Chapter 5     Semantics     

一、定义

1.命名论The naming theory

  The naming theory, one of the oldest notions concerning meaning, and also a very primitive one was proposed by the ancient Greek scholar Plato. According to this theory, the linguistic forms or symbols, in other words,the words used in a language are taken to be labels of the objects they stand for, so words are just names or labels for things.

2.意念论The conceptualist view

  It holds that there is no direct link between a linguistic form and what it refers to; rather ,in the interpretation of meaning they are linked through the mediation of concepts in the mind.

3.语境论Conceptualism

  It’s based on the presumption that one can derive meaning from or reduce meaning to observable contexts. her are two kinds of context: the situational and the linguistic context.

4.行为主义论Behaviorism

  It refers to the attempted to define the meaning of a language form as the” situation in which the speaker utters it and the response it calls forth in the hearer”. this theory somewhat close to conceptualism emphasizes on the psychological response.

5.意义Sense

  It’s concerned with the inherent meaning of the linguistic form. It’s the collection of all the features of the linguistic form, it’s abstract and de-contextualized.

6.所指意义Reference

  It means what a linguistic form refers to in the real, physical world, it deals with the relationship between the linguistic element and the non-linguistic world of experience.

7.同义词Synonymy

  It refers to the sameness or close similarity of meaning or we can say that words are close in meaning are called synonyms.

8.多义词Polysemy

  It refers to different words may have the same or similar meaning, the same one word may have more than one meaning.

9.同音(形)异义Homonymy

  It refers to the phenomenon that words have different meanings have the same form, i.e, different words are identical in sound or spelling, or in both.

10.同音异义Homophones

  It refers to two words are identical in sound. e.g. rain/reign.

11.同形异义Homographs

  It refers to two words are identical in form .e.g. tear v./tear n.

12.上下义关系Hyponymy

  It refers to the sense relation between a more general, more inclusive word and a more specific word. the word which is more general in meaning is called superordinate, and the more specific words are called its hyponyms.

13.反义词Antonymy

  It’s the term used for oppositeness of meaning on different dimension.

14.成分分析法Componential Analysis----分析词汇抽象意义

  It’s a way proposed by the structural semanticists to analyze word meaning.

  this approach is based upon the belief that meaning of a word can be dissected into meaning components, called semantic features.

15.述谓结构分析Predication Analysis   由British Linguist G.Leech提出

  It’s a new approach for sentential meaning analysis.

  Predication is usually considered an important common category shared by propositions, questions, commands ect.

  通过对论元argument和谓语predicate的分析，达到对句子意义进行分析的许多模式中的一种。

16.先设前提Presupposition

   It’s a semantic relationship or logical connection. A presupposes B.

17.蕴涵Entailment

   Entailment can be illustrated by the following tow sentences in which sentence A entails sentence B.

   A: Mark married a blonde heiress.

   B: Mark married a blonde.

二、知识点

1.Major views of meaning study:

   The naming Theory-----希腊Scholar Plato

   The conceptualism-----观点代表人是John Firth,但Bloomfield阐述更有说服力

   The Conceptualist view----Ogden和Richards用classic semantic triangle of

                           significance

   The Behaviorism-----英国Bloomfield提出，使用了Jack和 Jill故事阐明

The naming theory的局限性:

⑴It’s only applicable to Nouns only.

⑵Within the category of nouns, there are nouns which denote things that don’t exist in the real world.    sense

2.Lexical meaning   reference

3.主要的意义关系

Synonymy ;Antonymy; Hyponymy; Polysemy; homonymy

4.                (1)Dialectal synonyms—synonyms used in different regional dialects

Synonyms   (2)Stylistic synonyms---Synonyms differing in style

 分类            (3)Synonyms that different in their emotive or evaluative meaning

                   (4)Semantically different synonyms

例子：

(1)British English Lift    Luggage  Lorry   Petrol    Flat         windscreen  torch

  American English Elevator Baggage Truck   Gasoline  Apartment  windshield  flashlight

(2)kick the bucket=pop off=die=pass away=decease

5.Words having the same meaning may differ in style, or degree of formality.

6. some synonyms differ in their collocation. 

例子: Accuse….of     charge…. with      rebuke….for         sour milk

       Rotten tomatoes  addled eggs       rancid bacon or butter

7. a polysemic word, i.e, a word with several meaning, is the result of the evolution of the primary meaning of the word. complete homonyms are often brought into being by coincidence.

8.According naming theory words are just names or labels for things.

9.Every utterance occurs in a particular spatiotemporal situation, the main components of which include, apart from the place and time of the utterance ,the speaker and the hearer, the action they are performing at the time, the various objects and event existed in the situation.

10.the contextulist view was further strengthened by Bloomfield, who drew on behaviourist psychology when trying to define the meaning of linguistic forms.

