LING 324 – Introduction
to Semantics
Fall 2007
M 10.30-11.20 (RCB 7000)
WF 10.30-11.20 (WMC 2503)
Prof. F.J. Pelletier
Office: WMX 5661, 778-782-4855
CogSci Lab: RCB 7406,
778-782-5674
Office Hour: W 11.30-12.20 in
WMX5661; and by appointment, email jeffpell@sfu.ca
Prerequisite: LING 222.
Semantics is the study of
meaning. This raises the question
of just what is meaning, and we will briefly discuss some alternative views on
the matter. The course itself will
concentrate on truth-conditional semantics, which is the study of what
requirements does a sentence place on the world if the sentence is true. We will study how word meanings can be
combined to form phrasal meanings, and how these can be combined to form clausal
and sentence meanings. To do this
we will require some formal tools, and the early portion of the course will be
given over to the study of these tools.
At the end of the course we will look at two topics that are not
directly within the truth-conditional paradigm: word meanings and pragmatic
meaning (the use of a sentence in a context).
Textbook (required): Chierchia, G. & McConnell-Ginet, S.
(2000) Meaning and Grammar: An Introduction to Semantics. MIT Press, 2nd Edition. (Available at SFU Bookstore, Burnaby
campus). Be sure to get 2nd
edition!! [This book is also used for
Ling406, Advanced Semantics]
Evaluation: There are four components of grading.
There are five assignments spread
over the term. Each one is worth
4% of your total grade. I
encourage you to work in groups NOT GREATER THAN FIVE, preferably three or four. (You can also work alone if you
prefer). Each group turns in a
single (typed, or very neatly written) report of the answers. Everyone in a group will receive the
same mark. The assignments (also
the exams) will contain problems that require you to apply and sometimes extend
the techniques introduced in class and the book. They will be evaluated on the basis of the correctness of
the analysis, and the clarity and coherence of your write-up in proper
English. Points will be deducted
for incomplete and late assignments.
You are expected to turn in assignments in class on the date they are
due. 30% will be deducted for each
additional day they are late.
Assignments will not be accepted after they are discussed in class.
Each student is to give a class
presentation of your analysis on at least one problem from the assignments,
over the course of the semester.
The presentations will be evaluated based on the correctness of your
analysis and the clarity of your presentation.
The midterm exam will be given
during midterm week, or perhaps slightly later. The exact date will be determined early in the
semester. If you are ill for an
exam, you need to contact me before the
exam (email works well for this).
When you return to class you need to give me a note from your medical
doctor specifying the date of, and reason for, your absence. Use the Health Care Provider
Statement Form for this purpose.
You will not be able to take a deferred MidTerm exam, but instead the
weight of the midterm exam will be added to the final exam, making the final
exam worth 73% of the course.
The final exam is on Wednesday, 5
December, 08.30-10.30. You cannot take this exam early (or late, except with a
medical excuse). You are
responsible for ensuring that any travel plans do not conflict with final
exams.
Examinations will be open book
and open notes. (But no electronic
devices such as laptops, pda, iPod, phones, etc.) I will supply the paper; you supply a pen or pencil.
You are responsible for all
material in the assigned readings and lectures. The best way to ensure that you have the material is to do
the readings and to come to class.
Common courtesy says that you should come to class on time (I'll try to
do the same) and turn off cell phones (I'll do the same); you should be
respectful and not talk when the instructor or another student is addressing the class.
Academic dishonesty in all forms violates the basic principles of
integrity and thus impedes learning.
More specifically, academic dishonesty is a form of misconduct that is
subject to disciplinary action and includes the following: cheating, fabrication, fraud,
facilitating academic dishonesty, and plagiarism. For more information on academic honesty and student
conduct, please visit the following website: http://www.sfu.ca/policies/teaching/index.htm.
If a student is found guilty of plagiarism or other form of academic dishonesty
on a class paper, an assignment or an exam, an academic dishonesty report will
be written for that student, and this report will be filed in the department.
