Lesson 1 introduction

 Semantics is the study of linguistic meaning (i.e. signification in languages)

 Three challenges in doing semantics
o Challenges 是根据 definition theory 提出来的
 What is definition theory:
 definitions of words → meanings of sentences; everything is understood by its
definitions
o Challenge 1: circularity
 Province → administrative division → public/business affairs → matter…
 由于要解决↑这个问题，所以需要一个类似“中介语”的东西，来避免这种循环；于是 metalangauge 出现
 Metalanguage: a language that describes the semantic units and rules of another language;
 An ideal metalanguage would be neutral with respect to any natural languages.
o Challenge 2: how to make sure definitions are exact.
 这个问题也可以被翻译为"how to balance linguistic knowledge and encyclopedic knowledge"
 这两者在不同的情况下会有不同的主次
 Dictionary knowledge:
 It is knowledge of the essential meaning of a word that all speakers must possess, and
which dictionaries must accurately represent in order to allow the meaning to be
acquired for the first time.
 Encyclopedic knowledge
 It is not essential to the meaning of the word and will vary significantly from speaker to
speaker. Encyclopaedic knowledge is not linguistic in nature: that is, it does not
determine any of a word's linguistic behaviour.
o Challenge 3: contextual meaning.
 话语会在不同的语境下，受到多个因素的影响
 Conventional meaning vs literary meaning (I am starving)
 Semantic meaning vs pragmatic meaning
 Word meaning vs sentence meaning (其他的一些重要概念)
 Lexicon: "mental dictionary"
 Productivity:
 Phrases/sentences are productive from the lexicon
 the ability of producing new forms and new words
 具体表现：
 Noun, verb is increasing every year, preposition remains.
 Phrase/ sentence are recursive
 Compositionality
 The meaning of an expression can be understood by combining the
meaning of its expressions
 Non-compositional expression
 Idioms: phrases that are non-compositional.
 Some important assumption:
o Reference and sense
 The relationship by which language hooks onto the world is usually called reference.
  The semantic links between elements within the vocabulary system is an aspect of their sense, or
meaning.
 不同的 senses 可以指代同一个 reference
 Venus: (the morning star; the evening star)
 相比于其他的语言，一个 sense 也可以指代人家两个 sense 指代的 reference
 Sheep mutton（English）; mouton (French)
o Utterances, sentences and propositions
 An utterance is created by speaking (or writing) a piece of language. [concrete]
 Sentences are abstract grammatical elements obtained from utterances. [more abstract]
 Proposition is a part of the meaning of a sentence that describes some state of affairs. [most
abstract]
 忽视形式，只看所描述事物的状态
o Literal and non-literal meaning
 Literal meaning: meaning instances where the speaker speaks in a neutral, factually accurate
way. （conventional meaning）
 Non-literal meaning: meaning where the speaker deliberately describes something in untrue or
impossible terms in order to achieve special effects（literary meaning）
 It is difficult to draw a firm line between literal and nonliteral uses of language
 scholars see metaphor as an integral part of human categorization: a basic way of
organizing our thoughts about the world.
 Literal language theory:
 Hearers recognize non-literal uses as semantically odd, that is factually nonsensical, but
then are motivated to give them some interpretation by an assumption that speakers
generally are trying to make sense. The hearer then makes inferences in order to make
sense out of a non-literal utterance.
 发觉奇怪的东西，找到奇怪的东西，自动建立联系；很努力和善解人意的听者们
o Semantics and pragmatics
 Semantics: meaning abstracted away from users
 Pragmatics: meaning described in relation to speakers and hearers.
 Key concept:
o Different aspects of sense：
 Denotation:
 A word' s denotative meaning is its “literal” meaning,
 the kind of meaning that is most directly represented in dictionary definitions.
 “小气”和“节约”在 denotation 上是一样的
 Connotation:
 have to do with secondary factors such as its emotional force, its level of formality, its
character as a euphemism
 Social meaning:
 what an expression can tell you about the person who is saying it and the social situation
they are in.
 Research methods:
o Dictionary:
 Orthography, meaning, pronunciation, word class, etymology, register
 o Corpus
 A corpus is a collection of linguistic material that can be searched, varying wildly in their size,
breadth, and depth of coverage.
 Some are aimed at being representative of the language at large
 Derived from many different genres
 Others are created with more specific interests in mind.
 Limitation:
 Not everything about meaning is plainly evident from a corpus.
 If a word has several meanings it can be difficult in many contexts to determine
which of those meanings is in use in a particular bit of corpus material.
 A corpus can tell you part of what is possible in a language, but it cannot tell
you what is impossible in the language.
 Cannot answer the "why" question

o Intuition
 Native speaker intuition
 Intuition and corpora checks and balances on each other. (相互的制衡)
 Both methods can’t answer the ‘why’ question.
o experimentation
 Lesson 2 meaning, thought, and reality
 Denote or refer:
o Denote is used for the relationship between linguistic expression and the world. (emphasize on
relationship); denotatum and denoting
o Refer is used for the action of a speaker in picking out entities in the world. (emphasize on object);
referent and referring
 Referential approach
o The referential or denotational approach (到现实世界代入一下)
 The action of putting words into relationship with the world is meaning,
 so that to provide a semantic description for a language we need to show how the
expressions of the language can "hook onto"the world
 导致的结果或观察的结果： The difference in meaning arises from the fact that the two sentences
describe different situations
o Type of reference
 Referring reference and non-referring reference
 Whether they themselves can identify an entity
 Referring: cat
 Non-referring: so, very, maybe
 Generic reference and specific reference
 Generic reference: a woman whoever she is
 Specific reference: a woman I have met
 Constant reference and variable reference
 Constant reference: The Eiffel Tower
 Variable reference: she, I, you
 Referents and extensions
 Referent: the thing picked out by uttering the expression in a particular context.
 That pair of shoes
 Extension: the set of things which could possibly be the referent of that expression
 I hate shoes (a set of things)
o Names:
 Description theory:
 a name is taken as a label or shorthand for knowledge about the referent. In this theory
understanding a name and identifying the referent are both dependent on associating the
name with the right description.
 emphasizes the role of identifying knowledge.
 Causal theory:
 the names are socially inherited, or borrowed. Speakers may use names with very little
knowledge of the referent.
 stresses the role of social knowledge in the use of names,
 Nouns and noun phrases (的特点和功能)
 特点 1 Noun phrases may have no referents.
 Example: The King of France is bald
 功能 1 Indefinite and definite NPs can operate like names to pick out an individual
 Example: I spoke to a woman, the women is…
  功能 2.1 NPs can also be used to refer to groups of individuals, either distributively, where
we focus on the individual members of the group, or collectively, when we focus on the
aggregate count nouns and mass nouns
 example：The people in the lift avoided each other's eyes.
 example：The people in the lift proved too heavy for the lift motor.
 功能 2.2 Some nouns may vary in number when they denote distributively or collectively
(e.g. family, committee, band) （）
 功能 2.3 Nominals can also denote substances, actions and abstract ideas. [mass nouns]
 功能 2.4 Count nouns and mass nouns
 两者之间往往存在转换
 Quantifiers
 These allow a speaker, among other things, the flexibility to predicate something of a
whole class of entities, or of some subpart
o Reference as Theory of Meaning
 The simplest theory of meaning:
 Semantics is reference:

