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Analyzing Meaning - An Introduction to Semantics and Pragmatics

This book provides an introduction to the study of meaning in human language, from a linguistic perspective. It covers a fairly broad range of topics, including lexical semantics, compositional semantics, and pragmatics. The chapters are organized into six units: (1) Foundational concepts; (2) Word meanings; (3) Implicature (including indirect speech acts); (4) Compositional semantics; (5) Modals, conditionals, and causation; (6) Tense & aspect.

Linguistics Social Sciences

Author: Paul Kroeger
Publisher: Dallas International University
Source: LibreTexts
License: CC BY
Language: EN
Category: Basic Sciences

Read online Download PDF (open licence)

Contents· 157 sections

01: The meaning of meaning
1.01: Semantics and Pragmatics
1.02: Three levels of meaning
1.03: Relation between form and meaning
1.04: What does mean mean
1.05: Saying meaning and doing
1.06: More lies ahead (a roadmap)
02: Referring denoting and expressing
2.01: Talking about the world
2.02: Denotational semantics vs. cognitive semantics
2.03: Types of referring expressions
2.04: Sense vs. Denotation
2.05: Ambiguity
2.06: Expressive meaning- Ouch and oops
2.07: Conclusion
03: Truth and inference
3.01: Truth as a guide to sentence meaning
3.02: Analytic sentences synthetic sentences and contradictions
3.03: Meaning relations between propositions
3.04: Presupposition
3.05: Conclusion
04: The Logic of Truth
4.01: What logic can do for you
4.02: Valid patterns of inference
4.03: Propositional logic
4.04: Predicate logic
4.05: Conclusion
05: Word Senses
5.01: Introduction to Word Senses
5.02: Word meanings as construals of external reality
5.03: Lexical ambiguity
5.04: Context-dependent extensions of meaning
5.05: Facets of meaning
5.06: Conclusion
06: Lexical sense relations
6.01: Meaning relations between words
6.02: Identifying Sense Relations
6.03: Defining words in terms of sense relations
6.04: Conclusion
07: Components of lexical meaning
7.01: Introduction
7.02: Lexical entailments
7.03: Selectional restrictions
7.04: Componential analysis
7.05: Verb meanings
7.06: Conclusion
08: Grices theory of Implicature
8.01: Sometimes we mean more than we say
8.02: Conversational implicatures
8.03: Grices Maxims of Conversation
8.04: Types of implicatures
8.05: Distinguishing features of conversational implicatures
8.06: How to tell one kind of inference from another
8.07: Conclusion
09: Pragmatic inference after Grice
9.01: Introduction
9.02: Meanings of English words vs. logical operators
9.03: Explicatures- bridging the gap between what is said vs. what is implicated
9.04: Implicatures and the semantics
9.4.01: Implicatures and the semantics pragmatics boundary
9.05: Conclusion
10: Indirect Speech Acts
10.01: Introduction
10.02: Performatives
10.03: Indirect speech acts
10.04: Indirect speech acts across languages
10.05: Conclusion
11: Conventional implicature and use-conditional meaning
11.01: Introduction
11.02: Distinguishing truth-conditional vs. use-conditional meaning
11.03: Japanese Honorifics
11.04: Korean speech style markers
11.05: Other ways of marking politeness
11.06: Discourse particles in German
11.07: Conclusion
12: How meanings are composed
12.01: Introduction
12.02: Two simple examples
12.03: Frege on compositionality and substitutivity
12.04: Propositional attitudes
12.05: De dicto vs. de re ambiguity
12.06: Conclusion
13: Modeling Compositionality
13.01: Introduction
13.02: Why a model might be useful
13.03: Basic concepts in set theory
13.04: Truth relative to a model
13.05: Rules of interpretation
13.06: Conclusion
14: Quantifiers
14.01: Introduction
14.02: Quantifiers as relations between sets
14.03: Quantifiers in logical form
14.04: Two types of quantifiers
14.05: Scope ambiguities
14.06: Conclusion
15: Intensional Contexts
15.01: Introduction
15.02: When substitutivity fails
15.03: Non-intersective adjectives
15.04: Other intensional contexts
15.05: Subjunctive mood as a marker of intensionality
15.06: Defining functions via lambda abstraction
15.07: Conclusion
16: Modality
16.01: 16.1 Possibility and necessity
16.02: The range of modal meanings- strength vs. type of modality
16.03: Modality as quantification over possible worlds
16.04: Cross-linguistic variation
16.05: On the nature of epistemic modality
16.06: Conclusion
17: Evidentiality
17.01: Markers that indicate the speakers source of information
17.02: Some common types of evidential systems
17.03: Evidentiality and epistemic modality
17.04: 17.4 Distinguishing evidentiality from tense and modality
17.05: Two types of evidentials
17.06: Conclusion
18: Because
18.01: Introduction
18.02: Because as a two-place operator
18.03: Use-conditional because
18.04: Structural issues- co-ordination vs. subordination
18.05: Two words for because in German
18.06: Conclusion
19: Conditionals
19.01: Conditionals and modals
19.02: Four uses of if
19.03: Degrees of Hypotheticality
19.04: English if vs. material implication
19.05: If as a restrictor
19.06: Counterfactual conditionals
19.07: Speech Act conditionals
19.08: Conclusion
20: Aspect and Aktionsart
20.01: Introduction
20.2: Situation type (Aktionsart)
20.03: Time of speaking time of situation and topic time
20.04: Grammatical Aspect ( viewpoint aspect)
20.05: Interactions between situation type (Aktionsart) and grammatical aspect
20.06: Aspectual sensitivity and coercion effects
20.07: Conclusion
21: Tense
21.01: Introduction
21.02: Tense relates Topic Time to the Time of Utterance
21.03: Case study- English simple present tense
21.04: Relative tense
21.05: Temporal Remoteness markers (metrical tense)
21.06: Conclusion
22: Varieties of the Perfect
22.01: Introduction- perfect vs. perfective
22.02: Uses of the perfect
22.03: Tense vs. aspect uses of English have participle
22.04: Arguments for polysemous aspectual senses of the English Perfect
22.05: Case study- Perfect aspect in Barain (Chadic)
22.06: Case study- Experiential -guo in Mandarin
22.07: Conclusion