SEMANTICS

CHAPTER 1:
WORD MEANING

1. Semantic features
Semantic features are “the smallest units of meaning in a
word.” We identify the meaning of a word by its semantic features.
SOME EXAMPLES:
- Child: [+human], [−mature], [±male], [+innocent]
- Aunt: [+human], [±mature], [+female], [+father’s/mother’s
sister (-in-law)]
- Hen: [+animate], [+bird], [+fowl], [+fully grown], [+female]
- Oak (-tree): [+plant], [+deciduous tree], [+tough hard wood]
- Flower: [+part of a plant], [+colored], [+usually good-
smelling], [+bloom/blossom], [+fruit or seed is developed]
- Palm: [+part of a hand], [+inner surface], [+between the wrist
and the fingers]
- Palm (-tree): [+plant], [+tree] [−branches] [+a mass of large
wide leaves at the top], [+in warm or tropical climates]
- Bachelor: [+human], [+mature], [+male], [+stay single]
- Actress: [+human], [+female], [+professionally artistic],
[+perform a role]
- Plod: [+motion], [+walk], [+slowly and laboriously]
- Ewe: [+animate], [+sheep], [+fully grown], [+female],
[+producing wool and meat]
- Fly: [+motion], [+through air or space], [+fast], [+wings or a
means of transport]
- Fly: [+animate], [+insect], [+two wings], [+in and around
houses]
- Stallion: [+animate], [+horse], [+fully grown], [+male], [+for
breeding]
- Police officer: [+human], [±male], [+member of the police
force], [+disciplined]
- Beauty: [+attractive feature], [+combination of shape, color,
behavior, etc.], [+giving pleasure to senses]
- Imagine: [+mental state], [+form a concept or an image],
[+thoughtfulness]
 - Doe: [+animate], [+deer, reindeer, rabbit or hare], [+fully
grown], [+female]
- Drive: [+motion], [+operate/direct], [+related to a vehicle]
- Home: [+thing], [+place for human habitation], [+closely
related to a family or its life]
- Elm: [+plant], [+deciduous tree], [+large rough-edged leaves],
[+tough hard wood]
- Chalk: [+thing], [+limestone], [+soft], [+white or colored],
[+for writing or drawing]
- Rose: [+plant], [+bush/shrub], [+sweet-smelling flowers],
[+different colors, usually pinkish or red], [+thorns], [+symbol
for love]
- Chick: [+animate], [+bird], [+fowl], [−fully grown], [±male]
- Pap: [+thing], [+food], [+soft or semi-liquid], [+for babies or
invalids]
- Tiptoe: [+motion], [+walk], [+on toes], [+silently]
- Pine(-tree): [+plant], [+evergreen tree], [+needle-shaped
leaves], [+pale soft wood]
- Owe: [+state], [+be in debt], [+obligation/duty], [+pay/repay]
- Computer: [+thing], [+electric/electronic device],
[+storing/processing data], [+making calculations],
[+controlling machinery]
- Honesty: [+abstract notion], [+virtue], [+trustfulness], [+hard
to evaluate]
- Maid: [+human], [+mature], [+female], [+servant]
- Spinster: [+human], [+mature], [+female], [+stay single]
2. Semantics fields
A semantic field is “the organization of related words and
expressions into a system which shows their relationship to one
another. A semantic field can also be defined as “a set of words with
identifiable semantic affinities.
Example:
- kinship terms: father, mother, brother, sister, uncle, aunt, etc.
- adjectives describing human emotional states: angry, sad, happy,
exuberant, depressed, afraid, etc.
- drinking vessels: cup, mug, tumbler, wine glass, beer glass, etc.
- Types of fruit: apples, oranges, grapes, bananas, pears, plums,
etc.
- Pieces of furniture: seats, tables, beds, storage, etc.
- Terms of color: blue, red, yellow, green, black, white, etc.
- Ways of cooking: stew, boil, fry, steam, roast, grill, smoke, etc.
- Ways of looking: gaze, glance, peer, squint, stare, etc.
 - Ways in which a liquid escapes from its container: drip, leak,
ooze, run, seep, etc.
- Articles of clothing: shirts, socks, hats, coats, shorts, trousers, etc.
- Ways of walking: amble, limp, tiptoe, plod, trudge, stomp, stump,
tramp, etc.
- Items that form pairs of antonyms: long/short,
forward(s)/backward(s), in/out, beginning/end, lend/borrow, etc.
- Terms describing people whose weight is below normal: thin,
bony, skinny, scrawny, underweight, emaciated, slender, slim,
etc.
- Items that form pairs of antonyms: long/short, light/heavy,
alive/dead, love/hate, approve/disapprove, approve/disapprove,
begin/end, inside/outside, upstairs/downstairs, etc.
- Items that form pairs or trios of synonyms:
smart/bright/intelligent, conserve/preserve/safeguard,
fix/repair/mend, kind/sort/type/variety, happy/glad, etc.
- Do the housework: clean the rooms, do the washing, iron the
clothes, get the food, prepare a meal, wash up, etc.
- Do research: make hypotheses, collect data, analyze data, get
results, and come to conclusions.
- Male: waiter, tiger, actor, host, landlord, sir, etc.
- Female: waitress, tigress, actress, hostess, landlady, madam, etc.
- Age: grown-ups, adults, elderly people, middle-aged people,
teenagers, children, infants, babies, etc.
3. Lexical gaps
“The absence of a word in a particular place in a lexical field of
a language” is called a lexical gap.

