectives attribute the quality of
being criminals and the quality of being ministers respectively, rather than the persons.

Yesterday‘s criminals are today‘s ministers

Some reference modifying adjectives may have direct antonyms as in the case of descriptive
adjectives.

‘past‘ vs. ‗present‘

'past‘ vs. ‗present‘.

Colour adjectives

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 Colour terms need to be addressed differently than other adjectives. They can be both
nominal as well as adjectival. As adjectives they can be graded and conjoined with other
descriptive adjectives. But they differ form the descriptive adjectives as the pattern of direct
and indirect anotonymy does not hold good for colour adjectives. Only one color attribute is
clearly described by direct antonyms: LIGHTNESS, whose polar values are expressed by
light: drark

Relational adjectives

Relational adjectives include of a large and open class of adjectives. Relational

adjectives can be defined by using the phrase ‗of, relating/pertaining to or associated with
some noun', and they play a role similar to that of a modifying noun. For example,
‗fraternal‘, as in ‗fraternal love‘ relates to ‗brother/sister‘, and ‗economical‘, as in
‗economical difference‘, is related to. As for as Tamil is concerned noun form is used mostly
in the place of relational adjective in English. For example, ‗musical instrument‘, ‗dental
hygiene‘

Since relational adjectives do not have antonyms, they cannot be incorporated into the
clusters that characterize descriptive adjectives. And because their syntactic and semantic
properties are a mixture of those of adjectives and those of nouns used as noun modifiers,
rather than attempting to integrate them into either structure Tamil word net will maintain a
separate file of relational adjectives with cross references to the corresponding nouns.

Modification

The principal function of adjectives is modification: the combination of Adj + Noun

prototypically restricts the domain designated by the noun alone to a subpart, and designates
a subset of entities denoted by the noun alone. There are two main positions for adjectives in
English:

a long book - attributive position

the book is long - predicative position

Quantification

Quantification is concerned with expressions like the following:

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No Taliban came to the party.

Some of my best friends are Christians.

All students can sing national anthem.

The subject noun phrases in the above are quantified noun phrases; the sentence
express quantification. A quantification requires a quantifier (e.g. no, some, many, all, etc.),
restriction (which indicates the sort of things being quantified, e.g. Tamils) and scope, which
expresses what is true of the items designated by quantified noun phrase.

In linguistics and grammar, a quantifier is a type of determiner, such as all, some,

many, few, a lot, and no, (but not numerals) that indicates quantity.

Paraphrase
Paraphrase is to the sentence what synonymy is to words. This means that the
paraphrase explains a situation in which two or more sentences have one meaning. Indeed, a
sentence can have many paraphrases. There are two types of paraphrases: lexical and
structural paraphrases. In lexical paraphrases, we have two or more sentences fiving the
same interpretation as a result of the replacement of one word or phrase by another. The
following are examples:

(i) The chef hired a bachelor

(ii) The chef hired an unmarried man

In the two sentences above, the change in their structure is as a result of the substitution of a
bachelor for an unmarried man. Both a bachelor and unmarried man are phrases. Consider
further the following sentences:

(iii) The man was agitated

(iv) The man was anxious

We have achieved the paraphrase by the substitution of the word agitated for another,
anxious. Structural paraphrase is achieved when we alter the arrangements of the sentences
through transformations. The following are examples:

(i) They bought a new apartment (Basic –subject + Verb+ object)

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(ii) It was a new apartment that they bought (Cleft)

[A cleft sentence is a sentence in which some part is moved from its normal position into a
different place to give it more emphasis]

(iii) What they bought was a new apartment (Pseudo cleft)

(iv) A new apartment was what they bought (topicalised)

Ambiguity

When an expression can be given more than one interpretation ambiguity arises.
Therefore, why polysemy relates to words, ambiguity is concerned with sentences. We have
two types of ambiguity – lexical and structural.

Lexical ambiguity occurs when the presence of just a specific word leads to multiple
interpretations. Consider the following examples:

(i) The team has many goals

(ii) She prepared tables

It should be noted that goals and tables can be interpreted in different easy based on the
contexts.

Structural ambiguity is achieved by the organisation of the elements of the sentence. It

is possible to interpret these elements in different ways. Consider these examples:

(i) They promoted all English teachers

(ii) boiling water can be dangerous

The ambiguity in the second sentence drives from the possibility of reading the sentence as:

(a) Water that is boiling (i.e. hot) can be dangerous

(b) The act of boiling water can be dangerous

The first interpretation makes boiling water as the subject noun phrase whereas in the second
interpretations, boiling water is the complement.

Presupposition
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 In presupposition, there is usually a piece of information which the speaker assumes
the hearer already knows. This assumption is based on some shared background knowledge
between the speaker and the hearers. An outsider in the circle of communication may be at a
loss. Let us illustrate this situation with the following sentences.

(i) John: Are you able to bring Harry along?

(ii) Peter: That will be splendid. On our way, we shall pick up the drinks.

The presupposition in this conversation is that both John and Peter know who Harry is. They
both have an idea of the drinks, and the source from where to bring them.

Entailment

In entailment, there is usually a pair of sentences and the truth of one derives from the
truth of other. Consider the following sentences:

(i) Tracy is a spinster

(ii) Tracy is a female

Sentence (i) derives from the meaning of sentence (ii). This means that if sentence (i) entails
sentence (ii) then, sentence (ii) is necessarily the implication of sentence (i).

Contradiction

Contradictory expressions present two opposing proposition at the same time. Thus, a
person cannot be dead and alive at the same time. Other examples of anomaly are:

(i) That circular house is rectangular

(ii) The drains are flooded because there are no rains

Synopsis

A great deal of the problems of communication derives from the misinterpretation of

the grammatical and sentential meaning. It is always profitable to explore the full range of
meaning from the point of view of grammar and sentence. This we have attempted in lecture.
In lecture 14, we have studied semantics in its two dimensions: grammatical semantics and
sentential semantics. Under grammatical semantics we studied about the difference and

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relation between lexical meaning and grammatical meaning, the meaning of major
grammatical categories, grammatical meaning associated with nouns and noun phrases,
grammatical meaning associated with the verbs, adjectives and their properties and
quantification. Under sentential semantics we have focused our attention on paraphrase,
ambiguity, presupposition, entailment, etc.

Lecture 14 Semantics and Syntax

Students Learning Outcomes

By the end of this lecture, the students will be able to

i. Know about semantics and syntax

ii. Discuss the relationship between semantics and syntax

iii. Define different parts of a sentence

iv. Know about tree diagram

v. Describe how constituents and syntactic categories convey meanings

Semantics

Semantics is the study of the meaning of language. There are two types of meaning:
the meaning of language itself and the meaning that language has when used in a particular
context. For example, if we consider the following sentence 'Sarah is feeling unwell'. This
sentence means that Sarah is not feeling well. But it would communicate something different
when uttered in response to the question 'Is Sarah coming to the party tonight?‖ (It would
mean something like 'Sarah is not coming to the party') from when it was uttered in response
to the question, ―Is Sarah going to miss work today?‖ Linguists, therefore, distinguish
between what a sentence means ('linguistic meaning') and what an utterance of that sentence
communicates in a given context ('speaker meaning'). Semantics is the study of linguistic
meaning (speaker meaning is studied in pragmatics).

Language has several properties which a theory of semantics must explain. One
important property is that language is infinite, so we are able to understand an unlimited

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number of sentences, most of which we have never encountered before (e.g. we may have no
problem understanding 'My pet lobster ate three M and Ms today.)

There are many different approaches to semantics. One of the most influential is 'truth-
conditional semantics', which tries to reduce meaning to truth and falsehood. The idea is that
in order to know what a sentence means, we need to know what things would have to be like
in order for the sentence to be true.

Syntax

There is more to the meaning of a sentence than just the meanings of its words. For
example, it is quite clear that the sentence 'Dogs chase cats' means something quite different
from the sentence 'Cats chase dogs', even though they contain exactly the same words. The
point is that sentences are not just sequences of words - they have a certain structure and this
affects their meaning. The study of sentence structure is known as 'syntax'.

Sentences have a hierarchical structure, with words combining to form phrases and
phrases combining to form clauses. A sentence consists of a single clause or a combination
of clauses. Linguists often represent this structure in the form of a tree diagram.

Relationship between Semantics and Syntax

On the basis of the above-mentioned points, we may say that Syntax and Semantics
are two of the basic components of linguistics, and they are closely related and affect one
another. Syntax is the order and arrangement of words and phrases in sentences. Semantics,
on the other hand, is concerned with the meaning of a word, phrase, sentence, or text. The
way that semantics relates to syntax is that words have meaning, and how words are ordered
in a phrase or sentence affects meaning. A quick example that illustrates both syntax and
semantics is the following:

The boy saw the man with binoculars.

With binoculars, the boy saw the man.

Though the words are the same, the order (syntax) is slightly altered in the second
sentence, and that changes the sentence from ambiguous to clear, changing the meaning
(semantics) of the sentence.
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 According to traditional grammar, sentences consist of words, but not every string of
words constitutes a sentence as we can see in the following example: Lion cage this less in
dangerous is the. A possible analysis is that if we look at this example we know the meaning
of the individual words, but the sequence as a whole does not make sense, so we cannot
consider this structure a sentence. Thus, we can affirm that if a sequence of words is to
constitute a sentence, it must be meaningful, for instance: The lion is less dangerous in this
cage.
The network of relations between the words of a sentence is called its structure. There
are many different aspects that influence the structure of a sentence. A very important one is
word order. The different order of the words in a sentence can bring a difference in its
meaning, as in the following example: Did he say who he was?= Who did he say he was?
But a difference in word order does not always imply a difference in meaning. Sometimes it
simply entails a difference in emphasis: John ran away //A way ran John.
In relation to the words, the structure of the sentence also depends on the individual
meaning of the words or word groups making up the sentence; in the following example the
difference in structure is not due to word order but to the relationship between the words:
Peter was waiting for seven friends. //Peter was waiting for seven minutes.
Then this kind of Grammar deals with the concept of Ambiguous sentences and explains that
the structure of sentences is only sometimes unambiguously derivable from overt marks like
word order, lexical items, etc. Sometimes we come across sentences to which more than one
structure can be assigned, having, therefore, more than one meaning. This type of sentence
receives the name of Ambiguous Sentence, as in the following examples: George likes Susan
more than Joan // Visiting relatives can be tedious.
Only through the context in which these sentences may appear can we know which of
the two possible meanings is intended. Transformational Grammar deals with the idea that a
sentence has a syntactic structure, and it follows this term in order to develop its theory. The
first important point deals with the idea that the evidence for claiming that sentences have a
syntactic structure in language comes from the native speaker‘s intuition about the structure
of sentences in his language. These structural intuitions that native speakers have about the
Syntax of their languages are two types:
1. The constituents: intuitions about how sound sequences in sentences are structured
into larger structural units.
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[All the words and phrases that make up a sentence are said to be constituents of that
sentence. Every sentence (and every phrase and clause) has constituents. That is to say, every
sentence is made up of parts of other things that work together to make the sentence
meaningful.]
2. Categories: intuitions about whether structural units belong to the same category or not.
So, the following example is going to illustrate this fact:
To analyze the concept of a sentence we can do the following analysis: words are
grouped into lower constituents. For example ―incredibly‖ modifies ―intelligent‚ so the
sequence [incredibly intelligent] is a phrasal constituent of the sentence. Also, following the
analysis, ‗this‖ modifies ―pupil‖, so the sequence [that pupil] forms a single structural unit, a
constituent of the sentence. The same happens in the sequence [that teacher]. But
furthermore, also the sequence [to that teacher] is another constituent. To the
transformational grammar, the phrases [incredibly intelligent] and [to that teacher] both
modify ―then the whole sequence [seem incredibly intelligent to that teacher] is also a
constituent. Thus, all this information can be represented as we see before in diagrammatic
form, that is a tree diagram. Each point in the tree is called a node, and each node represents
a constituent. But, however, since nodes are predictable, later they were suppressed in
subsequent tree diagrams. But a tree diagram does not provide any representation of our
intuitions about which constituents are constituents of the same type. The traditional way of
describing the similarities and differences between constituents is to say that they belong to
categories of various types. And the same happens with the phrases. Finally, to this type of
grammar, the whole sequence [that pupil must seem incredibly intelligent to that teacher] is a
special type of constituent traditionally termed a clause or sentence.
Every sentence can be analyzed at four distinct form levels: the word level, the phrase
level, the clause level, and the sentence level. And this is called the rank scale. Later, after
the explanation of the constituents of a sentence, we will see the different levels and how
they can be analyzed following the same example. Thus, a diagram as provides a visual
presentation of the categorical constituent structure of the sentence. It shows us how a
sentence is structured out of its constituent phrases, and how each of the phrases is structured
out of its component words, and also provides a visual presentation of the phrase structure of
a sentence. The type of labeled tree- diagram used here is referred to as a Phrase-marker (P-

