Summarize Chapter 1 LTG 202

Pragmatics is t he study of speaker meaning and how more is communicated than is said 1 Invisible Meaning In many ways, pragmatics is the study of “invisible” meaning, or how we recognize what is meant even when it is not actually said or written. 2 Context The meaning of a word is based on the context it in Physical context : the situation, time or place in which words are used Linguistic context : the set of other words used in the same phrase or sentence   Deixis: Def: using words such as this or here as a way of “pointing” with language 3 Reference Def: an act by which a speaker/writer uses language to enable a listener/reader to identify someone or something Inference Def: Additional information used by a listener/reader to create a connection between what is said and what must be meant E.g: Where’s the spinach salad sitting? The word spinach salad is preferred to the one who eat the spinach salad  Anaphora Def: use of pronouns (it) and noun phrases with the (the pup...

Semantics is all about figuring out the intended meaning of words and sentences, the meaning everyone generally agrees on. It's not about what someone might be trying to twist a word to mean in a specific situation 1 Meaning  This distinction is generally presented in terms of referential meaning as opposed to associative or emotive meaning Referential meaning covers those basic, essential components of meaning that are conveyed by the literal use of a word. It is the type of meaning that dictionaries are designed to describe E.g:  needle => “thin, sharp, steel instrument.” But different people might have different associations or connotations attached to a word like needle. needle=>  “pain,” or “illness,” or “blood,” or “drugs,” or “thread,” or “knitting,” or “hard to find” This sentence is syntactically good, but semantically odd 2 Semantic Features Def Basic elements such as “human,” included as plus (+human) or minus (−human), used in an analysis of the compon...