 Flaw
 What about some non-referring words
 What about the words that do not exist.
 What about there is not one-to-one correspondence between a linguistic
expression and the item.
 Thus, there is more to meaning than reference.
 Sense 的引入(一种 metaphorical reference):
 Sense is the way in which we grasp or understand its referent;
 It is sense which gives an expression its cognitive value or significance.
 The representational approach
o Our ability to talk about the world depend on our mental model of it.
In this view a language represents a theory about reality, about the type of things and situations in the
world.
A speaker can choose to view the same situation in different way.
 Represent the mental model: (language→concept/mental mode)
 Meaning is representational
o Sense and concept:
 Sense: place a new level between words and the world; a level of mental representation
 Image: these mental entities are images
 Concept: the sense of some words, mental, not visual, more abstract, is called concept
o Concept(how to understand it)
 necessary and sufficient conditions
 Necessary condition: 起否定的作用
  Sufficient condition：起肯定的作用
 flaw：
 what if speakers do not share the same of sets of conditions.
 zebra
 The problem of ignorance
 whale
 Causal theory
 Natural kind terms, like names, are originally fixed by contact with examples of the
kind. Thereafter, speakers may receive or borrow the word without being exposed to the
real thing, or knowing very much about its characteristics.
 是否是通过否定语言和现实之间在意义上绝对的联系，sense 是一个宏达的 category，包含了并指向了多种现实中的可能性，并
通过这种方式实现功用的含义。（仿佛在暗示定义“concept”是意义不大的）
 prototype：
o a model of concepts which views them as structured so that there are central or typical members of a
category, but then a shading off into less typical or peripheral members.
o The concept of borderline uncertainty
 Whale ——fish/mammal
 在两个圈子的边边
o frames or idealized cognitive models (ICMs)
 Definition: Speakers have folk theories about the world, based on their experience and rooted in
their culture.
 ICM， a form of general knowleage, governs the use of the word
 Word's meanings are composed of two parts
 Dictionary-type definition
 Encyclopedia-type definition
 （或许可以理解为这是一种两方的 general knowledge 的对话）
o Conceptual hierarchies:
 Conceptual knowledge is relational in nature
 The concept of Conceptual hierarchies
 Such hierarchical conceptual structure allows individuals to perceive entities as
examples of types and to make predictions about their nature and behavior without
direct observation.
 Three levels of generality:
 Superordinate level: few features
 Subordinate level: more features, more specific
 Basic level: more features, cognitively important
 basic level items tend to be more basic and are the terms we learn first.
 basic level is perceptually more salient and the most unmarked
 Basic level is easy to notice and differentiate
 The basic level is from domain to domain, depending on expert's knowledge
 这是一只布偶猫/这是一只猫
 Linguistic relativity
o Based on Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis
 our own language predisposes us to see both reality and other languages through its own filter.
o Language of though(mentalese):
 memory and processes such as reasoning seem to make use of a kind of propositional
representation that does not have the surface syntax of a spoken language like English.
 Idealism:
 we believe that reality exists independently of the workings of human minds
 Can we perceive the world as it really is?
 If yes → objectivism: knowledge of reality is attainable and comes from correctly
conceptualizing and categorizing the world.
 If no → mental constructivism: we can never perceive the world as it really is; reality is
only graspable through the conceptual filters derived from our biological and cultural
evolution.
 Lesson 3 word meaning
 Some concepts
o Lexicon: all words; our own vocabulary
o Lexeme: words without inflections
o Words: grammatical words [walk, walks, walked, walking, etc.]
 Problems with pinning down word meaning
o Similar meaning, different collocation
o Fossilization and idioms
 Fossilization: hot and cold (*cold and hot), husband and wife (*wife and husband) （就是没有这种说
法）
 Idioms: kith and kin
 Vagueness or ambiguity
o Vagueness: If the word has one sense that is general enough that it can be applied to many different
things, then the word has a vague, or indeterminate, sense.
o Ambiguity: The state of having more than one possible sense is called ambiguity.
o How to distinguish vagueness and ambiguity
 "do so" test
 Duffy discovered a mole [=rodent] and Clark discovered a mole [=spy].
 ≠ Duffy discovered a mole and so did Clark. [rodent/spy] [ambiguous]
 He is a publicist./She is a publicist
 They hired a publicist and we hired a publicist.
 = They hired a publicist and so did we. [vague]
 Sense relation text
 I go for a run1 every morning.
 I go for a jog every morning./*I go for an enclosure every morning. [run1 = jog
≠ enclosure]
 He built a new run2 for his chickens.
 He built a new enclosure for his chickens./*He built a new jog for his chickens.
[run2 ≠ jog = enclosure].
 Zeugma test
 They hired a publicist for the holding company and another one for the subsidiary.
 ?He planned a run for charity and one for his chickens. [plan a run?]
 Lexical relations
o Homonymy （同音异义）
 Bank of the river; money in the bank
 两个词没有联系
o Polysemy（一词多义）
 Do not write on the book(page); I am reading a book
 两个词有联系：plain water; plain food; plain man; plain face
o Synonymy (同义)
 True or exact synonyms are very rare.
 Etymology
 Register
 Attitude
  Collocational restriction
 a big house: a large house [similar]
 my big sister: my large sister [different]
o Antonymy (反义词)
 Complementary (contradictory, binary) antonyms (没有中间概念；都是绝对概念)
 dead/alive (of e.g. animals)
 pass/fail (a test)
 hit/miss (a target)
 Gradable antonyms（相对概念）
 There are usually intermediate terms
 The terms are usually relative: a thick pencil is thinner than a thin girl
 In some pairs one term is more basic（cognitive）and common:
 How long is it? [common]
 How short is it? [uncommon]
 Reverse
 Opposite directions: push/pull, come/go
 Reversive processes: inflate/deflate, knit/unravel
 （都是动词）
 Converses:
 一个状态出现，另一个状态就不得不出现
 a relation between two entities from alternate viewpoints
 Some word pairs that are commonly considered opposites do not fit the above
categories.
 For example, learn/teach seem to go together in a converse-like way, but they
are not different perspectives on the same action, but rather two actions that
typically co-occur.
 Taxonomic sisters:
 words which are at the same level in a taxonomy [hierarchical classification system].
 Hyponymy
 Hypernym 上位词
 Hyponym 下位词
 （subcases of texonomy:
 Sometimes there is a distinct term, as in pig–boar–sow and swan–cob–pen; in other
examples the male name is general, as in dog, while in others it is the female name, for
example cow and duck.
 There may also be gaps: while tom or tomcat is commonly used for male cats, for some
English speakers there doesn’t seem to be an equivalent colloquial name for female cats
(though others use queen, as above)）
 Meronymy（整体关系）
 A part–whole relationship between lexical items.
 Car is the holonym（整体词） of engine.
 Engine is the meronym（部分词） of car.
 Meronymic hierarchies are less clear cut and regular than taxonomies.
 Meronymy also differs from hyponymy in transitivity.
  Hyponymy is transitive: kestrel < hawk < bird, so kestrel is a kind of bird.
 Meronymy can be transitive: nail < finger < hand, so a hand has nails.
 It is also intransitive: hole < button < shirt, but not ?a shirt has holes.
 Member-collection(部分和整体关系)
 A relationship between the word for a unit and the usual word for a collection of the
units. （可数的）
 ship – fleet
 tree – forest
 fish – shoal
 book – library
 bird – flock
 sheep – flock
 worshipper – congregation
 Portion-mass
 The relation between a mass noun and the usual unit of measurement or division. （不可数
的：liquid，hair ）
 drop of liquid
 grain of salt/sand/wheat
 sheet of paper
 lump of coal
 strand of hair
 Derivational relations
o Causative verbs (来自形容词的动词)
 The relationship between them
 an adjective describing a state, for example wide as in the road is wide [state]
 a verb describing a beginning or change of state, widen as in The road widened
[inchoative]
 a verb describing the cause of this change of state, widen, as in The City Council
widened the road [causative]
 The gates are open.
 The gates open at nine.
 The porters open the gates.
 Gap:
 The soil is rich [state].
 ?The soil is enriching. [inchoative]
 The gardener enriched the soil [causative]
 Resultative
 an adjective describing the state that is a result of the process.[resultative word]
 Hot – heat (vi.) – heat (vt.)– heated
 Some verbs are inherently causative and not derived from an adjective.
o Agentive nouns
 Nouns with -er or -or have the meaning “the entity who/which performs the action of the verb.”
  skier, walker, murderer, whaler, toaster, commentator, director, sailor, calculator,
escalator.
 Exceptions
 Meaning change：louger, undertaker, muffler, creamer, renter
 Form variation
 Depend-dependant (depender); cook-cook/cooker
o Back-formation
 Editor – edit
 translation-translate
 injury-injure
 Lexical typology
o The comparison of lexical organization or principles
o The comparison of lexical fields and individual lexical items
o Basic color terms (BCTs)
 The term is monolexemic, i.e. not built up from the meaning of its parts.
 （只能由一个词组成）
 The term is not a hyponym of any other color term, i.e. the color is not a kind of another color.
 (直接隶属于 color：red 是 scarlet 不是)
 The term has wide applicability. This excludes terms like English blonde.
 （利用率要高一些）
 The term is not a semantic extension of something manifesting that color.
 (不能从别的词转变，派生而来)
o Focal color:
 the best prototypical example of the color (cross-linguistically)
 The conclusion drawn in this and subsequent studies is that color naming systems are
based on the neurophysiology of the human visual system.(神经系统导致颜色的发展过程大差不差)
 The perception of the color spectrum is the same for all human beings but that languages
lexicalize different ranges of the spectrum for naming.
 BCT hierarchy

