SEMANTICS

STUDY OF LINGUISTIC MEANING

Introduction
To
Semantics
 What is semantics?

Semanticsis the study of meaning. It is a wide subject within the general study of
language.

(how language users acquire a sense of meaning, as speakers and writers, listeners
and readers) and oflanguage change(how meanings alter over time .
Some important areas of semantic theory or related subjects include
these:

Symbol and referent

Conceptions of meaning

Words and lexemes

Denotation, connotation, implication

Pragmatics

Ambiguity

Metaphor, simile and symbol

Semantic fields

Synonym, antonym and hyponym

 The study of semantics includes the study of how meaning isconstructed, interpreted,
clarified, obscured, illustrated, simplified negotiated, contradictedandparaphrased.

Collocation, fixed expression and idiom

Semantic change and etymology

Polysemy

Homonymy, homophones and homographs

Lexicology and lexicography

Thesauruses, libraries and Web portals

Epistemology
Words and lexemes
This is usually a single word, but may be a phrase in which the meaning
belongs to the whole rather than its parts, as in verb phrasestune in, turn
on, drop out or noun phrase(a) cock up.

Referential or denotative meaning

Referential meaning is primary while connotative meaning is secondary.

Theory of meaning, based on the first, is the theory of abstraction or referential theory,
also called the theory of signification.

This theory recognises the following three components of meaning:-

(1) the sound form or the linguistic sign,
(2) the concept underlying the form, and
(3) the actual referent, that part of the extra linguistic world
Connotative meaning

Connotative meaning is the communicative value which an expression has by virtue of

what it refers to.
EXP:

1. kill, murder, assassinate,

2. eat, partake, peck, wolf, devour,
3. Hindi marnaa, svargavaasii honaa, eN bolnaa,
4. khaanaa, liilnaa, bhakosnaa,
5. Bengali svaamii, bhaataar.

In the above sets of the words, we find that all the words of each set have some
common semantic features, which give their basic or denotative meaning.
 It is colorless and neutral. kill means simply causing death, whereas in murder there
are some additional or supplementary features which determine its meaning.

In the same way partake, peck, wolf, devour have some additional features. These
additional features add some extra meaning to the basic denotative meanings.
 These features are called connotation and the meanings based on them the
connotative meaning or connotation component of meaning.

We are connotations added to words? when a speaker feelsthat the denotation

meaning would not be enough to produce some desired additional effects like irony,
joke, humor, euphemism and respect etc. he adds connotations to the words.
 The connotation component of meaning related to the emotive or
expressive notion of the speaker or to stylistic values.

Introduced into the language by individuals.

Become socialized and become the part of the language.

Originating with figurative extensions they are gradually transferred and

are stabilized in the language.

We may take the Oriya word maharii used for female attendants in
temples. Originally meaning 'the female member of Mahar Caste' and the
'female servant of the god' the word now means something like a 'keep'.
 Stylistic differences also come under connotations.

When we compare the word pitaa 'father' paapaa

we find that the former is stylistically neutral, whereas the latter is colloquial.

A similar distinction can be made between friend and chum. The connotations
include the following variations of language
 Slangs, professionalisms, jargonisms, vulgarisms, dialectal words, neologisms,
formal, peotic, baby language etc.

The connotative meaning is vary significant for a lexicographer.

When he analyses the semantic structure of individual lexical units, especially the
polysemous ones, he has to distinguish between the denotative and connotative
meanings for fixing the arrangement of meanings.
IDIOMATIC MEANING

SENTENC INTERPRETATION TYPE OF MEANING

E
John kicked John hit the bucket Compositional Meaning
the bucket. with his leg.
John died.(idiomaic Non-Compositional Meaning
meaning)

The sentence pabucu dama atld includes such an example in Turkish.We

know it includes the meaning He has fallen out of favor but not the origin of
that meaning.
 Idiomatic meaning for a Turkish idiom
SENTENCE INTERPRETATION TYPE OF MEANING
His shoes were thrown out Compositional Meaning
Pabucu dama atld. onto his shop roof.
He is forbidden to work in Original Meaning
shoe business.
He has fallen out of favor. Non-Compositional Meaning
(idiomatic meaning)

Collocational Meaning

You shall know a word by the company it keeps .

1. Buxom lass attractive woman
2. Blond hair fair (yellow)hair
3. Cascading water wave-like dropping of water
4. Glooomy weather depressing weather
5. Vested interest secure possession
6. Fancy dress unusual costume

What do all these phrases have in common?

The obvious answer is that they are used in combination or

arrangement pretty frequently.

15
There is a saying in Turkish: Leb demeden, leblebiyi anlamak. Now ,let us take a
test:when

someone begins with the Turkish word zifiri,can you predict the next word?Yes, it is
karanlk qualifies for a true collocation.