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marker) because it marks the hierarchical grouping of words into phrases, and phrases into
sentences.
Another method of visual display used in the linguistic literature is to make use of
labeled bracketing. Within this system, we could represent the categorical status of the words
in the structure mentioned before as in the following example:
[D This] [N pupil] [M must] [V seem] [Adv incredibly] [A intelligent] [P to] [D that] [N
teacher]
We could use this system of labeled bracketing to represent the fact that [this pupil]
and [that teacher] are noun phrases, and [to that teacher] is a prepositional phrase. That
[incredibly intelligent] is an adjective phrase, that [seem incredibly intelligent to that teacher]
is a verb phrase, and that [this pupil must seem incredibly intelligent to that teacher] is an
―S‖ = clause. As follows:
[S [NP [D this] [N pupil]] [M must] [VP [V seem] [AP [ADV incredibly][A intelligent]] [PP
[P to][NP [D that] [N teacher] ] ] ] ]
Then the two diagrams represented here contain the same information. Many linguists
prefer tree diagrams as a form of visual representation of syntactic structure because they are
easier to read, and the reason for that is that the information they contain is less condensed.
Thus, diagrams like these provide a virtually complete representation of the syntactic
structure of the sentence. Also, we can find partial tree diagrams or partially labeled
bracketing: for instance, if we take the sentence mentioned before, we can see that it contains
three major constituents: [NP+VP+PP]
In a nutshell, both syntax and semantics are key parts of the philosophy of language
but have unique linguistic meanings. To be more precise, syntax refers to grammar, while
semantics refers to meaning. Syntax is the set of rules needed to ensure a sentence is
grammatically correct; semantics is how one‘s lexicon, grammatical structure, tone, and
other elements of a sentence merge to communicate its meaning. Therefore, it can be said
that syntax helps us put linguistic meanings into sentences.

Lecture 15 THEORIES OF MEANINGS

Students’ Learning Outcomes

After studying this lesson, the students will be able to:

i. Explain the concept of meaning in the light of various theories of meaning

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 ii. Identify that the concept of meaning is variable
1. Preamble

We have learnt that semantics deals with meaning in language. Just like every other
disciplines, there are theories to explain in detail the nature of meaning in a principled way.
We are well aware of the fact that language as a system is organised along the structures of
sound, words, sentences and meanings. Each of these levels can be studied in some details,
following specified formulations or theories. For the purpose of a detailed study of
semantics, the theories we shall explore, are expected to explain the nature of word and
sentence meaning, among several other things.

Semantic theories explain the nature of meaning by utilizing a finite set of rules to
explain a variety of semantic phenomena. Any theory of semantics should provide
statements that explain meaning relationship – such as ambiguity, anomaly, contradiction,
tautology, paraphrase, entailment, synonymy, hyponymy. This means that such a theory
should be able to explain the inherent meaning characteristics of words and sentences.

Any reliable theory of semantics should relate meaning to syntax, highlighting the
relationships between them. This means that the rules of sentence construction and those of
word meaning should relate to explain in full the meanings of the sentence.

The following theories of meaning are listed by Leopore in his write up on

"Semantics: Study of meaning" in Encyclopedia of Britannica:

 The Ideational Theory of Meaning

 The Behaviorist Theory of Meaning
 The Referential Theory of Meaning
 The Usage Theory
 Field Theory of Meaning

1.1 The Ideational Theory of Meaning (Pertaining to the formation of ideas or thoughts of
objects not immediately present to the senses)

This theory holds the view that linguistic meaning is mental: words are used to encode
and convey thoughts, or ideas. Successful communication requires that the hearer correctly
decode the speaker‘s words into their associated ideas. So construed, the meaning of an

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expression, according to Locke, is the idea associated with it in the mind of anyone who
knows and understands that expression.

This theory was developed by the British empiricist philosopher, John Locke. The
theory explains that the meaning attached to words can be separated from the word
themselves. This means that meaning originates in the mind in the form of ideas. Words are
just sensible signs for the convenience of communication. Language is therefore, a
mechanism for expressing thoughts and thought is viewed as a succession of conscious ideas.
The ideational theory is mentalistic. Thus the meaning of a word is the mental image or
idea of the word or the expression generated in the mind of the speaker or hearer.

There is no attempt to define words and expressions using physical associations.

Rather, the range of possible meanings ascribed to a given word is that set of available
feelings, images, ideas, concepts, thoughts and inferences that can be produced as soon as a
word is heard – (Glucksberg 1975:50).

The theory may not be able to account for synonymous expressions. It may also be
difficult to use the theory to explain the mental image conjured by sentences. Indeed,
sentences derive their meaning more from the word order.

1.2 Behaviourist Theory of Meaning

Behavioural theory of meaning criticizes the mentalist(ideational) point of view,

stating that no such internal structure, or innateness determine our view of meaning
rather, a practical responsive participation to things around us forms a basis for
understanding mental life (Skinner, 1957). This theory was pioneered by B.F Skinner who
proposed that correct semantics for a natural language is behaviouristic i.e. the meaning of an
utterance as uttered on a particular occasion is determined by its context: the meaning of an
expression, as uttered on a particular occasion, is either (1) the behavioral stimulus that
produces the utterance, (2) the behavioral response that the utterance produces, or (3) a
combination of both. Thus, the meaning of fire! as uttered on a particular occasion might
include running or calling for help. But even on a single occasion it is possible that not
everyone who hears fire! will respond by running or calling for help. Suppose, for example,
that the hearers of the utterance include a fireman, a pyromaniac, and a person who happens
to know that the speaker is a pathological liar. The Behaviourist account seem committed to
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the implausible view that the meaning of fire! for these people is different from the meaning
of fire! for those who run or call for help.

Idealism and mentalist in traditional semantics look at meaning as something

established in the hearer‘s or speaker‘s mind. There is usually a non-physical process of
thought, concept or feeling generating a mental experience. On the other hand, Behaviourism
relies on observables and records of utterances. These observables and records are linked to
their relationships with the immediate situations that produce them.

1.3 The Referential/ Analytical Theory of Meaning

Reference is an apparent relation between a word and the world. Russell, following the
19th-century British philosopher John Stuart Mill, pursued the intuition that linguistic
expressions are signs of something other than themselves. He suggested that the meaning of
an expression is whatever that expression applies to, thus removing meaning from the minds
of its users and placing it squarely in the world. According to a referential semantics, all that
one learns when one learns the meaning of tomato is that it applies to tomatoes and to
nothing else. One advantage of a referential semantics is that it respects compositionality: the
meaning of red tomato is a function of the meanings of red and tomato, because red tomato
will apply to anything that is both red and a tomato.

But what about expressions that apparently refers to nothing at all, such as unicorn? A
referential semantics would appear to be committed to the view that expressions such as
unicorn, Santa Claus, and Sherlock Holmes are meaningless. Another problem is that two
expressions may have the same referent without having the same meaning. The morning star
and the evening star, for example, refer to the same object, the planet Venus, but they are not
synonymous. As Frege noted, it is possible to believe that the morning star and the evening
star are not identical without being irrational (indeed, the identity of the morning star and the
evening star was a scientific discovery).

This theory is associated with Ogden and Richards (1922). According to the
Referential theory, the meaning of a word is the object it refers to in the external world.
That actual object is the referent. The connection between the words or expressions and
their referents is through the process of thought. The words or expressions are just
symbols.
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 One major criticism of this theory is that there are many words without physical
objects they refer to. Such words are intelligent, ugly, rich, poor etc. Which do not have the
concrete qualities of nouns may not have referents. Again, polysemous words (i.e. words
with more than one meaning) may have the additional problem of having more than one
referent. Items that belong to groups may not have physical objects that are identical. The
referential theory may not have a way to explain the meaning of words in the categories of
adjectives, adverbs, prepositions and conjunctions.

1.4 The Usage Theory of Meaning

The German scholar, Wittgenstein (1953), developed this theory. It has been
elaborated upon by J. Firth and M.A Halliday. The usage theory is also referred to as the
contextual or operational theory of meaning. According to the theory, the meaning of a word
or an expression is determined by the context of its use. It is the effect created by a linguistic
unit within a given context that expresses its full meaning.

According to this theory, meaning is classified into two broad categories: Contextual
Meaning and Formal Meaning.

Contextual meaning relates a formal item or pattern to an element of situation. There

is a regular association between a linguistic item and something which is extra-linguistic,
‗something which is part of the situation of language rather than part of the language itself.‘

Contextual meaning is further divided into thesis, immediate situation and wider
situation. In Formal meaning the relationship between a linguistic item, pattern or term form
a system and other linguistic item, patterns or terms from system belonging to the same level
of language.

Formal meaning can be understood by collocating and contrasting a lexical item with
other lexical items. The lexical item cat, for example, has the potentiality for collocating
with mew, purr, lap, milk, fur, tail, etc. It also contrasts with dog, mouse, kitten, etc. Thus,
the complete description of the formal meaning of a lexical item would involve the statement
of all the items with which it collocates and contrasts. Such items which fall into a context or
set of contexts are referred to as an association field.

1.5 Field Theory of Meaning

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 Basic to this theory is the concept that each word in a language is surrounded by a
network of associations that connect it with other terms.