4. Denotation and connotation

The denotation of a word is the core, central or referential
meaning of the word found in a dictionary.
The connotation of a word is the additional meaning that the
word has beyond its denotative meaning.
 Some English words usually have positive connotations (+);
others usually have neutral connotations (∅); still others usually have
negative connotations (-):
- mother/mom (+), woman (∅), witch (−);

- father/dad (+), man (∅), the old man (−);

- slender (+), thin (∅), skinny (−);

- plump (+), overweight (∅), fat (−).

5. Multiple senses of lexical items
- Primary meaning vs. secondary meaning:
+ The primary meaning of a word (or, to be more precise, a
lexical item) is the first meaning or usage that the word will
suggest to most people when it is said in isolation.
+ Secondary meanings of a word are the meanings besides its
primary meaning. They are said to be not central but peripheral.
In addition, secondary meanings of a word are context-bound
whereas its primary meaning is not.
- Literal meaning vs. figurative meaning:
+“The basic or usual meaning of a word” is usually referred to as
its literal meaning.
+ The figurative meaning of a word is different from its usual
(literal) meaning and creates vivid mental images to readers or
listeners.

CHAPTER 2:
SENTENCES, UTTERANCES, AND
PROPOSITIONS

1. Utterances
An UTTERANCE is any stretch of talk, by one person,
before and after which there is silence on the part of that
person. An utterance is a USE by a particular speaker, on a
particular occasion, of a piece of language, such as a
sequence of sentences, or a single phrase, or even a single
word.
An utterance was in a particular accent.
Utterances are physical events. Events are ephemeral.
Utterances die on the wind.
2. Sentence
A SENTENCE is neither a physical event nor a physical
object. It is, conceived abstractly, a string of words put
together by the grammatical rules of a language. A sentence
can be thought of as the IDEAL string of words behind
various realizations in utterances and inscriptions.
A SENTENCE is a grammatically complete string of
words expressing a complete thought.
3. Proposition
A PROPOSITION is that part of the meaning of the
utterance of a declarative sentence that describes some state
of affairs.
In uttering a declarative sentence a speaker typically
asserts a proposition.
The notion of truth can be used to decide whether two
sentences express different propositions.
 If there is any conceivable set of circumstances in which
one sentence is true, while the other is false, we can be sure
that they express different propositions.
True propositions correspond to facts, in the ordinary
sense of the word fact. False propositions do not correspond
to facts.
Propositions are clearly involved in the meanings of other
types of sentences, such as interrogatives, used to ask
questions, and imperatives, used to convey orders.
By uttering a simple interrogative or imperative, a
speaker can mention a particular proposition, without
asserting its truth.

CHAPTER 3:
REFERENT, REFERENCE AND SENSE
1. Referent
A referent is an object or an entity in the real world or in the
world of your imagination, that is talked about.
Example: your school, your classmates, your teacher, anything
you can see in the classroom right now, the idealistic working
conditions you have ever dreamed of, etc.
2. Reference
Reference is a relationship between a particular object in the
world and an expression used in an utterance to pick that object out.
For example, the reference of Peter’s house is the relationship
between this English noun phrase and the house that belongs to
Peter.

