Chapter 9: Semantic

CONCEPTUAL

• basic, essential components of meaning conveyed by literal use of words

• dictionary meaning

ASSOCIATIVE

• various people

→ various associations or connotations

• poets, song-writers, novelists, literary critics, advertisers, lovers

Semantic role: the part played by a noun phrase, such as agent, in the event described by the sentence. 

• Agent: the semantic role of the noun phrase identifying the one who performs the action of the verb in an event 

e.g: The boy kicked the ball.

• Theme: the semantic role of the noun phrase used to identify the entity involved in or affected by the action of the verb in an event 

e.g: The boy kicked the ball

• Instrucment :the semantic role of the noun phrase identifying the entity that is used to perform the action of the verb 

e.g: The boy cut the rope with a razor

• Experiencer :the semantic role of the noun phrase identifying the entity that has the feeling, perception or state described by the verb

e.g: The boy feels sad

• Location the semantic role of the noun phrase identifying where an entity is 

e.g: The boy is sitting in the classroom

• Source: the semantic role of the noun phrase identifying where an entity moving from

 e.g: The boy ran from the house

         I left from Hanoi

• Goal: the semantic role of the noun phrase identifying where an entity moving to 

e.g: The boy walked to the window

LEXICAL RELATIONS

• Synonymy: the lexical relation in which two or more words have very closely related meanings

e.g: “big” is a synonym of “large”

• Antonymy: the lexical relation in which words have opposite meanings (e.g: “Shallow” is an antonym of “deep”)

• Gradable antonyms: words with opposite meanings along a scale (e.g. big-small)        

• Non-gradable antonyms: words which are direct opposites (e.g. alive–dead)

• Reversives: antonyms in which the meaning of one is the reverse action of the other (e.g. dress–undress)

• Hyponymy: the lexical relation in which the meaning of one word is included in the meaning of another 

e.g: “rose” is a hyponym of “flower”

• Superordinate: the higher level term in hyponymy (e.g. flower–daffodil)

• Co-hyponyms: words in hyponymy that share the same superordinate (“daffodil” and “rose” are co-hyponyms of “flower”)

• Prototypes: the most characteristic instance of a category 

e.g: “robin” is the prototype of “bird”

• Homophones: two or more words with different forms and the same pronunciation 

e.g: to–too–two

• Homonyms: two words with the same form that are unrelated in meaning                                                                                e.g: mole (on skin) – mole (small animal)

• Polysemy: a word having two or more related meanings 

e.g. foot, of person, of bed, of mountain

• Metonymy(ẩn dụ): a word used in place of another with which it is closely connected in everyday experience 

e.g. He drank the whole bottle (= the liquid)

Container- contain bottles/water,can/juice)

Whole-Part (car/wheel, house/roof)

Resentative-symbol(King/Crown,white house/blue house)

• Collocation: a relationship between words that frequently occur together 

e.g. salt and pepper