LIN2310

Semantics

Proposed to be offered next in 1999

Keith Allan

8 points
* 3 hours per week
* First semester
* Clayton

Objectives Upon completion of this subject students should be able to evaluate formal and informal methods in semantic analysis; gain a sufficient mastery of set theory, propositional and predicate calculus, and model theory to enable their use in semantic analysis and also prepare the student for an advanced course in formal semantics; be familiar with lexical, realist, conceptual, and cognitive semantics; understand how language expressions correlate with things and ideas, things that exist and things that don't; make semantic analyses of texts and formally represent the semantic relations between language expressions in them.

Synopsis The subject is targeted at students of linguistics and relevant areas of psychology, philosophy, anthropology, sociology, communications, language studies, and education. The underlying philosophy, is that (a) semantics is about meaning in human languages; (b) meanings are cognitively and functionally motivated; and (c) expressing meanings through language is an essential means of cementing human bonding and displaying it to others, at both the individual and the community level. Semantic theory must reveal the nature of human language by establishing its meaningful categories and constructions, and uncovering their properties, interrelations, and motivations. A theory is developed by a process of abduction and induction from occurrences of actual speech events to create a demonstrably rational account of their structures and causes. The representation of meaning requires formal tools; so there is a grounding in propositional calculus, predicate logic, and lambda calculus. The value of these tools is immediately demonstrated in the study of quantifiers and articles; and later in semantic analysis of predicates, tense, aspect, mood, and modality. Differences between sense, reference, denotation, intension, and extension are explained and we explore the importance of world (or mental space) construction to language understanding. We also review the division of labour between lexicon and encyclopedia; the effects of form and connotation on word meaning; the semantic properties and relations revealed by field theory, frame semantics, and componential analysis. Theories considered include natural semantic metalanguage, role and reference grammar, and conceptual semantics. Finally, a wide range of evidence is adduced that meaning in natural languages is very responsive to, and often a reflex of, human perception and conception. This subject will provide students with the basic tools and preparatory skills to progress to original research in semantics.

Assessment 4 assignments (1500 words): 25% each

Prescribed texts

Allan K Natural language semantics Blackwell, 1998