UNIT 11 : SEMANTICS
It is the study of the meaning of words, phrases and sentences. Linguistic semantics deals with the conventional meaning conveyed by the use of words and sentences of a language.
Conceptual Vs. Associative Meaning
Conceptual Meaning covers these basic, essential components of meaning which are conveyed by the literal use of a word. E.g needle : thin , sharp, steel, instrument.
Associative Meaning is the idea, connection what that specific word brings to you. E.g needle : painfuL
Semantic Features
e.g. The hamburger ate the man.
This sentence is syntactically perfect : S => NP + VP ( V + NP )
But the meaning is not acceptable. The verb and the subject do not relate each other.
We identify the meaning by analyzing some features . ( page 116 : table )
Semantic Roles
Agent, Theme, Instrument
Mary wrote the letter with my pen.
a- Agent : The entity that performs the action ( Mary ) .
b- Theme : The entity that is involved in or affected by the action ( the letter ) .
c- Instrument : The entity that is used by the agent to perform the action ( my pen ) .
Experiences , Location, Source, Goal
a- Experiences : When a noun phrase ( as the person ) performs an action including a feeling, a perception do not actually perform the action, it happen by itself and you feel it.
e.g Mary saw a mosquito on the wall. saw => experiences
Mary cooked the meal last night. cooked => agent
b- Location : The direction or the place of an entity.
e.g. Mary saw a mosquito on the wall. => on the wall
c- Source is where an entity moves from and Goal is where an entity moves to .
e.g Sally borrowed some Money from Tom bought a birthday present and gave it to Sam.
Tom => source Sam => goal
Lexical Relations
* Synonymy : 2 or more forms with very closely related meanings.
e.g broad – wide , hide – conceal
* Antonyms : 2 forms of with opposite meaning .
e.g quick – slow . big – small
- Gradable Antonyms : Antonyms that can be used in comparative constructions.
e.g bigger than – smaller than
the negative of one member of the pair does not necessarily imply the other
e. g. That dog is not old. ( It does not have tome an “ that dog is young “ ) .
- Non – Gradable Antonyms ( Complementary Pairs ) : Comparative constructions are not normally used, and the negative of one member does imply the other.
e.g. deader / more dead => not possible
e.g. that person is not dead : that person is alive.
Reversies
They do the opposite of the other action.
e.g. tie – untie , enter – exit
Hyponymy : when the meaning of one form is included in the meaning of another, the relationship is described as hyponymy.
e. g . rose – flower , carrot – vegetable
rose is a hyponymy of flower
carrot is a hyponymy of vegetable
Co – Hyponymy / Super ordinate
Animal ( super ordinate ) => horse / dog / bird
Horse, dog , bird => co- hyponymys of animal
Prototypes
A prototype is the best example of a category.
Homophony / Homonymy / Polysemy
Homophony : when two or more different written forms have the same pronounciation they are described as homophones.
e.g bear – bare , meet – meat
Homonymy : when one written and spoken called homonymy.
e.g bank ( bank – of a river ) , ( bank – financial institution )
Polysemy : when one form ( written & spoken ) has multiple meanings which are all related by extension .
e. g . head => top of your body / top of a glass of beer / top of a company
Metonymy : A type of relation between words based simply on a close connection in everyday experience.
e.g. bottle – coke ( a container – contents relation )
car – wheels ( a whole – part relation )
king – crown ( a representative – symbol relation )
Collocation : the words that naturally go together.
e. g. hammer – nail
table – chair
salt – pepper
They frequently occur together.
UNIT 12 : PRAGMATICS
The study of intended speaker meaning is called Pragmatics.
Invisible Meaning
Pragmatics is the study of invisible meaning or how we recognize what is meant even when it is not actually said. Speakers depend on a lot of shared assumptions and expectations. You use the meanings of the words, in combination, and the context in which they occur, and you try to arrive at what the writer of the sign intended his message to convey. E.g. Baby & Toddler sale – Not selling children but selling clothes for babies.
