Chapter 9 - Semantics

Semantics is the study of

meaning of words, phrases and sentences

Semantic analysis focus on the basic, literal meaning of words (________ meaning), rather than the connotations people might attach to this word (__________ meaning)

conventional meaning

associative meaning

Semantic analysis focuses on
A. associative meaning

B. conceptual meaning

B

Which type of meaning is described in dictionaries?

A. conceptual

B. associative

conceptual (basic, literal meaning)

2 approaches to semantic analysis is to view a word’s meaning as:

• having certain features (semantic features)

• fullfilling a certain role within a situation described by a sentence (semantic roles)

List some common semantic roles

• Agent

• Patient/ theme

• Experiencer

• Instrument

• Location

• Source

• Goal

What is an agent in semantic roles?

perform the action

What is a patient/theme in a semantic role?

involved in or affected by the action

What is intrument?

used by agent to perform the action

What is experiencer?

having a feeling, perception or state

What is location

designating where the entity is

What is source?

designating where an entity move from

What is goal?

Designating where an entity move to

Ex: She give the magazine back to George => goal

What are lexical relations?

the relationship between words

List the lexical relations

• Synonymy

• Antonymy

• Hyponymy

• Prototypes

• Homophony

• Homonymy

• Polysemy

• Metonymy

Antonyms can be divided into:

• Gradable antonyms: old/young, tall/short

• Non-gradable antonyms: married/single, new/old

What are gradable antonyms?

• Can be used in comparative structures

• The negative of one member of a gradable pairs doesn’t necessarily imply the other

What are non-gradable antonyms?

• Not normally used with comparative structure

• The negative of one member in a non-gradable pair imply the other member

If the negative of member of an antonym pair implies the other member, this antonym pair is

a. gradable

b. non-gradable

non-gradable

If the negative of member of an antonym pair doesn’t necessarily imply the other member, this antonym pair is

a. gradable

b. non-gradable

a. gradable

What are reversive antonyms?

Antonym pairs which each member a reverse of the other

do/undo

What are auto-antonyms?

One word that has different meaning in different context

Ex: dust

What is hyponymy?

the meaning of one form is included in the form of the other

If the meaning of one form is included in the meaning of the other, it’s a

hyponymy

flower is called a __________ of rose

superordinate

rose, violet, daisy are ______ of flowers

co-hyponyms

The most characteristic hyponym of a superordinate is called its _________

prototype

Ex: robin is considered a prototype of bird.

1. robin, sparrow, hummingbird are _______ of bird.

2. bird is a ____________ of robin, sparrow, hummingbird.

3. robin and sparrow are _________ of bird

4. robin is considered _______ of bird.

1. hyponyms

2. superordinate

3. co-hyponyms

4. prototype

What is homophony?

• diffferent written form

• different meaning

• same pronunciation

Ex: flower vs flour

When 2 words are pronounced identically but they have different meanings and different written form, they are called ___________

homophones

What is homography?

• Different meaning

• Different pronunciation

• Same written form

Ex: tear /tɪə/ & tear /teə/

What is homonymy?

1 word have different unrelated meanings.

• Same written form

• Same pronunication

• Different meaning

Ex: bank (river bank) vs bank (financial institution)

What is polysemy?

One word has multiple meanings that are related by an extension

Ex: mouth (a part of human’s body) vs mouth (river mouth)

When a word have different meanings that are related to some extent, it’s called

polysemy

2 words that have the same written form but are different in pronunciation and meaning are

homography

2 words that have the same written form and pronunciation, but have different meanings are called:

homonyms

Compare homonyms and homography

Homonym: same written form, same pronunciation, different meaning

Homography: same written form, different pronunciation, different meaning

Using a word which has close connection to another word to refer to that word is called

metonymy

What is metonymy?

Using a word which has a close connection to another word to refer to that word

The connection in metonymy can be based on

• container - contents: bottle/water

• whole-part relation: car/wheels, house/roof

• representative - symbol relationship: king/crown, the President/ the White house

Although some examples of metonymy are conventionalized, some are highly ________, depending on the ability to infer what the speaker has in mind

contextualized

Words that frequently occur together are called

collocation

a large collection of text (spoken or written), stored as database in a computer is

corpus