BA.

English language and Literature

LALI 362: Semantics and Pragmatics
Lecturer: Prof. Maria Economidou-Kogetsidis

Lecture: AN INTRODUCTION TO
SEMANTICS AND PRAGMATICS
AIMS OF THE LECTURE

 To introduce Semantics
 To introduce Pragmatics
 To explain how Pragmatics is different to
Semantics.
 To explain the distinction between what
speakers mean and what words (or
sentences) mean.
AN INTRODUCTION TO SEMANTICS
Some Basic Ideas in Semantics
 Semantics is the part of linguistics that is
concerned with meaning.
 It is exclusively concerned with the meaning
of linguistic entities such as words, phrases,
grammatical forms and sentences, but not
with the meaning of actions or phenomena.
Semantics: Some Definitions:
 ‘Semantics is the study of MEANING in LANGUAGE’
(Hurford et al, 2007: 1)

 ‘In its broadest sense, semantics is the study of

meaning and linguistic semantics is the study of
meaning as expressed by words, phrases and
sentences of human languages…Semantics is the
study of meaning abstracted away from those aspects
that are derived from the intentions of speakers, their
psychological states and the socio-cultural aspects of
the context in which their utterances are made.’ (Cann,
1993: 1).
Word-Level Semantics
1.Homonyms:
1. "Bank" can mean either the edge of a river or a financial institution,
depending on context.

2.Synonyms:
1. "Big" and "large" are different words but share similar meanings.

3.Polysemy:
1. "Paper" can mean either a material to write on or an academic article.
Sentence-Level Semantics

Sentence means exactly what it says:

•"The cat" refers to an actual cat (a small, furry animal).

•"is sitting" means the cat is resting on its hind legs.

•"on the mat" indicates that the cat's position is physically on top
of a mat (a piece of fabric or material typically used on floors).
Sentence-Level Semantics
1.Ambiguity:
1. "I saw her duck."
1. This sentence could mean:
1. You saw a bird (duck) that belongs to her.
2. You saw her bend down quickly (verb "to duck").

2.Entailment:
1. "John is a bachelor" entails that "John is unmarried.“
 ‘Semantics is the study of
the relationships between
linguistic forms and
entities in the world; that
is, how words literally
connect to things.

 Semantic analysis also

attempts to establish the
relationships between
verbal descriptions and If someone says, "The sky is
states of affairs in the blue," we check if this statement
world as accurate (true) or matches reality (i.e., whether the
not, regardless of who sky really is blue).
produces that description.’
(Yule, 1996: 4) This approach focuses only on
the relationship between the
sentence and the real-world
fact, without worrying about who
said it.
 ‘Semantics is the study of
the meanings of linguistic
expressions, either simple
or complex, taken in
isolation. It further accounts
for the way utterance
meaning, i.e., the meaning
of an expression used in a
concrete context of
utterance, is related to
expression meaning.’
(Lobner, 2002:10)
For example:

•The word "bank" by itself could refer to either a riverbank

or a financial bank (this is expression meaning).

•If you say, "I went to the bank yesterday," the context
helps us understand you mean the financial bank (this is
utterance meaning).
This distinction helps show how the meaning can shift
depending on context, even if the same words are used.
How can Pragmatics be defined?
How is Pragmatics different to
Semantics?

↓
 How can Pragmatics be defined?
How is Pragmatics different to
Semantics?

 ‘Pragmatics is the study of the relationships

between linguistic forms and the users of
those forms…The advantage of studying
language via pragmatics is that one can talk
about people’s intended meanings, their
assumptions, their purposes or goals, and the
kinds of actions (for example, requests) that they
are performing when they speak.’ (Yule, 1996: 4)
↓
PRAGMATICS?
https://youtu.be/aRLXxbE0i9Q
 ‘Pragmatics is concerned with the study of
meaning as communicated by a speaker (or
writer) and interpreted by a listener (or a
reader). It has, consequently, more to do with
the analysis of what people mean by their
utterances than what the words or phrases in
those utterances might mean by themselves.
Pragmatics is the study of speaker meaning.’
(Yule, 1996: 3)
 A and B work together. B’s car has
broken down and it is at the mechanic.
On their way home from work they have
this exchange:

A: Right…I’ll see you tomorrow then.

B: Hey, do you live anywhere near the
central post office, or do you go towards
that direction?
What is B saying? What does he mean?
Shut up!
A: Have you seen Paul today?
B: He’s at a conference.
What is B saying? What does he mean?

A: Are you going to John’s party?

B: My parents are in town.

What is B saying? What does he mean?