The field theory visualizes the vocabulary as a mosaic on a gigantic scale, which is
built up of fields and higher units in the same way as fields are built up by words. The
associative field of a word is formed by an intricate network of associations, some based on
similarity, others on continuity, some arising between senses, others between names, others
again between both. The field is by definition open, and some of the associations are bound
to be subjective though the more central ones will be largely the same for most speakers.
Attempts have been made to identify some of these central associations by psychological
experiments, but they can also be established by purely linguistic methods. The identification
of these associations by linguistic methods is done by collecting the most obvious synonyms
and antonyms of a word, as well as terms similar in sound or in sense, and those which enter
into the same habitual associations. Many of these associations are embodied in figurative
language: metaphors, similes, proverbs, idioms, and the link. The number of associations
centered in one word will of course be extremely variable and for some very common terms
it may be very high.

This field is formed by an intricate network of associations: similarity, contiguity,

sensation, name, etc. The associative field is by any definition open, that is, no finite limits
can be assigned to any given field. Hence the aptness of the concept 'field', which serves an
analogous purpose in physics.

Conclusion

To sum up, the main principles of various well–known theories of meaning, namely
the referential theory to meaning, the non–referential theory to meaning, ideational theory of
meaning, etc. have been discussed. None of them is complete; each of them has strengths and
weaknesses. However, these theories may help formulate some background about meanings.
Lecture 16 Pragmatics

Objectives

i. Pragmatics
ii. Reference
iii. Deixis
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 Pragmatics is concerned with the range of choices and constraints available to users
based on the context. In pragmatics, emphasis is on the pairing of sentences and their
appropriate contexts. The choices made in language have been found to affect the listeners
and their responses. It is possible to observe norms of politeness, appropriateness, formality
and respect in the way language is used. It is believed that pragmatics determines the
appropriate interpretation of sentences since there could be differences between literal and
implied meanings. Differences in meaning are at the instance of the situation, the shared
background and the linguistics context of the expression.

Pragmatics, according to Kempson (1986) is the study of the general principles

necessary for retrieving information from a specific utterance based on the context.
Emphasis is not necessarily on the grammatical or structural properties of the sentence.
Indeed, a great deal of what we do in human communication is determined from the context.
This means that the meaning of any stretch of communication is based on the interpretation
of the listener. We also lay emphasis on the message, the participants, the deductions to be
made from the utterance, the implications of what is said or assumed and the impact of the
non-verbal aspects of the interaction on the meaning.

Pragmatics studies how context affects meaning in human language.

Pragmatics is the study of invisible meaning or how we recognize what is meant

even when it is not actually said or written. (Yule, 2019)

In terms of objectives, pragmatics deals with the totality of the processes through
which utterances convey meaning hearing in mind the context and how participants respond
to the meanings intended. It will therefore be easy to see that the common tie between
pragmatics and semantics is language. However, while semantics is concerned with
language meaning, pragmatics is concerned with language use. This will necessarily mean
that the contextual approach to meaning will be very relevant to pragmatics. Since the full
manifestation of language from the point of use deals on the implied processes, we shall
explore the nature of Implicature.

Reference, Referring Expression, and Referent

Reference is commonly construed as an act in which a speaker, or writer, uses

linguistic forms to enable a listener, or reader, to identify something. In other words,
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reference is concerned with designating entities in the world by linguistic means.
Matthews (1997:312) states that "reference is the relation between a part of an utterance
and an individual or set of individuals that it identified." It is important to note that
reference is often contrasted with the notion sense. While reference deals with the
relationship between the linguistic elements (language) and the non-linguistics elements (the
world), sense is exclusively concerned with the intra linguistic relations, particularly words
(Palmer, 1981). Thus, the sense of tulip, for instance, relates to sense of other words such
flower (known as hyponym), and the sense of profound relates to the sense of deep (known
as synonym). The relation among words is also known as sense relation.

The linguistic forms or the linguistic means used to identify or designate entities are
called referring expressions, which can be proper nouns (Edison, Bandung), noun phrases
that are definite (the woman, the singer), or indefinite (a man, an island), and pronouns (he,
her, it, them). Noun phrases, proper nouns are called primary referring expressions, while
pronouns are termed secondary referring expressions (Kreidle,1998). In addition, Kreidler
(1998:130) states that referring expression is "a piece of language that is used in an utterance
and is linked to something outside language, some living or dead or imaginary entity or
concept or group of entities or concepts."

When the sentence Einstein is a famous scientist is uttered to make a statement, we

will say that the speaker refers to a certain individual (Einstein) by means of a referring
expression. The thing or things (or the individual named Einstein in this case) in the world
referred to by a particular expression is called its referent(s). Thus the notion referent is an
expression for the thing picked out by uttering the expression in a particular context
(Saeed, 1997:27). Sentences may also contain two or more referring expressions. For
example, if the sentence Bill kissed Mary is uttered, with its characteristic force of making a
statement, both Bill and Mary would be referring expressions, their referents being the
individuals identifiable by names as Bill and Mary.

Kreidler (1998) further argues that the difference between referent and referring
expression lies in the fact that there is no natural connection between referring expression
and referent. There is no privileged one-to-one relationship between the expression Bill
Clinton and the Bill Clinton, who was the president of the USA. Furthermore, the existence
of a referring expression does not guarantee the existence of a referent in the physical-social
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world that we inhabit. We can create expressions with referents such as the dragon in my
house, the emperor of Indonesia without necessarily proving the existence of their physical
referent.

Types of Referents

Kreidler (1998) provides a comprehensive account of different types of referents used

by a language to identify entities in the world. According to him, there are essentially three
kinds of differences in referents. Each of these will be discussed below.

Unique and Non-Unique Referents

A referent has a unique entity or unique sets of entities if its referring expression has
fixed reference. Thus entities like the Rocky Mountains, the Louvre, the Pacific Ocean,
Germany designate unique entities that can be found only in certain places, and knowledge
of it is part of one's general knowledge. On the other hand, a referent may have a non-unique
entity if its referring expression has variable reference. Entities such as that woman, my
brother, a mountain, are not unique since they are different every time they are used, and
knowledge of it is a matter of specific knowledge. It is the physical and linguistic contexts
that help the speakers to identify those entities.

Concrete and Abstract Referents

Concrete referents are denoted by concrete or tangible objects such as book, lamp,
tree, brick, whereas the abstract ones are designated by abstract or intangible entities such as
beauty, democracy, knowledge, philosophy. It is interesting to note that lexemes with
different kinds of denotation generally occur in different kinds of utterances and may have
different effects on other lexemes. Thus the lexeme key has a concrete referent in the phrase
the key to the front door, bearing literal meaning, and an abstract one in the key to success,
bearing figurative meaning.

Countable and Non-Countable Referents

It is the property of noun phrase that merits the notion countable and non-countable,
both of which can be concrete and abstract. Concrete countable expressions are those that are
separate from one another, and those that can ordinarily be counted one by one. This
includes such entities as pencil, bags, chairs, and watches. Abstract countable nouns include
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such entities as problem, experience, and suggestion. Concrete non-countable phrases have
three kinds of reference: those that refer to continuous substances (ketchup, sauce, milk, ink),
those that name substances consisting particles not worth counting (rice, sand, sugar), and
those that refer to collections (furniture, jewelry, luggage).The feature that distinguishes
countable noun phrases from non-countable ones is that the former recognize the division
between singular and plural forms while the latter do not. Thus we can say an apple, a hat,
an umbrella, the overt specifier being present preceding the singular nouns, and some apples,
some hats, some umbrella, some apple sauce, some mud, some ink, with a zero specifier
preceding both plural countable and non-countable.

In a language such as English the names of the animals that are countable by nature
become uncountable when referring to food. An instance of this is the lexemes (a)lamb, (a)
chicken, and (a) turkey. Finally, some nouns phrases may have dual class membership in that
it can be countable and noun-countable, depending upon the items it designates. Such entities
as (a) paper, (a) iron, (a) glass, (a) coffee, etc. can be countable and non-countable.

Types of Reference

The discussion of reference has become a central concern in semantics, and the
classification of different types of the ways of referring is relatively uncontroversial and
remains undisputed among semanticists. Lyons (1977), Hofmann (1993), Kreidler (1998),
and Cruse (2000) agree on the following classification of reference types:

Generic and Non-Generic Reference

The meaning of the notion generic (not really synonymous with general) can be
understood by observing the following:

(1) The cat is a nice pet.

(2) A cat is a nice pet.

(3) Cats are nice pets.

Each of these sentences may be used to assert a generic proposition that is a proposition
which says something, not about this or that group of cat or about any particular individual
cat, but about the class of cats as such. In other words, the entity cat in the above sentence is

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reference to a class of referents (Cruse, 2000:311). The fact that the cat in the sentences
above has generic meaning can be demonstrated by proposing the question "which cat (s)?"
Obviously none of the above sentences are the answer of such as question because the
question is not germane. Sentence (1), (2), and (3) are in contrast with sentences (4) and (5)
below.

(4) A cat is lying on the mattress

(5) Cats are lying on the mattress

In that the latter do not have generic reference. They do not necessarily refer to the whole
class of cats. Although they are not the answers of the question "which cat (s)?" either, such
a question is germane in this context. Lyons (1977) and Cruse (2000) identify two sorts of
proposition involving generic reference as argument: either something is predicated of the
whole class referred to, or something is predicated of each member of the class. The former
has collective reference and the latter distributive reference. Sentence (1) has collective
reference, and sentence (2) exemplifies distributive reference.

Definite and Indefinite reference

Kreidler (1998:143) argues that referring expression is definite if the referent from the
physical-social context is identifiable for both speaker and hearer. The directive put the book
on the table contains definite referring expression the book and the table.

Moreover, if the speaker assumes that the addressee can make the necessary
implicature to relate a new reference to a previous one, this is also the case of referring
expression. The utterance I bought a new house in a quiet neighborhood. The kitchen is very
big has a definite expression the kitchen. We can also say that a referent is definite is the
referring expression is fixed and therefore presumably part of the addressee's general
knowledge, like Mount Everest. Finally, referring expression is definite if the referent has a
unique or nearly unique position in the more limited world of the speaker and addressee. For
example, the definite referring expression of this type can be seen in the interrogative have
you received the reports from the doctor?

The central idea of the indefinite referring expression is that the identity of referent is
not germane to the message, and that the hearer has to make a choice from the extension of

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the noun (Krediler, 1998; Cruse, 2000). It must be emphasized here that indefiniteness is not
restricted to the indefinite article only. The following sentences also contain indefinite
expressions (Cruse, 2000:308):

(6) Come up and see me sometime.

(7) I expect he's hiding somewhere.

(8) You'll manage somehow.

(9) Are you looking for something?

Specific and Non-Specific Reference

In order to identify whether a referent has a specific or non-specific reference, it is of

importance to understand the discourse rather than the expression of the referent present. It is
the discourse that determines the specificity or non- specificity of a reference. Consider now
the following sentence:

(10) Every evening at six o'clock a heron flies over the chalet.

The indefinite noun phrase a heron in this sentence can, under one interpretation, be
understood to refer to a specific referent. It refers to a particular heron that the speaker has in
mind. We can further support the specificity of the reference by providing the same context
as follow:

(11) It nests in the ground of the chateau.

The pronoun It in (11) is co-referential with a heron in (10). Again let us observe the
sentence below:

(12) I trust we can find answers to all your questions.

