语言学课后答案5

1.

conceptual meaning: This is the first type of meaning recognized by

Leech, which he defined as the logical, cognitive, or denotative content.

In other words, it overlaps to a large extent with the notion of reference.

But Leech also uses “sense” as a briefer term for his conceptual meaning.

As a result, Leech’s conceptual meaning has two sides: sense and

reference.

denotation: In the philosophers’ usage, denotation involves the

relationship between a linguistic unit and the non-linguistic entities to

which it refers. Thus it is equivalent to referential meaning. For example,

the denotation of human is any person such as John and Mary.

connotation: In the philosophers’ usage, connotation, opposite to

denotation, means the properties of the entity a word denotes. For

example, the connotation of human is “biped”, “featherless”, “rational”,

etc.

reference: Reference is concerned with the relation between a word and

the thing it refers to, or more generally between a linguistic unit and a

non-linguistic entity it refers to.

sense: In contrast to reference, sense may be defined as the semantic

relations between one word and another, or more generally between one linguistic unit and another. It is concerned with the intralinguistic

relations.

synonymy: Synonymy is the technical name for one of the sense

relations between linguistic units, namely the sameness relation.

gradable antonymy: Gradable antonomy is the sense relation between

two antonyms which differ in terms of degree. There is an intermediate

ground between the two. The denial of one is not necessarily the

assertion of the other. Something which is not “good” is not necessarily

“bad”. It may simply be “so-so” or “average”.

complementary antonymy: Complementary antonymy is the sense

relation between two antonyms which are complementary to each other.

That is, they divide up the whole of a semantic field completely. Not only

the assertion of one means the denial of the other, the denial of one also

means the assertion of the other. Not only He is alive means “He is not

dead”, He is not alive also means “He is dead”.

converse antonymy: Converse antonymy is a special type of antonymy in

that the members of a pair do not constitute a positive-negative

opposition. They show the reversal of a relationship between two

entities. X buys something from Y means the same as Y sells something

to X. X is the parent of Y means the same as Y is the child of X. It is the

same relationship seen from two different angles. relational opposites: This is another name for converse antonyms. As

converse antonymy is typically seen in reciprocal social roles, kinship

relations, temporal and spatial relations, these antonyms are also

known as relational opposites.

hyponymy: Hyponymy, the technical name for inclusiveness sense

relation, is a matter of class membership. For example, the meaning of

desk is included in that of furniture, and the meaning of rose is included

in that of flower.

superordinate: The upper term in hyponymy, i.e. the class name, is

called superordinate, and the lower terms, the members, hyponyms. A

superordinate usually has several hyponyms. Under flower, for example,

there are peony, jasmine, chrysanthemum, tulip, violet, carnation and

many others apart from rose.

semantic components: Semantic components, or semantic features, are

semantic units smaller than the meaning of a word. For example, the

meaning of the word boy may be analysed into three components:

HUMAN, YOUNG and MALE.

compositionality: Compositionality refers to the principle that the

meaning of a sentence depends on the meanings of the constituent

words and the way they are combined. propositional logic: Propositional logic, also known as propositional

calculus or sentential calculus, is the study of the truth conditions for

propositions: how the truth of a “composite” proposition is determined

by the truth value of its constituent propositions and the

connections between them.

proposition: A proposition is what is expressed by a declarative

sentence when that sentence is uttered to make a statement.

predicate logic: Predicate logic, also called predicate calculus, studies

the internal structure of simple propositions. In this logical system,

propositions like Socrates is a man will be analyzed into two parts:

argument and predicate. An argument is a term which refers to some

entity about which a statement is being made. And a predicate is a term

which ascribes some property, or relation, to the entity, or entities,

referred to. In the proposition Socrates is a man, therefore, Socrates is