Radwa Ayman

Semantics 8: Word Meaning & Sentence Meaning & Utterance

Meaning
The term ‘meaning’ isn’t a clearly definable term in semantics; therefore, its reference/ meaning
varies at different linguistic levels. The meaning of a single lexeme is different from that of an
entire sentence, from that of an utterance.

8.1 Word Meaning:

The word is so much a part of everyday knowledge that it is completely taken for granted.
Grammar books don’t attempt to define the term word; rather, they use it to define other
grammatical elements, such as the sentence, phrase, and clause. The main reason for this is that
in written language, words are clearly identified by the spaces between them. On any page of
print we can simply count how many words there are by counting the groups of letters that are
separated by spaces. However, we aren’t only concerned with words in writing but also words
in speech. It is a bit challenging to identify words in speech because there are no spaces in
speech; it is a misconception that there are slight pauses between words in spoken language. To
identify a word whether in speech or writing, we need to know what the ‘word meaning’ refers
to. There have been three approaches to identifying the word meaning. The first is to see the
word as a semantic unit; unit of meaning; the second sees it as a phonetic unit, one that is
marked by some features of the sounds of the language; the third considers it as isolable and
indivisible unit.

As a semantic unit, the word is defined as a linguistic unit that has a single meaning. This
definition has many difficulties. First, many single words cover not one but two or more bits of
meaning. For example, if ‘sing’ has a single meaning, then presumably ‘singer’ has more since
it means one who sings and even ‘sang’ must mean both ‘sing’ and ‘past time’. Similarly,
‘lamb’, ‘ewe’, and ‘ram’ don’t have a single meaning, since they all mean ‘sheep’, but ‘baby’,
‘mother’, and ‘father’. Additionally, there are two words to distinguish ‘passenger train’ from
‘goods train’, though for a similar distinction with road vehicles, there are ‘bus’ and ‘lorry’.
These examples prove that single words don’t appear to have single meanings. Conversely,
there are combinations of words that don’t have separate meanings, such as ‘put up with’ has a
single meaning ‘tolerate’. The same applies to other phrasal verbs such as ‘look for’ ‘put off’
‘take off’ and idioms, they cannot be divided into separate units. Second, the word division
doesn’t correspond to meaning division. For example, ‘heavy smoker’ doesn’t mean a person
who is both ‘heavy’ and ‘smokes’. Another example is that ‘criminal lawyer’ doesn’t mean a
person who is both a ‘criminal’ and a ‘lawyer’. In these examples, the meaning is placed within
the second word. Clearly, as far as meaning is concerned, the word isn’t a single unit, nor is it a
group of related units of meanings. Indeed, any attempt to define the word in terms of a unit of
meaning will be circular; the unit of meaning should be defined in term of the word.
 As a phonetic unit, a word is recognized in many languages by some features of pronunciation.
There are some languages, for instance, which have ‘fixed stress’: the stress always falls on one
particular syllable of the word, unlike English where it falls on different syllables in different
words. Another distinguishing phonological feature is ‘vowel harmony’ which is often a
characteristic of the word. In such language, all vowels of any one word have a particular
quality, and a change in the quality of the vowel marks word division. Vowel harmony is found
in many languages, such as Turkish and Hungarian. English has two other features that are
associated with the word. The first is stress; what is known as ‘the main/ full stress’. Although it
isn’t placed on a particular syllable, it falls on only one syllable in each word. This feature
distinguishes ‘blackbird’ from ‘black bird’, ‘greenhouse’ from ‘green house’. However there
the relationship between stress patterns and writing conventions isn’t consistent. For example,
The White House is pronounced as a single word but written in two words. This is a common
device in English to link two nouns by the use of a single stress whether they are written as a
single or two separate words such as tabletop- cushion cover cowshed- birdcage. Additionally,
the function words are unstressed and seem to be squashed with the preceding or following
words in one stress pattern. Thus, ‘beat her’ can be heard as ‘beater’ and ‘kissed her’ rhymes
with ‘sister’. The second is ‘juncture’: the ability to identify word boundaries in normal speech.
Such as the difference between
that stuff that’s tough
a nice cake an ice cake
keep sticking keeps ticking
Grey day Grade A

The vowel and consonants of each pair are identical, but they differ in juncture. However, this
phonetic feature has some difficulties. First, sometimes it is difficult to distinguish between two
expressions ‘that stuff’ and ‘that’s tough’ because the differences depend on various factors
including the speed of utterance and clarity of articulation. Therefore, the distinction is
noticeable in careful utterances. Second, juncture marks only some word division; they don’t,
for example, distinguish ‘a tack’ and ‘attack’.

