chapter 5 semantics.ppt

Lecture 5 Semantics
Presented by: Zhang Mingfang
Dept. of Foreign Languages, HEBUST
I. What is semantics?
Semantics can be simply defined as the study of meaning.
A semanticist examines the meaning of words as well as the meaning of whole sentences.
What is meaning in your view?
Question: Could you please tell me the meaning of “piano”?
1) This is a piano.
2) a large musical instrument played by pressing narrow black or white bars which cause small hammers to hit wire strings
3) a kind of musical instrument that can produce musical sounds
4) 钢琴
II. Some views concerning  the study of meaning
1. The naming theory
According to the ancient Greek scholar Plato, the linguistic forms or symbols, in other words, the words used in a language are simply labels of the objects they stand for. So words are just names or labels for things.
II. Some views concerning  the study of meaning
2. Conceptualism or mentalism (概念主义\心理主义) (P107-109)
This conceptualist view has been held by some philosophers and linguists from ancient times.
This view holds that there is no direct link between a linguistic form and what it refers to (., between language and the real world); rather, in the interpretation of meaning they are linked through the mediation of concepts in the mind.
The classic semantic triangle suggested
by Ogden and Richards
Concept
(thought or reference)
Word
(symbol or form)
Thing
(referent)
For example, The word “bird" is directly associated with a certain concept in our mind, ., what a “bird" is like, the conceptual meaning of a bird is a two legged, winged, egg-laying warm-blooded creature with a beak. but it is not directly linked to that particular bird mentioned in the sentence "The bird over there looks beautiful.” Thus, the symbol or a word signifies "things" by virtue of the concept associated with the form of the word in the minds of the speaker of the language; and the concept looked at from this point of view is the meaning of the word