11                 Homophones—when two words are identical in sound

                             Rain/reign; night/knight; piece/peace; leak/leek

Homonymy Homographs—when two words are identical in spelling             

   分类                      Bow v. /bow n. tear v./ tear n  lead v./lead n.

                   Complete homonyms—when two words are identical in both spelling 

                            and sound.例子Fast adj./ fast v. scale n./scale v.

12.            (1)Gradable antonyms分级反义词(a matter of degree)

                     例子 Old—middle-aged—young;   hot-warm-cold

Antonym (2) Complementary antonyms互补反义词a matter of degree between

分类         two extremes例子    Alive—dead;     male—female; 

               (3) Relational opposites关系反义词(中间可以加成分，如上、中、下)

                 father-son; teacher-pupil; doctor-patient; buy-sell; above-below

13.句子间的意义关系sense relation between sentences

X is synonymous with Y.

X entails Y.

X presupposes Y.

X is a contradiction.

X is semantically anomalous.

14. Analysis of meaning意义的分析

(1)Componential analysis—a way to analyze lexical meaning对词汇成分的分析

(2) Predication analysis—a way to analyze sentence meaning对句子意义的分析

  (1)is a way proposed by the structural semanticists to analyze word meaning.

   The approach is based upon the belief that the meaning of a word can be dissected into meaning components, called Semantic features.

   一个单词的意义可以分析为称作语义特征的意义。

   This is parallel to the way a phoneme is analyzed into smaller components called distinctive features.

   这一方法和把一个音位分析成更小的叫作区别性特征的方法类似。

   Plus and minimums signs are used to indicate whether a certain semantic feature is present or absent, these feature symbols are usually written in capitalized letters. One advantage of componential analysis is that by specifying the semantic features of certain words, it will be possible to show how these words are related in meaning.

加减号用来表示某一语义特征在一个词义中是存在或缺省，这些特征用大写字母来写。

15.the meaning of a sentence is not the sum total of the meanings of all its components.

   Two aspects of Sentence meaning: grammatical and semantic meaning.

16.Selectional restrictions---

   Whether a sentence is semantically meaningful is governed by rules.

17.In semantic analysis of a sentence, the basic unit is called predication------

   Predication is the abstraction of the meaning of a sentence. it applies to all forms of a sentence, including statements, imperative and interrogative.

   Predication consists of Arguments and Predicates.

   述谓是句子基本单位，是对句子的抽象化，适用于包括陈述句、祈使句和疑问句。述谓由一个或数个论元和一个谓词组成。

   An argument is a logical participant in a predication, largely identical with the nominal elements in a sentence, a predicate is something said about an argument or it states the logical relation linking the arguments in a sentence.

  论元是一个的逻辑的一个参与者，谓词是关于论元的陈述，或说明一个句子的论元间的逻辑关系。

18.According to the number of arguments contained in a predication, we classify the predications into two-place predication(has two arguments),one-place predication (has one argument),and no-place predication(has no argument).

19.判断题：although predicate and argument are the same kind of unit in terms of their componential make-up, they have different roles in the whole predication. the predicate can be regarded as the main element, for it includes tense, modality, ect. it may also said to govern the arguments for it determines the number of nature of the arguments.

20.The analysis of meaning is a highly abstract and complicated matter.

三、问答题

1.how are sense and reference related?

  Sense refers to the inherent meaning of a linguistic form, which is the collection of all the features of the linguistic form, it’s abstract and de-contextualized.

  Reference is what a linguistic form refers to in the real, physical world, it is a matter of relationship between the form and reality.

2.in what way is componential analysis similar to the analysis of phonemes into distinctive features?成分分析和把音位分析为区别性特征有何相似之处？

 In the light of componential analysis, the meaning of a word consists of a number of distinctive meaning features, the analysis breaks down the meaning of the word into these features; it is these different features that distinguish word meaning similarly, a phoneme is considered as a collection of distinctive sound features, a phoneme can be broken down into these distinctive sound features and its these sound features that distinguish different sounds.

3.what’s grammaticality? what might take a grammatically meaningful sentence semantically meaningless?

什么是语法性？一个语法上有意义的句子可能由于什么而不是有意义的?

Grammaticality---the grammatical well-formedness of a sentence.

A sentence may be well-formed grammatically, i.e. it conforms to the grammatical rules of the language, but it is not necessarily semantically well-formed, i.e. it may not make sense at all

Chapter 6     pragmatics

一 、定义

1.语境Context

  The notion of context is essential to the pragmatic study of language, it’s generally considered as constituted by the knowledge shared by the speaker and the hearer.

2.言语行为理论Speech act theory

It’s an important theory in the pragmatic study of language. it’s a philosophical explanation of the nature of linguistic communication. it aims to answer the question ”what do we do when using language?” 

The concept of causatives performatives, the locutionary act, the illocutionary act, the perlocutionary act and the5categories of illocutionary act suggested and formulated by J.R.Searle constitute the speech act theory.

