i00- /o/

Semantics is the study of meaning in language. The

term did not come to be widely used until the 20th
c€otur/; but the subject it represents is very old,
reaching back to the writings of Plato and Aristotle,
and attracting the special interest of philosophers,
logicians, and (these days) linguists (565). The
linguistic approach aims to study the properties
of meaning in a systematic and objective way, with
reference to as wide a range of utterances and lan- fr,
iJl
guages as possible. It is thus broader than the Semantics and Alice
approach taken by many logicians and philoso- One of the favourite 'The question is,'said
quotations of semanticists is Alice, 'whether you can
phers, who have tended to concentrate on a res-
from Lewis Carroll's Through make words mean so
tricted range of sentences (typically, statements, or the Looking G/ass (1872,' different things.'
'propositions') within a single language. But logical Chapter 6), in which Humpty 'The question is,'said
analysis nonetheless exercises a major influence on Dumpty turns our Humpty Dumpty, 'whiih is to
contemporary linguistic semantics (p. 107). conventional understanding be master-that's all.
of meaning on its head, and Alice was too much
Any scientific approach to semantics has to be thus makes us see more puzzled to say anything: so
clearly distinguished from a pejorative sense of the clearly what it has to be after a minute Humpty
term that has developed in popular use, when peo- about. lf everyone were to Dumpty began again.
ple talk about the way language can be manipu- use words in an idiosyncratic 'They've a temper, some o
lated in order to mislead the public. A newspaper way, as Humpty suggests, them - particularly verbs, ,i
the result would be they're the proudest- ge
headline might read 'Unemployment reduced to
semantics' - referring to a new way of counting
communication anarchy. adjectives you can do iZ
Only in certain fields - such anything with, but not verbs
the unemployed which makes it appear that there as literature (S12) - do we - however, /can manage
are fewer of them. Or someone might say in an tolerate personal deviations whole lot of them!
from the semantic norms of lmpenetrability! That's what /
argument, 'That's just semantics', implying that the
the language. say!'
point is purely a verbal quibble, bearing no rela- 'Would you tell me,
'There's glory for you!'
tionship to anything in the real world. This kind 'l don't know what you
please,' said Alice, 'what that
of nuance is absent when we talk about semantics mean by "glory,"'Alice said.
means?' said in a thoughtful tone.
from the objective viewpoint of linguistic research. 'Now you talk like a 'When I make a word do a
Humpty Dumpty smiled
reasonablechild,' said lot of work like that,' said
contemptuously.'Of course
Humpty Dumpty, looking Humpty Dumpty,'l always
you don't-till ltellyou. I
very nluch pleased. 'l meant pay it extra.'
meant "there's a nice knock-
THE MEANINGS OF MEANING by "impenetrability" that 'Oh!'said Alice. She was
down argument for you!"'
we've had enough of that too much puzzledto make
In an important early book on the subject, C. K. 'But "glory" doesn't mean
subject, and it would be just any other remark.
Ogden 6. I. A. Richards'sThe Meaning of Meaning "a nice knock-down 'Ah, you should
as well if you'd mention what see'em
argument,"' Alice objected.
(1,923),1,6 difrerent meanings of the words 'meanf 'Whep /useaword,'
you mean io do next, as I come round me of a
meaning' were distinguished. Here are some of suppose you don't mean to Saturday night,' Humpty
Humpty Dumpty said, in
stop here all the rest of your Dumptywent on, wagging
them: rather a scornfultone, 'it
life.' his head gravely from side to
means just what I choose it
'That's a great dealto side, 'for to get their wages,
to mean - neither more nor
make one word mean,'Alice you know.'
lohn means to write. 'intends' less.'
A green ligbt means go. 'indicates'
Heahh meAns euerything. 'has importance' it is only a part. Of greater importance is the study
His look was full of meaning. 'special import'. of the way in which words and sentences co-nvey
Wbat is the meaning of
'What
life? 'poinr, purpose' meaning in the everyday situations of speech and
does'capitalist' meAn to you? 'convey' writing.
What does'corneA' meAni 'refer to in the world'
THREE CONCEPTIONS OF MEANING
It is the last kind of use that comes closest to the
focus of linguistic semantics; but even this is a spe- Words + things
cial kind of enquiry. The quesrion asks for a defini- A popular view is that words 'name' or 'refer to'
!on, which is a somewhat unusual form of reply, things - a view that can be found in the pages
found more in dictionaries than in everyday sp...h, of Plato's Cratylus. Proper names llke London, Bill
that involves rhe 'translation' of the difficulf word Brown, and Daddy illustrate this conception, as
into 'easier' words. The study of the properties of do several other words and phrases - the labels
definitions is an important part of semantics, but attached to objects for sale in a shop, or those found

1OO . III THE STRUCTURE OF LANGUAGE

 on a paint colour chart. But there are large numbers
of words where it is not possible ro see what 'thing'
the word refers to: verbs such as ask or find; adje--
tives such as difficub or popular; nouns such as
consistency or tradition. In fact, the majority of
words seem unable to be related to things, in any
clear way.

