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Introducing English Semantics by Kreidler - Coggle Diagram
Introducing English Semantics by Kreidler
Demonstrating semantic knowledge
Knowledge
Relationships between words
Meaning of the words
Interpretation of texts
Types of meaning
Connotative
Associated meanings
Semantic relations
Antonyms
Hypernyms
Hyponyms
Synonyms
Semantic ambiguity
Polysemy
Homonymy
Denotative
Literal meaning
The systematic study of meaning
General Interest
Legal
Interpretation of laws
Humor
Jokes
double meanings
Literary
Interpretation
poems
stories
Commercial
Naming products
Creating slogans
Curiosity
New words
Ambiguous messages
Communication
Ensuring clarity
Linguistic Semantics
Systematic study
of how languages
organize
and
express meanings
Scope
Focus
on
English
Comparisons
with
other languages
Disciplines Studying Meaning
Philosophy
Knowledge
Presupposition
entailment
Linguistics
Shared
knowledge
Functioning
of language
Psychology
recall
problem-solving
Classification
The nature of language
All animals have some system for communicating
animals transmit or interpret through sound
Indicating friendliness or hostility
presence of food or danger signals
with other members of their species
In contrast, human language differs from these animal communication systems
Consists of two crucial aspects
As a first point, animals can only communicate in response to a specific stimulus.
Non-human communication takes place
refers to what is immediately present
No animal can tell another about its experiences or plans
Only humans are able to talk about a large number of things.
For example about their experience, previous knowledge or their imagination.
Human language is stimulus-free
Second, while animals have only a fixed repertoire of messages
human language is creative
we are always producing new expressions that others understand.
On the other hand, human utterances are composed of interchangeable units at two levels.
An utterance is made up of words in a given sequence
A word is composed of sound units
phonemes, in a given order.
We can only conclude that it is natural for human beings to have language
A child can acquire language from family members
nor is one language more natural than another.
Language and the individual
Every child, with a few pathological exceptions
learns the language of the society in which it grows up
A child acquires the language in the first five or six years of life
the child follows a general timetable in the process of acquisition
For example:
the baby sits up, then crawls, stands and walks according to an innate timetable
the child, at about the age of twelve months
begins to imitate its parents’ ways
of naming what is in the environment
for example:
bed, doll, baby, mama
Children who can hear learn speech
deaf children learn sign language
provided they are exposed to a medium
the individual enjoys a life of being able to inform
express feelings and thoughts
perhaps to influence others in smaller or larger ways, and to learn
At the same time, language use is subject to very specific rules and constraints
Since we acquire our native language so early in life
our knowledge is mostly implicit
the linguist's task is to explain this implicit knowledge.
To describe a language, the linguist writes a grammar.
Parts of a grammar
Phonology
there are units
called phonemes which combine in various possible ways
expressing meaningful units as words
with different meanings and interpretations
Syntax
is the knowledge or the description
of the classes of words, sometimes called parts of speech,
Morphology
description or knowledge of word formation
the telling of different forms of the "same" word
