M EA NIN G

TH E GE
L AN GU A
OF x ic a l, P h r a s a l a nd
: L e
Semantics a n tic s
t e ntia l S e m
S en
Group 5
i m a n D a lik a
Fadiah Nur
a A z -Z ah ra
Tahir
A li ya ya h ya
Fera
WHAT'S THE MEANING OF
LANGUAGE ?
the meaning of languange means
that you understand the meaning
of sentence which true or false,
that you can identify the word
like you know the differences
between a word that has two
meanings or two sentences that
has same meaning.
 The study of the linguistic meaning of
morphemes, words, phrases, and sen- tences is
called semantics. Subfields of semantics are
lexical semantics, which is concerned with the
meanings of words, and the meaning
relationships among words; and phrasal or
sentential semantics
 The study of how context affects meaning—for
example, how the sentence It’s cold in here comes to
be inter- preted as “close the windows” in certain
situations—is called pragmatics.
non linguistics knowledge
you know the kind of
world knowledge that is
needed. Such as knowing
the meaning
Nina bathed her dogs

Nina’s dog got wet

Knowing the meaning of a
sentence, then, means knowing
under what circumstance it would
be true or false according to your
knowledge of the world, namely
its
truth conditions
 linguistic knowledge

you can determine whether a sentence is

true or false, when one sentence implies
the truth or falsehood of another, and
whether a sentence has multiple meanings.
the only way to explain linguistic knowledge
is by formulating semantic rules that build
the meaning of a sentence from the meaning of
its words and the way the words combine
syntactically. This is often called

truth-conditional semantics
 Jack, who is
swimming in the
pool

Jack swimms
Knowing the meaning tells
you how to determine the
truth value.
Two sentences are contradictory if, whenever
one is true, the other is false or,
equivalently, there is no situation in which
they are both true or both false. For example,
the sentences Jack is alive and Jack is dead
are contradictory because Jack is alive and
Jack is dead have opposite truth values.
AMBIGUITY
semantic knowledge tells us when words or
phrases (including sentences) have more than
one meaning, that is, when they are ambiguous.
The sentence is structurally ambiguous because
it is associated with two different phrase
structures, each corresponding to a different
meaning.
 SEMANTICS:
DEFINITION

Language exists to be meaningful; the study of meaning, both in

general theoretical terms and about a specific language, is known
as semantics.
Semantics embraces the meaningful functions of phonological
features, such as intonation, grammatical structures and the
meanings of individual words.
Among the many examples of investigation for study within
semantics are the sense relations between words (such as
synonymy and antonymy) and the nature of "semantic features"
of word meaning (ex: woman= [adult, female, human]).
 What is Lexical Semantics?

Lexical semantics is a subfield of linguistic semantics, the

study of meanings of words. As well as the simple
meaning of a lexical unit, lexical semantics studies how a
word represents the meaning it conveys. In this sense, it
studies the word's existence as a whole. While grammar is
picked up as a child, an individual can expand their
lexicography throughout life.
 LEXICAL UNIT

A lexical unit is a single word or run of words

that creates the most basic level of a
language's lexicon or vocabulary. The study of
these units is called lexicology. The study of
the origin of lexical units and vocabulary in
general is called etymology. These studies are
distinct from lexical semantics, which
concentrates on meanings alone.

EXAMPLE: cat, traffic light, take care of, by

the way, and it's raining cats and dogs.

 Two Lexical Units

Two lexical units, sometimes more, can combine to form a compound

with a new meaning.

Sometimes this meaning is linked to both

words, but other times it is metaphor.

Each compound is considered

one unit in lexical semantics because it provides a different meaning.

EXAMPLE: He gave up smoking, once in a blue moon (metaphor).

 Lexical Chains

A run of lexical units that combines to provide

an overall meaning is called a lexical chain.

Lexical chains ignore the grammar functions

of a sentence and, in fact, remove them to
leave only the words that provide meaning. By
removing the function words, or vocabulary,
the information words can be strung together
in a chain.
 CLASSIFICATION OF LEXICAL UNIT

Classification is the process by which words are

separated from one another.
These classifications are usually by meaning or
function.

Once classified into broad categories, words are

then sub-divided within the category.

Of course, there are many words with multiple

meanings, known as polysemy,
which may fall into more than one category.
 Decomposition of
lexical unit

Words may also decompose. Word decomposition is the phenomenon where words
lose their original meaning over time. This is a separate element of lexical semantics
compared to classification because the old word meanings have now become relics
or fossils. Rather than morphing into a new meaning, the accurate words lost their
recognizable meaning, such
as in the case of old English words such as "ascylfan," meaning to destroy. Others are half-
decomposed like an atomic half-life, so people understand the meaning of "disheveled" and
"ruthless."
but do not know the meaning of "sheveled" and "ruth."
 The study of lexical semantics also broadens
out from the study of a single language. it is
also an element of comparative and contrastive
linguistics. in this sense, lexical semantics
compares and contrasts the meaning of
identical words between languages.
 Phrasal Semantics
Phrasal Semantics is concerned with the meaning of
syntactic units larger than the word
 Thematic Roles

Thematic roles are the Semantic relationships between

the verbs and Noun phrases of sentences. The following
chart shows the thematic roles in relationship to verb of
sentences
Thematic Role Description Example

Agent The one who performs an action Maria run

Theme The person or thing that undergoes Mary called Rina

an action

The place where an action takes

Location It rains in Spain
place

The place to which an action Put the cat on the

Goal
is directed porch

Source The place from which an He flew from LA to

action originates Chicago
Thematic Role Description Example

The means by which an action

Instrument He cuts his hair with scissors
is performed

Experiencer One who perceives something She heard Bob play the piano

Causative A natural force that causes The wind destroyed the house
a change

Possessor One who has something The tail of the cat got caught

Recipient One who receives something I gave it to the girl

 Sentential Semantics
Sentence Semantics (Setential Semantics) deals with the meaning if
syntactic units larger than words, phrases, clauses, and the Semantic
relationships between them
Preposition prepositions are the same thing as statements
with the definition to express by a sentence that
used make the statement be it right or wrong
about some states of external word

Jasmine is painting on canvas

Canvas is being painted by Jasmine
Jasmine is doing something to the canvas
Entailment Logical relationship between one proposition to
another

1. Paraphrasing (Proposional Synonym)

Example :
Example :
Andy killed Sara P : He love Anna
- Andy killed Sara Q : Anna is loved by him
- Sara died
2. Contradiction (Propositional Anatomy)
P : All cats are yellow
Q : My cat is white

3. Conclusion (Propositional Hyponymy /

Unindireational Entailment )
ANY QUESTIONS?

WORKOUT