The referent answer in (12) can be understood to refer to a non-specific reference since
both speaker and hearer are not really sure about the referent being spoken. It should be
admitted, however, that very often we cannot exactly tell whether an indefinite noun phrase
is being used with specific reference or not as it is dependent very much upon how the
speaker/hearer interprets it. Hence, due to the alleged ambiguity of the indefinite noun phrase
in the sentence below, it can be construed as being used specifically or non-specifically:

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(13) I want to marry a girl with blue eyes.

Under one interpretation, the indefinite noun phrase is used specifically if it implies
the existence of some individual who satisfies the description of having blue eyes, and thus
can be equated to having the same sense as the definite noun phrase the girl with the blue
eyes in the same context. On the other hand, it is used non-specifically provided that no
presupposition or implication exists.

Anaphora

Halliday and Hassan (1976), in a lengthy discussion of textual cohesion in English,

classify reference into two types: exophora and endophora. When we utter his shirt or your
uncle, we refer to some entity in the real world: real world reference is called exophoric
reference. But we can also refer to the referents in the text items using linguistic means:
reference in text is called endophoric reference.

Consider the following sentence:

(14) Danny doesn't like hamburger. He avoids eating it whenever possible

Danny and hamburger are two nouns with exophoric reference, while he and it have
endophoric reference: they refer to Danny and hamburger in the context, and not directly to
real-world entity. Traditionally they are called pronouns. Endophoric reference can be
classified into anaphora and cataphora depending on the position of the antecedent. Observe
the short passage below:

(15) In the film, a man and a woman were trying to wash a cat. The man was holding the cat
while the woman poured water on it. He said something to her and they started laughing.

The pronouns (it, he, her, and they) in the passage are subsequent reference to already
mentioned referents, which are known as anaphoric reference or anaphora. Technically
speaking, the subsequent reference is called anaphor and the initial or already introduced
reference is known as antecedents. Quirk et. al. (1985) states that anaphoric reference is used
where the uniqueness of reference of some phrase the X is supplied by information given
earlier in the discourse. They further distinguish two kinds of anaphora: direct and indirect.
In direct anaphora, the referents have already occurred in the text, and thus can be identified

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directly, whereas in indirect anaphora the hearer identifies the referents indirectly from his
knowledge by inferring what has been mentioned. Consider the following sentences:

(16) John bought a TV and tape recorder, but he returned the tape recorder.

(17) John bought a car, but when he drove itone of the wheels came off.

Sentence (16) exemplifies the use of direct anaphora where the referent the tape
recorder can be identified directly, while sentence (17) contains the indirect anaphora where
the noun car has been substituted by anaphor it.

Similarly, Matthews (1997:18) defines anaphora as "the relation between a pronoun

and another element, in the same or in an earlier sentence, that supplies its referents".
Finally, Kreidler (1998) adds another type of anaphora, which he calls lexical anaphora. This
anaphora is the restatement of a certain referring expression by means of repetition, synonym
and superordinate as in (19):

(18) There was a strange painting on the wall.

the painting

(19) I wondered where the picture had come from.

this work of art

Cataphora

The notion cataphora is less common in use than that of anaphora. Cataphora is the
relation between an anaphoric expression and an antecedent that comes later (Matthews
1997:48). Thus cataphora refers to entity that is mentioned latter in the discourse. Consider
this sentence:

(20) I turned to the corner and almost stepped on it. There was a large snake in the middle of
the path.

The pronoun it (the cataphor) in the sentence can be interpreted as referring forward to a
noun phrase

a large snake, (the antecedent) and is said to have cataphoric reference. Cataphora is also
known as anticipatory anaphora or backward anaphora.
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Deixis and its types

The notion deixis has become one of the important topics that merits our attention.
Deixis is a semantics notion, which is originally derived from a Greek word meaning
pointing or indicating via language. Any linguistic form used to accomplish this pointing is
called a deictic expression. The adjective deictic (deikticos) has the sense of demonstrative.
When we notice a strange object and ask, "What's that?" we are using a deictic expression
(that) to indicate something in the immediate context. Deictic expressions are also sometimes
called indexical. The notion of what deixis is relatively uncontroversial among the linguists.
Lyons (1977:637) offers the following definition of deixis: "the location and identification of
persons, objects, events, processes and activities being talked about, or referred to, in relation
to the spatiotemporal context created and sustained by the act of utterance and the
participation in it, typically of a single speaker and at least one addressee." Similarly, Yule
(1996:9) argues that deixis is a form of referring that is tied to the speaker's context, with the
most basic distinction between deictic expressions being "near speaker" versus "away from
the speaker." If the referents being referred to are near the speaker, the proximal terms such
as this, here, now are used. By contrast, the distal terms such as that, there, then are
employed provided that the referents are away from the speaker. Matthews (1997:89) states
that deixis is "the way in which the reference of certain elements in a sentence is determined
in relation to a specific speaker and addressee and a specific time and place of utterance."
From the three definitions given above, it can be inferred that the notion deixis involves the
pointing of certain referents that belong primarily to the category of persons (objects),
speaker-addressee relationship, space, and time, context of utterance. Respectively, this
category is termed person deixis, social deixis, spatial deixis, temporal deixis, and discourse
deixis (Cruse 2000: 319). We shall examine each of these in detail.

Person Deixis

Person deixis basically operates on a three-part division, exemplified by the pronouns

for first person or the speaker (I), second person or the addressee (you) and third persons or
other participants (he, she, it). What is important to note here is that the third person singular
forms encode gender, which is not deictic by nature because it is not sensitive to aspects of
the speech situation (Cruse, 2000). Another point worth making with regard to the person
deixis is the use of plural pronouns, which can be in the representative or true use (Cruse,
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2000:320). If the pronoun we is spoken or written by a single speaker or writer to represent
the group he or she refers to, it is the case of representative use. On the other, if it used to
refer to the speaker and the group, the pronoun weis employed in its true sense. The
representative and true use of pronoun we are also called inclusive and exclusive we,
respectively. The inclusive-exclusive distinction is explicable in the utterance Let's go (to
some friends) and Let us go (to someone who has captured the speaker and friends). The
action of going is inclusive in the first, but exclusive in the second. The pronoun systems in
English can be seen in the following (Cruse 2000: 319-320):

Singular Plural

1stperson

I/me we/us

2nd person you you

3rd person he/him, she/her, it they/them

Social Deixis

In many languages the deictic categories of speaker, addressee, and other(s) are
elaborated with markers or relative social status (addressee with higher status versus
addressee with lower status). Expressions that indicate higher status are described as
honorifics. A widely quoted example to describe the social deixis is the so-called TV
distinction, from the French tu (referring to familiar addressee), and vous (referring to non-
familiar addressee). Other languages that make a distinction between the social status are
German with the distinguishing pronoun du and Sie, and Spanish with tu and Usted. In the
social context the higher, older, and more powerful speaker will tend to use the tu version to
a lower, younger, and less powerful addressee, and be addressed by the vous form in return.

Spatial Deixis

The concept of distance is relevant to spatial deixis, where the relative location of
people and things is being indicated. As Cruse (2000:320) puts it "spatial deixis manifests
itself principally in the form of locative adverbs (here and there) and demonstratives or
determiners (this and that).‖ In English the spatial deictic system is indicated by two terms

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labeled proximal and distal. Such terms as here and this indicate that the location is relatively
close to the speaker, and hence proximal. Conversely, the terms there and that indicate the
relative distant of the location from the speaker, and hence distal. In considering spatial
deixis, Yule (1996) warns that the location from the speaker's perspective can be fixed
mentally and physically. Speakers temporarily away from their home location will often
continue to use here to mean the (physically distant) home location, as if they were still in
that location. Speakers also seem to be able to project themselves into other locations prior to
being in those locations, as when they say "I'll come later" (movement to addressee's
location). This is sometimes described as deictic projection.

Temporal Deixis

Cruse (2000: 321) asserts that temporal deictic s function to locate points or intervals
on the time axis, using the moment of utterance as a reference point. The time axis can be
divided into three major divisions: before the moment of utterance, at the time of utterance,
and after the time of utterance. The time adverbial that forms a basic concept in temporal
deixis in English includes now and then. Now displays the same capacity for indefinite
extension, which can refer to a precise instant, such as Press the button-now!; or it can
accommodate a wide swathe of time like The solar system is now in a relatively stable phase
(Cruse, 2000:320). However, very often now indicates the time coinciding with the speaker's
utterance; for example, I am reading a novel now (the action done at the moment of the
speaker's utterance).

Then, on the other hand, designate the time period which is distal from the speaker's
utterance. Then is normally interpreted from the context, as the following sentences indicate:

(20) Watching movies at 8.30 tonight? Okay, I'll see you then.

(21) December 23 rd , 2002? I was in Solo then.

Apart from the time adverbial, there are essentially other types of temporal deixis worth
mentioning here. One type is related to calendric notions that include both clock time as in
[1] and calendar time as in [2].

Other temporal deictic related to calendric system includes such expressions as today,
yesterday, tomorrow, this week, last week, next week, this month, last month, next month,

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this year, last year, and next year. The last type of temporal deixis in English is related to the
verb tense, as illustrated in the following sentences.

(22) We live here now.

(23) We lived there then.

The verb tense in (3) is in simple present and is normally treated as close to (proximal) the
speaker's current situation, whereas in (4) the verb tense is simple past, and is thought as
distant (distal) by the speaker.

Discourse Deixis

Discourse deixis is actually a linguistic device used to designate an entity in the

discourse. The linguistic devices can be the deictic expressions this and that, the expression
hereby in the explicit performative sentence, and sentence adverbs such as therefore and
furthermore. The following sentences exemplify each of these devices (Cruse 2000: 323).

(24) Listen to this, it will kill you!

(25) That has at least two implications.

(26) Notice is hereby served that if payment is further delayed, appropriate legal action will
be taken.

(27) That rationale is controversial; furthermore............

The deictic expression this in (5) and that in (6) respectively refer to future discourse
element and past discourse element. Similarly, the hereby in (7) points to current discourse.
Finally, the sentence adverb marker in (8) refers to what follows in the future discourse.
Discourse deixis is not, however, to be confused with anaphora, the difference being that the
latter might extract a referent from an extralinguistic entity. Thus the anphor she in sentence
(9) below does not strictly refer to the word Susan itself.

(28) Susan is indeed sexually attractive. She has been admired by many men.

Lecture 17 Entailment, Presupposition & Implicature

 Entailment
 Presupposition
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  Implicature

Entailment

Entailment refers to the relationship between two sentences, where the meaning of one
sentence (the entailed sentence) is logically derived or implied by the meaning of another
sentence (the entailing sentence). It indicates that the truth of the entailed sentence can be
inferred from the truth of the entailing sentence. Entailment is a key concept in
understanding the logical and semantic relationships between sentences and plays a crucial
role in various linguistic phenomena.

Here are some key points and examples which may help us to understand the concept of
entailment:

Entailment is a directional relation between two sentences, A and B, where A entails B

if and only if whenever A is true, B is necessarily true as well. This means that the truth of A
guarantees the truth of B, but not vice versa.

Example:

- Entailing Sentence: "John has a sister."

- Entailed Sentence: "John has a sibling."

In this example, if John has a sister, it logically follows that he has a sibling. Therefore, the
truth of the entailing sentence "John has a sister" entails the truth of the entailed sentence
"John has a sibling."

Positive and Negative Entailment:

a. Positive Entailment: In positive entailment, the truth of the entailing sentence guarantees
the truth of the entailed sentence.