 Core vocabulary
 Morris Swadesh suggested that each language has a core vocabulary that is more
resistant to loss or change than other parts of the vocabulary.
 When more than 90 percent of the core vocabulary of two languages could be
identified as cognates(同源词) then the languages were closely related.
 （通过对比两种语言的 core vocabulary 来判定两种语言的”同源关系“）
 Problem: 没有考虑到 semantic shift
 Cognates in two languages may drift apart because of historical
semantic
 processes, including narrowing and generalization
 比如 meat 从一开始的“食物”的意思，变成了现在的“肉”的意思
 Universal lexemes: Natural Semantic Metalanguage (NSM)
 NSM is concerned with reducing the semantics of all vocabulary down to a very
restricted set of semantic primitives
 Semantic representations (called explications in NSM) consist of paraphrases in
a metalanguage that has vocabulary and grammar drawn from natural language.
 The claim made by these scholars is that the semantic primes of all languages
coincide.
 Lesson 4 sentence relation and truth
 Truth condition
o Truth means a correspondence with facts, correct description of states of affairs in the world (it is
empirical and contingent )
o Truth-value:
 semanticist call a sentence's being true or false its truth-value
o Truth condition:
 Truth conditions: the facts that would have to obtain in reality to make a sentence true or false.
 Necessary truth
o Empirical truth: a posteriori truth
 基于经验
o Priori truth:
 不需要证明，万物的真理
o Necessary truth
 放之四海而皆准；tow plua two makes four
o Contingent truth
 需要在不同的语境下判断
o Analytic statement and synthetically true statement
 Analytic statements:
 the truth follows from the meaning relations within the sentence, regardless of any
relationship with the world
 "my father is my father"
 Synthetically true statement
 true because it accords with the facts of the world.
 "my father is a sailor"
 Analytic true are necessarily true
 Truth tables (被判断的其实是 pq 中间的符号是否成立)
o Negation and truth tables

o Conjunction (交集)

 加入 q 是（），p 是（），那么 p^q 是真是假

o Disjunction
 Exclusive disjunction
 

 ⊻：只有一个是对的
 You will pay the fine or you will go to jail. [exclusive]
 Inclusive disjunction

 ∨：有对的就行
 I'll see you today or tomorrow. [inclusive]
 Material implication

 If p, then q.
 Bi-conditional

 ≡: if and only if （充要条件）

 ‘p ≡ q’ = ‘(p → q) ∧ (q → p)’
 Basic concepts
o Synonymous

 My brother is a bachelor
 My brother has never married
o Entails; Entailment
 

 T--->T; F<---F
 The anarchist assassinated
 The emperor is dead
 The application of entailment
 Hyponymy
 I bought a dog today
 I bought an animal today
 Paraphrases
 The Etruscans built this tomb
 This tomb was built by Etruscans
o Contradicts; Contradiction

 Tom has just come from Rome

 Tom has never been to Rome
 Now is not now
 He is a murderer but he has never killed anyone
o Presuppose
 The mayor of Manchester is a woman
 There is a mayor of Manchester
o Tautologies
 Ireland is Ireland
 Presupposition
o to presuppose something means to assume it
 Her husband is a fool.
 She has a husband.
o Presupposition as a truth relation
 Step 1: If p (the presupposing sentence) is true then q (the presupposed sentence) is true.
 Step 2: If p is false, then q is still true.
 Step 3: If q is true, p could be either true or false.
o entailment vs. presupposition
 If we negate an entailing sentence, then the entailment fails.
 

 negating a presupposing sentence allows the presupposition to survive.

o The pragmatic approach: sentences as utterances of a communication act

 Downgraded or backgrounded
 Highlighted or foregrounded
 depend on the speaker's intentions and her guesses about the knowledge held by the
participants.
o Presupposition failure
 Using a name or a definite description to refer presupposes the existence of the named or
described entity.
 The King of France is bald. (Russell 1905)
 There is a King of France.
 What is there is no King of France (truth-value gap)

