Semantics and Pragmatics
SEMANTICS and PRAGMATICS
This Paper is Compiled to Fulfill Linguistic Task
Risca Nur Kafidah (13020230058)
ENGLISH DEPARTMENT
ISLAMIC UNIVERSITY of KADIRI
KEDIRI, EAST JAVA
2014
CHAPTER I
Introduction to Semantics
Language is a subtle and complex instrument used to communicate an
incredible number of different things, but for our purposes here we can reduce
the universe of communication to four basic categories: information, direction,
emotion, and ceremony. The first two are often treated together because they
express cognitive meaning while the latter two commonly express emotional
meaning.
Language may be used to communicate feelings and
emotions. Such expressions may or may not be intended to evoke reactions in
others, but when emotional language occurs in an argument, the purpose is to evoke similar feelings in others in
order to influence them to agree with the argument’s conclusion(s).
It is not an
exaggeration to say that all language users are interested in meaning. When we
come across a new word, for example, we wonder about its meaning. We laugh at a
joke, such as a pun, when it cleverly plays on words. Advertisers constantly
create messages to tempt us to buy products. Educators are concerned about
getting their words across to their students, politicians to the public, etc.
We are concerned about getting messages across to others and understanding what
others say to us.
So,
here is the explanation about Semantics.
Semantics
is
the study of the meaning of linguistic expressions, such as morphemes, words,
phrases, clauses, and sentences. There are two general types of semantics. Lexical semantics deals with the
meaning of words and structural
semantics deals with the meaning of utterances larger than words. We will
start with lexical semantics.
The
Meaning of Words: Lexical Semantics
Lexical
semantics is the study of the meanings of words. We can imagine that in each
person’s brain, there is a lexicon or dictionary containing the definitions of
all the words that a person knows. When a person hears an utterance, that
person quickly scans the mental lexicon for the meaning of those words, and
then interprets them. But there are different types of meaning that words can
have.
First of all, some
words have an actual concrete item or concept (idea, action, or state of being)
that the word refers to—its referent (the actual concrete item or concept to
which the word refers). The referential meaning describes the referent. The referential
meaning of a word is its definition.
Your dog is barking.
In this sentence, the referent is a
particular dog, and the referent of your is a particular person whose dog
is being referenced.
Words can also refer to
such prevaricated things as Santa Claus, mermaids, or Mickey Mouse, which don’t
exist in the real world, but which exist as a mental image for English speakers
because of their cultural symbolic representation. And of course there are
abstract concepts such as love, truth, and justice. However, they are
meaningful to English speakers because we understand their sense, which is an
additional meaning beyond referential meaning.
Secondly, there are words
that don’t have a referent but instead express relationships or
characteristics.
He is the teacher of this class.
The words he, teacher, and class in this sentence have concrete referents,
but the words is, the, and of don’t
have referent and conjure up no mental image.
Other Kinds of Meaning: Structural Semantics
Structural semantics is the study of how the structure of sentences
contibutes to meaning. Consider the meaning of the following two sentences:
1. The teacher taught
the student.
2.
The student taught the teacher.
Both
sentences are composed of exactly the same words. In the first sentence, the teacher is the subject and is performing
the action of teaching the students,
the object of the sentence. In the second sentence, the only thing that has
changed is that now the teacher is
the object and the student is the
subject. However, the change in the structure changes the meaning of the
sentences such that the first sentence describe a commonplace event, but the
second describes a more unusual one.
CHAPTER
II
Word
Meaning
In this chapter, we study the ways
in which we distinguish, determine, and manipulate the meaning of words in
speech.
Lexical Items
All languages
possess words. When the words are put together in a list, as in a dictionary,
we call the collection a vocabulary.
Technically, a
vocabulary is a lexicon, and this word is often used interchangeably with
dictionary. A lexical item is a unit in the lexicon, and it therefore can be
said to be more or less equivalent to a word.
Lexical Items vs. Grammatical Items
In studying the
vocabulary of a language, we examine the semantic meaning of a word by
comparing and contrasting it with other words to determine its lexical meaning.
For instance, the meaning of the word
man can be compared and contrasted with words such as human, gentleman, adult, male, boy, and so on. Its meaning is then
determined on the basis of such a comparison and presented in the following
way:
Man:
[+] human, [+] adult, [+] male
This formula
says that the referent of the word man has
the semantic features of being human and being an adult, as well as being a
male.
Markedness
In linguistics,
markedness is a phenomenon that applies to a relationship between two or more
words. Experts speak of this a s an asymmetry that helps linguists to understand
how various languages are used. This evaluation of words and phrases applies to
both grammatical and semantic differences, and also involves some evaluation of
phonology of words.
Many of the most
basic examples of markedness involve some opposite words that mirror each other
in specific ways. For example, a set of words where one or the other consists
of a prefixed form of its companion can be said to illustrate markedness. A
common example is the set of words happy
and unhappy. In this example,
the word unhappy is said to be
marked by its prefix that establishes it as the opposite of the word happy. The prefix un marks the word. Other prefixes used to mark words.