* Distinction between variable reference, constant reference and

co-reference
 - When the same linguistic expression refers to different
referents, it has variable reference.
Example: In the present circumstances, your left ear refers to the
thing you touched in response to the utterance “touch your left ear”.
We say that your left ear is the referent of the phrase your left ear.
However, The same expression can, in some cases, be used to refer
to different things. There are as many potential referents for the
phrase your left ear as there are people in the world with left ears.
- When two or more linguistic expressions share the same
referent, they have co-reference.
Example:
Ex1. The morning star and the evening star both refer to the
planet called Venus.
Ex2. If we are talking about a situation in which John is standing
alone in the corner, we can say that John has the same referent as
the person in the corner.
- When one linguistic expression refers to one and the same
referent, it has constant reference.
Example: the sun, the moon, Halley’s comet , the People’s
Republic of China, Angola, the United Nations, FIFA, UNESCO,
etc.
3. Sense
The SENSE of an expression is its place in a system of semantic
relationships with other expressions in the language.
The sense of a word or a linguistic expression shows the
internal relationship between that word or expression and others in
the vocabulary of a language.
Ex1. Teacher and student have a sense relationship of the former
is the one who gives a lesson and the latter is the one who has the
lesson given by the former.
Ex2. “A dog is chasing a cat” has some sense. However, a dog is
human and has no sense.
Ex3. “The King of Vietnam is bald” has some sense: its sense is
constructed by its individual lexical components and its syntactic
structure. However, this sentence has no reference: it does not refer
to any real person because the King of Vietnam does not exist
nowadays.
Assumption.
4. Referring expression
A REFERRING EXPRESSION is any expression used in an
utterance to refer to something or someone (or a clearly delimited
collection of things or people), i.e. used with a particular referent
in mind.
Example. The name “Fred” in an utterance such as ‘Fred hit
me’, where the speaker has a particular person in mind when he
says ‘Fred’, is a referring expression.
Fred in ‘There’s no Fred at this address’ is not a referring
expression, because in this case, a speaker would not have a
particular person in mind in uttering the word.
The same expression can be a referring expression or not (or,
as some would put it, may or may not have a ‘referring
interpretation’), depending on the context. This is true of indefinite
noun phrases.
Ex. A Norwegian, used in “Nancy wants to marry a Norwegian”,
can be a referring expression or not, It depends on whether the
speaker has in mind a particular person whom Nancy wants to
marry.
If the speaker says that Nancy just wants to find a Norwegian
boyfriend, whoever will be fine as long as a Norwegian.
 It is not a referring expression in this case.
 If the speaker has a particular Norwegian in mind and at that
time Nancy and that Norwegian were planning to hold a wedding,
the speaker was invited so he/she might be meet that person before.
 It’s a referring expression in this case.
5. Opaque context:
An OPAQUE CONTEXT is a part of a sentence that could be
made into a complete sentence by the addition of a referring
expression, but where the addition of different referring expressions,
even though they refer to the same thing or person, in a given
situation, will yield sentences with DIFFERENT meanings when
uttered in a given situation.
Example: “Laura Bush thinks that ... is a genius”
A: “Laura Bush thinks that the President is a genius”
B: “Laura Bush thinks that the Leader of the Republican
Party is a genius”
If, for example, Laura Bush believes erroneously that the
President is not the Leader of the Republican Party, then A
and B will mean different things.
Notice that opaque contexts typically involve a certain kind
of verb, like want, believe, think, and wonder about.
Note that it was often in the context of such opacity-creating
verbs that indefinite noun phrases could be ambiguous
between a referring and a non-referring interpretation, as in
‘Nancy wants to marry a Norwegian’.
6. Equative sentence
An EQUATIVE SENTENCE is one which is used to assert the
identity of the referents of two referring expressions, i.e. to assert
that two referring expressions have the same referent.
Example
Tony Blair is the Prime Minister.
That woman over there is my daughter’s teacher.
A feature of many equative sentences is that the order of the two
referring expressions can be reversed without loss of acceptability.
They are identified with the intensive verb “to be”, and they
MUST be in the affirmative form, if the sentence contains two
referring expressions but it is in the negative form, it’s not an
equative sentence.
Way to identify whether it is an equative sentence or not.
Sentence: A to be B
Step 1. Identify if A and B are referring expressions or not.
Step 2. Identify if they are referring expression and they both
appoint the same referent.
  If it does, It is an equative sentence.

