Name
Abstract | ||
|---|---|---|
The meanings of words are not permanent but change over time. Some changes of meaning are quick, such as when a pronoun changes its reference; some are slower, as when two speakers find out that they are using the same word in different senses; and some are very slow, such as when the meaning of a word changes over historical time. A theory of semantics should account for these different time scales. In order to describe these different types of meaning changes, I present an analysis of three levels of communication: instruction, coordination of common ground and coordination of meaning. My first aim is to show that these levels must be considered when discussing lexical semantics. A second aim is to use the levels to identify the communicative roles of some of the main word classes, in particular nouns, adjectives, verbs, indexicals and quantifiers. I argue that the existence of word classes can, to a large extent, be explained by the communicative needs that arise on the different levels. |
Year | DOI | Venue |
|---|---|---|
2018 | https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-014-0493-3 | Synthese |
Keywords | Field | DocType |
Lexical semantics,Communication,Conceptual spaces,Coordination of meaning,Word classes | Pronoun,Lexical semantics,Noun,Natural language processing,Artificial intelligence,Common ground,Linguistics,Mathematics,Semantics | Journal |
Volume | Issue | Citations |
195 | 2 | 1 |
PageRank | References | Authors |
0.41 | 3 | 1 |
Name | Order | Citations | PageRank |
|---|---|---|---|
| Peter Gärdenfors | 1 | 1699 | 183.78 |