Summary |
A
semantics for a particular language L is a theory that maps each sentence of L
onto its meaning, usually by having theorems of the appropriate form among its
deductive consequences. It is standard (although controversial) to require an
adequate semantics for L to be compositional – that is, to show how the meaning
of each sentence of L is determined by the meanings of its basic lexical items
and its syntactic structure. A central foundational question about semantics concerns
its proper object of study: what features of an expression count as its
semantic ones? One standard answer is that semantics should be
“outward-looking” and concern itself with the word-world relational features of
expressions, especially those that determine the truth-conditions of sentences.
Another influential answer is that semantics should be “inward-looking” and
concern itself with relationships between expressions and mental
representations. Further important questions concern how linguistic meaning
interacts with features of extra-linguistic context, how semantic and pragmatic
phenomena are to be distinguished, and what role (if any) an adequate semantics
for L should play in explaining the capacity of competent L-speakers to use and
understand utterances in L. |