Words -+ concepts + things

This view denies a direct link between words and
things, arguing that the relationship can be made
only through the use of our minds. For every word,
there is an associated concept. One of the best-
known formulations of this position is the'semiotic
triangle'of Ogden and Richards (1923,p.99):

Symbol Referent

, Ih.. T.1ln criticism of this approach is the insuper-

^,conceprs'.
able difficulty of identifyinfi The .ion-
cept' underlying a word such as iradition is no
' easier to define than the 'thing, referred to by tradi-
' tion. Some words do have meanings that aie rela-
, tively easy to conc€ptu alize, but ,ire certainly do
not have neat vizual images corresponding to every tsi.
' word we say. Nor is there gurrantie that a
dr.!6s'r!rrq.
''a
l.J.

I concept which might come to"ny mind when I use the A design by lsldore of Seviile (c. ao 555-636) The
word table is going to be the same as the one you, design attempts to show a link between a word;s shape
r the reader, might bring to mind. and its meaning. lsidore believed that the basic
meaning of a word could be found if it could be traced
back to its primitive shape. The discussion is found in
. Stimuli-+ words--+ responses the ninth book of his Originum sive etymologiarum tibri
XX which is largely about questions of semantic
Leonard Bloomfield (1887*1949) expounded a history and the origins of language.
i behaviourist view of meaning in his book Lorgrrg,
,, (1?33): meaning is somethirig that can be deiucJd
solely jrory a study of the situition in which speech
: is used - the stimulus (S) that led someone to ipeak
Natural or conventional ?
(r), and the response (R) that resulted from this
The Greek philosophers and even they change
,p..ch (s). He draws this as follows: and things - a principle ac-
, the
were the first to debate greatly from language to cepted by modern seman-
nature of meaning, from language. gut naturalistic ticists. There is nothing in
, S ---->r.... s---------+R which two main views thinking is stillwidely en- the form of the word pig
emerged. The naturalist countered, especialiy in the that bears any direct rela-
In Bloomfield's example, Jill is hungry, sees an from
view, deriving largely concern many peopl-e have tionship to the'thing'. But it
Plalo (427-347 ac), main- over the use of ceriain
' SPple (S) and asks Jack to get it for her (r); this tained that there was anin- words (to do with death or
is equally untenable to
think of language, as the
linguistic stimulus (s) leads tdack gerring the apple trinsic connection between sex, for example, p. 61), or conventionalists did, solely
(R). Bloomfield argues that you can tell what the sound and sense. The con- in the readiness with which as the result of an agree-
' meaning of r... s must be just by observing the uentionalistview,largely theymakejudgments menf between people to
events that accompanied it. However, in very many this
Aristotelian, held that about the appropriateness use words in a certain way.
situations it is difficult to demonstrate what the
ar-
connection was purely of words. 'Look at them, Such a procedure would
bitrary(565). sir,'says Aldous Huxley's presuppose the prior exis-
, relevant features of the stimulus/response are - a forms,
ln their extreme character Old Rowley, tence of language, to for-
real problem when events are not clearly visible lf
both views are untenable. pointing to swine wailowing mulate the agreement in
, in physical terms (as in the expression of feelings). were
the naturalist view in the mud, 'Rightly is they the first place. Diodorus of
And it proves even more diffitult to handle cases to
valid, we would be able called "pigs',., (Crome y6t- Megara (4th century ac)
words
tell the meaning of low,1gZ1). nonetheless supported the
yh.re people do not act in the 'predicted' way (if Only
just by hearing them. The conventionalist posi- conventionalist position to
. Jack did not fetch the apple, perhaps because of onomatopoeic words (S30), tion is nearer the truth, as the extent of calling his
a quarrel with Jill at Monte Carlo two years and
such as bow wow it emphasizes the arbitrary slaves by the names of
before). this,
splash, come close to relationship between words Greek particles!

17 SEMANTICS .