Context
We have got two kinds of contexts.
1- one kind is best described as linguistic context, also known as co-text. The co-text of a word is the set of other words used in the same phrase or sentence.
e.g. I get to the bank to cash a cheque.
Bank is homonym. By looking at other words in the sentence we know which type of bank is intended.
2- another type of context is described as pysical context . Our understanding of what we read and hear is tied to the physical context, particularly the time and place.
e.g. The word bank on the wall of a building in a city.
Dexis
There are some words in the language that can not be interpreted at all unless the physical context is known. These words are “ here, there, this, that, now, then, yesterday, come “ , pronouns, such as “ I , you, him, her, them “ .
e.g. You will have to bring that back tomorrow, because they are not here now. – this sentence is vague.
You, that, tomorrow, they, here , now => these expressions are called deictic.
Person deixis : expressions used to point to a person.
Place deixis : words used to point to a location.
Time deixis : expressions used to point to a time.
There is a distinction between what is marked as close to the speaker ( this, that, now ) . What is marked as distant ( that, there, then ).
Reference
Reference is an act by which a speaker uses language to enable a listener to identify something.
e.g. Can I look at your Chomsky ?
Chomsky refers to sth. The key process here is called inference. An inference ia any additionaal information used by the listener to connect what is said to what must be meant . The listener has to infer that the name of the writer of a book can be used to identify a book by that writer.
Anaphora
- Can I have your book ?
- Yeah, it is on the table.
The second underlined referring expression is an example of anaphora and the first mention is called antecedent. “ Book “ is antecedent, “ it “ is the anaphoric expression.
Presupposition
Speakers design their linguistic messages on the basis of assumptions about what their hearers already know. What a speaker assumes is true or known by the hearer can be described as presupposition.
e.g. Your brother is waiting for you. – There is a presupposition that you have a brother.
“ Constancy under negation “ test is applied for presupposition.
My car is wreck. / my car is not wreck. => “ I have a car “ remains true in both.
Speech Acts
The use of the term “ speech act “ covers actions such as requesting , commanding, questioning, informing. We use some linguistic forms with some functions.
When a speaker does not know sth and asks the hearer to provide the information, she typically produce a direct speech act.
e.g Can you ride a bike ?
Some questions are not about your ability to do sth.
You would not treat it as a question at all. Such an expression is described as an indirect speech act.
e.g. Can you pass the salt ?
Politeness
Politeness is showing awareness of another person’s face. Your face is your public self-image. Face – threatening act represents a threat to another person’s self image. Whenever you say sth that lessons the possible treat to another’s face . It is called a face – saving act.
You have both a negative and a positive face. Your negative face is the need to be independant and to have freedom from imposition. Your positive face is your need to be connected, to belong, to be a member of the group.
UNIT 13 : DISCOURSE ANALYSIS
How language – users interpret what other language users intent to conveny is based discourse.To interpret discourse , we use correct and incorrect form and structure.But that is not enough.Because an ungrammatical sentence may convey a message , we make sense of it As language users , we have more knowledge than that.
Cohesion
Cohesion can be described as ties and connections which exist within a text. Pronouns , references , lexical connections , terms which share a common element of meaning , connectors are cohesive links within a text which give us some insight in our judgements on whether something is well-written or not.
Coherence
We need to create meaningful connections which are not actually expressed by the words and sentences. We need to fill in a lot of gaps which exist in the text. This factor is described as coherence. If there are no cohesive ties within a fragment of discourse , we can understand them in terms of the conventional actions performed by the speakers.
Speech Events
We need to specify the roles of speaker and hearer and their relationship , whether they were friends , strangers , young , old , of equal or unequal status and many other factors.All of these factors will have an influence an what is said and how it is said.
Conversational Interaction
Two or more people take turns at speaking. Participants wait until one speaker indicates that he or she has finished , usually by signaling a completion point. We have different conventions of turns – taking ; cutting in an another speaker or waiting for an opportunity to take a turn.
