Semantics: An Introduction to Meaning in Language

by Ronnie Cann , Ruth Kempson , Eleni Gregoromichelaki

• ISBN13: 9780521525664
• ISBN10: 0521525667
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2009-05-29
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Summary

The study of meaning in language has developed dramatically over the last fifty years. Semantics is distinctive as it not only presents a general introduction to the topic, including the most recent developments, but it also provides a unique perspective for addressing current issues. It opens by introducing readers to the study of logic (natural deduction) as the background against which developments have taken place. This demonstrates the link between semantics and the study of reasoning and how this view can provide new solutions to the puzzles that have plagued the approaches presented in other textbooks. The major subject areas of semantics are discussed, including quantification, anaphora and discourse, tense and aspect, ellipsis and context, and word meaning. The book also presents state-of-the-art research in topics at the forefront of semantics.

Table of Contents

List of figures	p. x
Preface	p. xi
Preliminaries for model building	p. 1
Introduction	p. 1
Explaining semantics: starting from words?	p. 4
Constructing a semantic theory	p. 8
Breaking out of the language circle	p. 9
The language-of-thought hypothesis	p. 9
Language and the world	p. 11
Truth-conditional semantics	p. 12
Logic, meaning and context	p. 17
Further reading	p. 21
The syntax of logical inference	p. 22
Language and logic	p. 22
Proof theory and model theory: syntax vs. semantics?	p. 24
Logic, inference and natural-language semantics	p. 26
Natural deduction: a syntactic mode of inference	p. 27
Natural deduction for propositional logic	p. 28
Conditional Elimination: Modus Ponens	p. 29
Conditional Introduction: Conditional Proof	p. 33
Negation and extending the set of conditional rules	p. 35
The Elimination and Introduction rules for ^	p. 38
v Introduction and v Elimination	p. 41
Reduction and Absurdum: a constrained variant	p. 44
Commentary: propositional logic for linguists	p. 47
Predicate logic	p. 49
Predicate logic syntax	p. 50
Proof rules of predicate logic	p. 52
Defining inference proof-theoretically	p. 62
The proof-theoretic force of the logical conditional	p. 62
The de Morgan equivalences	p. 64
Commentary: theoretical implications	p. 65
Further reading	p. 66
The semantics of logical inference: models and semantic types	p. 68
Model-theoretic evaluation	p. 68
Models for propositional logic	p. 69
Model theory for predicate logic	p. 71
Defining a model	p. 73
Set theory: an introduction	p. 74
Model-theoretic semantics for predicate logic	p. 75
Model-theoretic evaluation of quantified formulae	p. 77
Inferential relations semantically defined	p. 81
Evaluating syntactic and semantic characterisations of inference	p. 83
Type theory	p. 85
The lambda operator	p. 87
Types reprised	p. 92
Interpreting typed expressions	p. 94
Summary	p. 97
Further reading	p. 98
Quantification and plurality	p. 99
Generalised quantifiers	p. 99
Quantifiers, compositionality and coverage	p. 99
Towards compositional quantification	p. 102
Interpreting quantifiers	p. 105
Cardinality quantifiers	p. 109
Contextual quantifiers	p. 112
Conservativity and monotonicity	p. 114
Plurals	p. 119
Interpreting plural noun phrases	p. 120
Extending the ontology	p. 125
Collective and distributive predicates	p. 129
Mass terms	p. 133
Coda	p. 134
Further reading	p. 135
Anaphora, discourse and context	p. 137
Noun phrases and discourse properties	p. 137
Anaphora and quantification	p. 140
Types of anaphora	p. 140
E-type pronouns	p. 143
Discourse Representation Theory (DRT)	p. 147
Introduction	p. 147
DRS construction	p. 151
Embedding	p. 155
Interpreting DRSs	p. 159
Accessibility	p. 163
Conclusion	p. 166
Coda	p. 166
Further Reading	p. 167
Time, tense and events	p. 169
Time and tense	p. 170
Simple tense logic	p. 172
Some problems	p. 176
Event theory	p. 180
Types of eventualities	p. 182
Tense in English	p. 184
Reichenbach's analysis of tenses in English	p. 184
Tense in DRT	p. 185
Aspect and Aktionsart	p. 190
Grammatical aspect	p. 191
Lexical aspect	p. 192
Representing aspect	p. 196
Conclusion	p. 205
Further Reading	p. 205
Ellipsis as a window on context	p. 207
Puzzles at the syntax-semantics interface	p. 207
Ellipsis: preliminaries	p. 210
Ellipsis: linguistic debates	p. 212
Ellipsis: syntactic puzzles	p. 214
Ellipsis: semantic challenges	p. 216
Ellipsis as pragmatic reconstruction	p. 221
Ellipsis: towards a unitary account	p. 223
Dynamic Syntax	p. 225
The tree-logic and tree-growth processes	p. 226
Quantification dynamics and the epsilon calculus	p. 232
Ellipsis and context	p. 235
Use of context-provided formulae	p. 235
Context-provided structure	p. 237
Context as a record of parsing actions	p. 239
Context defined	p. 241
Summary reflections	p. 244
Further reading	p. 244
What a word can mean	p. 246
The Generative Lexicon	p. 251
Semantic Minimalism	p. 253
Ellipsis and criteria for identity of content	p. 254
Variability in word meaning: new avenues of research	p. 260
Word meaning as concept-clusters	p. 260
Language as a tool-box	p. 264
New directions in semantics	p. 269
Semantics and pragmatics	p. 270
Coda	p. 272
Further reading	p. 273
Bibliography	p. 275
Index	p. 285
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