Semantics, Semiotics, and Language: Key Concepts

1. Semantics: Semantics is the study of decontextualized meaning communicated through language. It concentrates on words, phrases, and sentences.

Three main challenges in semantics are circularity, context, and the status of linguistic knowledge.

2. Semiotics: Semiotics is the study of the use of sign systems. Ferdinand de Saussure is one of the most important semioticians.

3. Icon, Index, and Symbol: C. S. Peirce made a basic distinction between icon, index, and symbol.

• An icon is where there is a similarity between a sign and what it represents; a photograph is a good example as it resembles whatever it depicts.
• An index is when the sign is closely associated with a signified, often in a causal relationship; thus, smoke is an index of fire.
• A symbol is where there is only a conventional link between the sign and its signified. Numbers and alphabets are good examples. There's nothing inherent in the number 9 to indicate what it represents.

4. Metalanguage: A metalanguage is a form of language or set of terms used for the description or analysis of another language. For example, in a grammar of Arabic written in French, Arabic is the object language and French is the metalanguage.

5. Literal Meanings: Literal meaning uses words exactly according to their conventionally accepted meanings or denotation, out of context.

6. Semantics and Pragmatics: Semantics and pragmatics are terms that denote related and complementary fields of study, both concerning the transmission of meaning through language.

While semantics deals with the relations of signs to the objects to which the signs are applicable and the meaning abstracted away from users, pragmatics deals with the relation of signs to interpreters or, in other words, the meaning described in relation to speakers.

7. Langue and Parole by Saussure: Langue (French, meaning "language") involves the principles of language, without which no meaningful utterance is possible. Parole (meaning "speaking") refers to the concrete instances of the use of langue. This is the individual, personal phenomenon of language as a series of speech acts made by a linguistic subject.

8. Ogden and Richards' Model of the Sign:

9. Saussure's Model of the Sign:

Difference between one and the other:

The "Saussurean egg" and the "Semiotic triangle" still exclude the speaker and the hearer. Thus, both are non-pragmatic. Bühler includes the speaker and the hearer in his theory, as well as extralinguistic references.

10. Designation and Signification: Designation denotes the relationship between the full linguistic sign and the extralinguistic object or referent. (A designation is a representation of a concept by linguistic or non-linguistic means.) Signification is purely linguistic and linguistically structured, and it alone is therefore relevant for structural semantics.

11. Bühler's Model of the Sign:

12. Intension and Extension:

Intension indicates the internal content of a term or concept that constitutes its formal definition, and extension indicates its range of applicability by naming the particular objects that it denotes. For instance, the intension of "ship" as a substantive is "vehicle for conveyance on water," whereas its extension embraces such things as cargo ships, passenger ships, battleships, and sailing ships. The distinction between intension and extension is not the same as that between connotation and denotation.

13. Componential Analysis:

Example:

Human - Dolphin - Cat - Turtle:

• Human (animal)(mammal)(vertebrate) (hominidae)
• Dolphin (animal)(mammal)(vertebrate)(Phocoenidae)
• Cat (animal)(mammal)(vertebrate)(felidae)
• Turtle (animal)(reptile)(invertebrate)(Testudines)

Using binary features:

• Human (+animal)(+mammal)(+vertebrate)(-aquatic) (+biped)
• Dolphin (+animal)(+mammal)(+vertebrate)(+aquatic) (-biped)
• Cat (+animal)(+mammal)(+vertebrate)(-aquatic) (-biped)
• Turtle (+animal)(-mammal)(-vertebrate)(+-aquatic) (-biped)

14. Redundancy Rule:

Redundancy rules predict the automatic relationship between components, which helps to simplify the meaning of words.

Examples:

• Married > Human
• Married > Adult
• Human > Animate
• Animate > Concrete (existing in a material or physical form; not abstract.)

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