o Presupposition triggers
 Names and definitions give rise to presuppositions.
 "你去过长城么"（隐含长城是什么）
 长城——presupposition triggers
 Syntactic triggers
 Cleft: It was his behavior with frogs that disgusted me.
 [something disgusted me]
 Pseudo-cleft: What disgusted me was his behavior with frogs.
 [something disgusted me].
 Subordination: I was riding motorcycles before you learned to walk.
 [you learned to walk]
 Comparative clause: He's even more gullible than you are.
 [you are gullible]
 Lexical triggers
 Sean realized/knew that Miranda had dandruff.
 [factive verbs: Miranda had dandruff].
 Sean thought that Miranda had dandruff.
 [no presupposition]
 John blamed me for telling her.
  [verbs of judgment: I told her]
 John accused me of telling her.
 [no presupposition]
 Context sensitivity:
 She cried before she finished her thesis.
 [pre：she finished her thesis]
 She died before she finished her thesis.
 [no presupposition/she didn’t finish her thesis]
 Defeasibility: presupposition can be canceled. ——只需要在说完之后补
 Lesson 5 sentence semantics: situation(verb)
 Situation type
o Static situation:
 to describe a situation as static or unchanging for its duration.
 In describing states the speaker gives no information about the internal structure of the state.
 Robert loves pizza.
 Mary knows the way to San Jose.
o Dynamic situation
 they imply that the action has subparts. (是一个过程)
 Robert grew very quickly.
 Mary is driving to San Jose.
o （In English, adjectives are typically used for states and verbs for dynamic situations.）
 Exceptions
 The file is in the computer.（be 动词）
 Ann has red hair.
 You know the answer.
 The amendment remains in force.
 Jenny loves to ski.
o Stage-level predicates [SLPs]
 修饰的东西的短期的临时的性质，一般是后置形容词
 a person responsible for…
 the stars visible
o Individual-level predicates [ILPs]
 修饰的东西本身的长久的性质，一般是前置形容词
 a responsible person
 the visible stars
o Stative verb
 allow the speaker to view a situation as a steady state, with no internal phases or changes.
 Moreover the speaker does not overtly focus on the beginning or end of the state.
 Mary loved to drive sports cars.
o Dynamic verb
 Describe processes and may focus on a point
 Punctual verbs (dynamic verbs)
 describes an event that seems so instantaneous that it involves virtually no time.
 John coughed
 Durative verbs (dynamic verbs)
 describe a situation or process which lasts for a period of time.
 John slept
 Telic verb(早晚结束)
 refers to those processes that are seen as having a natural completion.
 Harry was building a raft. [not completed]
 Harry built a raft. [completed]
 Atelic verb（结束不了）
 refers to those processes that are seen as not having a natural completion.
  Harry was gazing at the sea. [no completion]
 Harry gazed at the sea. [no completion]
 Telic and atelic verbs can be interchangeable
 Run; sing
 Iterative interpretation
o The grammatical difference between stative verbs and dynamic verbs
 Progressive
 I am learning Swahili.
 *I am knowing Swahili.
 Imperative
 Learn Swahili!
 ?Know Swahili!
 But the difference is not clear-cut
 Remains and have

 Smith's types

 semelfactive :短促的，一次性的
 static；durative； telic
o Transfer
 因为名词后置状语的不同导致的名词类别的改变
 Frankie cycled. [state]
 Frankie cycled in the park. [activity]
 Frankie cycled to the park. [accomplishment]
o Test for situation types
 The progressive verb form
 Imperative verb forms
 Simple present verb forms
  If a situation type can occur in the frame What happened was… it is non-stative.
o Durative
 Certain prepositions: in [with telic], for [with atelic]
 They reached the school in half an hour. (Achievement)
 ?They played cards in half an hour. (Activity)
 They played cards for half an hour. (Activity)
 ?They reached the school for half an hour. (Achievement)
 Finish picks out situation types that are durative and telic.
 Joan finished fixing the car. (Accomplishment)
 ?Joan finished fixing cars. (Activity)
 ?Joan finished recognizing her old boss. (Achievement）
 Almost
 When an accomplishment is modified by almost it has two readings
 John almost wrote a novel.
 [John almost finished writing a novel; John didn't write a novel]
 Activity and achievement types only have the second reading:
 John almost played. (Activity)
 John almost noticed the mistake. (Achievement)
 Tense(时态)
o Tense allows a speaker to locate a situation relative to some reference point in time, most likely the time
of speaking.
o Tense is said to be a deictic system,（是一个相对的概念） since the reference point for the system is usually the
act of speaking.
o Reference point theory
 S = the speech point, the time of utterance;
 R = the reference point, the viewpoint or psychological vantage point adopted by the speaker;
 E = event point, the described action’s location in time.

 Aspect （体，从行为的角度是）
o Aspect allows speakers to view an event in various ways: as complete, or incomplete, as so short as to
involve almost no time, as something stretched over a perceptible period, or as something repeated over
a period.
o The progressives 进行体
 The progressives describe action as ongoing and continuing.
o The perfect 完成体
 The perfect aspect allows a speaker to emphasize the relevance of events in the past to the
“present.
  [current relevance：过去发生的事情对现在有影响]
 Don't run. The train has left.
 ?Don't run. The train left.
o English simple forms: 一般…时
 Simple tense forms can be seen as basically neutral with respect to aspect:

 情态动词决定 R
o Exception
 复合句会变得很复杂：简单句的时态放在复合句的时态中不一定对
 Historical present: speakers and writers may narrate past events in the present tense.
 Modality
o Modality is a cover term for devices which allow speakers to express varying degrees of commitment to,
or belief, in a proposition.
o 情态是一个语义概念，可以使用多种表达来表达“情态”，不一定使用情态动词
o Types of modality
 Epistemic modality: degree of knowledge
 一件事可不可能发生的判断，表达的现实世界的主观看法
 She must/may not be here.
 Deontic modality
 obligation, responsibility and permission
 You must take these books back.
 You can leave them there.
 Dynamic modality: the control of events belongs to the subject
 更加强调一种主观的感受和想法
 Willingness: I will go there.
 Ability: I can play the piano.
 原因看 ppt
 Evidentiality
o Evidentiality allows a speaker to communicate her attitude to the source of her information. It is
achieved through subordination or adverbs in English.
 Lesson 6 sentence semantics: participants (noun)
 Argument
o Argument around a verb
 Thematic roles
o Agent
 the initiator of some action, capable of acting with volition.（动作发出者）
 但是有一个前提：有意志的发出动作，并且要跟一个合理的动词
 David cooked the rashers
o Patient
 the entity undergoing the effect of some action, often undergoing some change in state.
 动作的承担者，且会发生一定的变化。
 The sun melted the ice.
o Theme
 the entity which is moved by an action, or whose location is described.
 Roberto passed the ball wide. (ball 是没变样的)
 The book is in the library.
o Experiencer （感受一下）
 the entity which is aware of the action or state described by the predicate but which is not in
control of the action or state.
 Kevin felt ill.
 Mary saw the smoke.
 Lorcan heard the door shut.
o Beneficiary （受益一下）
 the entity for whose benefit the action was performed.
 They baked me a cake
 Robert filled in the form for his grandmother
o Instrument
 the means by which an action is performed or something comes about.
 She cleaned the wound with an antiseptic wipe.
 They signed the treaty with the same pen.
o Location
 the place in which something is situated or takes place.
 The monster was hiding under the bed.
 The band played in a marquee.
o Goal
 the entity toward which something moves.
 Sheila handed her license to the policeman.
 Pat told the joke to his friends.
 goal 通常带有 to
o Source
 the entity from which something moves.
 The plane came back from Kinshasa.
 We got the idea from a French magazine.
o Stimulus
  the entity causing an effect (usually psychological) in the EXPERIENCER.
 John didn't like the cool breeze.
 The noise frightened the passengers
 不是 theme 的原因，动词跟状态无关，跟“人”有关，尤其是心理
o Test
 whether the phrases like deliberately, on purpose, in order to, and so on can be added to the
sentence. (来判断是否有自由意志)
 actor：
 every AGENT is an ACTOR
 force:
 used for an inanimate entity that causes something.
 The wind flattened the crops
 recipient
 a type of GOAL involved in actions describing changes of possession.
 He sold me this wreck.
o How many can an argument have
 For Chomsky, there must be a one-to-one correspondence between noun phrases and thematic
roles [Theta-Criterion]
 For Jackendoff, one nominal might fulfill more than one role.
o Tiers of thematic roles
 Action tier roles: ACTOR, AGENT, EXPERIENCER, PATIENT, BENEFICIARY,
INSTRUMENT.
 Thematic tier roles: THEME, GOAL, SOURCE, LOCATION.
o How are such roles identified in the grammar
 词义体现语法
 Syntax; verb choice
 Grammar and thematic role
o Implicational hierarchy:
 The speaker's preference for a thematic role over a function
 [subject] AGENT > RECIPIENT/BENEFICIARY > THEME/PATIENT > INSTRUMENT >
LOCATION （被允许的可能性）
 Two reading
 The leftmost elements are the preferred, most basic and expected subjects,
 while moving rightward along, the string gives us less expected subjects.
 If a language allows the LOCATION role to be subject, we expect that it will
allow all the rest.
 Verbs and thematic roles
o Thematic role grid:
 Put V: <AGENT, THEME, LOCATION>(有三个 arguments)
 JohnAGENT put the bookTHEME on the shelfLOCATION.
 Distinguish arguments from nonarguments
 [S Roland [VP put [NP the book] [PP in the bathroom] ] ] (complement)
 In the bathroom 不可以省略：participant roles and arguement
 [S Roland [VP read [NP the book] ] [PP in the bathroom] ] (adjunct)
  In the bathroom 可以省略：non-participant roles and non-argument
 Problem
o As for PATIENT, both the type of “affectedness” and the role of the INSTRUMENT vary between verb
types (Dixon 1991).
 很难区分开
o How do we define theta-roles in general? What semantic basis do we have for characterizing roles?
 Dowty's solution:
o Theta-roles are defined in terms of shared verbal entailments about nominal referents.
o Dowty proposes that we view the roles not as discrete and bounded categories but instead as prototypes,
o proto-agent(properties)
 volitional involvement in the event or state 意志
 sentience (and/or perception) 感觉
 causing an event or change of state in another participant 引起变化
 movement (relative to the position of another participant) 动作
o Proto-patient
 undergoes change of state 状态发生改变
 incremental theme 递增或递减的状态；可以被切割的状态
 causally affected by another participant 被影响的
 stationary relative to movement of another participant 相对静止的（stableness）
 Justification of identifying thematic roles
o Justification: motivation (1)
 Predicting linkages between the participant roles and the grammatical relations, and more
general patterns among individual cases, is one of the primary functions of thematic roles. (预测的
作用，用已知的理论去预测没有见过的句子)
 Argument selection principle (Dowty)（判断 subject 和 object）
 In predicates with grammatical subject and object, the argument for which the predicate
entails the greatest number of Proto-Agent properties will be lexicalized as the subject of
the predicate
 the argument having the greatest number of Proto-Patient entailments will be lexicalized
as the direct object. （谁多归谁）
 Corollary 1:
 If two arguments of a relation have (approximately) equal numbers of entailed Proto-
Agent and Proto-Patient properties, then either or both may be lexicalized as the subject
(and similarly for objects).（一样多时）
 Corollary 2:
 With a three-place predicate, the non-subject argument having the greater number of
entailed Proto-Patient properties will be lexicalized as the direct object.
 The non-subject argument having fewer entailed Proto-Patient properties will be
lexicalized as an oblique or prepositional object.
 If two non-subject arguments have approximately equal numbers of entailed Proto-
Patient properties, either or both may be lexicalized as direct object.
 Non-discreteness
 Proto-roles do not classify arguments exhaustively or uniquely or discretely.
o Justification: motivation(2)
  Using thematic roles to help characterize semantic verbal classes. (可以帮助分类)
o Other motivations
 Machine translation and question answering systems
 Causation（及物性）
o Causative: 后面有宾语
 Helen boiled the water.
 The sun melted the ice.
o inchoative：后面没宾语
 The water boiled.
 The ice melted.
 两者之间可以相互转化，但是有的不行
o 不同语言之间体现及物和不及物的方式是不同的
 English: lexical causative
 Non-English: morphological causative
o The causal chain
 Speakers have a number of options in characterizing the connection between sub-events.
 Voice
o Figure(需要突出的东西) and Ground（不突出的东西）
 Billy groomed the horses. [AGENT, PATIENT]
 The horses were groomed. [PATIENT]
o The qualifications for foregrounding in a passive in English are complex:
 partly grammatical,
 partly semantic
 partly due to the flow of discourse
 Partly the speaker's choice of viewpoint.
o Exception: 不太提倡 location, beneficiary, instrument 往前放
o 可以适当的往前放，但是不能放在最前面
 Spray/load verbs
o Discourse factor
 行文流畅
 Classifiers
o numeral classifiers：量词
o possessive classifiers
o verbal classifiers
 Lesson 7 culture and inference (语用学)
 Dexis
o Deictic(adj) and deixis(n)
 Elements of language that are so contextually bound
o Spatial
 their proximity to the location of the speaker
 Speaker occupies the reference point
o Person
 First person, second person, third person
 First person plural: information about some of identification between the speaker and others.
o Social(把社会关系和层级语法化)
 Grammaticalize information about the social identities or relationship of the participants in the
conversation
 Reference and Context
o Knowledge as context
 The use of referring expressions involves calculations of retrievability taking account of
contextual information (encyclopedia knowledge)
 Metonymy; synecdoche
 The calculations of retrievability guesses about knowledge:
 Make estimation of what her hearers know
 Physical context
 Available form what has already been said
 Available from background or common knowledge
o Discourse as topic （社会的，对方的）
 participants construct a notion of what the discourse is about
 An experiment by Anderson
 The main point here is that listeners add their own inferences when they interpret
utterances, fleshing out the material in ways that depend on knowledge provided by the
discourse topic.
o Background knowledge as topic（自己的）
 It includes background, common sense, encylopedic, sociocultural, and real-world knowledge
 前提条件：membership in a community
 Kess & Hoppe's study
 John chased the dog with the stick
 Information structure
o How estimates of knowledge are grammaticalized, how the speaker's package their utterance to take
account of estimates of knowledge
o Determiners