The Co-operative Princible
In a conversational exchange , the participants are co-operating with each other.We have four maxims to be obeyed.
Quantity : As informative as required
Quality : Say that which you believe to be true.
Relation : Be relevant
Manner : Be clear , brief and orderly
Implicature is an additional conveyed meaning.To describe the conversational implicature , we have to appeal to some background knowledge that must be shared by the conversational participants.
Background Knowledge
We actually create what the text is about based on our expectations of what normally happens.
A Schema is a term for a conventional knowledge.Structure which exists in memory.One particular schema is a script.A script is dynamic in which a series of conventional actions takes place.
UNIT 15 : LANGUAGE & THE BRAIN
Neurolinguistics, the study of relationship between language and the brain.
Parts of the brain
The brain has two basic parts : The left hemisphere, and the right hemisphere. We will first concentrate on the left hemisphere.
Broca’s Area ( the anterior speech cortex )
It deals with producing speech.
Wernicke’s Area ( the posterior speech cortex )
It deals with comprehension.
The Motor Cortex
It controls movement of muscles, when speaking face, jaw, tongue, and larynx.
The Arcuate Fasciculus
It forms a crucial connection between Wernicke’s area and Broca’s area .
The Localization View
The word is heard and comprehended by Wernicke’s area , the signal is transferred via the arcuate fasciculus to Broca’s area where preparations are made to produce it. A signal is then sent to the motor cortex to physically articulate the word.
But this is an oversimplified version of what may actually takes place. We have neglected to mention the intricate interconnections via the central nervous system, the complex role of the brain’s supply, and the extremely interdependent nature of most brain functions.
The localization view is one way to say that our linguistic abilities have identifiable locations in the brain.
Tongue Tips & Slips
• The Tip of the Tongue : You feel that some word is just eluding you, that you know the word.
• Slip of the tongue : Tangled expressions.
e.g. long shorty stort ( long story short )
or word reversals : ( spoonerism )
e.g. use the door to open the key
Although the slips of the tongue are mostly treated as errors of articulation, it has been suggested that they many result from “ slips of the brain “ as it tries to organize linguistic messages.
• Slip of the ear : A type of misunderstanding.
e.g. Have you seen the great ape ?
But the speaker said “ grey tape “
Aphasia
Aphasia is defined as impairment of language function due to localized cerebral damage which leads to difficulty in understanding and/or producing linguistic forms.
Broca’s Aphasia ( Motor Aphasia )
It is serious language disorder characterized by a substantially reduced amount of speech, distorted articulation and slow often effortful speech. They generally use lexical morphemes but not functional morphemes. In Broca’s aphasia comprehension is typically much beter than production.
Wernick’s Aphasia ( Sensory Aphasia )
The type of language disorder which results in difficulties in auditory comprehension is sometimes called “ sensory aphasia “ someone suffering fom this disorder can actually produce very fluent speech which is, however, often difficult to make sense of it.
Conduction Aphasia
It is identified with damage to the arcuate fasciculus. This time people do not have articulation problems but may have disrupted rhythm because of pauses and hesitations.
Comprehension of spoken words is normally good. But repeating a word or phrase ( spoken by someone else ) will create major difficulties. What is heard and understood can not be transferred to the speech production area.
Dichotic Listening
Anything experienced on the right-hand side of the body is processed in the left hemisphere of the brain and anything on the left side is processed in the right hemisphere. So a signal coming in the right ear will go to the left hemisphere and a signal coming in the left ear will go to the right hemisphere.
In Dichotic Listening Test, a subject sits with a set of earphones on and is given two different sound signals simultaneously. When asked to say what was heard, the subject more often correctly identifies the sound which came via the right ear. This is known as right-ear advantage. The right hemisphere appears to have primary responsibility for processing a lot of other incoming signals of non linguistic nature. So the right-hemisphere handles non-verbal sounds and the left-hemisphere handles language sounds.