The student gets zero for the paper, assignment, or exam. If more than one
academic dishonesty report has been filed for a student, the case can be
presented to the University Board on Student Discipline.
Consult the department standards on class management and student
responsibilities stated in http://www.sfu.ca/linguistics/undergraduate/standards.html,
and exam procedures stated in http://www.sfu.ca/linguistics/undergraduate/Exam_Procedures.html.
Students requiring accommodations as a result of a disability must
contact the Centre for Students with Disabilities (778-872-3112 or csdo@sfu.ca)
OK,
Now that all that is over:
We will start at the end(!) of
the book, with 'mathematical preliminaries', pp. 529-540. This is merely to acquaint those of you
who have not yet come across these concepts what they are, and to remind those
of you who have seen them before of what they mean. They will be appealed to throughout the course. Please go over this material right
away, and see whether any of it seems unusual or puzzling. Here are some notes that you can look at.
After that we will study Chapter
1 (pp. 1-52), on what semantics is.
There are many topics on these pages, but pay particular attention to
'inference types' and 'semantics vs. pragmatics'. (But don't ignore the rest of the stuff!!) The second set
of notes is based on this chapter; here they are.
We will follow this with a brief
introduction to propositional symbolic logic. This is not a course in logic, so we will only mention some
of the high-level concepts and have a few assignment problems that will allow
you to follow some of the more formal material in the upcoming chapters. Here are some notes that are relevant to this
topic.
Further readings will be added to
this page, but if you want to read ahead, you can look at Chapter 2, especially
pp.69-87. Here are some notes relevant to this part of the
textbook.
The
first assignment was passed out on
Friday, Sept. 7th. It
was due on Friday, Sept. 14th, in class. Here
is the first assignment (pdf).
Presentations about assignment #1
took place on Friday, Sept. 21st.
The
second assignment was passed out on
Wednesday, Sept. 26th.
It will be due on Wednesday, Oct. 3rd, in class. Here is the second
assignment (pdf).
NOTE:
because of Monday, Oct. 8th being the Thanksgiving holiday (no
classes), I want you to have your graded Assignment #2¹s returned to you on
Friday, Oct. 5thŠso that there is enough time between returning the
assignment and giving the presentations.
The presentations will take place on Friday, Oct. 12th. BE SURE TO PICK UP YOUR ASSIGNMENT ON
FRIDAY, OCT. 5th!
The
third assignment will be passed out on
Friday, Oct. 12th. It
will be due on Friday, Oct. 19th. Here
is the third assignment (pdf).
The third presentation and the
midterm exam will happen sometime after the third assignment is due. The midterm will cover all the material
up to the lecture just before the midterm--wherever we happen to be at that
time. It is intended that we will
cover the material in the lecture notes #4, which are linked above (for pages
69-87 of the textbook), and lecture notes #5, which cover pages 87-98 of the
textbook. These
notes are here.
The material that is relevant
immediately after the midterm exam is in Chapter 3 of our textbook. This is (in my opinion) the central
part of the course, and you need to work hard to understand the material. I have three sets of notes that cover
this material:
Here
are the notes relevant to pp. 113-141
Here
are the notes relevant to pp. 142-157
Here are the notes relevant to pp.
158-172
And the
fourth assignment (pdf) is here. Passed out on Friday Nov. 2nd;
due on Friday Nov. 9th.
The last part of the book we will
cover in this course is Chapter 4.
The slides for this section are in two parts:
Here are the
notes for pp. 196-221
Here are the
notes for pp. 221-255.
The final
assignment is assignment #5. Note
that I have changed the requirements for group size. I want all groups to be three or fewer students in size!! It is passed out on Wednesday, Nov. 21
and is due Wednesday, Nov. 28. It
will be returned on Friday, Nov. 30, and presentations concerning this homework
will be on Monday, Dec. 3rd.
Please be a good student and come to hear the final presentations!
The final
exam is 8.30-10.30, Wednesday, Dec. 5th. It is in room RCB
8100. (The first exam
of the entire exam period!!) As
with the midterm, this is open book, open note. But you are not allowed to have electronic devices.