Example:

- Entailing Sentence: "Mary owns a dog."

- Entailed Sentence: "Mary has a pet."

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If Mary owns a dog, it can be concluded that she has a pet. Therefore, the entailing sentence
positively entails the entailed sentence.

b. Negative Entailment: In negative entailment, the falsity of the entailed sentence

guarantees the falsity of the entailing sentence.

Example:

- Entailing Sentence: "The car is red."

- Entailed Sentence: "The car is not blue."

If the car is not blue, it can be inferred that the entailing sentence is true, i.e., the car is red.
Hence, the entailed sentence negatively entails the entailing sentence.

Presupposition and Entailment:

Presupposition is an assumption or background knowledge that is always satisfied

whenever certain sentences are used. While presupposition may be related to entailment,
they are distinct concepts. Presuppositions are not affected by negation, while entailment can
be negated.

Example:

- Entailing Sentence: "John stopped smoking."

- Entailed Sentence: "John used to smoke."

If we say that John stopped smoking, it is presupposed that he used to smoke.

However, negating the entailed sentence does not affect the entailment, as the presupposition
remains intact: "John used to smoke" does not entail "John did not use to smoke."

Entailment is a fundamental concept that describes the logical relationship between

sentences. It helps in understanding the implications, inferences, and presuppositions
associated with different linguistic expressions.

Presupposition

Presupposition is a linguistic term that refers to the underlying assumptions or beliefs

that are expressed or implied in a statement or conversation, and which are often taken for

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granted. In other words, presuppositions are assumptions that a speaker or writer makes
about their audience's knowledge or background.

There are two types of presuppositions: lexical and structural.

1. Lexical Presupposition - It arises from individual words or phrases. It presupposes

something that is taken for granted in the expression‘s meaning.A lexical presupposition is
embedded in the meaning of the word, and it creates a subtle implication that the speaker
assumes the listener shares.

Example:

- John‘s son came home from school.

Presupposition: John has a son.

- My sister stopped smoking.

Presupposition: I have a sister.

2. Structural Presupposition - It arises due to the structure of a sentence. Structural

Presupposition is expressed through grammar and live in the arrangement of phrases and
clauses.

Example:

- The boy who won the game lost three teeth in the process.

Presupposition: The boy lost the game.

- I want to know if you've had a chance to try the new pizza place.

Presupposition: There is a new pizza place.

- Sarah is still painting.

Presupposition: Sarah was painting before.

- The caterers served caviar in the VIP room.

Presupposition: There was a VIP room.

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 Presuppositions can be important to identify and understand, as they can reveal the
underlying beliefs, assumptions, and attitudes of the speaker or writer. They can also have an
impact on how a message is received and interpreted by the audience.

Implicature

Implicature is a term used in linguistics to refer to the meaning that is implied but not
directly stated in a conversation or text. It arises when the speaker intends to communicate a
message that goes beyond the literal meaning of the words used. Instead, they rely on
context, tone, or other non-verbal cues to convey a deeper meaning.

The Gricean Maxims are a set of guidelines for effective communication that were
first introduced by philosopher H.P. Grice in his 1975 book "Logic and Conversation." These
maxims explain how speakers can use implicature to convey meaning to their listeners by
observing certain rules of conversation.

The four Gricean Maxims are:

1. Maxim of Quantity: Speakers should provide the right amount of information

needed for the conversation, but no more or less than necessary. If a speaker provides too
much or too little information, it can create confusion or misunderstandings.

Example:

A: Do you have any siblings?

B: Yes, I have a sister.

Implicature: B does not have any other siblings.

2. Maxim of Quality: Speakers should be truthful in their statements. If a speaker

purposefully says something false or misleading, it can damage their credibility.

Example:

A: Did you finish your project?

B: Yes, I finished it last night.

Implicature: B is telling the truth.

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 3. Maxim of Relevance: Speakers should stay on topic and communicate information
that is relevant to the conversation at hand.

Example:

A: Can you pass me the salt?

B: I love your shirt, where did you get it from?

Implicature: B is being dismissive and not taking the conversation seriously.

4. Maxim of Manner: Speakers should communicate in a clear and concise manner,

using correct grammar and avoiding ambiguity.

Example:

A: Can you pick up some groceries on your way home?

B: I can, but I'll have to go to the store on the corner.

Implicature: B may not want to go out of their way to pick up groceries.

Implicature is frequently used in literature to create a sense of depth and nuance in the
text. Authors may use it to convey character traits, motivations, or themes without explicitly
stating them.

Sophocles’ Use of Implicature in Oedipus Rex

Following examples of Implicature can be traced from Oedipus Rex:

i. Oedipus accuses Tiresias of being involved in a conspiracy against him. Tiresias

responds with "wisdom is a dreadful thing when it brings no gain to its possessor." This
implies that Tiresias knows something that would be harmful for Oedipus to hear but is
reluctant to reveal it.

ii. Jocasta repeatedly tells Oedipus to stop trying to uncover the truth about his origins,
saying "no good comes of such investigation." This implies that Jocasta knows more about
Oedipus' past than she is letting on and is trying to protect him from the devastating truth.

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 iii. When the chorus sings "whoever is the murderer of Laius may he still remain
unknown," this implies that the killer might still be among them and potentially pose a threat
to Oedipus and the citizens of Thebes.

iv. When the messenger says that Polybus, the man Oedipus believed was his father,
has died of natural causes, this implies that Oedipus was not responsible for his death and
therefore not guilty of killing his father.

v. When Oedipus says "I shall not rest until I have cast out the pollution from this
land," this implies that he believes the source of the city's problems lies within himself and
that he must take action to purify the city and himself.

From Prologue to the Canterbury Tales

i. When April with its sweet showers has pierced the drought of March, and bathed every
root of every plant with its gentle rain, then people long to go on pilgrimages.

Implicature: Spring brings new life and renewal, leading people to desire spiritual
journeys.

Lecture 18 Reference

Reference is a relationship between objects in which one object describes, or acts as a

means by which to connect to or link to, another object. The first object in this relation is
said to refer to the second object. It is called a name for the second object. The second
object, the one to which the first object refers, is called the referent of the first object. A
name is usually a phrase or expression, or some other symbolic representation. Its referent
may be anything – a material object, a person, an event, an activity, or an abstract concept.
References can take on many forms, including: a thought, a sensory perception that
is audible (onomatopoeia), visual (text), emotional state and relationship with other.

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. Two expressions which have the same
referent are said to be co-referential. In the sentence John had his dog with him, for instance,

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the noun John and the pronoun him are co-referential, since they both refer to the same
person (John).

In semantics, reference is generally interpreted as the relationships

between nouns or pronouns and objects that are named by them. Hence, the word "John"
refers to the person John. The word "it" refers to some previously specified object. The
object referred to is called the referent of the word. Sometimes the word-object relation is
called "denotation"; the word denotes the object. The converse relation, the relation from
object to word, is called "exemplification"; the object exemplifies what the word denotes. In
syntactic analysis, if a word refers to a previous word, the previous word is called the
"antecedent". A reference can be Definite, Indefinite, Generic, Anaphoric, Cataphoric and
Exophoric,

Anaphoric Reference

Anaphoric reference occurs when a word or phrase refers to something

mentioned earlier in the discourse.

Here‘s an example of anaphoric reference:

Muaz went to the bank. He was annoyed because it was closed.

He refers to Muaz.

it refers to the bank.

Anaphoric reference often makes use of the definite article the, because one of the
functions of the definite article is to indicate that something has already been mentioned.
Here‘s another example:

He sat down at the table and took a small box from his pocket. The object felt heavy in his
hands. Inside it was the key to his future.

Both the object and it refer back to a small box in the first sentence.

Cataphoric Reference

Cataphoric reference occurs when a word or phrase refers to something

mentioned later in the discourse.

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Here are some examples of cataphoric reference:

Although I phone him every week, Naveed still complains that I don‟t keep in touch often
enough.

Him refers to Naveed.

The book was there on the table. I‟d never read Moby Dick and I didn‟t intend to do so now.

The book refers to Moby Dick.

Exophoric Reference

Exophoric reference occurs when a word or phrase refers to something outside the discourse.

Here are some examples of exophoric reference:

“They„re late again, can you believe it?” “I know! Well, they‟d better get here soon or it„ll
get cold.”

The word “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).

The use of exophoric reference requires some shared knowledge between two speakers, or
between writer and reader(s).

Lecture 19 SIMPLE AND BRIEF LECTURE ON SPEECH ACT

Speech act theory is a fundamental concept in the field of pragmatics, which examines
how language is used in context to accomplish specific communication goals. Developed by
philosophers J.L. Austin and John Searle, speech act theory focuses on the idea that
utterances not only convey information but also perform actions within the social world.

1. Definition of Speech Act

A speech act refers to an utterance or statement that has both meaning and
action. It is an act of communication where the speaker not only conveys information
but also performs a specific function or accomplishes a particular goal through their

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words (Searle, 1969). For example, when a person says "I apologize," they are not simply
stating that they are sorry but also performing the act of apologizing.

2. Components of Speech Act

According to Searle (1969), speech acts consist of three main components:

a) Locutionary act: It refers to the actual production of an utterance with a specific meaning
and grammatical structure.

b) Illocutionary act: It represents the intended purpose or force behind the utterance. It
includes various speech acts such as requests, commands, promises, apologies, etc.

c) Perlocutionary act: It involves the effect or impact of the utterance on the listener or the
audience. It focuses on the consequences or intended outcomes of the speech act.

3. Types of Speech Acts

Speech acts can be categorized into several types, based on their intended illocutionary
force or function. Here are some commonly recognized speech acts (Searle, 1969):

a) Assertives: Utterances that express beliefs, facts, or statements that can be judged as true
or false. Example: "The Earth revolves around the Sun."

b) Directives: Utterances that make requests, suggestions, or commands. Example: "Please

pass me the salt."

c) Commisives: Utterances that involve making promises, commitments, or offers. Example:

"I will complete the project by Friday."

d) Expressives: Utterances that express emotions, feelings, attitudes, or psychological states.

Example: "Congratulations on your achievement!"

e) Declarations: Utterances that bring about changes in social reality. Example: "I now
pronounce you husband and wife."

4. Pragmatic Principles and Speech Acts

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 Speech act theory is closely related to pragmatic principles that govern language use in
context. Grice's Cooperative Principle and maxims of conversation play a significant role in
speech act analysis (Grice, 1975). These principles include:

a) Maxim of Quantity: Speakers should provide enough information to make their

contribution informative, but not more or less than necessary.

b) Maxim of Quality: Speakers should be truthful and provide information that is supported
by evidence.

c) Maxim of Relevance: Speakers should stay on topic and provide relevant information.

d) Maxim of Manner: Speakers should be clear, concise, and avoid ambiguity or obscurity.

To sum up, speech act theory provides a framework for understanding how language
is used to accomplish various communicative goals. It emphasizes that communicative acts
go beyond the transmission of information and involve explicit intentions and actions.
Understanding speech acts is essential for effective communication and for the interpretation
of meaning in social interactions.