  越往右边越新
o Intonation
 This prominent part is usually called the focus.
o Topicalization
 把要强调的放到前面来（背景：越往前越是 topic）
o Comprehension
 难免不会出现，双方听不懂的情况，因为背景知识并不是统一的
 评估“不懂”，然后做出一定的改变
o Information structure in English
 Complement proposing 补充前置
 In New York there is always something to do.
 Most of it she had written herself.
 Postposing（把结构重的放到后面去）
 Chris put on the table a large blue bucket full of ice-cubes. [weight]
 Subject-dependent inversion（主谓倒装）
 Three days later came another eight offers.
 Existential clauses （there is 句型）
 There is plenty of food in the fridge.
 Extraposition（有一个形式主语）
 There is plenty of food in the fridge.
 Dislocation （逗号隔开，单独表示）
 Her parents, they seem pretty uncaring.
 They seem pretty uncaring, her parents.
 Cleft clauses （强调句又叫分裂句）
 It was a red sweater that I bought
 What I bought was a red wool sweater
 Passive voice (被动句)
 They were killed by the hijackers
 Inference
o Inference, coreference
 Coreference:
 a referential relation between expressions where they both refer to the same entity.
 Repeated nominal（the 引导再说一次）
 I fell down a hole yesterday. The hole was very deep.
 Independent nominal used as an epithet(绰号)
 The old fool still doesn't recognize me.
 Anaphoric（前指的） pronoun
 Anaphoric pronoun: I trod on a slug this morning. It died.
 Inference (指代不明确的，需要自己建立联系)
 Bridging inference
 The listener makes a bridging inference; the basis for the inference seems to be
background knowledge.
 I looked into the room. The ceiling was very high.
 John went walking out at noon. The park was beautiful.
  Bridging inference 的前提是假设一个 background knowledge
 一旦出现，就会把话说得简单一点
o Grice's CP and maxims
 Conversational implicature
 allows participants to make assumptions about each other’s goals and conversational
strategies. In this view it supports the use of inferences for communication, which would
be termed a conversational implicature.
 Maxims
 The maxim of quality (说真话)
 The maxim of quality (说的不多不少)
 A: Did you do the reading for this week's seminar?
 B: I intended to.
 A: Did you drink all the bottles of beer in the fridge?
 B: I drank some.
 The maxim of relevance (切题，别一点关系也没有)
 A: Can I borrow ten euros?
 B: My purse is in the hall.
 The maxim of manner （不模糊守规矩）
 The implicature has three characteristics
 It is implied
 A result of the context
 The implicature are cancellable
 Conversational implicatures are reinforceable
 Some of her friends are musicians but not all of them. [not redundant]
 语义上是重复的，但是语用上不是
 PCT and GCI
 Particular conversational implicatures（离了语境完全无法理解）
 Generalized conversational implicatures（不一定依靠语境）
 The maxims can be broken
 Figurative language
o Horn's Q/R principles
 Q-Principle: Say as much as you can, balancing against the R-principle.

 R-principle: Say no more than you must, balancing against the Q-principle.
 I don't not like you.
 I like you.
 Scalar implicature:
 在交际中，使用语义场较弱的表达，则表明比该词汇语义程度更高的表达不合适
 Jane ate some of the biscuits
 IMPLICATES Jane didn't eat all of them.
 o Relevance theory:
 Every act of ostensive communication communicates the presumption of its own optimal
relevance.
 In Relevance theory this contextual modulation is seen as an inferential process
governed by the principle of relevance.
 A speaker calculating a balance between communicative profit and loss from the hearer's
point of view
 Explicature：implicared premisse
 Implicated premise is not directly stated and therefore is implicated but it is provided as
an inferential support for the final implicature, or implicated conclusion.
 Peter: Would you drive a Saab?
 Mary: I wouldn't drive any Swedish car.
 [implicated premise: Saab is a Swedish car.]
 Mary's implicature: I would not drive a Saab.
 [implicated conclusion]
 Lexical pragmatics
o In Relevance theory this contextual modulation is seen as an inferential process governed by the
principle of relevance.
 John opened the door
 John opened the wine
 John opened the eyes
o Broadening
 a process where the concept expressed by use of a lexical item is more general than that usually
assumed to be linguistically encoded.
 Bornholm Island is rectangular.
 This steak is raw. [hyperbole]
 She can just google the restaurant. [category extension]
o Narrowing
 All politicians drink. [drink liquid → drink alcohol]
 Brian doesn't drink. [*water/alcohol]
 应对这种情况可以用反义词。
 fresh；dirty
 Lesson 8 semantic change
 Significance of semantic change
o Availability of better resources
 large dictionaries and online corpora.
o The rise of Cognitive Semantics, which is interested in the relationship between mental process and
linguistic expression
 Invited inferencing (pragmatics)
 Bridging context; formerly pragmatic sense
 Reasons and difficulties in studying semantic change
o Difficulty:
 The patterns of semantic change are rarely predictable
 The process of semantic change is rarely straightforward
 Slowly and unevenly
 变化缓慢且不均衡
 It may not be observable to all speakers at the same time or may not take place in all
varieties of English
 不是说对所有人都是这样
 A new meaning may co-exist with established meanings
 变化之后，两个 meaning 同时存在
 A meaning may be lost over time, and may or may not be replaced by a new meaning
 意义奇奇怪怪地消失
 Categories
o Widening and narrowing
 Widening:
 Becomes more general to a broader, less specific concept
 Narrowing (specialization)
 The meaning of a word more restricted and specific
 that it refers to only a subset of the concept described in its earlier meaning.
 Reason:
 The need for new forms of expression for novel or more precisely specified concepts.
 Availability of synonyms: while a meaning is narrowed its synonyms continue to cover
the general concept.
 Die and starve
o Amelioration and pejoration
 Word: positive, natural, negative
 Amelioration
 从右往左走
 Pejoration （deterioration, degeneration）
 从左往右走
o Metaphor and metonymy
 Metaphor:
 A mapping between two concepts based on similarity.
 Metonymy
 A mapping between two concepts based on association.
 o Grammaticalization
 A word loses some of its semantic content and becomes part of the grammatical system.
 Causes
o External factors
 Technological change
 Social change
o Internal factors
 Polysemy
 quaint
 Homonymy
 Arse and ass
 Synonyms
 where true synonymy arises, one of the words is likely to become obsolete or undergo a
shift such as specialisation or pejoration.
o Stylistic factors
 Overstatement 夸张
 Starve(hungry)
 Understatement“轻描淡写"
 Misunderstanding (querrel)
 Euphemism 美化
 Bathroom (toilet)
 Dysphemism 幽默
 Kick the bucket(die)
 Lesson 9 meaning components
 Key concepts
o Decompositionality:
 Words are not the smallest semantic units but are built up of smaller components of meaning
 Semantic components/ primitive,
 componential analysis (CA)
 Lexical relations:
o Inclusion
 hyponym
o Incompatibility
 They share a set of features but differ from each other by one or more contrasting features.
o Binary feature
 [+FEMALE] ; [−FEMALE]
o Redundancy rules
 没有必要的不要写
o AVMs （attribute-value matrix）
 成对出现的矩阵

 Ketz's theory
o Semantic rules have to be recursive for the same reasons as syntactic rules: that the number of possible
sentences in a language is very large, possibly infinite.
o Meaning is compositional.
o Aim
 To give specifications of the meanings of lexical items. [dictionary]
 To give rules showing how the meanings of lexical items build up into the meanings of phrases
and so on up to sentences. [projection rules]
 To do this in a universally applicable metalanguage. [componential metalanguage]
o Semantic markers and distinguisher
 Semantic markers:
 the links which bind the vocabulary together, and are responsible for the lexical
relations.最基本的(human) (female)
 Distinguisher:
 idiosyncratic semantic information that identifies the lexical item. [who plays a character
in an artistic performance]
o Projection rule:
 Chomskyan generative grammar
 Use tree diagrams


  先名词后形容词；先（）再[ ]；the 分隔
o Selection restrictions
 形容词可以形容的东西要有自己的限制
 (evaluative) [having distinctive character, vividness, or picturesqueness] <(aesthetic object) or
(social activity)>
 Jeckendoff's conceptual structure
o Mental postulate
 The central principle of this approach is that describing meaning involves describing mental
representations. [mental postulate]
 that meanings must serve as a basis for inference
o Semantic component
 Event; state; place; path
 句子分为动词导致的两种类型：event and state