Other forms of
markedness involve a pair of words where one of the words is more commonly spoken
than another. A set of opposites with one formal term and one slang term could
be seen as a case of markedness. Another good example of this principle is in
gendered words where one gender may be the basic form of the word, and
addressing the other gender adds a suffix. For example, in the set of words poet and poetess, the word poetess,
which refers to the female, is marked by the suffix ess.
Kinds of Semantics Relationships:
a.
Hyponyms
Hyponyms are more specific words that constitute a subclass
of a more general word. Consider the words poodle and dog. Suppose that the
current set of poodles includes Princess. The current set of dogs will then
include at least this dog and possible others as well (such as Buttercup the
Rottweiler and Killer the Chihuahua).
Dog
is a hyponym of animal; poodle is a hyponym of dog.
Take a loot at this box!
b.
Synonyms
Synonyms are words that have similar meanings and
share the same semantic properties. They are often used interchangeably.
Woman =
Lady
Child = Kid
Sleep = Nap
Student = Pupil
But, look a little closer at common synonyms, and
realize that two words aren’t always 100% the same and interchangeable.
100% same
|
quick/rapid, sick/ill, couch/sofa
|
Regional
|
tap/faucet, skillet/pan, hot cakes/pancakes,
soda/pop
|
Formality
|
pass away/die/pop off
|
Political
|
freedom fighter/guerilla/terrorist
|
Legal
|
kill/manslaughter/murder
|
c.
Homonyms
Homonyms
are words that sound the same but mean different things.
fair/fare capitol/capital
pair/pare to/too/two
boar/bore
d.
Antonyms
Antonyms are words that are opposite in one of their
semantic properties.
Kinds of antonym:
·
Complementary
pairs are words that express a binary relationship.
male/female married/unmarried
dead/alive animal/plant
·
Gradable pairs
are words that express the concept that one of them is more, whereas the other
is less.
hot/cold good/bad
strong/weak happy/sad
·
Relational
opposites are words that express a symmetrical relationship.
parents/children teachers/students
doctor/patient employer/employee
CHAPTER
III
Phrase
and Sentence Meaning
Words and morphemes are the smallest
meaningful units of language. For the most part, however, we communicate in
phrases and sentences, which also have meaning. The meaning of phrases or
sentences depends on both the meaning of its words and how these words are
structurally combined. Both words and sentences can be used to refer to, or
point out, objects; and both may have some further meaning beyond this
referring capability.
Sense and References
Words other then proper names both
have a meaning and can be used to refer to objects, and so can larger units
such as phrases and sentences. The German philosopher, Bottlob Frege, proposed
that the meaning of and expression be
called sense, and if the expression refers to something, it
has reference. We can say, the sense of an expression is how it refers
to an object, while its reference is
the object it refers to. For example:
The
husband of Barbara Bush is the President who succeeded Ronald Reagan.
The reference
is: President of the U.S.A (George Bush senior) and the two senses are:
1. The husband of Barbara Bush; and
2. The man who became President after Ronald Reagan.
Phrases may,
however, have sense but no reference. If not, we will not be able to understand
sentences like these:
a.
Ambiguous
Words that have double meaning are ambiguous. Many
words have more than one meaning such as bank (of a river or a financial
institution) or glasses (eye glass, sunglasses, and drinking glasses).
Ambiguity at the sentence level means a phrase or
sentence has more than one underlying structure.
·
Korean history
teacher (the history teacher from Korean OR
the teacher of Korean history)
·
Smart men and
women (women and men who are smart OR men
and women who are smart)
·
Sherlock saw the
man with the binoculars (Sherlock used binoculars to see the man OR Sherlock saw the man who was using
binoculars)
Sentence level ambiguity, although sometimes
humorous, can lead to confusion. To be clear, the speaker needs to rephrase the
sentences.
b.
Anomalous
Anomalies are nonsensical words and phrases.
The semantic properties of words determine what
other words they can be combined with. A sentence widely used by linguistics
illustrates this fact:
Colorless green ideas sleep
furiously.
The sentence obeys all syntactic rules of English.
The subject is colorless green ideas and
the predicate is sleep furiously. It
has the same syntactic structure as the sentence:
Dark green leaves rustle furiously.
But there is obviously something semantically wrong
with the sentence. The meaning of colorless
includes the semantic feature without
color, but it is combined with the adjective green, which has the semantic feature green in color. How can something be both without color and green in
color? This sentence violates
and is, therefore, semantically anomalous. Semantic violations in poetry may
form strange but interesting.
c.
Idioms
Idiomatic expressions are phrases that have fixed
meanings that are literal. Fixed meanings can not be inferred from the meanings
of the individual words.
Here is some common English idioms:
·
Do you want me
to love you? Okay! When pigs fly!! (it will never happen)
·
You disturb me!