Lecture 19 A Detailed Lecture on Speech Acts

A speech act in linguistics and the philosophy of language is an utterance that has
performative function in language and communication. According to Kent Bach, "almost any
speech act is really the performance of several acts at once, distinguished by different aspects
of the speaker's intention: there is the act of saying something, what one does in saying it,
such as requesting or promising, and how one is trying to affect one's audience." The
contemporary use of the term goes back to J. L. Austin's development of performative
utterances and his theory of locutionary, illocutionary, and perlocutionary acts. Speech acts
are commonly taken to include such acts as promising, ordering, greeting, warning, inviting
and congratulating.

Austin's Speech Act Theory

A theory of language based on J. L. Austin's How to Do Things with Words (second

edition, 1975), the major premise of which is that language is as much, if not more, a mode
of action as it is a means of conveying information. As John Searle puts it, "All linguistic

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communication involves linguistic acts. The unit of linguistic communication is not, as has
generally been supposed, the symbol, word, or sentence, or even the token of the symbol,
word, or sentence, but rather the production or issuance of the symbol or word or sentence in
the performance of a speech act." Meaning, then, should be regarded as a species within the
genus intending-to-communicate, since language itself is highly complex, rule-governed
intentional behavior. A theory of language is part of a theory of action. The basic emphasis
of speech act theory is on what an utterer (U) means by his utterance (x) rather than what x
means in a language (L). As H.P. Grice notes, "meaning is a kind of intending," and the
hearer's or reader's recognition that the speaker or writer means something by x is part of the
meaning of x. In contrast to the assumptions of structuralism (a theory that privileges langue,
the system, over parole, the speech act), speech act theory holds that the investigation of
structure always presupposes something about meanings, language use, and extralinguistic
functions.

In How to Do Things with Words, Austin commences by enunciating a reasonably

clear-cut distinction between constative and performative utterances. According to him, an
utterance is constative if it describes or reports some state of affairs such that one could say
its correspondence with the facts is either true or false. Performatives, on the other hand, "do
not 'describe' or 'report' or ‗constate‘ anything at all, are not 'true' or 'false.' . . . The uttering
of the sentence is, or is part of the doing of an action, which again would not normally be
described as saying something." Marrying, betting, bequeathing, umpiring, passing sentence,
christening, knighting, blessing, firing, baptizing, bidding, and so forth involve
performatives. The attitude of th

true or false, the performative utterance is felicitous or infelicitous, sincere or insincere,

authentic or inauthentic, well invoked or misinvoked. An "I do" at a marriage ceremony is
insincere and misinvoked if the utterer is already married and has no intention of abiding by
the conditions of the contract.

Austin divides the linguistic act into three components. First, there is the locutionary
act, "the act of 'saying' something." Second, there is the illocutionary act, "the performance
of an act in saying something as opposed to the performance of an act of saying something."
Third, there is the perlocutionary act, for "saying something will often, or even normally,

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produce certain consequential effects upon the feelings, thoughts, or actions of the audience,
of the speaker, or of other persons." In other words, a locutionary act has meaning; it
produces an understandable utterance. An illocutionary act has force; it is informed with a
certain tone, attitude, feeling, motive, or intention. A perlocutionary act has consequence; it
has an effect upon the addressee. By describing an imminently dangerous situation
(locutionary component) in a tone that is designed to have the force of a warning
(illocutionary component), the addresser may actually frighten the addressee into moving
(perlocutionary component). These three components, then, are not altogether separable, for
as Austin points out, "we must consider the total situation in which the utterance is issued --
the total speech act -- if we are to see the parallel between statements and performative
utterances, and how each can go wrong. Perhaps indeed there is no great distinction between
statements and performative utterances." In contradistinction to structuralism, then, speech
act theory privileges parole over langue, arguing that external context -- the context of
situation -- is more important in the order of explanation than internal context -- the
interrelationships among terms within the system of signs.

The concept of an illocutionary act is central to the concept of a speech act. Although
there are numerous opinions regarding how to define 'illocutionary acts', there are some
kinds of acts which are widely accepted as illocutionary, as for example promising, ordering
someone, and bequeathing.

Following the usage of, for example, John R. Searle, "speech act" is often meant to
refer just to the same thing as the term illocutionary act, which John L. Austin had originally
introduced in How to Do Things with Words (published posthumously in 1962). Searle's
work on speech acts is also commonly understood to refine Austin's conception. However,
some philosophers have pointed out a significant difference between the two conceptions:
whereas Austin emphasized the conventional interpretation of speech acts, Searle
emphasized a psychological interpretation (based on beliefs, intentions, etc.).

According to Austin's preliminary informal description, the idea of an "illocutionary

act" can be captured by emphasizing that "by saying something, we do something", as when
someone issues an order to someone to go by saying "Go!", or when a minister joins two
people in marriage saying, "I now pronounce you husband and wife." (Austin would
eventually define the "illocutionary act" in a more exact manner.)
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 An interesting type of illocutionary speech act is that performed in the utterance of
what Austin calls performatives, typical instances of which are "I nominate John to be
President", "I sentence you to ten years' imprisonment", or "I promise to pay you back." In
these typical, rather explicit cases of performative sentences, the action that the sentence
describes (nominating, sentencing, promising) is performed by the utterance of the sentence
itself.

Austin (1962) describes the Speech Acts theory as an approach that explains the roles
of utterances in shaping the attitudes of participants in interpersonal communication. Speech
acts reveal the intentions of speakers and the effects the speaker‘s utterances and expressions
have on the hearers. The implication of speech acts is that every utterance has a purpose
which derives from the specific context. It has been observed that language use depends on
such contextual factors as social and physical conditions, attitudes, abilities, beliefs and the
relationship existing between the speaker and the listener.

Levels of Speech Acts

There may be some confusion regarding types and levels of speech acts. We have
already discussed types of speech acts – representative, declarative, directive, expressive and
commissive. For levels of speech acts, emphasis is on the different stages of interaction
between the speaker and the listener through the use of speech acts. Three distinct levels are
usually observed – locutionary, illocutionary and perlocutionary acts.

Locutionary Acts – These are observed as the processes of producing grammatical and
meaningful utterances which can be recognised by the hearer.

Illocutionary Acts – Illocutionary acts are the force behind the utterances. Indeed, the
speaker performs these acts to achieve the purpose of communication as a statement, a
question, a command, an invitation, a threat, a request, an apology etc. It is possible, for
instance, to use a sentence that has the structure of a statement for the purpose of a warning.
For example:

(i) You will lose all your deposits – (from a financial adviser to a client)

This sentence may be a warning or a piece of advice. Therefore, it is possible to use identical
utterance types for different tokens based on the intentions of the speaker and the context.

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 Perculationary Acts – These are the effects of the speaker‘s utterance on the behaviour
of the hearer. They are the acts performed by the hearer as a result of the effect of the
speaker‘s utterances. It is assumed, for instance, that the hearer will respond to a question of
the speaker in a specific way, or behave in accordance with the demands of the context. It
should be noted that the illocutionary force is the intended effect of an utterance on the
hearer from the point of view of the speaker. The perlocutionary effect is the actual effect of
the speaker‘s utterance on the action, behaviour, attitude or belief of the hearer.

Maximum communication is achieved when there is illocutionary uptake. This

situation arises when the listener understands the intended effect of the speaker. This demand
is at the core of semantics since meaning must be shared.

Austin himself admits that these three components of utterances are not altogether
separable.―We must consider the total situation in which the utterance is issued- the total
speech act – if we are to see the parallel between statements and performative utterance, and
how each can go wrong. Perhaps indeed there is no great distinction between statements and
performative utterances.‖ (Austin 1962).

Different types of Speech Acts

There are different types of speech acts, the most common being the following:

(a) Representative Acts;

(b) Declarative Acts

(c) Directive Acts

(d) Expressive Acts; and

(e) Commissive Acts.

Representative Acts: These acts describe events, processes and states. Usually, the speaker is
committed to the truth of the assertion, claim, report, suggestion, prediction, description,
hypothesis or conclusion.

Declarative Acts: These are acts that immediately change the state of affairs to which they
apply. These acts are used in arresting, christening, marriage, sentencing, acquittal etc.
Consider the following:
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(29) I discharge and acquit the accused

(30) I hereby name this baby Amanda

Directive Acts: In directive acts, the addressee is instructed to carry out some instruction by
responding verbally to an utterance or by performing some physical actions. The acts can be
questions, commands, requests, pleas or invitation. e.g.

(31) Kindly lend me some money!

(32) Please, be my guest!

(33)What is your name!

Expressive Acts: Expressive acts show the psychological states – feelings and attitudes
towards some events and affairs. These usually occur in greetings, scolding, condoling,
appreciating, thanking, congratulating, apologising, etc. e.g.

(34) We congratulate you on your success

(35) I apologise for my mistakes.

Commissive Acts: In Commissive Acts, the speaker is committed to some future action as in
challenging, betting, promising, offering, threatening, vowing, warning, etc. e.g.

(36) I pledge a hundred thousand Naira

(37) We promise to build them a house

It should be noted that commissive acts carry specific performative verbs – promise,
swear,

name, pledge, warn, advise, declare, bet.

Searle's Classification of illocutionary speech acts

Performative verbs fall fairly naturally under a small number of headings. It is useful
to group them in this way, as it enables us to gain a picture of the range of functions that
these verbs perform. Searle (1975) has set up the following classification of illocutionary
speech acts:

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Assertives: Assertives commit the speaker to the truth of the expressed proposition:

state, suggest, boast, complain, claim, report, want (that)

Directives: Directives have the intention of eliciting some sort of action on the part of the
hearer: order, command, request, beg, beseech, advise (to), warn (to), recommend, ask, ask
(to)

Commissives: Commissive commit the speaker to some future action: promise, vow, offer,
undertake, contract, threaten

Expressives: Expressives make known the speaker's psychological attitude to a presupposed

state of affairs: thank, congratulate, condole, praise, blame, forgive, pardon

Declaratives: Declaratives are said to bring about a change in reality: that is to say, the world
is in some way no longer the same after they have been said. In an obvious sense this is true
of all the performative verbs: after someone has congratulated someone, for instance, a new
world comes into being in which that congratulation has taken place. The specialty about
declaratives is that they cause a change in the world over and above the fact that they have
been carried out. If someone says, I resign, then thereafter they no longer hold the post they
originally held, with all that that entails. resign, dismiss, divorce (in Islam), christen, name,
open (e.g. an exhibition), excommunicate, sentence (in court), consecrate, bid (at auction),
declare (at cricket)

There is a finite number of explicit performative verbs in English (several hundred), but
there is no reason to believe that there is a theoretically finite set of possible speech acts.

Implicatures

Implicature is a technical term in the pragmatics sub-field of linguistics, coined by H.

P. Grice, which refers to what is suggested in an utterance, even though neither expressed
nor strictly implied (that is, entailed) by the utterance. As an example, the sentence "Mary
had a baby and got married" strongly suggests that Mary had the baby before the wedding,
but the sentence would still be strictly true if Mary had her baby after she got married.
Further, if we append the qualification "not necessarily in that order" to the original sentence,
then the implicature is now cancelled even though the meaning of the original sentence is not

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altered."Implicature" is an alternative to "implication," which has additional meanings in
logic and informal language.

