语义学.docx

语义学.docx

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语义学

Chapter1Metalinguisticpreliminaries

1.0Introduction

Inthischapter,whichconstitutesthewholeofthepart1,wedealwithanumberofconceptswhicharefundamentaltothewholeenterpriseofputtinglinguisticssemanticsonasoundtheoreticalfooting.

1.1Themeaningof‘meaning’

Semanticsistraditionallydefinedasthestudyofmeaning.Thenounmeaningandtheverbmeanareusedinawiderangeofcontextsandinseveraldistinguishablesenses.

Thedistinctionsbetweentheintentionalandthenon-intentional,ontheonehand,andbetweenwhatisnaturalandwhatisconventional,orsymbolic,ontheother,havelongplayedacentralpartinthetheoreticalinvestigationofmeaningandcontinuetodoso.

Mostlanguage-utterances,whetherspokenorwrittendependfortheirinterpretationuponthecontextinwhichtheyareused.UtterancescontainingtheverbmeanarenodifferentfromotherEnglishutterancesinthisrespect.Itmustnotbeassumedthatallnaturallanguageshavewordsintheireverydayvocabularywhichcanbeputintoexactcorrespondencewiththeverbmeanandthenounmeaninggrammaticallyandsemantically.

Itislinguisticsemanticswithwhichweareprimarilyconcernedinthisbook.

1.2Themetalanguageofsemantics

Therearecontextsinwhichthenounmeaningandtheverbmeanarenotincorrespondencewithoneother.

Semanticistsrefertoasametalanguage:

i.e.,alanguagewhichisusedtodescribelanguage.ThepropertybyvirtueofwhichalanguagemaybeusedtorefertoitselfIwillcallreflexivity.

Asfarasthemetalinguisticvocabularyofnaturallanguageisconcerned,therearetwokindsofmodificationopentous:

regimentationandextension.Wecantakeexistingeverydaywords,suchaslanguage,sentence,word,meaningandsense,andsubjectthemtostrictcontrol,definingthemorre-definingthemforourownpurposes.

Asfarastheeverydaymetalinguisticuseofthespokenlanguageisconcerned,therearecertainrulesandconventionswhichallnativespeakersfollowwithouteverhavingbeentaughtthemandwithoutnormallybeingconsciousofthem.Butthesehavenotbeenfullycodifiedandcannotpreventmisunderstandinginallcontexts.

1.3Linguisicandnon-linguisticsemantics

Thetermlinguisticsemanticsisambiguous.Giventhatsemanticsisthestudyofmeaning,linguisticsemanticscanbeheldtorefereithertothestudymeaninginsofarasthisisexpressedinlanguageor,alternatively,tothestudyofmeaningwithinlinguistics.Linguisticsdoesnotaimtodealwitheverythingthatfallswithinthescopeofthewordlanguage,itestablishesitsowntheoreticalframework.

Onekindofnon-arbitrarinessiscommonlyreferredtothesedaysasiconicity.Roughlyspeaking,aniconicsignisonewhoseformisexplicableintermsofsimilaritybetweentheformofthesignandwhatissignifies:

signswhichlackthispropertyofsimilarityarenon-iconic.

Spokenutterances,inparticular,willcontain,inadditiontothewordsofwhichtheyarecomposed,aparticularintonation-contourandstress-pattern:

thesearereferredtotechnicallyasprosodicfeatures.Theyareanintegralpartoftheutterancesinwhichtheyoccur,andtheymustnotbethoughtofasbeinginanysensesecondaryoroptional.Theprosodicfeaturesofspokenlanguagesandtheparalinguisticgesturesthatareassociatedwithspokenutterancesinparticularlanguagesinparticularculturesvaryfromlanguagestolanguageandhavetobelearnedaspartofthenormalprocessoflanguage–acquisition.

1.4Language,speechandutterance;‘langue’and‘parole’;‘competence’and‘performance’

TheEnglishword‘language’,likethewordmeaning,hasawiderangeofmeaning.Butthefirstandmostimportantpointtobemadeabouttheworld’language’isthatitiscategoricallyambivalentwiththerespecttothesemanticallyrelevantpropertyofcountability:

i.e.,itcanbeusedasacountnoun;itcanalsobeusedasamassnoun,whichdoesnotrequireadeterminerandwhichnormallydenotesnotanindividualentityorsetofentities,butanunboundedmassoraggregateofstufforsubstance.

ExpressionscontainingthewordsEnglish,French,German,etc.exhibitarelated,butratherdifferent,kindofsystem-productambiguitywhentheyareusedasmassnounsinthesingular.Thesyntacticambivanlenceuponwhichtheambiguityturns,isnotbetweencountnounsandmassnouns,butbetweenpropernounsandcommonnouns.

OnewayofavoidingambiguityistoadoptthepolicyofneverusingtheEnglishwordlanguagemetalinguisticallyasamassnounwhentheexpressioncontainingitcouldbereplaced,withoutchangeofmeaning,withanexpressioncontainingthepluralformoflanguageusedasacountnoun.Anotherwayofavoiding,orreducing,theambiguityandconfusioncausedbythesyntacticambivalenceoftheeverydayEnglishwordlanguageandbyitsseveralmeaningistocoinasetofmorespecializedtermstoreplaceit.

