UE913 - LING 201 - Semantics 1

Intervenant·e·s

• Benjamin Spector [référent·e]   directeur de recherche, CNRS / Institut Jean-Nicod (IJN)

Human beings can produce and understand, without any apparent effort, sentences that have never been used or understood before. This capacity must rely on a mechanism thanks to which the meaning of a complex expression can be computed on the basis of that of its parts and the way they are combined (compositional semantics). Furthermore, the interpretation of sentences does not only rely on their linguistically encoded meaning, but also on all the inferences that we are able to draw, in a given context, regarding the communicative intentions of speakers (pragmatics). Formal semantics and pragmatics aim to characterize both the the linguistically encoded meaning of sentences and the inferential mechanisms that play a role in how natural language sentences are interpreted. This course is the department's first module in natural language semantics and pragmatics.  Topics discussed include compositionality, predication and modification, pronouns, quantification, polarity, pragmatics, modality and intensionality. 

The class is taught in English, but questions can be asked in either French or English, remarks can be made in either language. Homework assignments can be done either in English or French.

Class 1 -  How to approach natural language meaning?

- Compositionality

- Reference, truth-conditions, entailment

- Semantics and Pragmatics: context-dependence, linguistic meaning vs. inferred meaning.

Class 2 -  Quantity Implicatures: disjunction as a case study

Class 3 - A small fragment for quantification and pronouns

Class 4 

Models, interpretation function

Transitive and intransitive verbs

Conjunction

Generalized Quantifiers

A universal constraint on the meaning of determiners: conservativity

Class 5

From set to functions, functional application

Notion of type

Type driven interpretation

Functional application as the main compositional rule, lambda notation.

 Class 6-7 - Continuing the fragment, Quantification

- More on the lambda notation.

- Negation, Conjunction, (Adjectives, Predicate Modification)

- Determiners

Class 8 - Relative clauses, variables, and pronouns again

- Relative clauses, traces as variables, assignment functions, lambda abstraction

- pronouns as variable

- Binding through lambda abstraction

Class 9 - Quantifier scope

- Quantifier raising

[covert movement analysis vs. flexible types].

 Class 10 - 11. Intensionality

- Possible world semantics

- Flavors of modality

- Attitude verbs

- Conditionals

Class 12 -  13 one among those: presuppositions, plural semantics, question semantics, focus.