Table of Contents

List Of Figures And Tables. Preface. List Of Abbreviations And Symbols. Part I: Preliminaries: 1. Semantics In Linguistics: Introduction. Semantics And Semiotics. Three Challenges In Doing Semantics. Meeting The Challenges. Semantics In A Model Of Grammar. Some Important Assumptions. Summary. Further Reading. Exercises. Notes. 2. Meaning, Thought And Reality: Introduction. Reference. Reference As A Theory Of Meaning. Mental Representations. Words, Concepts And Thinking. Summary. Further Reading. Exercises. Notes. Part II: Semantic Description: 3. Word Meaning: Introduction. Words And Grammatical Categories. Words And Lexical Items. Problems With Pinning Down Word Meaning. Lexical Relations. Derivational Relations. Lexical Universals. Summary. Further Reading. Exercises. Notes. 4. Sentence Relations And Truth: Introduction. Logic And Truth. Necessary Truth, A Priori Truth And Analyticity. Entailment. Presupposition. Summary. Further Reading. Exercises. Notes. 5. Sentence Semantics 1: Situations: Introduction. Classifying Situations. Modality And Evidentiality. Summary. Further Reading. Exercises. Notes. 6. Sentence Semantics 2: Participants: Introduction: Classifying Participants. Thematic Roles. Grammatical Relations And Thematic Roles. Verbs And Thematic Role Grids. Problems With Thematic Roles. The Motivation For Identifying Thematic Roles. Voice. Summary. Further Reading. Exercises. Notes. 7. Context And Inference: Introduction. Deixis. Reference And Context. Knowledge As Context. Information Structure. Inference. Conversational Implicature. Summary. Further Reading. Exercises. Notes. 8. Functions Of Language: Speech As Action: Introduction. Austin's Speech Act Theory. Categorizing Speech Acts. Indirect Speech Acts. Sentence Types. Summary. Further Reading. Exercises. Notes. Part III: Theoretical Approaches: 9. Meaning Components: Introduction. Lexical Relations In CA. Katz's Semantic Theory. Grammatical Rules And Semantic Components. Components And Conflation Patterns. Jackendoff's Conceptual Structure. Pustejovsky's Generative Lexicon. Problems With Components Of Meaning. Summary. Further Reading. Exercises. Notes. 10. Formal Semantics: Introduction. Model-Theoretical Semantics. Translating English Into A Logical Metalanguage. The Semantics Of The Logical Metalanguage. Checking The Truth Value Of Sentences. Word Meaning: Meaning Postulates. Natural Language Quantifiers And Higher Order Logic. Intensionality. Dynamic Approaches To Discourse. Summary. Further Reading. Exercises. Notes. 11. Cognitive Semantics: Introduction. Metaphor. Metonymy. Image Schemas. Polysemy. Mental Spaces. Langacker's Cognitive Grammar. Summary. Further Reading. Exercises. Notes. References. Index.

About the Author

John I. Saeed is Associate Professor of Linguistics in the Centre for Language and Communication Studies, Trinity College, University of Dublin. He is the author of several books, including Somali Reference Grammar (second edition, 1993) and Somali (1999).

Reviews

"This new edition of Saeed's textbook is clearly written and very comprehensive, with updated discussions of important areas in semantics. It is impeccably structured, includes useful exercises and will serve as an excellent main text for introductory and intermediate semantics classes." David Adger, Queen Mary, University of London "This lively book provides a truly comprehensive introduction to current linguistic semantics. Used in introductory and intermediate courses in semantics, it will supply teachers with an easy-to-use basic text and students with an accessible source of dependable information." Ronnie Cann, University of Edinburgh