Semantics: Linguistic Approaches to Meaning

Catalog description

Semantics is the study of meaning in language. As humans use language they produce meaning in any number of ways: through intonation, through body language, through contextual (in)congruities, and through the linguistic structures used. Semanticians try to limit their study to the last of these, while always aware of other meaning-creating tools. In this course, we begin with the study of logic-based theories of meaning, examining propositional meanings. At each stage in this initial investigation, we will keep in mind how this carefully restricted corpus compares with situated language use. In the second part of the course, we will systematically build in context to approach an understanding of natural semantics, the way human beings mean.