The ‘reversal test’ applied here is not a perfect diagnostic for

equative sentences, however. In What I need is a pint of
Guinness, a pint of Guinness is not a referring expression,
because a user of this sentence would not have any particular
pint of Guinness in mind, but the sentence is nevertheless
reversible, as in A pint of Guinness is what I need. And the
sentence That is the man who kidnapped my boss definitely is
equative, but it is not reversible, as The man who kidnapped my
boss is that is unacceptable.

7. Generic sentence
A GENERIC SENTENCE is a sentence in which some statement
is made about a whole unrestricted class of individuals, as opposed
to any particular individual.
Example:
The whale is a mammal.
The male of the species guards the eggs.
Gentlemen prefer blondes.
A wasp makes its nest in a hole in a tree.

CHAPTER 4:
DEIXIS AND DEFINITENESS
1. Deixis & deitic expression
Deixis is a technical term for one of the most basic things we do
with utterances. It means ‘pointing’ via language.
Any linguistic form used to accomplish this ‘pointing’ is called a
deictic expression.
A DEICTIC word is one which takes some element of its meaning
from the context or situation (i.e. the speaker, the addressee, the
time, and the place) of the utterance in which it is used.
2. Classification
- Personal pronoun: I, she, he, you, we, they, it/ Possessive: her,
his my, your, their, our, its/ object pronoun: me, your, him, her,
them, us, it.
- Spatial: here, there, over here,…
- Temporal: before, last time, now, then, tomorrow,…
- Demonstrative: this, that, these, those.
- Verb: go, come, bring, take.
 CHAPTER 5:
SENSE PROPERTIES & SENSE
RELATIONS

The SENSE of an expression is its indispensable hard core of

meaning.
we will concentrate on three important sense properties of
sentences, the properties of being analytic, of being
synthetic, and of being contradictory.
1. Analytic, Synthetic & Contradictionory sentence
An ANALYTIC sentence is one that is necessarily TRUE, as a
result of the senses of the words in it. An analytic sentence,
therefore, reflects a tacit (unspoken) agreement by speakers of the
language about the senses of the words in it. Example: “All
elephants are animals.”
A SYNTHETIC sentence is one which is NOT analytic but may
be either true or false, depending on the way the world is. Example:
“John is from Ireland”.
A CONTRADICTION is a sentence that is necessarily FALSE,
as a result of the senses of the words in it. Thus a contradiction is in
a way the opposite of an analytic sentence. Example: “This animal
is a vegetable”.
We pay no attention here to the figurative use of both analytic
sentences and contradictions. Taken literally, the sentence That man
is not a human being is a contradiction. This very fact is what gives
it its power to communicate a strong emotional judgement in a
figurative use (stronger than, say, the synthetic That man is very
cruel).
The notions analytic, synthetic, and contradiction each apply to
individual sentences. Analyticity, syntheticity, and contradiction are,
then, sense properties of sentences.
Example
That man is human has the sense property of analyticity (or of
being analytic).
That man is tall has the sense property of syntheticity (or of
being synthetic).
That man is a woman has the sense property of being a
contradiction.
2. Condition
 A NECESSARY CONDITION in the sense of a predicate is a
condition (or criterion) that a thing MUST meet in order to qualify
as being correctly described by that predicate.
A SUFFICIENT SET OF CONDITIONS in the sense of a
predicate is a set of conditions (or criteria) which, if they are met by
a thing, are enough in themselves to GUARANTEE that the
predicate correctly describes that thing.
Example:
Take the predicate square, as usually understood in geometry.
‘Four-sided’ is a necessary condition for this predicate, since for
anything to be a square, it must be four-sided.
‘Plane figure, four-sided, equal-sided, and containing right
angles’ is a sufficient set of conditions for the predicate square, since
if anything meets all of these conditions, it is guaranteed to be a
square.
‘Four-sided and containing right angles’ is not a sufficient set of
conditions for square. Many non-square shapes, such as rectangles
and trapezoids, meet these conditions.
‘Three-sided’ is not a necessary condition for square.
3. Synonymy & Paraphrase
SYNONYMY is the relationship between two predicates that have
the same sense.
Example
In most dialects of English, stubborn and obstinate are
synonyms.
In many dialects, brigand and bandit are synonyms.
In many dialects, mercury and quicksilver are synonyms.
Synonymy is a relation between predicates, and not between
words (i.e. word forms).
Recall that a word may have many different senses. Each distinct
sense of a word (of the kind we are dealing with) is a predicate.
A sentence that expresses the same proposition as another
sentence is a PARAPHRASE of that sentence (assuming the same
referents for any referring expressions involved).
Paraphrase is to SENTENCES (on individual interpretations) as
SYNONYMY is to PREDICATES (though some semanticists talk
loosely of synonymy in the case of sentences as well).
Example
Bachelors prefer red-haired girls is a paraphrase of Girls with
red hair are preferred by unmarried men.
4. Hyponymy & Entailment
 HYPONYMY is a sense relation between predicates (or sometimes
longer phrases) such that the meaning of one predicate (or phrase)
is included in the meaning of the other.
Example:
The meaning of red is included in the meaning of scarlet. Red is the
superordinate term; scarlet is a hyponym of red (scarlet is a kind of
red).
We define HYPONYMY in such a way that SYNONYMY counts as a
special case of hyponymy. For example, given two synonyms, such
as mercury and quicksilver, we say for convenience that these also
illustrate the hyponymy relationship and that mercury and
quicksilver are hyponyms of each other. Thus synonymy can be seen
as a special case of hyponymy, i.e. SYMMETRICAL HYPONYMY
Rule: If X is a hyponym of Y and if Y is also a hyponym of X, then X
and Y are synonymous.