DIFFERENCES IN ENGLISH TURKISH

COLLOCATIONS
water water

soup soup
DRINK
x cigarette

x oath

nterpret nterpret(a dream)

DREAM (a dream)
I had a dream about I saw you in my
you. dream.
Meaning Relations at Sentence and Lexical Level

As the study of meaning of the linguistics expressions,semantics is

conveniently divided into two:

Sentential Semantics
Lexical Semantics
 Meaning Entailment
SENTENTIAL SEMANTICS Inclusion
Meaning Equation Ambiguity
paraphrase
S
E Inconsistency Contradiction
M
A Meaning Inclusion Hyphonymy
N
T Meaning polysemy
I Relations
C Meaning Extension Metonymy
S Metaphor
Meaning Equation Synonymy
LEXICAL Ambiguity
SEMANTICS Lexical Relations Inconsistency Antonymy
Anomaly
Sentential Semantics

Paraphrasing
Entailment
Ambiguity and
contradiction

Paraphrasing at the sentence level is much more complicated.The
commonest ones in structural change include:

Active-passive transformation
Paraphrased Entailed

Inversion

It-clefts

Wh-clefts

Non-referentialthere

Fronting Utterance
Paraphrase

Paraphrase and entailment

 Entyailment refers to the recognition of the shared,presupposed knowledge.All
Utterances are based on certain entailments.

ACTUAL UTTERANCE ENTAILED KNOWLEDGE

Hows school going? I know you study at a school.

Did you quit smoking? I know you were smoking

Im not going to speak of my My political opponent has

political opponents blunders. blunders.
 Existence of ambiguity in natural languages.

They hated the shooting of the They hated the hunters who
hunters. did the shooting
They hated the fact that the
hunters were shot.

Lexical semantics

Studies meaning of words

Divided into two:Meaning Relations and Lexical Relations

 Meaning Relations is about the interaction of meanings within and across lexical
items in the vocab.

Meaning Inclusion
Meaning Extension
Meaning Equation

Meaning Inclusion

Meaning Inclusion:Polysemy,Entailment and Hyphonmy.

 Polysemy and Homonymy

Polysemy

1. Directly related with metaphor

2. Common in languages

3. Multiple related meanings on the basis of analogy,similarity

Head (n) a)Part of human body

b)President of an institution
c)Go(v) where are you heading?
Homonymy

It involves two or more lexical items

Having same shape either in the form of pronunciation or spelling

Club(n) a)Society of persons

b)Heavy stick,baton
c)A kind of playing card

A:Do you believe in clubs for young people?

B:Only when kindness fails,my friend!
Homophones

Have the same pronunciation but different spelling.

Threw/through /ru:/
I/eye /a/

Homographs

Have the same spelling but different pronunciation.Compare:

Wind in the sense of blowing./wnd/

Wind in the sense of bendind./wand/
 Hyponymy

The meaning of one includes the meaning of the other word.

The word that includes is called a superordinate while the one that is included in the
meaning of the superordinate is called a hyponym.

SUPERORDINATE SPEAK
Hyponyms Shout,tell,say,utter,pronounce,murmur,mutter,whisper,grumple,
mumble

SUPERORDINATE WRITE
Hyponyms Inscribe,red,pink,orange,green,
yellow,blue,purple,white.
SUPERORDINATE COLOR
Hyponyms Black,red,pink,orange,yellow,blue,purple,white.

Meaning Extension

Metaphor

It ncludes two major subsections:metaphor and metonymy.

The sole purpose of linguistic communaication (metaphor)

Express the word in a creative way that based on perceptual,functional or physical

resemblances.
Metonymy

It is a semantic relationship that holds between two words in terms of part

whole,content-container,symbol-represented.connections.

Can you light up the stove?

What is to be lit is not the stove,but the contents of the stove.

Meaning Equation

Synonymy

Extremely useful tool for people not to sound too repetitive as well as to be
understood when the listener is not familiar with the word.

To consist of
To comprise
To be composed of
Synonymy through collocations:freedom

FREEDOM LIBERTY STATUS

Freedom of speech Liberty of speech Synonymous

*Civil freedoms Civil liberties Not synonymous

*At freedom At liberty Not synonymous

Synonymy through collocations Car

CAR AUTOMOBILE STATUS

Car mechanic *Automobile mechanic Not synonymous

Car wash *Automobile wash Not synonymous

Car show Automobile show Synonymous

Ambiguity

A word,phrase or sentence that has more than one meaning is said to be

ambiguous.

Where are the glasses? (seeing glasses vs. window glasses)

Inconsistency

Antonymy

A relationship of oppositeness

Richxpoor
 Anomaly

Whats odd in the following?

My cat wishes to study linguistics for a change.

COMPONENTIAL ANALYSIS
EXAMPLES HUMAN ADULT
Study (+) (+)
Cat (-) (+)

BURCU KESKOLU
100908016

SNAN DERNOLU
100908033