• Connotational meaning(内涵意义): the emotive or affective meanings suggested by a linguistic expression. Home, mother
• Three types of connotative meanings: • positive(褒义), neutral(中性),negative(贬义)
• A good meal, • A good car, • A good movie, • a good road, • A good child, • good weather • A good umbrella
• A fast road, • a fast typist • A fast book • A fast decision.
the hearer (stimulus—response)
Jill is hungry and wants Jack to pick the
apple for her from the tree:
Jill
Jack
• S-------------r…….s---------------R
• 证实论：一个句子只有得到经验证实才有 意义：John is outside。
Chapter 5 Semantics(语义学）
5.1 what is semantics
• Semantics（语义学）is the study of meaning.
• What is meaning? Love, friendship， truth, fact, democracy, good, chair, ghost, unicorn；真善美，justice, soul
hope, democracy 4 sentence , five, I, he
• 2 conceptualist view
• Meaning is the concept or idea in the mind: • “chair”does not refer to a specific chair,
• “we shall know a word by the company it keeps”
• “The meaning of a word is its use in the language” what is the meaning of “five”?
• It is raining: 取消比赛；客人不要走；进屋； • “以前我和你一样；以后你和我一样。”
• A heavy blow • Heavy traffic • A heavy heart(沉重的心情） • A heavy smoker • Heavy applause(热烈的掌声） • Heavy foliage(密叶） • Heavy invester
Synonymy(同义关系）
• Synonymy:two or more words have the same meanings.
• Philosophy • Psychology • Logic • Semiotics • computer science Anthropology
all study meaning
• sub-branches of semantics: in terms of
whether it falls within the scope of linguistics: linguistic semantics(语言语 义学)and non-linguistic semantics(非语 言语义学):philosophical semantics,
• Adj: right, wrong, tall, deep, • Verb:remember, dream, hate, • Conj: or. And, because, to of
• If you do not ask me “what is meaning” , I know the meaning. But if you ask me what is meaning, I do not know the meaning of sth.
• Denotation: the objects or state of affairs in the real world that linguistic expressions stand for.
• Denotation is invariant and utteranceindependent while reference is variable and utterance dependent, could be specific.
• Textual semantics: the meaning of a text or a piece of discourse.
5.2 theories of meaning
• 1 Naming(命名）: words are labels for things they stand for.
white smoking gun
4 Behaviorism(行为主义)
• Meaning is the behavior that language
evokes: the situation in which the speaker
utters it and the response it calls forth in
• Context: situational context(情景语 境):speaker, hearer, place and time of the
utterance, the actions they perform.
• Linguistic context or co-text(语言语境，上 下文）：black hair, black tea, black coffee (不加牛奶）black humour，black eye(青肿 眼眶。 Cultural context: dragon,dog,
• Conceptual meaning（概念意义）: the meaning given in the dictionary:
• Associative meaning(联想意义):the secondary meaning supplemented to the conceptual meaning: connotative, stylistic, affective and collocative meanings（搭配意义）. Handsome man, handsome woman, cute girl VS cute man
• Referent: the entity(实体) or objects to which a linguistic expression refers to.
• Some words do not have referent: would, if, ghost
• Sense(意义） refers to the relationship inside language, the set or nework of relationship between an expression and other expressions in a language. Sense is interlexical（词汇之间） and intralingual（语 言内部） while reference is extralingual
• All misers are stingy. • All misers are rich. • All misers are miserable. • All bachelors are unmarried • All bachelors are happy. • All carnivores(食肉动物） eat meat • What about giant panda that bamboo
but to the concept of all the chair in the world.
• Semantic triangle(语义三角论) or semiotic triangle developed by Odgen and Richards: symbol, thought and referent(指称物) or sign,meaning, and object:
the referent, linguistic expressions relates to the real world only through their meaning
3 contextualism
• Meaning should be studies in terms of situation,context, use.
• Grammatical meaning: the part of meaning of a word which indicates grammatical function or relations. Like number, tense.
• Lexical meaning: the meaning that is codified in a lexicon or dictionary. Open class of elements
shoots. Birds VS bats
Basic concepts
• Reference(所指,指称): the relation between the linguistic expression and the object in extra-linguistic reality to which the expression refers to.