Ch 2: Scope of Semantics - Naming
Meaning as denotation - Plato Cratylus: words "stand for" something in theworld. Words are labels for things. Child learns names by a process ofnaming.Meaning of larger constructs (expressions) [Lyons, Semantics, 1977 2vols:206-9]Denotation : the class of persons, things etc. generally represented by the expressionReference: the actual person, thing being referred to in a specific contextThis view appears to be limited to nouns. Maybe colours (adjectives). Butnot at all plausible even for adj like "attractive", useful, relevantdifficult, plausible. 18With a noun we can often draw a picture of the object denoted. But this isdifficult, if not impossible, with verbs.even nouns like goblin, unicorn, fairy etc - for objects that don't existConsider the verb "run", and an attempt to illustrate what it denotes with apicture of running (maybe a moving picture). Difficulty: picture has a boy,and has him running - hard to distinguish the boy and "what he is doing". 19meaning != denotation 20
Morning star / evening starIn Gilbert and Sullivan's Mikado, First Lord of the treasury Lord Chief Justice Commander in Chief Lord High admiral Master of the Buck Houndsare all names for Pooh-Bah. 20[same holds for "His Holiness" and "the Pope" and "Benedict XVI"]even when names are limited to visible objects, they may represent a wholelot of rather different objects.[Hence - meaning must be based on function]"In the world of experience, objects are not clearly grouped together ready,so to speak, to be labelled with a single word.Realist view: all things called by the name have some common propertyNominalist: nothing is common except for the name. [this radical view is of course false, chairs can't be called mountains]possible cultural relevance-
Malinowski (1923, The Problem of meaning in primitive lgs, supplem to Ogden and Richards 1923/1949:299-300)was troubled by the fact that he was unable to produce satisfactorytranslations for the Trobriand Islanders' speech (text) he had recorded.e.g. boast by canoeist: "We-run front-wood ourselves... we-turn we-seecompanion-ours he-runs rear-wood."This, Malinowslki argued (:300-01), made sense only ifthe utterance was seen in the context [--> Behaviourism].lg is not a "mirror of reflected thought", or a "counteersign of thought",but a "mode of action". Expressions such as "How do you do" or "Ah there youare" - more to establish a common sentiment than any semantic substance.Also talk about the weather or family 50-51 --> PHATIC COMMUNION - ony social, no semantics 52Eskimo: have four words for "snow" (1911:20): "snow on the ground", "falling snow", "drifting snow", and "snowdrift". (Boas 1911, Intro to Hbk of Am Ind Lgs :20)Hopi: only one word for "flier" - be it insect or aeroplane (Whorf 1956:210) p.21Bloomfield: Salt is "NaCl" - is wrong. It is what appears on our tables, with pepper and mustard, and is no less salt if it is not exactly NaCL [AM: e.g. composition may have other elements, Mg or Iodine]Russell: Object word vs Dictionary word 22
Some words refer to objects and are learned as labels, while others arelearned as definitions based on them - OSTENSIVE DEFINITIONS. (Russell 1940 An inq into meaning and truth:25,66 repr. 1962:23,63). p.22Wittgenstein (1953:16): I must be a master of lg to understand an ostensivedefinition."The child does not simply learn labels - else he would not be able to handleall these complexities. We shall not solve problems of semantics by looking at a child learning lg, for an understanding of what he does raises precisely the same problems as those of understanding what adults do in their normal speech. 23Concepts 24
Ogden & Richards 1923/1949:11 : the concept (thought or reference) is in arelation with the symbol, and also the actual referent;Triangular relationship - but symbol and referent are connected by dashed line. 24What is precisely the "associative bond" of Saussure, or the link betweenO&R's symbol and concept?semantics as "association in the mind". The difficulty w this view is that it really says nothing at all. 26 [becomes a circular definition, a tautology] [AM: results from our inadequacy in understanding the mechanism in the mind, until that's understood, philosophizing becomes only hot air]nothing is gained by moving meaning one step back to the brain - the ghost inthe machine / homunculus argument. 27Dualism is encouraged by the term "meaning" itself.Wittgenstein (1953:31): for a large class of words... the meaning of a word is its use in lg.'not a very helpful remark, since "use in lg" is just as unclear. But still,has value; we can now investigate "use". 29Sense and Reference
Reference: what the expr refers to in the non-linguistic world of experienceSense: relationships that hold between the lg elements (mostly the words) themselvesWould appear that reference is the key part of semantics.But - sense relations are also common - e.g. sex differences (older grammars in English) - ewe / ram - cow/bull; mare/stallion - were thought to be grammatical, and not lexical (since related to gender). p.30also father/son; duck/duckling; buy/sell;Dictionary : concerned primarily w sense relationsthere may be two kinds of semantics - one that relates to non-linguisticentities, and the others (as in dictionaries, with their unsystematicdefinitions) - intra-linguistic.Bierwisch (1970:167) says that a semantic theory must explain sentences like:1. His typewriter has bad intentions2. My unmarried sister is married to a bachelor3. John was looking for the glasses.4a. The needle is too short b. The needle is not long enough [is it a paraphrase?]6a. How long was Archibald in Monte Carlo? b. He was there for some time [presupposed by "a")123 are : anomalous, contradictory, ambiguousKatz and Fodor 1963:176 A semantic theory describes and explains the interpretive ability of speakers; by accounting for their performance in determining the number of readings of a sentence; by detecting semantic anomalies; by deciding upon paraphrase relations between sentences; and by marking every other semantic property or relation tha plays a role in this ability."Notably, the list of abilities (in later work, Katz:1972 has fifteen suchrelations), does not include the ability to relate the sentences to the worldof experience; and indeed K&F explicitly exclude from a semantic theory anyreference to the context.2.4 The word 32
"Boys like to play"what is the meaning of "to"?Henry Sweet 1891, distinguished "full" words (tree, sing, blue, gently) from"form" words (the, of, and). The form words are not normal dictionary wordsand have only grammatical meaning.word may be defined in terms of stress - only one main stress -e.g. in spoken lg, can distinguish "blackbird" from "black bird" 33(so does "shoe-horn" or "shoe polish")Bloomfield 1933: "word is the minimum free form" in isolation; the, is, by donot appear in isolation (but then, maybe, neither do any others).Bloomfield: morphemes as units of meaning, e.g. "-berry" in blackberry or"-y" in Johnny.Later linguists: "loved" = love + -d = adore + past. (but what of "took")LEXEME: love and loved are under the same dictionary heading; unitBloomfield: status of "cran-" in cranberry - no indep meaning, and notoccurring in any other words. (for that matter, straw- and goose- +berry)greenfinch bullfinch and chaffinch: green- is a colour, bull- is a word butnot relate-able to bullfinch; and chaffinch no meaning at all).may be PHONAESTHETIC - initial cluster of consonants gives an indication ofmeaning of a speccial kind.e.g. many words with "sl-" are "slippery" in some sense - slide, slip,slither, slush, sluice, sludge etc. often pejorative - slatterns, slut,slang, sly, sloppy, slovenly. 35ending in -ump often refers to roundish mass : plump, chump, rump hump lumpbump stump, perhaps even dump and mumps. 35Ullman 1962: transparent vs opaque words, "male giraffe" vs "stallion"doorman vs axe. But does a scredriver "drive" screws? spanner - obsoletesense of span.heavy smoker = "heavy smoke"+er, not heavy+smoker; similarly "good singer","criminal lawyer" etc ياليت احد يشرح لي