Semantic

What is Semantic?
The study of meaning of words, phrases, and sentences.
↳ The study of meaning in language

Semantic analysis focus on:

What the words conventionally means (decoration) rather than on what an
individual speaker might think they mean, or want them to mean, on a
particular occasion (connotation)

Concerned with: linguistics meaning that's shared by all components of the

language

Our main interest is in what we might describe as the widely accepted objective
or factual meaning of words and not their subjective or personal meaning

This distinction is generally presented in terms of:

Referential meaning Opposed to Associate or Emotional meaning

Basic, essential Feelings or reactions
components of meaning to words that may be
that are conveyed by the found among some
literal use of words individuals or groups
→ the type of meaning but not others
described in dictionaries

Ex: Needle Ex: Needle

A thin sharp steel To some people, it is
instrument associated with pain,
illness, blood, thread,
knitting
→ something hard to find
“A needle in a haystack”
Etc..
These associations may differ from one person to the next. These associations
can't be part of the world’s referential meaning.
 REFERENTIAL MEANING AND SEMANTIC FEATURES
One way in which the study of basic referential meaning might be helpful would be as a means of
accounting for the “oddness” we experience when we read sentences like the following:

→ The hamburger ate the boy

→ The table listen to the radio These sentences are syntactically
→ The horse is reading the newspaper good, but semantically odd.

The meaning is not acceptable. The verb and the subject do not relate to each other
So we identify the meaning by analyzing some features:
-
Focus on the nouns in each sentence; try to describe them referentially
2 Focus on the verbs, describe them referentially

3 Relate the verbs to the nouns.

Your simple analysis is an instance of describing the words in terms of semantic feature

Semantic features
One of the approaches to explain / analyze words

Basic elements such as “human” included as plus (+ human) or minus (-human), used in an
analysis of the components of word meaning.
Ex:
For instance: Boy (+ H uman)
→ If a noun is non-human it is labelled as (- human) Hours (+ Animate) (- Human)
→ If a noun is non-animal it is labelled as (- animate) Radio (- Animate)
→ If a noun is non-human, but an animal it is labelled as (+animate)

SEMANTIC FEATURES → COMPONENTIAL ANALYSIS

The identification of semantic features (e.g., + human) as basic elements or
components of the meaning of a word.

These semantic features can also be used to analyze how words in a language are
connected, or not connected, to each other.

You use semantic features to make sense / no sense of the sentences like :
1 The dolphins walks in the desert .
2 The king wears the crown.
 Componential analysis:

This approach views words in a language as some sort of containers that carry meaning components.
However, for many words in a language, it may not be as easy to come up with neat components of
meaning:
Try analyzing the following nouns in terms of their semantic features: ‘advice’, ‘threat’, ‘ warning’.
Thus, the approach seems too restrictive and very limited in terms of practical use.

SEMANTIC ROLES
Also called thematic roles or case roles
Looking at words (nouns) in terms of parts
Role they play within the situation described by a sentence

Semantic roles refers to the way in which the referent of the noun phrase contributes to the state,
action or situation described by the sentence.

Example: The boy kicked the ball

The action that is
the nouns preformed

The nouns in the sentence described the role entities, such as people or thing involved in the action.

1- Agent: the entity that preforms the action

2- Theme: the entity that is involved in or affected by the action
3- Instrument: the entity that is used by the agent to perform the action
4- Experiences: when a noun phrase (as the person) performs an action including a feeling, a
perception do not actually preform the action, it happens by itself and you feel it .
5- location: The direction or the place of an entity
6- Source: when an entity moves from
7- Goal: where an entity moves to

**Agent and theme are the most common semantic roles**

 SEM ANTIC ROLES
The agent is the entity that preforms the action
Agent are typically human , but they can also be non-human entities that
cause actions.
Agent

Examples:
-The students read the book -The wind blew the ball
-A car ran over the ball -The dog caught the ball
-John broke the Vase -The dog caused the ball