It is the study of the meaning of words, phrases and sentences. Linguistic semantics deals with the conventional meaning conveyed by the use of words and sentences of a language.
Conceptual Vs. Associative Meaning
Conceptual Meaning covers these basic, essential components of meaning which are conveyed by the literal use of a word. E.g needle : thin , sharp, steel, instrument.
Associative Meaning is the idea, connection what that specific word brings to you. E.g needle : painfuL
Semantic Features
e.g. The hamburger ate the man.
This sentence is syntactically perfect : S => NP + VP ( V + NP )
But the meaning is not acceptable. The verb and the subject do not relate each other.
We identify the meaning by analyzing some features . ( page 116 : table )
Semantic Roles
Agent, Theme, Instrument
Mary wrote the letter with my pen.
a- Agent : The entity that performs the action ( Mary ) .
b- Theme : The entity that is involved in or affected by the action ( the letter ) .
c- Instrument : The entity that is used by the agent to perform the action ( my pen ) .
Experiences , Location, Source, Goal
a- Experiences : When a noun phrase ( as the person ) performs an action including a feeling, a perception do not actually perform the action, it happen by itself and you feel it.
e.g Mary saw a mosquito on the wall. saw => experiences
Mary cooked the meal last night. cooked => agent
b- Location : The direction or the place of an entity.
e.g. Mary saw a mosquito on the wall. => on the wall
c- Source is where an entity moves from and Goal is where an entity moves to .
e.g Sally borrowed some Money from Tom bought a birthday present and gave it to Sam.
Tom => source Sam => goal
Lexical Relations
* Synonymy : 2 or more forms with very closely related meanings.
e.g broad – wide , hide – conceal
* Antonyms : 2 forms of with opposite meaning .
e.g quick – slow . big – small
- Gradable Antonyms : Antonyms that can be used in comparative constructions.
e.g bigger than – smaller than
the negative of one member of the pair does not necessarily imply the other
e. g. That dog is not old. ( It does not have tome an “ that dog is young “ ) .
- Non – Gradable Antonyms ( Complementary Pairs ) : Comparative constructions are not normally used, and the negative of one member does imply the other.
e.g. deader / more dead => not possible
e.g. that person is not dead : that person is alive.
Reversies
They do the opposite of the other action.
e.g. tie – untie , enter – exit
Hyponymy : when the meaning of one form is included in the meaning of another, the relationship is described as hyponymy.
e. g . rose – flower , carrot – vegetable
rose is a hyponymy of flower
carrot is a hyponymy of vegetable
Co – Hyponymy / Super ordinate
Animal ( super ordinate ) => horse / dog / bird
Horse, dog , bird => co- hyponymys of animal
Prototypes
A prototype is the best example of a category.
Homophony / Homonymy / Polysemy
Homophony : when two or more different written forms have the same pronounciation they are described as homophones.
e.g bear – bare , meet – meat
Homonymy : when one written and spoken called homonymy.
e.g bank ( bank – of a river ) , ( bank – financial institution )
Polysemy : when one form ( written & spoken ) has multiple meanings which are all related by extension .
e. g . head => top of your body / top of a glass of beer / top of a company
Metonymy : A type of relation between words based simply on a close connection in everyday experience.
e.g. bottle – coke ( a container – contents relation )
car – wheels ( a whole – part relation )
king – crown ( a representative – symbol relation )
Collocation : the words that naturally go together.
e. g. hammer – nail
table – chair
salt – pepper
They frequently occur together.
UNIT 12 : PRAGMATICS
The study of intended speaker meaning is called Pragmatics.
Invisible Meaning
Pragmatics is the study of invisible meaning or how we recognize what is meant even when it is not actually said. Speakers depend on a lot of shared assumptions and expectations. You use the meanings of the words, in combination, and the context in which they occur, and you try to arrive at what the writer of the sign intended his message to convey. E.g. Baby & Toddler sale – Not selling children but selling clothes for babies.
