Meaning and Grammar, second edition

by Gennaro Chierchia and Sally McConnell-Ginet

Book Overview

This self-contained introduction to natural language semanticsaddresses the major theoretical questions in the field.

This self-contained introduction to natural language semantics addresses the major theoretical questions in the field. The authors introduce the systematic study of linguistic meaning through a sequence of formal tools and their linguistic applications. Starting with propositional connectives and truth conditions, the book...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 026253164X
• ISBN13: 9780262531641
• Release Date: March 2000
• Publisher: MIT Press
• Length: 592 Pages
• Weight: 2.75 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.3" x 7.0" x 10.0"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher

Customer Reviews

Very readable introduction to formal semantics

This book is a thorough and very readable introduction to a certain semantic theory that may be called truth-value semantics and/or model-theoretic semantics. One of the authors' prime concern is to elucidate the connection between syntax and semantics (hence the title "Meaning and Grammar"). Accordingly, this book is not suitable for students who want to get a broad overview of the field of semantics (see also my criticism below). Also, to draw maximum benefit from this excellent book, readers should have at least some basic knowledge of generative grammar, the syntactic theory that the authors draw on. That said, it should be pointed out that the introduction to formal semantics provided in this book is well-paced and very accessible. Abstract concepts are introduced by means of illuminating examples. The authors have done a great job at making difficult things (relatively) easy to understand. The authors begin with an informal discussion of what a semantic theory has to explain that many novices will find intriguing and motivating (Chapter 1). They go on to introduce basic concepts such as denotation and truth, simultaneously giving a short introduction to predicate logic (Chapter 2; since this short introduction is rather dense, previous knowledge of logic might be helpful here). In Chapter 3, the authors home in on one of the core topics of formal semantics, namely quantification and scope phenomena, which they explain by drawing on the notion of logical form as it is used in generative grammar. Chapter 4 gives a short introduction to pragmatics, the study of language use. The authors insightfully point out some important connections between language meaning and language use, thus enabling the reader to see how the semantic theory outlined in the first three chapters applies to language use in real life. The remaining chapters of the book mainly introduce advanced topics in formal semantics, namely intensionality (Chapter 5), context, indexicality and presupposition (Chapter 6), lamda abstraction (and its application to linguistic phenomena such as relative clauses) (Chapter 7) and generalized quantifiers (Chapter 9). It is remarkable that even as topics get more and more advanced and technical, the text remains clear and understandable. Chapter 8 deserves special mention, as it provides a both sophisticated and illuminating introduction to word meaning. Having praised the book quite a lot, I should point out that I have two issues with it. First, the title is a bit misleading. In contrast to what the subtitle and the back cover text might be taken to suggest, this text is not a general introduction to linguistic semantics (comparing different theories etc.). Rather, the book introduces just one approach to natural language meaning, namely the formal, model-theoretic approach. Other important theories such as e.g. prototype semantics are only mentioned in passing. Second, the book, although it is in its second edition, contains a lot of ty