 Four kinds of semantic field (state 的四种用法)

 spatial location; temporal location; property ascription; possession
 Carl is in the pub.
 [State BELoc ([Thing CARL], [Place IN ([Thing PUB])])]
 The party is on Saturday.
 [State BETemp ([Thing PARTY], [Place AT ([Time SATURDAY])])]
 The theatre is full.
 [State BEIdent ([Thing THEATRE], [Place AT ([Property FULL])])]
 This book belongs to John.
 [State BEPoss ([Thing BOOK], [Place AT ([Thing JOHN])])]
 Complex application
 Inchoative verbs
 [Event INCH ([State BEIdent ([Thing POOL], [Place AT ([Property
EMPTY])])])]
 The pool emptied
 是将（the pool is empity ）“不及物化
 Cause
 [Event CAUSE ([Thing JOHN], [Event INCH ([State BEIdent ([Thing POOL],
[Place AT ([Property EMPTY])])])])]
 John causes the pool emptied
o Thing: [+-b],[+-i]
 [± BOUNDED]:
 [+b] bounded：不能再分了（indivisible），不能再加了（additive）
  也就是增加或减少是否会影响形式上限制的性质(它不是它了)
 可数名词是 bounded(teapot)，不可数名词是 unbounded（mud）
 单数是 bounded（teapot），复数是 unbounded（teapots）
 [± INTERNAL STRUCTURE]:
 [+i]：由多个独立的个体组成
 可数名词复数是 teapots [+i]；可数名词单数是 teapot[-i]
 可数名词概念是 teapot[-i];不可数名词概念是 mud[-i]
 Four types of material entity
 [+b, –i] = individuals (a teapot, a mountain, a person)
 [+b, +i] = groups (a committee, a team, a set [of something])
 [–b, –i] = substances (mud, rice, water)
 [–b, +i] = aggregates (teapots, cattle , committees)
 Extending to situation type
 John is sleeping. [-b] atelic
 John ran into the room. [+b] telic
o Semantic combination
 PL
 Plural (PL)把单数变为复数

 Brick—>bricks
 COMP
 Composed of （COMP）不可数变为单数集合概念

Wood---> a house of wood

 PL+COMP

 Bricks—> a house of bricks

 Pustejovasky's Generative lexicon
o Qualia structure: a classification of the properties of an item
 Constitutive:（a kind of ?）
  the relation between an object and its constituents, or proper parts.
 Formal (什么形式)
 : that which distinguishes the object within a larger domain.
 Telic （目的是什么）
 the purpose and function of the object
 Agentive （如何被创造）
 factors involved in the origin or "bringing about"of an object
 Criticism
o Philosophical criticisms are that these semantic components are simply a variation of, and equivalent to,
the necessary and sufficient conditions approach to word meaning.
o Psychological criticisms claim that there is no experimental evidence for semantic primitives.
o For the use of metalanguages
 Ad hoc and unsystematic: another arbitrary language
 Circular
 They are not grounded.
 Lesson 10 formal semantics
 Advantage
o using logical expressions as a semantic metalanguage
 import into linguistics the economy and formality of the traditional discipline of logic and the
benefits of the long struggle to establish mathematics and logic on common principles.
 Avoid circularity
 approaches allow us to see more clearly the connection between human languages and the
simpler signs systems of other primates.

 Predicate logic
o Arguments and Predicates

 大写字母表示 predicate
 小写字母表示 argument
 Pete is crazier than Ryan. → C(p, r)
 Fatima prefers Bill to Henry. → P(f, b, h)
 Máire doesn't jog. → ¬J(m)
 Fred smokes and Kate drinks. → S(f) ∧ D(k)
 If Bill drinks, Jenny gets angry. → D(b) → A(j)
 Relative clauses (定语从句的实质就是并列)
 Carrick, who is a millionaire, is a socialist. → M(c) ∧ S(c)
 Emile is a cat that doesn't purr. → C(e) ∧ ¬P(e)

 ∀: all, every
o Quantifiers

 Every student knows the professor: ∀x (S(x) →K(x, p))

 The professor knows every student: ∀x (S(x) →K(p, x))
 ∃: at least one
 One student kissed Kylie: ∃x (S(x) ∧ K(x, k))
 Kylie kissed (at least) one student: ∃x (S(x) ∧ K(k, x))
 Complex quantification
 No student wrote a paper
 ¬∃x (S(x) ∧ W(x, p))
  ∀x (S(x) → ¬W(x, p))
o Scope
 这种符号可以帮助理解歧义的 mechanism

 ∀x∃y (L(x, y)) [the universal quantifier has wide scope]，

 Everyone loves someone.

 ∃y∀x (L(x, y)) [the existential quantifier has wide scope]

 谁在前面谁先被考虑

 ∀x ¬(V (x, l)) [the surface scope: every > not]

 Everyone didn't visit Limerick

 ¬∀x (V (x, l)) [the inverse scope: not > every]

 Logical metalanguage
o Model and domain
 Model
 当我们需要判断的是真值，这个真值的判断需要在一个特定的环境下进行判断，这个环境可以被称为 model.
 Domain
 this is a model of a situation which identifies the linguistically relevant entities,
properties and relations;
 一些特殊的情景设定

o Individual constant
 a = Ali, f = Foreman, r = the referee
o Predicate function
 {x: x is standing in v} means 'the set of individuals who are standing in situation v'
 {<x, y>: x punches y in v} / {<x, y, z>: x hands y to z in v}.
 Truth-value 判断真值（判断真假）
o [S(j) ∧ I(b, e)]M1 = 1 iff [S(j) ]M1 = 1 and [I(b, e)]M1 = 1

o Check the truth-value of ∀x (H(x, j)) [‘Everyone hunts Jerry’]

 X（y）: y 包括在满足 F（X）的所有条件里面

o Check the truth-value of ∃x (C(x) ∧ H(x, j)) [‘Some cat hunts Jerry’.]
 Meaning postulate 词汇之间的关系

 ∀x(DOG(x) → ANIMAL(x))
o Hyponymy （上位词）

 ∀x(DEAD(x) → ¬ALIVE(x))
o Binary antonyms

 ∀x ∀y(PARENT(x, y) → CHILD(y, x))

o Converse

 ∀x (COUCH(x) ≡ SOFA(x))
o Synonymy

 ∀x(COUCH(x) → SOFA(x))
 ∀x(SOFA(x) → COUCH(x))
 Higher-order logic
o Restricted quantifiers
  为了不让 split 的现象出现，就把两种给结合起来了
 everything every thing (∀x: T(x))
 everybody every person (∀x: P(x))
 something some thing (∃x: T(x))
 someone some person (∃x: P(x))
 Everything is either matter or energy: (∀x: T(x)) (M(x) ∨ E(x))
 Barbara hates everyone: (∀x: P(x)) H(b, x)
 Everywhere is dangerous: (∀x: L(x)) D(x)
o Most, all, fever than…