Thewordlanguealwaysreferstolanguage-system.Thewordparolehasanumberofrelated,overlappingandmeaningsineverydayFrench.Theessentialdistinctionisbetweenasystemandtheproductsofthesystem.

By“competence”Chomskymeansthelanguage-systemwhichisstoredinthebrainsofindividualswhoaresaidtoknowthelanguageinquestion.TheChomskyanterm“performance”isoftenemployedbylinguisticstoreferindifferentlybothtotheuseofthesystemandtotheproductsoftheuseofthesystem.‘Parole’,incontrast,employedtorefertoanythingotherthantheproductsoftheuseofparticularlanguage-system.

1.5Words:

formsandmeanings

Inthisbook,singlequotation-markswillbeemployedforwords,andforothercompositeunitswithbothformandmeaning;italicsforformsanddoublequotation-marksformeanings.

Thegrammaticallydistinctformsofawordaretraditionallydescribedasinflectional,somelanguagesaremuchmorehighlyinflectedthanothers.Itisneverthelessimportanttodrawadistinctionbetweenawordanditsform,evenifithasnodistinctinflectionalforms.

Homonyms:

differentwordswiththesameform.Forexample,‘bank1’,oneofwhosemeaningis“financialinstitution”andthe‘bank2’,oneofwhosemeaningis“slopingsideofariver”,aregenerallyregardedashomonyms.

ThefactthattwoormorephoneticallydifferentformsmaybeorthographicallyidenticalisalsoreadilyillustratedfromEnglish.Thiskindofidentitymaybecalledmaterialidentity.

1.6Sentencesandutterances;text,conversationanddiscourse

Themeaningofasentenceisdeterminednotonlybythemeaningofthewordsofwhichitiscomposed,butalsobyitsgrammaticalstructure.Thisisclearfromthefactthattwosentencescanbecomposedofexactlythesamewords.

IneverydayEnglish,thewordutterancesisgenerallyusedtorefertospokenlanguage.Thewordtextisgenerallyrefertowrittenlanguage.Ourlanguagemustnotbeconfusedwithspeech.Indeed,oneofthemoststrikingpropertiesofnaturallanguageistheirrelativeindependenceofthemediuminwhichtheyarerealized.

Thetermsutterance,discourseandconversationhavebothaprocess-sense,theydenoteaparticularkindofbehaviour,oractivity;intheirproduct-sense,theydenote,nottheactivityitself,butthephysicalproductoftheactivity.Sentencemeaningiscontext-independent,whereasutterancemeaningisnot:

thatistosay,themeaningofanutteranceisdeterminedbythecontextinwhichitisuttered.Andthereisanintrinsicconnexionbetweenthemeaningofsentenceandthecharacteristicuse,notoftheparticularsenseassuch,butofthewholeclassofsentencestowhichthesentencebelongsbyvirtueofitsgrammaticalstructure.Thisconnectionmaybeformulated,foroneclassofsentences,asfollows:

adeclarativesentenceisonethatbelongstotheclassofsentenceswhosemembersareusedtomakestatement.

Sentence-meaningisrelatedtoutterance-meaningbyvirtueofthenotioncharacteristicuse,butitdiffersfromitinthatthemeaningofasentenceisindependentoftheparticularcontextinwhichitmaybeuttered.Todeterminethemeaningofanutterance,wehavetotakecontextualintoaccount.

1.7Theoriesofmeaningandkindsofmeaning

Thedistinctionbetweendescriptiveandthenon-descriptive:

withregardtodescriptivemeaning,itisauniversallyacknowledgedfactthatlanguagesthatcanbeusedtomakedescriptivestatementswhicharetrueorfalseaccordingtowhetherthepropositionsthattheyexpressaretrueorfalse.Non-descriptivemeaningismoreheterogeneousandlesscentral.Expressivemeaning-i.e.,thekindofmeaningbyvirtueofwhichspeakersexpress,ratherthandescribe,theirbeliefs,attitudesandfeelings-isoftenheldtofallwithinthescopeofstylisticsorpragmatics.

Chapter2WordsasMeaningfulUnit

2.0Introduction

Itisgenerallyagreedthatthewords,phrasesandsentencesofnaturallanguageshavemeaning,thatsentencesarecomposedofwordsandthatthemeaningofasentenceisaproductofthewordsofwhichitiscomposed.

Thetechnicaltermdictionary-wordislexeme.Alexemeisalexicalunit:

theunitofthelexicon.Thelexicalstructureofalanguageisthestructureofitslexicon,orvocabulary.Notallwordsarelexemes,andnotalllexemesarewords.

2.1Formsandexpressions

TheAmericanphilosopherPeircereferredtoasthedistinctionbetweenwordsastokensandwordsastypes.Itiswordexpressions,notwordforms,thatarelistedanddefinedinaconventionaldictionary.Accordingtoanalphabeticorderingoftheircitation-forms;whatarecommonlyreferredtothehead-wordsofthedictionaryentries.Inordertoassignmeaningtothewordformsofwhichasentenceiscomposed,wemastbeabletoidentifythem,notmerelyastokensofa