Don’t take my hair! (stop kidding)
·
Your actions
speak louder than words.
·
Add fuel to the
fire.
CHAPTER
IV
Cooperative
Principle
So far we have been talking about
the meaning of words and word combination themselves. But sometimes the meaning
of a word is totally dependent upon the context in which it is used. Pragmatics is the study of the effect
of context on meaning which can not be explained by semantics. It is concerned
with speaker meaning and how utterances are interpreted by listeners.
When people communicate, they
exchange information. When a conversation is taking place between two persons,
they are depending on some common guidelines in order to get the most out of
the communication. For the messages to be successfully put across, those
involved in the communication should share the same common grounds on what is
being talked about. In social science, generally, and linguistics specifically,
the cooperative principle describes
how people interact with one another.
Listeners and speakers must speak
cooperatively and mutually accept one another to be understood in a particular
way. The cooperative principle describes how effective communication in conversation
is achieved in common social situations.
Consider this
following conversation!
There is a woman sitting on a park
bench and a big dog lying on the ground in front of the bench. A man comes
along and sits down on the bench.
Man :
Does your dog bite?
Woman : No, he doesn’t.
(The man reaches
down to feed the dog. The dog bites the man’s hand)
Man :
Ouch! Hey! You said that your dog doesn’t bite.
Woman : He doesn’t. But, that’s not my dog.
In the scenario,
it seems that the man’s assumption is more communicated than what is said by
the woman, her answer is less information.
Grice’s
cooperative principle is a set of norms expected in conversation.
The cooperative
principle can be divided into four maxims, called the Gricean Maxims:
·
Maxim of Quality
1.
Do not say what
you believe to be false.
2.
Do not say that
for which you lack adequate evidence.
·
Maxim of
Quantity
1.
Make your
contribution as informative as is required (for the current purposes of the
exchange).
2.
Do not make your
contribution more informative than is required.
·
Maxim of
Relation
1.
Be relevant to
the topic of discussion.
·
Maxim of Manner
1.
Be brief (avoid
unnecessary prolixity).
2.
Avoid ambiguity.
CHAPTER
V
Implicature
Implicature
is a component of speaker meaning that constitutes an aspect of what is meant
in a speaker’s utterance without being part of what is said.
For
example:
Mary
had a baby and got married.
The
sentence strongly suggests that Mary had a baby before the wedding, but the
sentence would be true if Mary had a
baby after she got married. Further, if we add the qualification to the
original sentence, then the implicature is cancelled even though the meaning of
the original sentence is not altered.
Types of Implicature
Conversational Implicature
Paul
Grice identified three types of general conversational implicatures:
1. The speaker deliberately flouts a conversational
maxim to convey an additional meaning not expressed literally. For instance, a
speaker responds to the question “What did you think about the guest speaker?”
with the following utterance:
Well, I am sure he was speaking English.
It means: The content of the
speaker’s speech was confusing.
2. The speaker’s desire to fulfill two conflicting
maxims results in his or her flouting one maxim to invoke the other. For
instance, a speaker reponds to the question “Where is Jhon?” with:
He is either in the cafetaria or in his office.
In this case, the speaker doesn’t want to be
ambiguous but also doesn’t want to give false information by giving a specific
answer in spite of his uncertainty. He doesn’t have the evidence to give a
specific location where he believes Jhon is.
3. The speaker invokes a maxim as a basis for
interpreting the utterance.
Do you know where I can get some gas?
There’s a gas station around the corner.
It means: The gas station is open
and he can probably get gas there.
Scalar Implicature: is great detail of a particular sort of implicatures,
expressing quantity and terms.
I
ate some of the cake.
This
sentence implies “I didn’t eat all of the cake”. The words “none, some, all”
form an implicational scale, in which the use of a stronger form is not
possible.
Conventional Implicature
Conventional
implicature is independent of the cooperative principle and its four maxims. A
statement always carries its conventional implicature.
Bill
is poor but happy.
This
sentence implies poverty and happiness are not compatible but in spite of this
Bill is still happy. It also implies “Surprisingly, Bill is happy in spite of
being poor.”
CHAPTER
VI
Speech
Acts
A speech act is
an act that a speaker performs when making an utterance. Of course, for the
action to take place, the sentences have to be said in the correct context and
by the correct person.
I
now pronounce you husband and wife.
I hereby sentence you to ten years
in jail.
I bet you a hundred dollars.
I warn you to stay away from the
edge of the cliff.
I quit.
I promise to do it.
I am sorry.
Those sentences
called performative sentences. Performative sentences are the utterances that
perform speech acts. Performative sentences can also perform the act of
requesting or the act of ordering.
References
Rowe, Bruce M.
And Levine, Diane P. 2011. A Concise
Introduction to Linguistics. New Jersey. Prentice Hall.
Soeparto. 2003. Semantics. Malang.
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