The theme is the entity that is involved or affected by the action

It’s also sometimes known as the patient
The theme can also be an entity that is simply being described (I.e. not
performing an action)
Theme

The theme is typically non human but it can be a human

Examples
-The students read the book -The ball was red
-John broke the Vase -The house was big
-I bought you a present -The test was easy

The instrument is the entity that is used (by the agent) to preform the
action of the verb
Instrument

(An agent uses another entity in order to preform an action this is

what we call the instrument)

Examples
-The boy cut the rope with the razor
-He drew the picture with a crayon
-The man robbed the store with gun

Note: the preposition “with” is often a clue to identify the instrument

 SEM ANTIC ROLES
The experiencer is the entity that has feeling, perception or state
Experiencer

described by the verb

Note: When we feel, hear, know, enjoy something, we are not really
preforming an action (hence we are not agents). We are in the role of
experiencer.
Examples:
-The woman feels delighted about the news
-The woman feels sad
-Did you hear the noise?

Where an entity is in the description of an event

Location

For instance ( on the table, in the room)..

Examples:
-I can eat at home today
-My book is on the table

Where the entity moves from

Source

Examples
-Mary borrowed a pen from George
-We just arrived from Chicago
-I’m just coming from the classroom

Where an entity moves to

Goal

Examples
-Mary handed the pen back to Goerge
-We have moved to our new house
-We drove from the airport to the house
 LEXICAL RELATIONS
Characterizing the meaning of each word in terms of its relationship with other words
An association between different words or meanings in a language

1- Synonym: Two or more words with very closely related meanings

They can often, but not always, be substituted for each other in sentences.
Ex:
What was his answer? or What was his reply?

We should keep in mind that the idea of “sameness” of meaning is not necessarily “total
sameness,” and it is best to think of these pairs as “close synonymous.”

Take another look at the two words ‘reply’ and ‘answer’ in the following examples:
A: Sandy had only one answer correct on the test
vs. B: Sandy had only one reply correct on the test.

There are also regional differences in the use of synonymous pairs

For example between American E and British E:
Candy vs. Sweet | chips vs. Crisps

Synonymous forms may also differ in terms of formal versus informal uses.
Ex: My father purchased a new car (formal) vs. My father bought a new car (less formal).

2- Antonym: Two forms with opposite meanings

Antonyms

Gradable Non-gradable Reverse

Words with opposite meanings
along a scale
-Can be represented on a scale, a
continuum, i.e., there are often adjectives
that fall between and around the two
opposites: e.g. small vs. big:
tiny – small – medium – big - x-large
-The negative of one member does
not necessarily imply the other:
My car isn’t old ≠ My car is new.
-We can use it in comparative
construction involving adjectives:
small x big > smaller x bigger old x
new > older x newer
-Can be modified by adverbs of intensity
“very, extremely, too, so, quite” very
quiet, so loud, extremely hard, too big etc.
Words which are direct opposites The meaning of one is the
reverse action of the other
-They cannot be graded because they
are truly opposite in meaning, i.e. if you
are alive, then you are not dead. dress undress
True x false male x female enter exit
pack unpack
-Not normally used with comparative
lengthen shorten
constructions: You don’t say: *more
raise lower
dead ? *deader?
tie untie
-The negative of one member implies the
other member (negative test): My cat
isn’t a she > It is a he.
-Usually not modified by adverbs of
intensity
-No adjectives representing middle states
between non-gradable antonyms.
 3- Hyponymy : meaning of one form is included in the meaning of another

→ One form is a kind of / type of another (higher) form

Horse> animal ant > insect rose > flower
→ The concept of “inclusion” involved in this relationship is the idea that If an object
for example is a rose, then it’s necessarily a flower.. so the meaning of flower is
included in the meaning of rose, or rose is hyponym of flower
→ Hyponymy is a transitive relation
→ Hyponymy relationship can also be found in the following forms / actions (verbs):
punch, shoot, stab > injure
bake, boil, fry, grill, microwave > cook
→ Hyponymy essentially look at the meaning of words in some type of hierarchical
relationship