Context
We have got two kinds of contexts.
1- one kind is best described as linguistic context, also known as co-text. The co-text of a word is the set of other words used in the same phrase or sentence.
e.g. I get to the bank to cash a cheque.
Bank is homonym. By looking at other words in the sentence we know which type of bank is intended.
2- another type of context is described as pysical context . Our understanding of what we read and hear is tied to the physical context, particularly the time and place.
e.g. The word bank on the wall of a building in a city.
Dexis
There are some words in the language that can not be interpreted at all unless the physical context is known. These words are “ here, there, this, that, now, then, yesterday, come “ , pronouns, such as “ I , you, him, her, them “ .
e.g. You will have to bring that back tomorrow, because they are not here now. – this sentence is vague.
You, that, tomorrow, they, here , now => these expressions are called deictic.
Person deixis : expressions used to point to a person.
Place deixis : words used to point to a location.
Time deixis : expressions used to point to a time.
There is a distinction between what is marked as close to the speaker ( this, that, now ) . What is marked as distant ( that, there, then ).
Reference
Reference is an act by which a speaker uses language to enable a listener to identify something.
e.g. Can I look at your Chomsky ?
Chomsky refers to sth. The key process here is called inference. An inference ia any additionaal information used by the listener to connect what is said to what must be meant . The listener has to infer that the name of the writer of a book can be used to identify a book by that writer.
Anaphora
- Can I have your book ?
- Yeah, it is on the table.
The second underlined referring expression is an example of anaphora and the first mention is called antecedent. “ Book “ is antecedent, “ it “ is the anaphoric expression.
Presupposition
Speakers design their linguistic messages on the basis of assumptions about what their hearers already know. What a speaker assumes is true or known by the hearer can be described as presupposition.
e.g. Your brother is waiting for you. – There is a presupposition that you have a brother.
“ Constancy under negation “ test is applied for presupposition.
My car is wreck. / my car is not wreck. => “ I have a car “ remains true in both.
Speech Acts
The use of the term “ speech act “ covers actions such as requesting , commanding, questioning, informing. We use some linguistic forms with some functions.
When a speaker does not know sth and asks the hearer to provide the information, she typically produce a direct speech act.
e.g Can you ride a bike ?
Some questions are not about your ability to do sth.
You would not treat it as a question at all. Such an expression is described as an indirect speech act.
e.g. Can you pass the salt ?
Politeness
Politeness is showing awareness of another person’s face. Your face is your public self-image. Face – threatening act represents a threat to another person’s self image. Whenever you say sth that lessons the possible treat to another’s face . It is called a face – saving act.
You have both a negative and a positive face. Your negative face is the need to be independant and to have freedom from imposition. Your positive face is your need to be connected, to belong, to be a member of the group.
UNIT 13 : DISCOURSE ANALYSIS
How language – users interpret what other language users intent to conveny is based discourse.To interpret discourse , we use correct and incorrect form and structure.But that is not enough.Because an ungrammatical sentence may convey a message , we make sense of it As language users , we have more knowledge than that.
Cohesion
Cohesion can be described as ties and connections which exist within a text. Pronouns , references , lexical connections , terms which share a common element of meaning , connectors are cohesive links within a text which give us some insight in our judgements on whether something is well-written or not.
Coherence
We need to create meaningful connections which are not actually expressed by the words and sentences. We need to fill in a lot of gaps which exist in the text. This factor is described as coherence. If there are no cohesive ties within a fragment of discourse , we can understand them in terms of the conventional actions performed by the speakers.
Speech Events
We need to specify the roles of speaker and hearer and their relationship , whether they were friends , strangers , young , old , of equal or unequal status and many other factors.All of these factors will have an influence an what is said and how it is said.
Conversational Interaction
Two or more people take turns at speaking. Participants wait until one speaker indicates that he or she has finished , usually by signaling a completion point. We have different conventions of turns – taking ; cutting in an another speaker or waiting for an opportunity to take a turn.
