Scribd
Upload
56 views5 pages

Semantics - Notes

The document discusses three linguistic approaches that shift focus from form to meaning: componential analysis, formal semantics, and pragmatics. Componential analysis breaks down words into minimal semantic components, while formal semantics emphasizes propositional meaning using logical methods. Pragmatics addresses contextualized meaning, highlighting the limitations of formal semantics in capturing the complexities of natural language.

Uploaded by

Gema Crespo Ruiz
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
56 views5 pages

Semantics - Notes

The document discusses three linguistic approaches that shift focus from form to meaning: componential analysis, formal semantics, and pragmatics. Componential analysis breaks down words into minimal semantic components, while formal semantics emphasizes propositional meaning using logical methods. Pragmatics addresses contextualized meaning, highlighting the limitations of formal semantics in capturing the complexities of natural language.

Uploaded by

Gema Crespo Ruiz
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 5

Group number: 3

Deriving from these non-semantic linguistic approaches, some related theories felt the
need to move from form to meaning, concentrating on the minimal units of language,
i.e., words, sentences, and utterances. Three of them are:

1. Componential analysis: Related to Structuralism, sees language constituents as


contrastive and focuses on the analysis of words and their semantic components.

2. Formal semantics: Related to Generativism, focuses son propositional sentence


meaning by using the analytical method of logic (a branch of philosphy).

3. Pragmatics: Developed as a reaction against the limiting principles and


procedures of Formal semantics, focuses o contextualised utterance meaning.

FROM LINGUSITIC FORM TO LINGUISTIC MEANING: SOME FORMAL


SEMANTIC APPROACHES:

Focusing on the minimal units of language

- The structuralist approach: componential analysis  word meaning.


- The generativist approach: formal semantics  sentence/propositional meaning
(declarative, truth-conditional meaning)
- The pragmatic approach: utterance

THE STRUCTURALIST APPROACH: COMPONENTIAL ANALYSIS

- Componential analysis is a branch of semantics that applies the principles of


contrast and opposition practiced by structuralist on other areas of language such
as phonology and morphology.
- Componential analysis describes the meaning of semantically close words by
decomposing them into a number of minimal shared components.
- The components identified in a lexical element are compared and contrasted to
the components of other lexical items belonging to the same semantic field.
A simple example of the analysis into sufficient components of a set of related concepts
belonging to the animal semantic field:

a. Cat: +animal +mammal + feline +carnivorous -wild +domesticated +four legs


+retractable claws +small -barks (all of them are of the lexical item)

b. Tiger: +wild -domesticated (contrary than cat in this)

c. Dog: -feline -wild -retractable claws +barks

The features of a given lexical group appear in the different lexical items as marked (+)
or unmarked ( - ) Conceptual components are theoretical notions that serve to describe
the semantic features shared by a number of lexical elements in a given language.

Word/Concept: dog

Conceptual components:

Semantic features of the concept “dog”: +animal +mammal…

A main problem of componential analysis lies in the fact that it is limited to the analysis
of uncontextualized lexical elements.

Practical application of the componential analysis approach: lexicology and dictionary


making.

The division of lexical items into semantics components practiced by componential


analysis can be regarded as formalized dictionary definitions.

Componential analysis also facilitates the definition of some essential semantic


phenomena such as:

Synonymy (speed/celerity), antonymy (speed/slowness), superordination


(speed/movement), hyponymy (speed/human speed, walking speed), polysemy
(quickness/slang for amphetamine (the drug)).

THE GENERATIVIST APPROACH TO MEANING: FORMAL SEMANTICS

- Branch of linguistics developed by members of the generative school of


linguistics who claimed that Chomsky’s notion of a “deep structure” was
actually the sentence meaning.
o Example: the police arrested the thief/ the thief was arrested by the police
– different surface structure ^form*/ same deep structure. [meaning].
- To approach the study of “sentence meaning”, they borrowed the methods of
logical semantics (a philosophical discipline).

What is Logical Semantics?

- Philosophical discipline interested in the organization of rational thought.


- Logicians study the meaning of rational declarative sentences, for instance,
statements which can be declared true or false. The meaning structure
underlying declarative sentences is termed “proposition”.
- Logicians use formal constructed language to represent the propositional
meaning of declarative sentences.
o For example, to represent the rational notion of “additive conjunction”,
they use the following notation: “Mary speaks French <and> Lisa speaks
German”. P & q (p and q).
- The semi-compatibility of logical and formal semantics: some abstract structures
shared by the artificial language of logic and natural languages:
- The basis unit of analysis in generative grammar is sentence. The basic unit in
logical semantics is the proposition = the meaning of the sentence. (proposition
borrowed by logic).
- In logical semantics, a proposition is defined as the abstract meaning of a
declarative sentence that is assigned a truth value, i.e., a proposition can only be
either true or false, never both (sometimes it is assigned the value of
“indeterminate”).
- Formal semantics borrows the notion of “proposition”, as the basic unit of
analysis representing the abstract meaningful structure underlying any
declarative sentence. For example:
o My uncle lives in this house/ This is my uncle’s residence – 2 sentences,
1 proposition, two ways of saying the same thing.

Differences between the formal artificial language of logic and the analysis of natural
languages:

- The language of logic simplifies the complexities of natural language, as their


focus is on the processes and rules of rational thought.
- The language of logic is always propositional (that is, declarative) and is
evaluated in terms of true-false values.
- The language of logic does not contemplate ambiguity or alternative
interpretations often present in the expressions produced in real communicative
interaction.
- The interest of logicians is normative, not descriptive.
- The richness of unrestricted creative and contextualized meaning in the normal
everyday use of natural languages is the cause of many of the technical
complications and insufficiencies encountered in formal semantic theory.

Illustrating two typical problems with the application of the formal method of logic to
the analysis of meaning in natural languages studied by formal semantics:

1) The sentences of natural language are often subject to ambiguity and complex
interpretation if they are not contextualized. E.g.. “they passed the port at
midnight”, read out of context, poses difficulties when assigning meaning to it.

The lexical item “port could be interpreted both as – “they passed the harbor at
midnight and as – they passed the “wine” at midnight.

POLYSEMY – it is ambiguous.

2) According to the principles of logic, propositional status applies only to


declarative sentences. E.g.. the interrogative version “did they pass the port at
midnight?” would present problems of analysis as it does not represent an
assertion subject to evaluation in terms of truth of falsity.

The question is not a declarative sentence. Formal semantics

Test true or false if it is false explain why. 1hour, starts at 10.

- Category systems have both a vertical and a horizontal dimension. T


- In the vertical dimension, categories are defined in terms of prototypes.
o FALSE: prototypes are found in the basic level concept level, in
horizontal position.
- The vertical dimension forms a four-level hierarchy, consisting of general words,
superordinate, basic level concepts, and subordinates. T
- Prototypes are the clearest members of a category according to personal
experience and cultural, environmental context.

Free spirit arrives on earth. > life is a journey conceptual metaphor, metonymy. (free
spirit represents a human being) --- conceptual integration.

MIDTERM 2
COHESION AND COHERENCE

COHESION:

You might also like