Semantics and Pragmatics BUKHARI GRAPHICS

Difference between Semantics and Pragmatics

1. *Literal vs. Contextual Meaning*

*Semantics*: Focuses on the literal meaning of words and sentences without considering context.
*Example*: "John is a bachelor" means John is an unmarried man.

*Pragmatics*: Focuses on how context influences the interpretation of meaning.

*Example*: In the context of a conversation about marriage, saying "John is a bachelor" might
imply that John is available and looking for a partner.

2. *Sentence Meaning vs. Speaker Meaning*

*Semantics*: Concerned with the meaning of a sentence as a whole.

*Example*: "The apple is red" simply describes the color of the apple.

*Pragmatics*: Concerned with what the speaker intends to convey in a given context.
*Example*: If someone says, "The apple is red" in a context where different colored apples have
different prices, it might imply "The red apple is the cheaper one."

3. *Grammatical Structure vs. Conversational Implications*

*Semantics*: Studies how meaning is constructed through the grammatical structure of a sentence.
*Example*: "He gave her the book" means a male gave a book to a female.

*Pragmatics*: Studies how meaning is implied and inferred in conversation.

*Example*: If someone says, "He gave her the book" in response to "What did he give her?", it
implies that the book was the item discussed.

4. *Denotation vs. Connotation*

*Semantics*: Deals with the denotation (literal definition) of words.

*Example*: "Snake" denotes a legless reptile.

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*Pragmatics*: Deals with the connotation (additional meanings or associations) of words.

*Example*: Calling someone a "snake" in a conversation might imply that the person is deceitful.

5. *Truth Conditions vs. Use in Discourse*

*Semantics*: Analyzes sentences based on their truth conditions (whether the sentence is true or
false).
*Example*: "Snow is white" is true if snow is indeed white.

*Pragmatics*: Analyzes how sentences are used in discourse.

*Example*: Saying "Snow is white" in a context where someone doubts it might be used to reassure
or assert a known fact.

6. *Meaning Invariant vs. Meaning Variable*

*Semantics*: Meaning remains invariant regardless of who says it or where.

*Example*: "Dogs bark" means the same thing no matter who says it.

*Pragmatics*: Meaning can vary depending on the speaker, listener, time, and place.
*Example*: "It’s late" can mean different things depending on the context, such as urging someone
to leave or indicating it’s time for bed.

7. *Lexical Semantics vs. Speech Acts*

*Semantics*: Lexical semantics deals with the meaning of words and their relationships.
*Example*: Understanding that "run" can mean to move quickly on foot.

*Pragmatics*: Speech acts theory examines how utterances function as actions.

*Example*: Saying "I promise" is not just stating something but actually performing the act of
promising.

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8. *Static vs. Dynamic Meaning*

*Semantics*: Views meaning as static and unchanging.

*Example*: The word "water" consistently refers to the liquid H2O.

*Pragmatics*: Views meaning as dynamic and evolving with context.

*Example*: Saying "water" at a restaurant means you want a drink, while saying "water" during a
chemistry lesson refers to the chemical substance.

9. *Reference and Sense vs. Deixis*

*Semantics*: Focuses on reference (specific entities) and sense (general meaning).

*Example*: "The morning star" refers to the planet Venus, and its sense is "a star seen in the
morning."

*Pragmatics*: Focuses on deixis, which are words that require contextual information to
understand.
*Example*: Words like "here," "there," "now," and "then" depend entirely on the context for their
meaning.

10. *Compositionality vs. Implicature*

*Semantics*: Based on the principle of compositionality, where the meaning of a whole is

determined by the meanings of its parts.
*Example*: "Red apple" combines the meanings of "red" and "apple" to describe a red-colored
apple.

*Pragmatics*: Explores implicature, where meaning is implied rather than explicitly stated.
*Example*: If someone asks, "Do you want coffee?" and you reply, "I have to work early
tomorrow," you are implying that you don’t want coffee because it might keep you awake.

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Deixis definition
Deixis refers to a word or phrase that shows the time, place or situation a speaker is in when talking.

Also known as deictic expressions (or deictics), they typically include pronouns and adverbs such
as 'I', 'you', 'here', and 'there', and tend to be used mostly where the context is known to both the
speaker and the person spoken to.

Examples:

Some deictic examples include "I wish you'd been here yesterday."

In this sentence the words 'I,' 'you', 'here', and 'yesterday' all function as deixis - they reference a
speaker and an addressee, a location and a time. As we are outside of the context, we cannot know
who 'I' is, where 'here' is, nor can we be entirely sure when 'yesterday' was; this information is
known to the speaker instead and is therefore termed 'deictic'.

"Last week I flew over there for a quick visit."

In this sentence, 'last week', 'I' and 'there' are the deixis - referencing time, speaker and place.

We do not have enough context to completely understand the whole sentence, whereas the speaker
and the addressee do; they don't need to repeat or state the precise context. Instead, they use words
and phrases that refer to people, time and place and these function deictically.

Let's examine another deictic example sentence taken out of context:

'If you come over here I can show you where it happened, all that time ago.'

Firstly, we don't know who is speaking, or to whom; we also don't know where 'here' is, or what
happened. Our questions will tend to be 'where, who, what?' and probably also 'when?'. The
speaker and his audience, however, have no such problem. They are in the context and they know
the topic so they use deictic expressions or words to reference (or 'show') what they are talking
about.