 All：all (A, B) = 1 iff A ⊆ B

 Most：most (A, B) = 1 iff |A ∩ B | > |A – B|

 Some：some(A, B) = 1 iff A ∩ B ≠ Ø
 No：no(A, B) = 1 iff A ∩ B = Ø
 Fewer than seven：fewer than seven(A, B) = 1 iff |A ∩ B| < 7
o Symmetry
 Asymmetrical class: proportional quantifiers (A 和 B 位置不能互换)
 All A are B is not equivalent to All B are A.
 det (A, B) ≠ det (B, A)
 Symmetrical class: cardinal quantifier (A 和 B 的位置可以互换)
 Some A are B is equivalent to Some B are A.
 det (A, B) = det (B, A)
 Some quantifiers have both a cardinal and proportional reading
 A. There are many valuable stamps in this collection.（绝对数量；cadinal manner）
 B. Many of the stamps in this collection are valuable.（相对数量；propositional manner）
o Monotonicity and negative polarity items
 Upward/downward entailment
 Intentionality (去语用)
o Subjectivity
o Modality
o Tense (include the location of time)
 Past(C (t, j)) Tom chased Jerry.
 Present(C (t, j)) Tom is chasing Jerry.
 Future(C (t, j)) Tom will chase Jerry.
o aspect
 Lesson 11 cognitive semantic
 Vs. formalism
o Cognitive linguistics is part of functionalism.
o Cognitive linguists seek to break down the abstractions and specializations characteristic of formalism.
 Is potentially harmful to our conception of language
o Diachronic perspective
o Cognitive linguists oppose objectivist semantics
o an interdisciplinary activity
 Categories
o Classical
 defined in terms of sets of features
 the features are individually necessary and jointly sufficient
 categories have clear boundaries
 all members of a category have equal status
 The features are binary
o Prototypical
 Categories have fuzzy boundaries
 There are central and peripheral members of a category
 Categories have marginal examples whose membership is doubtful
 Category members do not all share the same discrete features
 Attributes are not all binary features but may be from a range of mental representations
including images, schemas, exemplars, etc
o Radial
 Radial categories have a prototypical sense connected with conventionalized links
 idealized cognitive models (ICMs)
 Example: Mother
o Embodiment(具象化)
o Schema
 Image schemas
 Are proposed as primitive level of conceptual category underlying metaphor and which
provide a link between bodily experience and higher cognitive domains such as
language.
 Containment schema
 Basic rules
 Disjunction: either inside or outside
 Transitive: 俄罗斯套娃
 implications：
 Protection
 Limit forces
 Relative fixity of location
 Affects an observer's view
 Example
 Ontological metaphors
 The ship is coming into view. [visual field]
  I put a lot of energy into washing the windows. [activity]
 He's in love. [state]

 Path schema
 The path schema contains a starting point, an end point, and a sequence of contiguous locations
connecting them.
 Implications
 连续的位移；必然经过的中点
 方向性；一头到另一头
 长度和时间的正相关
 Examples:
 He's writing a PhD thesis and he’s nearly there.
 I meant to finish painting it yesterday, but I got sidetracked
 Force schemas
 Compulsion (must)
 Removal of restraint(may)
 Blockage (must not; should not)
 Polysemy in cognitive semantic
o Prepositions
 metaphorical in nature
 Systematic and natural
o Over:
 Trajectory
 Landmark
 The above-cross sense
 The above sense
 The covering sense
 The reflexive sense
o Because radial category is systematic and widespread
 Model verbs
o Deontic modal verb
 Force schemas have been used to describe polysemy in deontic modal verbs.
 May must
o Epistemic modal verbs
 Epistemic uses of modals for rational argument and judgment are derived from their uses for the
real world of social obligation and permission.
 You may be right
 May: a lack of barrier
 You must have driven too fast
 The evidence forces my conclusion that you drove too fast.
 Metaphor
o The target domain
o The source domain
o Conceptual metaphor theory
  metaphor is ubiquitous in ordinary language;metaphors are conceptual structures which pervade
ordinary language.
 Up-down orientation
o Features
 Conventionality : 隐喻无处不在且被大部分人接受; 且可以二创
 body；biological virus schema
 Systematicity ：内在 source 和 target doman 的紧密结合使得 metaphor extended and his its own internal
logic
 Asymmetry :
 Metaphors are directional: 从抽象到具象
 Life is a journey
 Abstraction
 用具象来指代抽象
 Metonymy
o Vs. metaphor
 similarity：
 They are both conceptual processes;
 Both may be conventionalized;
 Both are used to create new lexical resources in language and both show the same
dependence on real-world knowledge or cognitive frames.
 The same terminology of target and source can be used.
 Difference
 Metaphor is viewed as a mapping across conceptual domains;
 Metonymy establishes a connection within a single domain.
o Taxonomies of metonymy
 Part for whole
 Whole for part
 Container for content
 Material for object
 Producer for product
 Place for institution
 Institution for people
 Place for event
 Controlled for controller
 Cause for effect
 很多都存在二次转喻
o 使用倾向
 human > non-human,
 whole > part,
 visible > non-visible,
 concrete > abstract
 Mental space
o Basic idea
  Mental spaces can be seen as a cognitive parallel to the notion of possible worlds in formal
semantics, since it is assumed that speakers can partition off and hold separate domains of
reference.
o Identification principle
 Trigger：shakespeare
 Target: Shakespeare's books
 Identification principle:
 (b = F(a))
 Belief contexts
 Like a signal
 Believes; wants
o Space builders
 Adverbials of location and time
 Adverbs (possible or really)
 Connective: if…then…
 verbs：believe, hope, imagine
o parent spaces
 The initial space, always be reality
o Referential opacity(所指不明确)
 是否处于一个 mental space
 The transparent reading (处于两个 mental space)
 The opaque reading (处于一个 mental space; 一般 reality 是空的)
 Transparent non-contradictory reading
 In Canadian football, the 50-yard line is 55 yards away.
o the floating of presupposition
 三个 mental space 存在（reality, belief, presupposition）
 Optimization（最佳化最优化）:
 space M is set up within a parent space R, structure M implicitly so as to maximize
similarity with R.
 a parent space, say reality, can cancel an incompatible presupposition.
o Conceptual integration theory（conceptual blending）
 Four spaces
 Two input space
 Combine conceptual structures
 The generic space:
 Schematic structure abstracted from both input spaces
 output
 Construction grammar
o general constructionist view:
 In constructions larger than words the meaning is a combination of word meaning and
construction meaning.
o Construction Grammar is a cognitive theory (or group of theories) that began with the recognition that
grammatical constructions may map to semantic or conceptual representations in a similar way to lexical
items.
  there is no strict division between grammar and the lexicon:
 form and meaning are associated in similar ways with units of all sizes from words to
sentences.
o Traditional grammar; Conventionalized constructions
 Regularity, productivity, compositionality…
 Lesson 12 language and culture
 Reciprocal images: left/right hand
 对左手的歧视：left handed (adj)
 Pronouns of address:
 T/V system
o V form : superior social status
 You have (V form)
o T form: lower status
 You have (V form)
o An ever-increasing range of words to denote people of different ages
 青少年的逐渐拥有了话语权
 Kinship
 In the past kinship terms were more chaotic and complex
 Primogeniture 长子继承制：不再需要进一步的分辨
o Fade-out: our knowledge of the system fades as the information it contains loses importance
 FAMILY
o ‘servants’ → ‘parents and children+ servants’ → ‘parents and children’
 Time:(divide time into manageable chunks)
 Year, month, week, day, hour minute, second
 Days
 Weeks
 Years
 season