Semantic: Denotation & Referential
08:26
Before I start writing this note, I humbly admit that
before I enroll this course, I never thought a language can be this precisely
examined. This includes those branches of a language’s knowledge which are
phonology, morphology or even from the perspective of semantic. With the
guidance and some examples from the video that I have watched, I personally
believe that this video can be a great medium for us to get an overview of what
semantic is actually. Therefore, I would like to share some of the interesting
facts and knowledge that I acquire from it.
First of all, we have to know that, semantic is about
how people organize and attribute meaning to words. More than that, semantic
also means the study of the meaning of linguistic expressions. For your information,
semantic can be categorized into three types which are word semantic, sentence
semantic as well as utterance semantic. As for this video, it only explains to
us concerning the word semantic. This type of semantic discuss about the
phenomenon of meaning in nature language by means of defining the nature of
word’s meaning.
In every language, there are words like “tree”, “run”
and “red” which seem to have an obvious relationship to objects and events as
well as descriptions of things in the world around us. For example, a child who
learns his native language is actually learning it in association with observable
items and situations as well as events. This simple analogy and fact can give
rise to an overly simple idea about what “meaning” is. A language is consisting
of a large number of words and each of these words has a direct correlation
with something outside of language, which is its meaning.
For your information, there is a definable
relationship between a word and an object which is denotation. Denotation
identifies the central aspect of word meaning, which everybody generally agrees
about. For instance, words that are listed in the dictionary are actually
universally defined so that people will agree on certain words. Let’s use the
word “home” as an example.
What do you think when someone said “home”? Is it a
bungalow? A house? A flat? A condominium? These might be yours answer but the
truth is that, all of us know that “home” is actually “a place where one
lives”. Thus, if we want to communicate with one another through a language, it
must be that all of us have the same “idea” or “concept” associated with each
word. To be clearer, we must first identify and understand what relationship
between “words”, “concept’ and “meaning” is. This can be done by referring to
the triangle below.
Figure
1:
RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN "WORD", "CONCEPT" &
"OBJECT"
From Figure 1, we are now know that there is a bond
between word and concept as well as object. Those bonds are specifically known
as “association”, “reference”, and “meaning”. Referring back to the video that
I have watched, it primarily explains to us about what “reference” and
“concept” are. Therefore, in this note,
we are going to explore the relationship of “reference” first before we move to
the “concept” relationship.
“Reference” or “referential” discusses the
relationships between a word and an object. It defines how people assign
meaning to the relevant entities. For example, when we hear someone said a
sentence:
“Look at that magician, he is weird”
We undoubtedly
can identify or recognize which “magician” that person is talking about without
given a hint or a pointed finger. Based on this example, it shows us that we can
actually refer or attribute meaning to the main entity that expressed by the
linguistic expression by using certain properties.
This example actually represents one of the three
types of references which is definite
reference. This type of reference is an act of identifying entities through
linguistic expressions which is categorized by certain properties. Some of the properties include:
|
Definite Determiner
|
The, our
|
|
Pronoun
|
They, I
|
|
Name
|
John
|
|
Adverb-Location
|
There, here
|
|
Adverb-Temporal
|
Yesterday, tomorrow
|
As for the case of “that magician”, the word “that”
is actually the property of the linguistic expression which allows us to
identify which magician that person is talking about. In this case, the
property belongs to definite determiner.
Moving on to the second type of reference, it is known
as indefinite reference. This type
of reference informs us how people indicate the word’s meaning without depending
or focusing on the individual features of the reference, but only on the
features of the class to which the reference belongs are relevant. This might
be a bit difficult for us to understand what indefinite reference is. Thus,
let’s look at this example.
“Many
of us do not understand what indefinite reference is all about.”
