UNIT 16

About Dictionaries

Presented by :

Desya Kurnia Saputri

Semantics a coursebook James R.
Hunford.
 A dictionary as a central part of the
description of any language

A good ordinary dictionary gives

three kinds of information about words:

Phonological
INTRODUCTIO (about how the word
pronounced)

N Grammatical
information about its
Semantic
information (about
part of speech e.g. the word’s meaning.
Noun, verb) and
inflection (e.g. For plural
number or past tense)

Run / rθn/ [Verb] move of a speed faster than a walk

 1 2

INNTERCONNECTION IN DICTIONARY HYPONYM AND HYPERNYM

DICTIONARY VS ENCYCLOPAEDIA
 INNTERCONNECTION IN DICTIONARY

A dictionary gives you the definition of word(s).

The definitions in dictionary are necessarily interconnected.

Example :
male Man
sex
female woman

In the kind of dictionary that a semanticist would propose,

as a part of the semantics description of a language, there
would be the same interconnectedness between the
definition of various predicate
PRACTICE
male
1 sex
female woman

wife join

2 marry marriage

husband unite
 Practice
(a) Identify the odd man out and (b) describe as concisely as you can the common
conceptual element in the remaining predicates
1
1
Sing, talk,dance,speak,shout,whisper,mutter

Dance Deliberate noise-making activity with the vocal

tract.
2
trickle,drip,seep,slide,gush
2
Slide Movement made by liquids

3 rub, scratch,scrape,brush,push (all transitive verbs)

3
Push Movement of a solid body across and in
contact with a surface
4
4 at, of, in ,on,under,near
Of Physical location
HYPONYM AND HYPERNYM

Hyponym is a word or phrase

whose semantic field is included
within that of another word..

Example

1. Bird,mammal - Animal

2. Male, female - Human

(Hyponym-hypernym)
HYPONYM AND HYPERNYM

If B is a hypoym of A, Then
the meaning of B is a special case of A

IF A is a hypernym of B, then
the meaning of A is a more general instance of B

B
A
(Un)productive Hyponym Formation

Add the title here

Hypernym Hyponym
interesting very interesting
car german car

adding a modifier
 t ice Not with compaounds
ac
Pr

1. Boom box
No: box Yes : sound system

2. Station wagon
No : Wagon Yes: car

3. Soap opera
No : opera Yes: TV show
 DICTIONARY VS ENCYCLOPEDIA

Encyclopedia contains factual

information of a variety of types, but
Dictionary describes the sense of
generally no information specifically on
predicates.
the meanings of word

Semantics often mode the assumption that non-

lingustic facts are not particulary relevant to the
study of lingusitic. therefore, they attempt to
make a strict demarcation between a dictionary
and an encyclopedia.
 Analytic and syanthetic (S)

Analytic is is a statement that is included in the

subject.
Syanthetic statement whose predicate is not
included the subject.

Example :
Example:
1) Frozen water is ice
Basque peasants used to wear berets
2) two halves make up a whole
in doing philosophy, those are very
important that can be completed each
others
 Practice
Say whether each of the following sentences as analytic (A) Or syanthetic (S)

1
1
Basque peasants used to wear berets
S
2
A beret is a form of headgear
2
A
This Walrus is a mammal
3
3
A
4
4 The skin of the walrus makes valuable leather
S
UNIT 17
Meaning Postulates
 POSTULATES
a formula expressing some aspect of the sense of a
predicate. it can be read as a proposition necessarily true
by virtue of the meaning of the particular predicates
involved.
 POSTULATES
Semanticist wants the presentation of information in his
dictionary to be economical, and so only icludes the
minimum number of meaning postulates from which it is
possible to deduce all the ( direct or indirect) sense
relathions between predicate
HYPONYMY
A Sense relation in semantics that serves to relate word concepts in
a hierarchical fashion. Hyponym is a relation between more general
term and their more specifix instances of it.

x PARROT x BIRD
x BIRD x ANIMAL
x PARROT x ANIMAL

in short time that Parrot is hyponymy of

bird an than bird is a hypernym
 SELECTION RESTRICTION

It applies to two place predicate. Restriction may effect the

expression in the “subject position” ( x slot) or the expression in
the “ object position” ( y slot)

EXAMPLE:

john struck the table is fine but john struck motherhood is not

a meaning postulate to express this fact can be formulate as follow:

X STRIKE y -> y CONCRETE

 CONTRADICTION

The most centrally a logical term.

The basic form of a logical contradiction is
p &~p.

e.g. John is here and John is not here

ANOMALY
Its semantics oddness that can be traced to the meanings of the
predicates in the sentence concerned.

EXAMPLE

1. Students teach the teacher

2. Mom is reading newspaper while dad is
cooking in the kitchen
 Practice
For each sentence below, say whether it is basic contradiction (C) , anomaly (A)

jack's courage chewed the bone

1
1
A

2 James sliced the idea

2
A

3
3 john is neither here nor not here
C
 BINARY
ANTONYMY

Case of binary anonymy between two place

predicate. Meaning postulate , using the
negative connective to account for antonymy
of the following pairs.

Example :
Good,bad xGOOD y -> ~x BAD y
 Practice
Write meaning postulates, using the negative connective ~ to account for the
antonymy between the following pairs:
1
1
Same, different

x SAME y ~ x DIFFERENT y
2
inside, outside
2
x INSIDE y ~ x OUTSIDE y
3 ignore, pay attention to
3
x IGNORE y ~ x ENEMY y
 CONCLUSION

The meaning postulates play a control part

in traditional approach to constructing a
semantic dictionary. meaning postulates
can be used to deduce information about
sense relation, hyponymy and some of
antonymy, selection and anomaly.
THANK YOU
THANK YOU
THANK YOU