PREREQUISITES

Students should have an ability to follow formal analyses, and they should thus have taken a serious introduction to formal logic or to formal semantics, or have significant experience with mathematical theories. If in doubt, please check with the instructors.

COMMUNICATION

About any topic: write to us early in case of doubt.

We will communicate through this website and by e-mail. Be sure to be officially registered for the class so that we have your address.

Material for the class (readings, slides) will either (i) be linked to the sessions below, or (ii) be made available in this Dropbox folder.

Honor Code To foster learning and discussion, students are discouraged from using phones, tablets or laptops during class, unless this is solely to take notes and/or follow the pdf slides as they are presented (with all other applications closed).
[Summary of some data on this topic]
[Effects of laptop multitasking on users and nearby students]

REQUIREMENTS

All details about the requirements are available in this document. Below is just a short version of it.

Topic first: Participants are invited to work on small projects (e.g., literature reviews, formal analyses of a set of phenomena, proposals for experiments). The first task is always the choice of a topic in Super semantics - please discuss possible topics with the instructors as early as possible.

Assessment: 

• Between 1 and 3 homework about classes will be given

• Squib

  • Nov 18th: confirm your topic by email to all instructors

  • Dec 7th: Send your squib by email to all instructors

DEADLINE EXTENSION: Dec 11th.

• Mini-term paper

  • Dec 21st: confirm your topic by email to all instructors

  • Jan 31st, 5pm: send your term paper by email to all instructors

The squib could be the building up of the final mini-paper.

Individual & group work: You are encouraged to get feedback on your work not just from the instructors but also from one or several students. (If so, please indicate which other student(s) you discussed your work with.) You may also work in groups of up to three participants, please discuss this option with us.

Academic credit: Students should not get double academic credit for the same work. If you are pursuing a project you started in another academic context, please (i) make an explicit note of this, and (ii) indicate what is new in the current version.

Logistics: All materials should be submitted by email to all three instructors: emmanuel.chemla@ens.psl.eu, salvador.mascarenhas@ens.fr, philippe.schlenker@gmail.com.

SESSIONS [to be adapted as we go]

Part A. Super Semantics in reasoning and thought
(Chemla & Mascarenhas)

Sept 18: Salvador Mascarenhas
Introduction to super semantics in reasoning [slides]

We introduced the traditional program of semantics, foreshadowing how it extends to some non-standard cases.  We discussed to what extent language can be seen as a tool for thought, and sketched an internalistic program for natural-language semantics.  We discussed Twin Earth in some detail.

Homework: Please take a look at slides 11 ff. in advance of next week's lecture.

Sept. 25: Salvador Mascarenhas
Alternatives, question semantics, and attention in meaning and reasoning I [slides]

We motivated the tight connection between natural-language semantics and human reasoning, both in terms of the inferences you can draw from sentences and the properties of mental representations.  We covered a number of arguments for the idea that questions and disjunctions share a common representational (and inferential) core.  We introduced the erotetic theory of reasoning informally.

Homework: Please read the first 16 pages of Koralus & Mascarenhas (2013, "The erotetic theory of reasoning," Philosophical Perspectives), that is up to and excluding section 4.  They present the system at an intermediate level of formality, between the completely informal presentation of today and the 40 pages that follow that in the article, a bit of which will be covered next week.

Oct. 2: Salvador Mascarenhas

Alternatives, question semantics, and attention in meaning and reasoning II [slides]

We looked at the propositional version of the erotetic theory of reasoning in some detail, discussing how the theory accounts for both failures and successes of reasoning.  We sketched an alternative account of certain illusory inferences from disjunction in terms of scalar implicature, and concluded that both reasoning and interpretive processes were involved in the phenomenon. We concluded with studies of visual variants of these inferences, which convey the same logical structure without using language.

Oct. 9: Salvador Mascarenhas
Probabilities in meanings and reasoning [slides]

We argued that theories of questions from linguistic semantics shed light on important debates on how the representation of alternative possibilities develops in children. We gave an erotetic account of reasoning by representativeness (conjunction fallacy, lawyers and engineers) and presented experimental work corroborating the theory's predictions.