Grice's Conversational Maxims

Implicture, a term coined by H.P. Grice refers to what is suggested in an utterance and
which may not have been expressed. The speaker deliberately breaks the rules of a
conversational maxim to convey additional meaning. For instance, the following could be a
possible question and respond respectively:

(38) Do you really believe Betty?

(39). She was speaking grammar.

The answer implies, among other things that Betty was not telling the whole story. It is
expected of people in communication to obey certain co-operative principles. These
principles have been presented as maxims‘s of quantity, quality, relation and manner.

Maxim of quality

Maxim Quality is concerned with truth telling, and two parts:

(i) Do not say what you believe is not rue;

(ii) Do not say that for which you lack evidence.

One could argue that the second sub-maxim entails the firs: thee will obviously not be
adequate evidence for a false statement. We can paraphrase this maxim as Do not make
unsupported statements (Cruse, 2000: 355).

Maxim of Quantity

Maxim of quantity is concerned with the amount of information (taken in its broader sense)
an utterance conveys.

(i) Make your contribution information enough;

(ii) Do not make your contribution more informal than necessary.

Maxim of relation

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The maxim is very simple: Be relevant. The point of this maxim is not sufficient for a
statement to be true for it to contribute an acceptable conversational contribution. For
example

A: Have you seen Mary today?

B: ?I am breathing.

Notice that this maxim is implicated in the Maxim of quantity, which could easily be
reformulated as: [Make] the strongest statement that can be relevantly made.

Maxim of manner

Maxim of manner has four components:

(i) Avoid obscurity of expression.

(ii) Avoid ambiguity.

(iii) Avoid unnecessary prolixity.

(iv) Be orderly.

It is generally regarded as being less important that the others. There are also conventional
implicatures used for communicating non-truth-conditional meaning for specific linguistic
expressions. It is largely self-explanatory.

Conversational implicature

Paul Grice identified three types of general conversational implicatures:

1. The speaker deliberately flouts a conversational maxim to convey an additional meaning

not expressed literally. For instance, a speaker responds to the question "How did you like
the guest lecturer?" with the following utterance:

Well, I‘m sure he was speaking English.

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If the speaker is assumed to be following the cooperative principle, in spite of flouting the
Maxim of Relevance, then the utterance must have an additional nonliteral meaning, such as:
"The content of the lecturer's speech was confusing."

2. The speaker‘s desire to fulfill two conflicting maxims results in his or her flouting one
maxim to invoke the other. For instance, a speaker responds to the question "Where is
John?" with the following utterance:

He‘s either in the cafeteria or in his office.

In this case, the Maxim of Quantity and the Maxim of Quality are in conflict. A cooperative
speaker does not want to be ambiguous but also does not want to give false information by
giving a specific answer in spite of his uncertainty. By flouting the Maxim of Quantity, the
speaker invokes the Maxim of Quality, leading to the implicature that the speaker does not
have the evidence to give a specific location where he believes John is.

3. The speaker invokes a maxim as a basis for interpreting the utterance. In the following
exchange:

Do you know where I can get some gas?

There‘s a gas station around the corner. The second speaker invokes the Maxim of
Relevance, resulting in the implicature that ―the gas station is open and one can probably get
gas there‖.

Scalar implicature

According to Grice (1975), another form of conversational implicature is also known as a

scalar implicature. This concerns the conventional uses of words like "all" or "some" in
conversation.

I ate some of the pie.

This sentence implies "I did not eat all of the pie." While the statement "I ate some pie" is
still true if the entire pie was eaten, the conventional meaning of the word "some" and the
implicature generated by the statement is "not all".

Conventional implicature

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 Conventional implicature is independent of the cooperative principle and its four
maxims. A statement always carries its conventional implicature: Donovan is poor but
happy.

This sentence implies poverty and happiness are not compatible but in spite of this Donovan
is still happy. The conventional interpretation of the word "but" will always create the
implicature of a sense of contrast. So Donovan is poor but happy will always necessarily
imply "Surprisingly Donovan is happy in spite of being poor".

Implicature vs entailment

This can be contrasted with cases of entailment. The statement "the President was
assassinated", for example, not only suggests that "the President is dead" is true, but requires
this to be so. The first sentence could not be true if the second were not true; if the President
were not dead, then whatever it is that happened to him would not have counted as a
(successful) assassination. Similarly, unlike implicatures, entailments cannot be cancelled;
there is no qualification that one could add to "the president was assassinated" which would
cause it to cease entailing "the president is dead" while also preserving the meaning of the
first sentence.

It is always common to hear people argue over what is meant, and what is implied. This
means that there could be differences between what a speaker says and how the listener
interprets it. However, success in communication depends on how well the meaning intended
by the speaker and the implicature of the listener converge. This is usually possible when
participants in communication obey principles of conversational implicature.

SUMMARY

Here in this lecture, we have discussed about speech acts. We have learned about
Austin's speech act theory and Searle's classification of speech acts. Lastly, we have
discussed about implicature. We have learned about Grie's conversational maxims and
conversational implicatures.

Glossary of Semantics
Abstract/ Concrete nouns: An abstract noun denotes one or more entities that do not have
physical existence: idea, problem; a concrete noun denotes one or more physical entities e.g.

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Chair, food, etc.
Accent The heaviest stress on one syllable in a phrase or sentence, giving the word in which
the syllable occurs greatest emphasis.
Accomplishment verb: A verb that takes an object and denotes a change in the status or
condition of what that object refers to: I broke the window.
Achievement verb A verb that indicates a change in the status or condition of the referent of
the subject: We moved away.
Acronym A word made from the initial letters of the words of a phrase: North Atlantic
Treaty Organization ® NATO.
Action noun An abstract noun, often derived from a verb, that expresses something that
somebody does: discovery, swimming.
Active-subjective/passive-objective adjectives: An active-subjective adjective is derived
from a verb and describes what its subject does: She is very attractive; a passive-objective
adjective is derived from a verb and describes what may be true of the object of such a verb:
breakable.
Active Voice see Voice
Activity verb: A verb that expresses action without expressing an end to the action: They
ran.
Actor role:
Addition The process of creating words by putting meaningful elements together: mean-ing-
ful.
Adjective A word that expresses some attribute of a noun and is modified by very, more and
other qualifiers: a very nice day.
Adjective phrase: An adjective along with any modifiers it may have: very nice; five feet
tall.
Affected noun: A noun derived from a verb which names an entity that receives the action
of the verb: advisee.
Affected role, Affecting role
Affirmative see polarity
Affix A meaningful form that is attached to another form; it may be a prefix as un- in unkind
or a suffix like -ness in kindness.

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Agent noun: A noun, usually derived from a verb, which names a person who performs the
action of the verb: painter, cook.
Agent role See Thematic Role
Ambiguity The condition whereby any linguistic form has two or more interpretations:
Club=a heavy stick; a social group.
Animate Said of a word, especially a noun that denotes some living thing: dog, boy, an
inanimate noun denotes some non-living thing(s): stone, happiness.
Anomalous sentence: A meaningless sequence of words which deviates from the rules for
sentence formation.
Antonym: A word that is opposite in meaning to another word; good and bad are antonyms.
Arbitrariness: The characteristic of language such that there is no natural relation between a
word, for example cat, and what it stands for.
Aspect: The expression of some temporal characteristic of a predicate; includes ingressive,
durative, egressive, prospective, and retrospective.
Aspectual verb: A verb such as start or continue which tells the aspect of the main verb that
follows.
Attitudinal predicate: A verb or adjective that expresses the feelings of the subject: I hate
this music; I‟m fond of swimming.
Auxiliary verb: A verb used with a lexical verb to make grammatical modifications, as in
are working, have seen, will go.
Binary antonym:s Two lexemes such that, if used as predicate for the same subject, only
one can be true: dead, alive.
Blend: The result of two clipped forms put together to make a compound: smog=smoke+fog.
Causative verb: A verb that expresses an action which results in the status or activity of
some entity: insert X in Y=cause X to be in Y.
Characteristic adjective: An adjective derived from a noun and which expresses the quality
of that noun: gold ® golden.
Characterized noun: A noun derived from an adjective and which expresses an entity of
whom the adjective can be predicated: young ® youngster.
Clause: A construction of words that expresses a proposition but forms part of a sentence
rather than being a sentence in itself: She told us she will wait.

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Clipping: A process of word formation in which a new word is made by shortening an
existing word: laboratory ® lab.
Co-hyponyms: Two or more lexemes that have the same superordinate: collie, dachshund
and poodle (among others) are co-hyponyms.
Collective noun: A noun that refers to a group of entities; army, furniture, luggage.
Collocation: Words occurring together in a phrase or sentence.
Command: A type of sentence in which someone is told to do or not do something: Wait.
Don‟t go.
Commissive predicate: A verb that expresses the commitment of the subject to the
performance or non-performance of an action: I pledge to carry out all orders given to me.
Common noun: A noun that refers to one or more of a class of objects or concepts: cat,
idea. Cf. proper noun.
Complement: Any form that follows a predicate and completes its meaning: I made a
mistake; She looks nice; They‟re afraid of the dark.
Compound: A word made of two or more independent words: armchair.
Compound verb (as used here) A combination of verb+particle or verb+preposition, which
acts as a single semantic unit: stand up, listen to.
Concrete noun see abstract/concrete nouns
Conjunction A word that connects two linguistic expressions: John and Mary, now or at
five o‟clock.
Connotation: The personal associations produced by words; cf. denotation.
Containing adjective: An adjective derived from a noun and which expresses the presence
of some quantity of what is expressed by the noun: color® colorful.
Context: The linguistic environment of a form in a sentence; the social, spatial, temporal
situation in which a form is produced.
Contradiction: The relation between two propositions such that if one is true, the other must
be false: of the two propositions represented by John is here and John is not here, each is the
contradiction of the other.
Converse antonyms: Two lexemes so related that either one presupposes the
other: If A gives X to B, B receives X from A.
Conversion: A type of word formation in which, without change, a word of one class
becomes also a word of another class: hammer is both noun and verb.
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Co-referents: Two expressions that denote the same entity.
Countable noun: A noun that has singular and plural forms and which denotes separable
entities: child(ren), house(s). See non-countable noun.
Counterfactive predicate: A verb that, whether affirmative or negative, communicates
that the following predication is untrue: pretend.
Creativity: The characteristic of language which makes it possible for us to produce and
understand utterances we have never heard or produced before.
Declarative sentence see statement
Definite: Said of a noun phrase that refers to an entity or group of entities whose identity is
presumably known to the addressee.
Deletion: The omission of some language element.
Demonstrative: Applied to forms that have the function of identifying by proximity to the
speaker: this, that.
Denotation: The objective relationship between a linguistic form and its referent.
Derivation: Any process whereby one word is formed from another: writer from write.
Determiner A word that occurs before a noun to express number, quantity, or (in)
definiteness: a, the, some, all.
Directive: An utterance intended to get the addressee(s) to do or not do something:
Wait, I wish you‟d wait.
Directive predicate: A predicate that can occur in an overt directive utterance: I ask you to
wait.
Discourse: A continuous stretch of spoken or written language, consisting of at least one
sentence and usually more than one.
Displacement: The ability of language to refer to contexts which differ from the time and
place of an utterance.
Distribution The total set of linguistic contexts in which a lexeme can occur.
Durative aspect: The expression of continuance of an action or permanence of a status: He
kept running; They stayed at home.
Dynamic verb: A type of verb that expresses activity or change of state: They‟re moving.
Cf. stative verb.
Effect noun: A noun derived from a verb and which expresses the product or outcome of the
action expressed by the verb: song ¬ sing.
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Ellipsis: The omission of part of a sentence, where the missing part is understood from
context: Where are you going? Out.
Embedding: Inserting one sentence into another sentence: I believe you‟re right.
Enabling predicate: A verb or adjective which tells that the following predicate is made
possible: We allowed the car to pass.
Environment: The parts of an utterance that are adjacent to a lexeme; in The dog is barking
the environment of bark is The dog is ____ing.
Euphemism: An expression used in place of one considered unpleasant: pass away instead
of die.
Extension: The class of entities which a lexeme denotes; the extension of Albert Einstein is
a single individual, while the extension of scientist is a large number of individuals.
Extra-linguistic: Said of anything outside of language to which language can refer.
Focus: Special attention to one element in a sentence: Henry in Henry is the one I told what
you said; in speech focus it is often accomplished through accent: I told Henry what you
said.
Function: The role played by a word in a sentence; in George saw me and I saw George the
word George has different functions.
Generic Used to refer to a whole class of entities: A child can do that (= any chil, all
children); The Child from Three to Six (= children in general).
Gerund The form of a verb ending in -ing used as (part of) a noun phrase: I enjoy swimming,
She accused me of telling lies.
Goal: The role that expresses what is affected by the action of a predicate: Roger gave Ellen
a present. Ellen received a present.
Gradable: Said of an adjective that can be compared or intensified: hot ® hotter, very hot.
Grammar: The rules by which a language operates, and therefore the implicit knowledge
that speakers of that language have which makes them competent to use the language; also,
an account of the rules.
Habitual: Said of a form, especially a verb that expresses customary, repeated activity: He
smokes a pipe.
Head: The main word in a phrase on which other elements depend and which controls the
function of the phrase: all those dirty clothes in the corner.