 Hurford et al, 2007: 2  Practice 1

[1] Do the following two English sentences mean (approximately) the

same thing?
I’ll be back later - I will return after some time YES/NO

[2] Is the answer to the previous question obvious to a normal speaker

of English? YES/NO

[3] In the light of your reply to (2), if I ask “what did John mean when he
said he’d be back later?”, would you be giving the helpful kind of
answer that I probably want if you said “He meant that he would return
after some time”? YES/NO
 Hurford et al, 2007: 2  Practice 1

[4] In asking “What did John mean that he said he’d be back later?” is
the questioner primarily asking
(a) What the sentence ‘I’ll be back later’ means, or
(b) What JOHN meant in saying it?

[5] A dictionary can be thought of as a list of the meanings of words, of

what words mean. Could one make a list of what speakers (e.g. John,
you, or I) mean? Yes/No

[6] Do you understand the question? Yes/No

 Always keep in mind the distinction
between what speakers mean and what
words (or sentences) mean.

 The word ‘mean’ can be applied to

speakers in roughly the sense of ‘intend’.

 The word ‘mean’ can be applied to words

and sentences roughly expressed as ‘be
equivalent to’.
 SPEAKER MEANING = what speaker
means (i.e. intends to convey) when he
uses language.

 SENTENCE MEANING (OR WORD

MEANING) = is what a sentence (or a
word) means.
 Mike, Annie and Mike’s cat, Felix,
are in Mike’s kitchen. What did
Annie mean?:

Mike: What happened to milk?

Annie: Cats drink cream.
Cats drink milk

Semantic Paraphrase (SP): Domestic

felines consume the liquid fat of milk.

Pragmatic Paraphrase (PP): Felix probably

drank the milk.
Hurford et al, 2007: 3  Practice 2

Read the following conversation between two people

and then answer the questions 1-8.
Hurford et al, 2007: 3  Practice 2
Read the following conversation between two people, A and B, at a bus stop
one morning. (The lines are numbered for reference.) Then answer the
questions (1) – (8).
1 A: “Nice day”
2 B: “Yes, a bit warmer than yesterday, isn’t it?”
3 A: “That’s right – one day fine, the next cooler”
4 B: “I expect it might get cooler again tomorrow”
5 A: “Maybe – you never know what to expect, do you?”
6 B: “No, Have you been away on holiday?”
7 A: “Yes, we went to Spain”
8 B: “Did you? We’re going to France next month”
9 A: “Oh. Are you? That’ll be nice for the family. Do they speak French?”
10 B: “Sheila’s quite good at it, and we’re hoping Martin will improve”
11 A: “I expect he will. I do hope you have a good time”
12 B: “Thank you. By the way, has the 42 bus gone by yet? It seems to be late”
13 A: “No. I’ve been here since eight o’clock and I haven’t seen it”
14 B: “Good. I don’t want to be late for work. What time is it now?”
15 A: “Twenty – five past eight”
QUESTIONS
(1) Does speaker A tell speaker B anything he doesn’t already know in lines
1,3 and 5? Yes/ No
(2) Does A’s statement in line 7 give B any information? Yes/ No
(3) When B says “Did you?” in line 8, is he really asking A to tell him
whether he (A) went to Spain? Yes/ No
(4) Is there any indication that A needs to know the information that B gives
him about travelling to France? Yes/ No
(5) Does A’s “That’ll be nice for the family” in line 9 give B any information?
Yes/ No
(6) Do A’s statements in lines 13 and 15 give B any information the be (B) needs?
Yes/ No
(7) At what point does this conversation switch from an exchange of uninformative
statements to an exchange of informative statements?
(8) At what point does the information exchanged begin to be of a sort that one of the
speakers actually needs for some purpose in going about his everyday business?
Meaningfulness vs.
Informativeness
 One must not equate meaningfulness with informativeness
in a narrow sense.

 Many sentences are used by speakers not to give

information but for other purposes (e.g. for social
purposes).  exchange between A and B about the
weather serves to reassure them both that a friendly
relationship exists.

 Speaker meaning can include politeness, hostility, praise,

insult, endearment etc.  the examination of these
expressions falls in the domain of pragmatics.
Hurford et al, 2007: 5  Practice 3

Consider the following strained exchange between husband and wife.