There is a homework assignment on the erotetic theory, here.  It is optional, and even if you go for it, it contains an optional part. It is due Monday November 13, by email to Salvador.

Oct. 16: Emmanuel Chemla

Language of Thought - Vocabulary

Slides are available here

Oct. 23: Emmanuel Chemla
Language of Thought - Beyond the lexicon

We will do a normal session, see you on Monday.

Slides are here (negation) and here (alternatives).

Oct. 30: [no class: cogmaster break]

Nov. 6: Emmanuel Chemla
We will aim for a shorter session, because preparation is mandatory. The instructions will guide you through three topics: linguistic inferences without words, modularity discussion when it comes to explaining linguistic judgments from logical judgments, and children language of thought. The instructions are available in Word, Pages, or PDF format.

Part B. Super Semantics in communication (Schlenker)

Reminders: 

(i) Readings that are not linked below will be found in this Dropbox folder.

(ii) If you haven't already done so, please fill out the online survey asking about your background. 

General reading for this part: One of the following:
Schlenker, What is Super Semantics? Philosophical Perspectives 2019 [published pdf in the Dropbox folder] 

Patel-Grosz et al. Super Linguistics: an Introduction, to appear in Linguistics & Philosophy (broader and less detailed than the preceding reference)

Optional background: What it All Means  (ask the instructor for a pdf copy).

Nov. 13: Animal Semantics I: Primates I

Reading: Schlenker, Chemla, Zuberbühler  Semantics and Pragmatics of Monkey Communication. Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Linguistics. [pdf] 

Longer version: Schlenker et al. Formal Monkey Linguistics. Target article in Theoretical Linguistics.     Preprint version 

Shorter version:  Schlenker, Chemla, Zuberbühler What do Monkey Calls Mean? Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 20, 12, 894–904 (in the shared Dropbox folder)

Introductory alternative: What it All Means Ch. 1

More recent: Berthet et al. 2021 Animal Linguistics: a Primer

Note: there is a very recent issues of Proceedings of the Royal Society on animal vs. human languages.

Links:

Further readings and slides on animal linguistics 

BBC article Catherine Hobaiter on chimpanzee gestures.

Great ape gesture dictionary

Chimpanzee vs. Bonobo gestures
Humans' understanding of ape gestures; see also this.

Ape dance!

Nov. 20: Animal Semantics II: Primates II and Birds

Reading: one of the following
Suzuki and Matsumoto 2022

Schlenker et al. 2023 The ABC-D of Animal Linguistics

Nov. 27: [no class: PSL week]

Dec. 4: Sign language semantics I

Reading: Schlenker, Lamberton and Kuhn, Sign Language Semantics

Alternatives: Schlenker, Visible Meaning (long!)

Shorter alternative: Schlenker Logical Visibility and Iconicity in Sign Language Semantics: Theoretical Perspectives 

Introductory alternative: What it All Means Ch. 2

Dec. 11: Sign language semantics II

Optional: Schlenker et al. 2023 Iconic Syntax

Dec. 18: Typology of iconic enrichments 

Reading: Schlenker Iconic Pragmatics

Introductory alternative: What it All Means Ch. 12

Optional: Tieu et al. Co-speech gesture projection: evidence from inferential judgments

Extension to emojis: Tieu et al. Experimental evidence for a semantic typology of emoji: Inferences of co-, pro-, and post-text emoji

Background: Abner et al. 2015: Gestures for linguists. [pdf]

Dec. 25, Jan 1: no class [Cogmaster break]

Jan. 8 Music semantics

Background: Jackendoff and Lerdahl, The capacity for music

Reading: What it All Means Ch. 15

Optional: Schlenker, Musical Meaning Within Super Semantics.  

Optional talk on dance (online): Pritty Patel-Grosz, Dance semantics and extensions to music (live online, November 7, 2020)

Links:   Bernstein on meaning in music Bernstein on Strauss's Don Quixote  Another take on the William Tell Overture  

Jan. 15: NO CLASS