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Homonyms: Words with the same pronunciation but different meanings: club ‗a heavy
stick‘ and club ‗a social organization.‘ homophones=homonyms that sound the same but
have different spellings.
Hyponym: A word whose referent is included in the referent of a more general word, called
the superordinate: rose is a hyponym of flower, and flower is a superordinate of rose.
Implicative verb: A verb that expresses something about the truth of the predication that
follows in the sentence: We didn‟t hesitate to accept the offer implies that we accepted the
offer.
Implicature: A meaning derived not from what is said but deduced from the necessary way
of interpreting what is said.
Inanimate see animate
Inceptive: Said of a form that expresses the beginning of a status or action: arrive; begin
running.
Indefinite see definite
Infinitive: A non-finite form of a verb; in English often, but not always, consisting of to+the
verb: I want them to go, I let them go.
Information: The content of a message.
Inhabitant noun: A noun like New Yorker which names the inhabitant of a particular place.
Instrument noun A noun that refers to an inanimate object by which the action of some
verb is accomplished: brush, projector.
Intention: What a speaker or writer wants to communicate in producing an utterance.
Interpretation: The message that a hearer or reader gets from an utterance.
Intonation: The system of melodies with which utterances are spoken and which can make
differences of meaning.
Lexeme: A minimal form that conveys one meaning and can be used in reference or
predication: the word cat, and the ‗idiom‘ put up with are both lexemes.
Lexicon: The vocabulary of a language, together with information about the pronunciation,
use, and meaning of each item in it.
Linguistic meaning: The meaning conveyed by linguistic forms, as distinct from meanings
conveyed by the circumstances of an utterance, which is speaker meaning.
Locution An utterance, that is, what is said as distinct from the intention of the speaker
(illocution) or the interpretation of the hearer (perlocution).
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Meta-language: The language used in talking about language.
Metaphor: A figurative expression in which a notion is described in terms usually used for a
different kind of notion.
Metonymy: A way of denoting an entity by using some characteristic of that entity, e.g. blue
eyes as a way of referring to a person with blue eyes.
Modal verb: An auxiliary verb that expresses permission, probability or necessity: can,must.
Modality The expression of necessity, possibility and probability, often through modal
verbs.
Morpheme The smallest contrastive unit of meaning: a single word like cat or an affix such
as un- and -ness in unhappiness.
Negation: A process that expresses the denial or contradiction of some part, or all, of a
sentence.
Non-binary antonyms: Two lexemes that have opposite meanings but for which there are
intermediate degrees of the same quality: hot and cold.
Non-countable noun: A noun that has no plural form: mud, misery.
Non-verbal: Said of communication that does not use words.
Noun: A class of words with a naming function, showing contrasts of countability and
number.
Noun phrase: A phrase with a noun as head; hence, a noun alone may be a noun phrase.
Number The grammatical category that expresses the distinction of singular and plural.
Object: The noun phrase that names the entity which receives the action of the verb: John hit
Bill.
Paradigmatic: The relation of items that can substitute for one another at the same place in a
sentence. Cf. syntagmatic.
Paralanguage: Characteristics of the voice, apart from the words spoken, which can
communicate something about the speaker‘s attitude.
Paraphrase: An alternative way of expressing the content of a sentence.
Participle: A non-finite form of a verb, either present (amusing) or past (amused).
Particles Words that combine with verbs to make compound verbs: in, out, on, off, up,
down, over, away, through.
Passive voice see voice
Perceptual predicate: A verb that expresses the activity of any of the five senses.
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Performative verb: A verb that may be used to state the actual performance of an action;
declare.
Period adjective: An adjective derived from a noun that expresses some period of time:
monthly ¬ month.
Person: A grammatical category of reference, in English expressed with pronouns, referring
to the speaker and perhaps others (1st person: I, we), the addressee(s) (2nd person: you), or
others (3rd person: he, she, it, they).
Phatic: Said of utterances used mainly to establish social contact.
Phoneme: A unit in the sound system of a language, which combines with other such units
to form syllables and words; English cash and shack have the same three phonemes
differently arranged.
Phrase: A group of words smaller than a clause, forming a grammatical unit.
Plural see number
Polarity: The contrast of affirmative and negative.
Possessive: A language category that indicates possession: my, your.
Pragmatics: The study of language in use, including the ways in which we derive meanings
from the context and from knowledge of speakers apart from the linguistic meanings of what
is said.
Preposition: One of a class of function words that ties a following noun phrase to the rest of
the sentence: at, for, with.
Presupposition: The information that must be assumed in order for a sentence to be
meaningful; ―Have you stopped beating your wife?” presupposes that the addressee has been
beating his wife, which presupposes that the addressee is married and that the addressee is an
adult male.
Preventing predicate: A verb which states that its subject is the agent causing the non-
occurrence of the predication that follows: I kept the ball from rolling away.
Privative verb: A verb that expresses removal of something: undress.
Productive process: A means of making new words which is frequently used at the present
time: adding -er to verbs to make nouns like driver.
Productivity: The ability of humans to produce and understand constantly new utterances.

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Progressive: The extended verb form composed of forms of be and the present participle,
expressing the duration or incompleteness of what the verb signifies: He is running, They
were waiting.
Pronoun: One of a small class of words that can substitute for a noun phrase: he, somebody,
who.
Proper noun: A noun or noun phrase that labels some specific person, place, building,
historic event, etc. and which lacks the grammatical forms of a common noun.
Proposition: The meaning of any sentence that is asserted to be true or false.
Prospective verb: A verb that expresses some action or attitude oriented toward a later time:
We expect to go.
Qualifier: A word or phrase that modifies another word, thereby limiting the reference of
that word: very nice, big enough.
Quantifier/quantifying determiner: A word or phrase that expresses the amount of what is
expressed by another word: all, several, a dozen.
Reciprocal: A relationship that can be expressed by each other or one another.
Redundant: Said of any item that is more than necessary in a message for conveying the
meaning.
Reference: The relation between a language form and some physical entity, which is the
referent of that sign.
Reflexive: A verb or a construction in which the subject and the object have the same
referent: She hurt herself.
Retrospective verb: A verb that expresses an action or attitude oriented toward a previous
time: We regretted having gone there.
Reversive verb: A verb that expresses the reversing or undoing of what is expressed by
another verb: disconnect is the reversive verb that corresponds to connect.
Rhetorical question: A question for which no answer is expected.
Semantic field/set: A group of lexemes that are defined with respect to one another: kinship,
colors, etc.
Semantics: The study of meaning expressed by language.
Sense relations: The relations of meaning between words, as expressed in synonymy,
hyponymy, antonymy, etc.
Sentence: A grammatical construction that is complete in itself.
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Sign: Any formal item that conveys meaning, especially a conventional piece of a system.
Simple sentence: A sentence that contains only one clause.
Simple verb: A finite verb that has no auxiliary and so consists of just one word.
Singular see number
Speaker meaning see linguistic meaning
Speech act: An utterance defined in terms of the speaker‘s intention and the effect on the
audience.
Statement: A sentence that tells something.
Stative verb: A verb that expresses some state of affairs, rather than an action or event.
Structural semantics: The study of the sense relations between words.
Structure: A system of interrelated elements that have repeatable relations to one another
and which are defined by their relations to one another.
Subject The noun phrase about which something is stated; John and I are ready.
Synonym: A word that is equivalent in sense to another word (in a particular context or
contexts); select is a synonym of choose in ―Will you help me choose a new suit?‖ (but not
in ―I don‘t choose to wait.‖).
Syntagmatic: The relation of words to one another when they form a construction.
Syntax: The study of how words go together to form sentences.
Tense: The expression of time in a verb; in English a verb has two tenses, present (play) and
past (played).
Utterance: A stretch of speech by one person; it may consist of a single word, a single
sentence, or numerous sentences.
Valency: The number of arguments (noun phrases) that a predicate takes in one sentence.
Verdictive predicate: A verb that occurs in a sentence which expresses the speaker‘s
Judgment of some presumed action by the addressee: I blame you for what happened.
Voice: the relation of the action of the verb to its subject; either active, as in She loves me, or
passive, as in She is loved by me.
Weather predicate: An adjective like rainy or a verb such as snow which occurs with the
empty subject it.
Oft-Repeated Long Questions
1. What is presupposition? Discuss different types of presupposition with examples
2. “The Sense of an expression can be thought of as the sum of its sense
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 properties and sense relation” discuss.
3. What Felicity Conditions in relation to Speech Act Theory are required.
Elaborate.
4. What are thematic roles? Discuss in detail.
5. What are the Semantics properties? Elaborate property noun and verb with
examples.
6. What are SEMANTIC PROPERTIES? Discuss in detail their role in
establishing the meaning of words?
7. Write an exhaustive note on SEMANTIC ROLES?
8. Write detailed note n SPEECH act theory?
9. Semantics is the study of meaning. What are different types of meaning?
10.What is PRESUPPOSTION? How it is different from ENTAILMENTT?
11.Write a detailed note on all semantic relations along with suitable examples?
12.Write a brief note on the following?
a. The Word
b. Presupposition
c. Entailment
d. Implicature
13.What is Discourse? How can we understand discourse meaning?
14. Define Antonyms. Discuss their types in detail?
15. What are semantics properties? Discuss their role in establishing the meaning
of words in detail.
16. Speech Acts
17. Grice’s Cooperative Principles

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