There are several examples of deixis in the sentence we have just looked at, e.g: 'Here', 'you' and
'where'. These are deictic expressions of place, person and location.

Let's now recreate the earlier example, starting from context:

'If you come over here I can show you where it happened, all that time ago.'
A tour guide is showing his group around an old fort where a famous battle took place a few
hundred years ago. He says to them: 'If you come over to this part of the castle, I can show you
where the siege took place 500 years ago.'

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Here we have the context: we know the speaker is a tour guide, we know he is speaking to a group
of tourists, we know where they are (the castle), and we know what he is talking about (the siege)
and when it took place (500 years ago).

Let's say we are now either the tour guide or the tourists. At this point, the tour guide starts to move
over to one of the ramparts of the castle, and instead of repeating all the above information, the
guide can simply say: 'If you come over here, I can show you where it happened all that time ago.'

This avoids stating the obvious, it saves time repeating information already given, and both the
guide and his audience understand immediately what he is referring to. At this point, a specific
reference becomes an example of deictic reference, through the use of words such as 'here', 'it', and
'that'.
Types of deixis :

Now that we have an idea of how deixis works, let's look deeper into the various types of deixis.

There are three traditional types of deixis:

 Personal deixis relates to the speaker, or the person spoken to: the 'who'.
 Temporal deixis relates to time: the 'when'.
 Spatial deixis relates to place: the 'where'.
1. Personal deixis:
Personal deixis refers to the way language points to the participants in a conversation. It involves
the use of words and expressions that refer to the speaker (first person), the listener (second person),
and others (third person). Personal deixis is essential in communication as it helps to identify who is
speaking, who is being addressed, and who is being referred to.

2. Temporal deixis :
Temporal deixis refers to the use of language to refer to the time in which an event takes place. It
involves the use of temporal expressions such as "now", "then", "yesterday", "tomorrow", "last
week", "next month", and so on. Temporal deixis is important in understanding the meaning of a
sentence, as it allows the listener or reader to determine when the event being referred to occurred or
will occur.

3. Spatial deixis:
Spatial deixis describes the way language refers to spatial locations, such as those related to the
speaker and the listener. It involves the use of spatial markers and indicators, such as adverbs,
pronouns, and prepositions, to indicate the location of objects or events in space.

Personal, temporal, and spatial deixis examples

Looking at our earlier deictic examples again, we can now identify temporal deixis, spatial deixis
and personal deixis:

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I wish you'd been here yesterday.

 'I' and 'you' are examples of personal deixis, (people)

 'Here' is an example of spatial deixis, (place)
 And 'yesterday' is temporal deixis. (time)
Last week I flew over there for a quick visit.

 'Last week', which relates to when, is the temporal deixis,

 'I' refers to a person, and becomes the personal deixis,
 'There' refers to location, and is the spatial deixis.

1. Contradiction
Contradiction occurs when two statements are in direct opposition to each other, such that if one is
true, the other must be false.

Example:

"All dogs are mammals."

"Some dogs are not mammals."

These statements contradict each other because if all dogs are mammals, it cannot be true that some
dogs are not mammals.

2. Anomaly
Anomaly in linguistics refers to sentences that are grammatically correct but semantically
nonsensical. These sentences don't make sense because the concepts they involve don't logically fit
together.

Example:

"Colorless green ideas sleep furiously."

The sentence is grammatically correct but semantically anomalous because "colorless green ideas"
is a nonsensical phrase and "sleep furiously" combines incompatible concepts.

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3. Presupposition
Presupposition is an implicit assumption that must be true for the utterance to make sense. It is
background information assumed to be known or accepted by the listener.

Example:

"Jane’s brother is a lawyer."

This sentence presupposes that Jane has a brother. If Jane doesn't have a brother, the sentence
doesn't make sense.

4. Proposition
Proposition is the content or meaning of a declarative sentence that can be true or false. It represents
an assertion about the world.

Example:

- *Sentence*: "The cat is on the mat."

- *Proposition*: The meaning conveyed by this sentence is that there is a cat, and its
location is on the mat. This proposition can be evaluated as true or false depending on the
actual situation.

5. Quantifier
Quantifiers are words or phrases that express quantities or amounts and modify nouns to indicate
how many or how much.

Example:

"All students passed the exam."

"Every student without exception passed the exam”

"Some students passed the exam."

At least one student passed the exam, but not necessarily all.

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6. Rheme
In linguistics, the *rheme* of a sentence is the part that provides new information about the topic (or
theme). It is the comment or the focus of the sentence that tells us something about the subject.

Example:

"The book was read by Mary."

"was read by Mary" is the rheme because it provides new information about "the book."

7. Sense Relation
Sense relations refer to the relationships between meanings of words. Key types of sense relations
include synonymy, antonymy, hyponymy, and hypernymy.

- Synonymy: Words with similar meanings.

Example:: "Big" and "large."

- Antonymy: Words with opposite meanings.

Example: "Hot" and "cold."

- Hyponymy: A hierarchical relationship where one word is a more specific instance of a

more general word.

Example "Rose" (hyponym) and "flower" (hypernym).

- Hypernymy: A general word that encompasses more specific words.

Example "Vehicle" (hypernym) and "car" (hyponym).

SUMMARY

 "The light is on" and "The light is off" are contradictory.

 "The purple dog barked silently"
 "Before you walk the dog, make sure you have the leash"
 "Water boils at 100 degrees Celsius" . (
 "Most birds can fly" (
 In the summer, we travel a lot" (

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