From this example, we know that some of us cannot
digest what indefinite reference is about. However, do we know the exact
person? No, we do not. We just assume there is someone among us who do not
understand this subject. That’s it. Not more than that. Therefore, by using the
property “many” which is indefinite determiner, we are actually able to
identify the relevant of reference or entity. But still, we do not know the
exact person as we only focus on the features of the class to which the
reference is belonging is relevant. Here are some properties of indefinite
reference.
|
Indefinite Determiner
|
A, many
|
|
Pronoun Indefinite
|
Everyone, someone
|
|
Adverb-Location
|
Anywhere
|
|
Adverb-Temporal
|
Sometime, anytime
|
Apart from definite and indefinite reference, there is
one more reference which is called as generic
reference. This type of reference
occurs when there is potentially referring elements such as nouns do not pick
out a particular entity but refer to a class of reference. Most of the time,
this reference is indicated by the absence of the definite or indefinite
properties. Let’s take a look at this example.
I like flowers.
I like your flowers.
I like some flowers.
These three sentences represent for each type of
references. For the first sentence, it is completely generic reference as the
referring noun “flowers” does not
indicate a particular type of flower. It solely implies flowers. As for the
second and third sentence, these two sentences on the other hand have its own
property that allows hearer or speaker to refer to a relevant entity. For
example, the noun phrase of “your flowers” and “some flowers” indicates different denotations. This can be
understood by viewing in the perspective of definite reference and indefinite
reference. Take “your flowers” for example, which it is included with a definite
determiner. Thus, it is surely categorized as a definite reference as it
informs us which flowers that person likes. While for the “some
flowers” case, even though it
indicates a certain entity of reference, it still does not focus on individual
feature. It only states the class of which the reference is belongs to.
Having discussed the type of references, the central
question that arises here is how to define these various types of references.
One of the definable ways is known as the “naming”
view. This view takes a position that the word is a name for an object
which its meaning is reference. For instance, Shila Amzah is a name for herself
and its meaning can be referred as a reference in a real life.
However, this
view seems to be lacking as there are words that do not have a particular
object or reference to be referred in a real life such as happy, hungry or pure.
Hence, we need a more sophisticated view that relates words and entities that
able to explain those abstract words. For your information, reference is only
one dimensional meaning. The other dimension is referred as sense or concept.
Knowing the fact that we already go through what
“reference” relationship is all about, we must now know that not all words can
be associated with a particular object or mental image as some words have a
range of meaning greater than any single association. This is because, “reference”
relationship alone cannot fully describe the word’s meaning as it is a complex
thing.
This is the time where “sense” or “concept” comes to
play an important role in explaining to us the complexity of meaning
association process that takes place in our mind. For example, when we hear or
read a word, we often form a mental picture of what the word represents and so
we are able to associate “concept” with a mental picture. It is easier for us
to form a mental picture for words such as “DOOR” and “CAT”. For instance, what
mental picture do we form when we hear or read a word of’ DOOR’? We might think
of a folding door, a sliding door or a revolving door but still, does our image
associated with what others talked?
We can picture all of these pictures in sequence but
not simultaneously especially when we are in a conversation. This example informs us that the meaning of
“door” is more than what is included in a single image. Apart from that, it
also indicates us that our knowledge of this word is much more than the ability
to relate them to single objects. One of the direct relationships and definable
ways on how concept and sense happens in our mind is by looking at the
onomatopoeia perspective. Onomatopoeia is a word that imitates the sound it
represents. For examples, “buzz” word comes from the sound made by bees.
However, not all onomatopoeia words in this world same. Another perspective to
be viewed is iconicity perspective. It uses the imagery in linguistic science.
To be more precise, it refers to the properties of some linguistic symbols.
Though word’s meanings are said to be designed via
concepts in our mind or sense, still we conscious based on what forms these
concept and sense take. Concepts have the status of mental categories because
they classified experiences and provide knowledge about entities which falling
to them. But what is the best way of characterizing the conceptual categories. One
of the answers would be the condition. For example, human and animal are happen
to be important to us. Thus, we identify them with full significant in our
concept. Next answer would be the prototypes. Prototypes explain to us how our
mind categorizing various entities but under one class. The best example would
be “cat”. Lion, tiger, and leopard are also examples of cats. But why our mind
directly choose domestic cat as our mental picture. This is what it means by
prototypes. We, ourselves pick the most suitable entity to be matched with the
word used.
*Sorry is there any wrong with my explanations*
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