A proposition X ENTAILS a proposition Y if the truth of Y follows

necessarily from the truth of X. We extend this basic definition in
terms of propositions to cover SENTENCES in the following way. A
sentence expressing proposition X entails a sentence expressing
proposition Y if the truth of Y follows necessarily from the truth of X.

Rule 1: Given two sentences A and B, identical in every way except that
A contains a word X where B contains a different word Y, and X is a
hyponym of Y, then sentence A entails sentence B.

Example
John ate all the kippers (X) entails Someone ate something (Y).
John killed Bill (X) entails Bill died (Y).

Entailment applies cumulatively. Thus if X entails Y and Y entails Z,

then X entails Z.
Example: X, Some boys ran down the street entails Y, Some kids
ran down the street
Y, Some kids ran down the street entails Z, Some kids went down the
street
 Therefore, X, Some boys ran down the street entails Z, Some kids
went down the street.
Two sentences may be said to be PARAPHRASES of each other
if and only if they have exactly the same set of ENTAILMENTS; or,
which comes to the same thing, if and only if they mutually entail
each other so that whenever one is true the other must also be true.
Rule 2: Given two negative sentences A and B, identical in every
way except that A contains a word X where B contains a different
word Y, and X is a hyponym of Y, then sentence B entails sentence
A.

Example:
Henry was not chewing a flower (B) entails Henry was not
chewing a tulip (A)

Rule 3: Given two sentences (A) & (B) both involving the word
all . The B sentences entail the A sentences. However, the entailment
from B to A only holds when the set of things referred to by the
phrase including all actually exists.
Example: All Denis’s animals have foot-rot entails All Denis’s
sheep have foot-rot only if Denis actually has some sheep, i.e. if
some of his animals are in fact sheep.