3.叙述句Constatives

 Constatives are statements that either state or describe, and are thus verifiable and it bearing the truth-value.;

4.行为句Performatives

Performatives are sentences that did not state a fact or describe a state, and are not verifiable.

5.言内行为Locutionary Act

A locutionary act is the act of uttering words, phrases ,clauses. it’s the act of conveying literal meaning by means of syntax, lexicon and phonology.

6.言外行为Illcotionary Act

An illocutionary act is the act of expressing the speaker’s intention it’s the act performed  in saying something.

7.言后行为 Perlocutionary  Act

Perlocuationary Act is the act performed by or resulting from saying something. it’s the consequence of ,or the change brought about by the utterance.

8.句子意义Sentence meaning

It refers to a sentence and is a grammatical concept, the meaning of a sentence is often studied as the abstract intrinsic property of the sentence itself in terms of predication.

9.话语意义Utterance meaning

It refers to a sentence as what people actually utter in the course of communication, it becomes and utterance and it should be considered in the situation in which it is actually uttered.

10.合作原则Cooperative Principle

It’s proposed and formulated by P.Grice, a pragmatic hypothesis, is about that the participants must first of all be willing to cooperate, otherwise, it would not be possible for them to carry on the talk.

11.会话含义Conversational implicatures

According to P.Grice, it refers to the extra meaning not contained in th utterance, understandable to the listener only when he shares the speaker’s knowledge or knows why and how he violates intentionally one of the four maxims of the CP.

话语的言外之义是说话人通过故意违反某一准则而获得这种听者能懂的暗含之意。

二、知识点

1.语用学的几个重要的理论

⑴言语行为理论Speech act theory   

由英国哲学家John Austin在20世纪50年代末提出

在此理论基础上John区分了定义了叙述句Constatives和行为句performatives

在区分叙述句和行为句之后，他又定义了言内行为、言外行为和言后行为

例子：you have left the door wide open.

Locutionary act:: expressed what each word of this sentence literally mean.

Illutionary act: expressed his intention of speaking, asking someone to close the door.

Perlocutionary act: someone heard the sentence, and close the door, then this act is successfully performed.

※在这三种行为中，语言学家对言外行为最感兴趣

cos this kind of speech act is identical with the speaker’s intention, and in their study of language communication, linguists are most interested in how a speaker expresses his intention and also how his intention is recognized by the hearer.

⑵会话原则CP 逻辑哲学家Paul Grice提出;

2. 合作原则的准则4Maxim of Cooperative Principle

 数量 the maxim of Quantity-----你说的话应包含所需内容且不可超过内容要求

              Make your contribution as informative as required;

              Do not make your contribution more informative than is required

质量the maxim of Quality -----不要说你认为是假的话或你缺乏足够证据的话

        Do not say what you believe to false.

        Do not say for which you lack adequate evidence

关系 the maxim of relation-----使你的话与话题相关be relevant

方式 the maxim of manner-----避免模糊、歧义，应简明有序

       Avoid obscurity of expression and ambiguity;

       Be brief/be orderly.

3.六七十年代时，美国哲学语言学家John Searle对言外行为分成了5类

阐述性Representatives---to commit the speaker to something’s being the

                                           Case ,to the truth of what has been said.

   例词:stating, believing, swearing, hypothesizing最有代表性,

   指令性Directives---are attempts by the speaker to get the hearer to do

                                something.

  例词:inviting, suggesting ,requesting ,advising ,warning ,threatening,

          ordering  是特有实例

   承诺性Commissives---when speaking the speaker puts himself under

                                         obligation.

  例词:promising, undertaking, vowing最典型

表达类Expressives---the speaker is expressing his feelings or attitude towards

                                   an existing state of affairs.

   例词:apologizing ,thanking, congratulating

宣告类Declarations---the successful performance of an act of this type brings

                               about the correspondence between what is said and reality.    

例句

I now declare the meeting open/I appoint you chairman of the committee/I fire you.

  这五类differ in their strength or force.

4.Semantics 和Pragmatics的区分

Pragmatics studies how meaning is conveyed in the process of communication.

The basic difference between them is that pragmatics considers meaning in context, traditional semantics studies meaning in isolation from the context of use.

5.语境中听者与说话者shared knowledge is of two types:

 The knowledge of the language they use, the knowledge about the world, including the general knowledge about the world and the specific knowledge about the situation in which linguistic communication is taking place.

6.Sentence meaning与Utterance meaning的区别

  Sentence meaning---abstract, decontextualized.

  Utterance meaning---concrete, contextualized it’s based on sentence meaning, it’s the realization of the abstract meaning of a sentence in a real situation of communication, or simply in a context.

区分句子和话句，类似区分语义和语用学，关键在于是否考虑语境。

7.While most utterances take the form of sentences ,i.e. most utterances are complete sentences

In terms of syntax, some utterances are not, and some can’t even be restored to complete sentences