Dog is hyponym Pine is hyponym of

of animal tree
'

7 7
Tree is
Animal is superordinate or
superordinate of ✓
pine
dog Pine and banyan
are co-hyponym
Dog and house are said of tree
co-hyponyms of
animal

Superordinate means a higher level terms

“a thing that represents a superior order or category within a system of
classification”

We can also say two or more words that share the same superordinate term are
co-hyponyms

For example:
Ant is hyponym of insect
Insect is a superordinate of ant
Ant and cockroach are co-hyponyms of the superordinate insect
4- Prototypes: The prototype of any category is the member or set of members of a
category that best represents the category as a whole.

→ The characteristic instance of a category ( a standard or typical example of . . .)

→ The thing that we are quick to recognize as a better example of a category
→ The concept of a prototype helps explain the meaning of certain words not in terms
of component features, but in terms of resemblance to the clearest example.

Examples:
There may be many co-hyponyms of birds (e.g., canary, dove, duck flamingo, parrot
pelican, robin, but they are not all considered to be equally good examples of the
category ‘bird’.
According to some researchers, ‘robin’ is most characteristic instance of the category
‘bird’.

Given the category label furniture, we are quick to recognize chair as a better
example than bench or stool

5- Homophones: Two or more words with different (written) forms but having the same
pronunciation

Examples:
to – too – two flour - flower pail - pale right - write. bare – bear
meat - meet pair - pear sew - so

6-Homonyms:Two words with the same (written or spoken) form but with unrelated
meaning

Note:
The meaning of each word develops separately historically; they are not related.
It is just accidental that they have the exact same written form.

Examples:
rose ‘past tense of rise’ x rose ‘flower’
saw ‘past:see’ x saw ‘ Instrument’

7- Homographs: (also heteronyms)

Two words with the same written form but with different pronunciation with unrelated
meaning
8- Polysemy: Two or more words with the same form and related meanings
(from Greek poly = many + semy = meaning)

→ One form (written or spoken) having multiple meanings that are all related by
extension
→ The relatedness of meaning is based on similarity

Examples:
with the word ‘head’:
part of the body head – of a company, a department
To head – (a ball)
the heading of (an article)
headto(v)- (aplace)

POLYSEMY VS. HOMONYMY

If we are sure whether different uses of a single word are examples of homonym or
polysemy :
We can check in a dictionary:
•If the word has multiple meanings (I.e., it is polysemous), there will be a single entry
with a numbered list of the different meanings
•If two words are homonyms, they will have two separate entries..

Of course, it is possible for two forms to be distinguished via homonymy and for one
of the forms also to have various uses via polysemy
Like the word Date

9- Word play: Something we all do or partake in ; playing with words in riddles and
jokes etc
Example:
Why is 6 afraid of 7?
You can understand why the answer is funny (because 789) by identifying the
homophones

Note: You tend to look for some existing relation between the objects to solve the
riddles
 10-Metonymy: Replacing the name of an object or concept with a word closely
related to , or suggested by the original word
-The close connection can be based on different types of relations:

Whole – part relation:

car / wheels house / roof (Give example of expressions / sentences)
Container - content relation:
bottle / water can / juice (Give example of expressions / sentences)
Representative - symbol relationship:
crown / king President / White house; Kremlin etc. (Give example of sentences)

COLLOCATION
A relationship between words that frequently occur together

Collocation is different way to look at words

It has given rise to a new way of studying words in Corpus Linguistics.
*Corpus Linguistics:The study of which words occur together and their frequency of
co-occurrence.*
*A corpus: A large collection of texts , spoken or written typically stored on a database
in a computer*
-Corpus linguists can access the database to study how often specific words or
phrases occur and what type of collocations (collocates) are most common.

→ CONCORDANCE: A listing of each occurrence of a word (or phrase) in a corpus along

with the words surrounding it.

The key word being studied is described as KWIC (Key Word In Context.)