Clearly, rules stating the relationship between hyponymy and

entailment are somewhat complex, although most of the logical
principles involved are well enough understood. We will mention
one more case which presents problems, the case of gradable words,
like big, tall, small, expensive, etc.
5. Antonymy & Contradiction
- BINARY ANTONYMS are predicates that come in pairs and
between them exhaust all the relevant possibilities. If the one
predicate is applicable, then the other cannot be, and vice versa.
Another way to view this is to say that a predicate is a binary
antonym of another predicate if it entails the negative of the other
predicate.
Example:
true and false are binary antonyms.
If a sentence is true, it cannot be false. If it is false, it cannot be
true. Alternatively, if something is true, this entails that it is not
false. If it is false, this entails it is not true.
- If a predicate describes a relationship between two things (or
people) and some other predicate describes the same
 relationship when the two things (or people) are mentioned in
the opposite order, then the two predicates are CONVERSES of
each other.
Example:
Parent and child are converses, because X is the parent of Y (one
order) describes the same situation (relationship) as Y is the child
of X (opposite order).
- Two predicates are GRADABLE antonyms if they are at opposite
ends of a continuous scale of values (a scale which typically
varies according to the context of use).
Example:
Hot and cold are gradable antonyms.
Between hot and cold is a continuous scale of values, which may
be given names such as warm, cool, or tepid. What is called hot
in one context (e.g. of oven temperatures in a recipe book) could
well be classed as cold in another context (e.g. the temperatures
of stars).
A good test for gradability, i.e. having a value on some
continuous scale, as gradable antonyms do, is to see whether a
word can combine with very, or very much, or how? or how
much? For example, How tall is he? is acceptable, but How top
is that shelf? is not generally acceptable.

- A proposition is a CONTRADICTORY of another proposition if it

is impossible for them both to be true at the same time and of the
same circumstances.
- A sentence expressing one proposition is contradictory of a
sentence expressing another proposition if it is impossible for
both propositions to be true at the same time and of the same
circumstances. Alternatively (and equivalently) a sentence
contradicts another sentence if it entails the negation of the other
sentence.
 Example: This beetle is alive is a contradiction of This beetle is
dead.

Rule: Given two sentences, both identical except that: (a) one
contains a word X where the other contains a word Y, and (b) X
is an antonym of Y (or X is incompatible with Y), then the two
sentences are contradictories of each other (i.e. contradict each
other).
6. Homonymy, Polysemy & Ambiguity
- A word or sentence is AMBIGUOUS when it has more than one
sense.
- A sentence is ambiguous if it has two (or more) paraphrases that
are not themselves paraphrases of each other.
Example: We saw her duck is a paraphrase of We saw her lower her
head and of We saw the duck belonging to her, and these last two
sentences are not paraphrases of each other. Therefore We saw her
duck is ambiguous.
In the case of words and phrases, a word or phrase is AMBIGUOUS
if it has two (or more) SYNONYMS that are not themselves
synonyms of each other.
Example: Trunk is synonymous with elephant’s proboscis and with
chest, but these two are not synonyms of each other, so trunk is
ambiguous.
Similarly, coach is synonymous with trainer and charabanc (or
bus) but these two are not synonyms of each other, so coach is
ambiguous.
- A case of HOMONYMY is one of an ambiguous word whose
different senses are far apart from each other and not obviously
related to each other in any way with respect to a native
speaker’s intuition.
Example
Mug (drinking vessel vs gullible person) would be a clear case of
homonymy.
Bank (financial institution vs the side of a river or stream) is
another clear case of homonymy).
 There is no obvious conceptual connection between the two
meanings of either word
- A case of POLYSEMY is one where a word has several very
closely related senses. In other words, a native speaker of the
language has clear intuitions that the different senses are related
to each other in some way.
Example
 Mouth (of a river vs of an animal) is a case of polysemy.
The two senses are clearly related by the concepts of an opening
from the interior of some solid mass to the outside, and of a place
of issue at the end of some long narrow channel.
Polysemy in nouns is quite common in human languages.
- A sentence which is ambiguous because its words relate to each
other in different ways, even though none of the individual
words are ambiguous, is STRUCTURALLY (or
GRAMMATICALLY) AMBIGUOUS.

When it comes to structural ambiguity, you have to draw

different phrase maker to prove your answer.

- Any ambiguity resulting from the ambiguity of a word is a

LEXICAL AMBIGUITY.
Example:
We can interpret the sentence They were waiting at the
bank in two different ways because the two nouns bank — bank1,
which means financial institution and bank2, which means shore
of the river — are two homonyms.
We can interpret the sentence That robot is bright in two
different ways because the adjective bright is a polysemous word
which has two slightly different but closely related meanings:
shining and intelligent
 Thus, both polysemy and homonymy contribute to lexical
ambiguity.