The Co-operative Princible
In a conversational exchange , the participants are co-operating with each other.We have four maxims to be obeyed.
Quantity : As informative as required
Quality : Say that which you believe to be true.
Relation : Be relevant
Manner : Be clear , brief and orderly
Implicature is an additional conveyed meaning.To describe the conversational implicature , we have to appeal to some background knowledge that must be shared by the conversational participants.
Background Knowledge
We actually create what the text is about based on our expectations of what normally happens.
A Schema is a term for a conventional knowledge.Structure which exists in memory.One particular schema is a script.A script is dynamic in which a series of conventional actions takes place.
UNIT 15 : LANGUAGE & THE BRAIN
Neurolinguistics, the study of relationship between language and the brain.
Parts of the brain
The brain has two basic parts : The left hemisphere, and the right hemisphere. We will first concentrate on the left hemisphere.
Broca’s Area ( the anterior speech cortex )
It deals with producing speech.
Wernicke’s Area ( the posterior speech cortex )
It deals with comprehension.
The Motor Cortex
It controls movement of muscles, when speaking face, jaw, tongue, and larynx.
The Arcuate Fasciculus
It forms a crucial connection between Wernicke’s area and Broca’s area .
The Localization View
The word is heard and comprehended by Wernicke’s area , the signal is transferred via the arcuate fasciculus to Broca’s area where preparations are made to produce it. A signal is then sent to the motor cortex to physically articulate the word.
But this is an oversimplified version of what may actually takes place. We have neglected to mention the intricate interconnections via the central nervous system, the complex role of the brain’s supply, and the extremely interdependent nature of most brain functions.
The localization view is one way to say that our linguistic abilities have identifiable locations in the brain.
Tongue Tips & Slips
• The Tip of the Tongue : You feel that some word is just eluding you, that you know the word.
• Slip of the tongue : Tangled expressions.
e.g. long shorty stort ( long story short )
or word reversals : ( spoonerism )
e.g. use the door to open the key
Although the slips of the tongue are mostly treated as errors of articulation, it has been suggested that they many result from “ slips of the brain “ as it tries to organize linguistic messages.
• Slip of the ear : A type of misunderstanding.
e.g. Have you seen the great ape ?
But the speaker said “ grey tape “
Aphasia
Aphasia is defined as impairment of language function due to localized cerebral damage which leads to difficulty in understanding and/or producing linguistic forms.
Broca’s Aphasia ( Motor Aphasia )
It is serious language disorder characterized by a substantially reduced amount of speech, distorted articulation and slow often effortful speech. They generally use lexical morphemes but not functional morphemes. In Broca’s aphasia comprehension is typically much beter than production.
Wernick’s Aphasia ( Sensory Aphasia )
The type of language disorder which results in difficulties in auditory comprehension is sometimes called “ sensory aphasia “ someone suffering fom this disorder can actually produce very fluent speech which is, however, often difficult to make sense of it.
Conduction Aphasia
It is identified with damage to the arcuate fasciculus. This time people do not have articulation problems but may have disrupted rhythm because of pauses and hesitations.
Comprehension of spoken words is normally good. But repeating a word or phrase ( spoken by someone else ) will create major difficulties. What is heard and understood can not be transferred to the speech production area.
Dichotic Listening
Anything experienced on the right-hand side of the body is processed in the left hemisphere of the brain and anything on the left side is processed in the right hemisphere. So a signal coming in the right ear will go to the left hemisphere and a signal coming in the left ear will go to the right hemisphere.
In Dichotic Listening Test, a subject sits with a set of earphones on and is given two different sound signals simultaneously. When asked to say what was heard, the subject more often correctly identifies the sound which came via the right ear. This is known as right-ear advantage. The right hemisphere appears to have primary responsibility for processing a lot of other incoming signals of non linguistic nature. So the right-hemisphere handles non-verbal sounds and the left-hemisphere handles language sounds.
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