Unit 3 - Reference and Sense
- 1. UNIT 3 Part 1 REFERENCE AND SENSE
- 2. T H E O G D E N -RIC HA RDS T R I A NGLE FO R M E A NING OR T H E S E M I OTIC T R I A NG LE o In linguistics, the triangle of reference is a model for explaining how words convey meaning.
- 3. In layman's terms, the triangle of reference says that a word suggests an idea in the mind of the hearer. The idea connects to a real-world object.
- 4. T WO WAYS O F TA L KI NG A B O UT T H E M E A NI NG O F WO R DS A N D OT H E R E X P RESSI ONS o Sense → we deal with relationships inside the language o Reference → we deal with the relationships between language and the world.
- 5. Definition By means of reference, a speaker indicates which things in the world (including persons) are being talked about. e.g. (My son) is in (the beech tree). Reference ↓ ↓ identifies persons identifies things • Reference: is the relationship between parts of a language and things outside the language (in the world). Practice 27
- 6. • Can the same expression be used to refer to different things? • The same expression can, in some cases, be used to refer to different things. • Thus, many expressions in a language can have variable reference. Reference Practice 28 Your actual left ear , your ‘Your left mother’s actual ear’ ear, ……...etc.
- 7. • Are there expressions in normal everyday conversation that always refer to the same things? • E.g. • E.g. • There are cases of expressions which in normal everyday conversation never refer to different things, i.e. in most everyday situations that one can Reference envisage, have constant reference. • However, there is very little constancy of reference in language. Almost all of the fixing of reference comes from the context in which expressions are used.
- 8. • Can two different expressions have the same referent? • E.g. • • • • The classic example is the Morning Star and the Reference Evening Star, both of which normally refer to the planet Venus.
- 9. The SENSE of an expression is its place in a system of semantic relationships with other expressions in the language. Semantic relationships: 1. sameness of meaning • We will deal first with the senses of words Sense in context. • Can we talk about the sense of longer expressions (phrases and sentences)?
- 10. • In some cases, the same word can have more than one sense. (T/F) • E.g. • • • • • Practice 30
- 11. • We use the term ‘word’ in the sense of ‘word form’. • (convenient to treat anything spelled with the same sequence of letters and pronounced with the same sequence of phonemes as being the same word). • Some semanticists would regard ‘bank’ as several different words (different entries in dictionaries).
- 12. • Can one sentence have different senses ?
- 13. The relationship between sense and reference: 1. The referent of an expression is often a thing or a person in the world. SENSE & REFERENCE 2. The sense of an expression is not a thing at all; it is an abstraction that can be entertained in the mind of a language user. 3. It is difficult to say what sort of entity the sense of an expression is. It is useful to think of sense as that part of the meaning of an expression that is left over when reference is factored out. 4. It is much easier to say whether or not two expressions have the same sense.
- 14. • Every expression that has meaning has sense. T/F SENSE & REFERENCE • Every expression has reference. T/F Practice 31
- 15. PART 2
- 16. Practice 31 SENSE & • Pomme REFERENCE • La pomme est l'un des fruits les plus consommés dans le monde. Produite par le pommier, elle est comestible et a un goût sucré ou acidulé selon les variétés.
- 17. Circularity: • There is something essentially circular about the set of definitions in a dictionary & defining the SENSE & senses of words and other expressions. REFERENCE • Not a bad thing Practice 32 • Often unavoidable → (e.g. cases of expressions that have no referents: and, etc.) there is no way of indicating the meaning of an expression except with other words. Likely probably In all potentially likelihood possibly
- 18. • There is something semantically complete about a proposition, as opposed to the sense of a phrase or single word. SENSE & • One might say, roughly, that a proposition PROPOSITION corresponds to a complete independent thought. Practice 32 Grammatically Whole Smaller complete sentence expression e.g. a phrase or a single word Sense of a Semantically A proposition phrase or a complete single word
- 19. • Can the same sense to belong to expressions in different languages ?? • I woke up early yesterday. SENSE & • DIFFERENT LANGUAGES • The Pyramid of Khufu is the oldest and largest of the three pyramids in the Giza. It is the only one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World to remain largely intact. Practice • 32 . • To the extent that perfect translation between languages is possible (a very debatable point), essentially the same sense can be said to belong to expressions in different languages.
- 20. • The relationship between: Sense & proposition → direct → similarity Reference & utterance → not so direct → similarity SENSE & DIFFERENT • Both referring and uttering are acts performed by LANGUAGES particular speakers on particular occasions. • Most utterances contain, or are accompanied by, one or more acts of referring. Practice • An act of referring is the picking out of a particular 3 referent by a speaker in the course of a particular utterance.
- 21. • Although the concept of reference is fundamentally related to utterances, in that acts of reference only actually happen in the course of utterances. • When talking about reference in connection with sentences, or parts of sentences, we are imagining a potential utterance of the sentence or expression in question. • In everyday conversation, the words meaning, means, mean, meant, etc. are sometimes used to indicate reference and sometimes to indicate sense. Practice 34
- 22. REVIEW PRACTICE P 30
- 25. Semantics: A Cour sebook by JAMES R. HURFORD, RENDAN HEASLEY, MICHAEL B. SMITH What Is the Triangle of Reference? Tower of Babel, Semantics Initiative, and Ontology Pomme – Wikipédia SOURCES - Great Pyramid of Giza