SEMANTICS

LIT620M

SEMANTICS
study of the meaning of words, phrases and
sentences

CONCEPTUAL AND ASSOCIATIVE MEANING

Conceptual/ Denotation
factual and objective meanings

Associative/ Connotation
associated, personal and subjective meanings

SEMANTIC FEATURES

The hamburger ate the boy.

The door kicked the girl.
The ship died.

SEMANTIC FEATURES
The sentences are syntactically correct but
semantically wrong.
Hamburger, door and ship dont have the features
that can eat, kick and die.

SEMANTIC FEATURES
Only living creatures can perform the actions of
eating, kicking, dying

animate being (+)

any living creature

SEMANTIC FEATURES
table
animate

human
female
adult

horse

boy

man

girl

woman

SEMANTIC ROLES
also called as the thematic roles

AGENT
the entity that performs the action
the entity can be also non- human
Example:
The boy kicked the ball.
The wind blew the ball away.
The storm affected the whole city.

THEME/ PATIENT
The entity that is involved in or affected by the action
The entity that is simply being described (not performing the action)

Example:
The boy kicked the ball.
The ball was red.
The dog chased the boy.

AGENT AND THEME

The same physical entity can appear in two difference
semantic roles in a sentence.
Example:
The boy cut himself.

INSTRUMENT
If an agent uses another entity in order to perform an action

Example:
The boy cut the rope with an old razor.
He drew the picture with a crayon.

EXPERIENCER
An entity who has feeling, perception or state fills the semantic role
of experiencer
Example:
The boy feels sad.
Did you hear that noise?

LOCATION, SOURCE AND GOAL

Location
Where an entity is

Source
Where the entity moves from

Goal
Where the entity moves to

LOCATION, SOURCE AND GOAL

Mary

saw

EXPERIENCER

She

borrowed

AGENT

She

squashed

AGENT

She
AGENT

handed

a fly

on the wall

THEME

LOCATION

a magazine

from George

THEME

SOURCE

the bug

with the magazine

THEME

INSTRUMENT

the magazine

back to George

THEME

GOAL

LEXICAL RELATIONS
the relationship of the words based on
their meaning

SYNONYMY
two or more words with closely related meaning

Example:
answer/ reply
almost/ nearby
big/ large

ANTONYMY
two forms with opposite
meaning
Example:
alive/ dead
old/ new

Gradable antonyms
Used in comparative constructions

Non- gradable antonyms

Comparative pairs