Then answer the questions (1)- (8)

Husband: “When I go next week, I’m taking the car”

Wife: “Oh. Are you? I need the car here to take the kids to school”
Husband: “I’m sorry, but I must have it. You’ll have to send them on the
bus”
Wife: (Ironically)“That’ll be nice for the family. Up at the crack of dawn,
and not home till mid-evening! Sometimes you’re very inconsiderate”
Husband: “Nice day”
QUESTIONS
(1) This conversation includes three utterances which were also used in the polite
bus stop conversation between A and B. Identify these three utterances.
(2) When the wife in the above exchange says “Are you?” is she thereby in some
sense taking up a position opposed to that of her husband? Yes/ No
(3) In the bus stop conversation, when A says “Are you?”(line 9), is he in any sense
taking up a position opposed to B’s position?
Yes/ No
(4) When the wife, above, says “That’ll be nice for the family”, is she expressing the
belief that her husband’s absence with the car will be nice for the family? Yes/
No
(5) When A says to B at the bus stop “That’ll be nice for the family”, is he expressing
the belief that going to France will be nice for the family? Yes/ No
(6) Is A’s remark at the bust stop “Nice day” a pointed change of subject for the
purpose of ending a conversation? Yes/ No
(7) What is the function of this remark of A’s?
(8) When the husband uses these same words about the weather, above, what
does he mean by it?
Hurford et al, 2007: 5  Practice 3
The same utterances can carry different
meaning when used by different people on
different situations.

 Once a person has mastered the stable

meanings of words and sentences as defined
by the language system, he can then grasp
the different conversational and social uses
that they can be put to.
 It is possible for a speaker to convey a
quite intelligible intention by using a
sentence whose literal meaning is
contradictory or non-sensical.
 LEVELS OF MEANING

Notion of meaning – has to be broken down into

different levels at which we interpret words and
sentences.

LEVELS OF MEANING

EXPRESSION MEANING
UTTERANCE MEANING COMMUNICATIVE MEANING
EXPRESSION MEANING
‘I don’t need your bicycle’

 A characteristic semantic question is: ‘What is

the meaning of this sentence?’
 Uncovering the knowledge of the meanings of
words and sentences and revealing its nature
are the central objectives of semantics.
EXPRESSION MEANING
‘I don’t need your bicycle’
↓
Meaning of words:
- What is the meaning of the verb ‘need’?
[Don’t: auxiliary verb/ need: full verb]
[used with direct object  i.e. bicycle]
‘need’ = require
‘bicycle’ = vehicle with two wheels and without a motor.
- ‘need’ and ‘bicycle’: the main carriers of information –
CONTENT WORDS
EXPRESSION MEANING
 All the other elements: FUNCTION WORDS (articles,
pronouns, prepositions, conjunctions).
 What is the meaning of ‘I’? – reference to the speaker
 What is the meaning of ‘you’? – reference to one or
more addressees.
• What is the meaning of ‘don’t’?
 negates the verb ‘need’ – turns what the verb means
into its contrary
 – it contributes present tense.
EXPRESSION MEANING
 An attempt to determine the meaning of each word in the
sentence.
 If we put the pieces together , we can describe the meaning
of the sentence = ‘for the speaker, the two wheeled
vehicle of the addressee(s) is not necessary, or very
important, at the time when this is being uttered’.
 The sentence leaves open who the speaker is, who the
addressee(s) is/are, the time referred to and which bicycle.
 The meanings of words, phrases and sentence, taken out of
any particular context, constitute the level of meaning called
‘EXPRESSION MEANING’
UTTERANCE MEANING
 1 August 1996, morning. Mary has been planning a
trip to town that afternoon. Two days before, she
talked with her neighbour John about the trip and
asked him to lend her his bike for the trip. She had
lent her car to her daughter and did not know if she
would get it back in time. Meanwhile her daughter is
back and has returned Mary’s car. Mary is talking
with John on her mobile, telling him, embedded
within the usual small talk: ‘I don’t need your bicycle;.
 Upon this context, the utterance acquires concrete
meaning.
 Fixed references: ‘I’  Mary,
‘your’  John, fixed time reference
 Utterance meaning: comes about when a sentence with its
meaning is used in a concrete context.
 Central notion – the notion of truth
 Utterance meaning = the meaning that results from
using an expression in a given context of utterance.;
fixed reference and truth value.
COMMUNICATIVE MEANING
 What does the speaker intend with the utterance?
 What does the speaker want from me?
 The same utterance can carry several meanings:
e.g., a request, a statement, a refusal of an offer
etc. (Speech Act theory)
 COMMUNICATIVE MEANING: the meaning of
an utterance as a communicative act in a given
social setting.
 Communicative meaning lies outside the scope of
semantics – central concern of pragmatics.
Reading

 Hurford J., Heasley B. and Smith M. (2007)

‘Semantics a Coursebook’ . Cambridge
University Press. (Unit 1)
Additional Optional Reading

 Cann, R. (1993) Formal semantics: An introduction.

Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
 Lobner, S. (2002) Understanding Semantics. Hodder
Arnold, Oxford University Press.
 Yule, G. (1996). Pragmatics. Oxford University Press.