As an isolable unit, the word can be defined in terms of potential pause; words in a sentence
can be identified in terms of the pause that can be established between its units. For example, ‘I
saw Mary’ can be divided by pausing into 3 words. But this definition isn’t satisfactory because
speakers tend to pause deliberately between parts of word like ‘sleepless- postman- discuss-
consider’. Also, the word has been defined as an ‘indivisible unit’, the one that doesn’t permit
the insertion of any other linguistic material, but this has some difficulties. For example, ‘little
boy’ is made of two words since we can insert ‘English between them, but we cannot insert
anything within ‘singing’. But this turns out to be false; singing can be divided into ‘sing’ and
‘ing’, and the ‘ing’ part can be added to ‘dance’, forming ‘dancing’.

Bloomfield defined a word as a ‘minimum free form’, meaning the smallest bit of speech that
can occur in isolation. However, this cannot be applied to many words, especially function
words. It is difficult to provide a context for the occurrence in isolation of ‘the’ ‘an’ ‘my’. ‘The’
can only be used in isolation as an answer to a question about language (e.g., what comes before
book in the book?”. It’s obvious, however, that questions about language cannot be used to
establish what words are because we could produce false words by asking for instance: ‘what
comes before -ject in reject’?. The answer is ‘re-‘, but ‘re-‘ isn’t a word. In other words
anything can occur in isolation if we want to talk about it. Bloomfield’s test can still be useful if
we restrict our attention to ordinary language an not to language about language; for example,
we can say that while ‘the’ ‘a’ aren’t minimum free forms, they function in the same way as
many others that are, such as ‘this’ or ‘that’. Palmer claims that the term ‘word’ can be used in
different senses. For example, we can say ‘cat’ and ‘cats’ are two different words. In another
sense, we tend to say that ‘cat’ is a word that has a singular form ‘cat’ and a plural form ‘cats’.
To distinguish between words and forms of words, Plamer suggests using the expression
‘lexical item’ to refer to the word, not its forms.

To conclude, sadly, we have to say that the word isn’t a clearly definable linguistic unit.

8.2 Sentence meaning

If we can establish a distinction between sentence meaning and word meaning, a major
problem will be that of relating the two. Some scholars believe that the meaning of a sentence is
derived from the sum of word meanings. Is the word meaning determined by its position in a
sentence or is the sentence meaning derived from the sum of word meanings?
8.2.1 Definition
Sentence meaning refers to the meaning that a sentence carries based solely on its structure
and the meanings of the words it contains, independent of who says it or where it is said. In
other words, it is the abstract, context-free meaning of a sentence that any competent speaker of
the language can understand. For example, the sentence “The cat is on the mat” conveys a clear
picture involving a specific relationship between two things: a cat and a mat. This meaning is
accessible regardless of the speaker or the circumstances in which it is uttered. Sentence
meaning is what allows us to judge a sentence as meaningful or grammatical without
necessarily knowing anything about the speaker's intentions or the surrounding context.

8.2.2 Meaningful vs. Meaningless Sentences

To understand sentence meaning better, it helps to distinguish between meaningful and
meaningless sentences. A meaningful sentence is one that follows grammatical rules and makes
sense in a standard interpretation of its words. For instance, “Birds can fly” is a meaningful
sentence because it is grammatically correct and conveys an idea that aligns with our
understanding of the world. On the other hand, a meaningless sentence might be grammatically
correct but lacks semantic sense. The most famous example comes from Noam Chomsky:
“Colorless green ideas sleep furiously.” This sentence is structurally sound but semantically
odd. The contradiction between “colorless” and “green,” the abstract nature of “ideas,” and
the action “sleeping furiously” do not logically combine to produce a coherent image or idea.
Thus, while grammatically correct, the sentence lacks real-world meaning.
8.2.3 Word order: Projection rules
The componential analysis of lexical items help determine the meaning of a sentence by
proposing a set of rules to combine the meanings of individual lexical items. These rules are
known as ‘projection rules.’ This kind of analysis deal with the surface structure of a sentence.
The projection rules are needed to state what may be merged with what, and in what order. This
will be determined by the grammatical status of the items; we can combine adjectives with
nouns, noun phrases with verbs and so on. For example, ‘the man hit the colorful ball.’ The
noun phrase ‘the man’ is combined with the verb ‘hit’ and with another noun phrase ‘colorful
ball’ which is composed of a determiner+ an adjective + noun. It helps identify the somatically
odd sentences. While projection rules distinguish between what’s semantically accepted and
what’s semantically odd, for example, they handle these sentences ‘the idea cut the tree’ and
‘John drank the bread’ as semantically odd, there are some difficulties in using it to move from
word meaning to sentence meaning. First, if we merely add components together as we use the
projection rules then it will follow that ‘cats chase mice’ and ‘mice chase cats’ have exactly the
same meaning. The point is clear: ‘chase’ is a relational verb, meaning that the direction of the
relation is important to identify the meaning of a sentence. The same applies to active/ passive
structures; one of them entails the other. (e.g., cats chase mice entails mice are chased by cats).
Secondly, the same components may at times merely provide the environment for
amalgamation, at others be part of the meaning of the resultant combination. For example, the
word ‘pregnant’, we can say that is occurs only in the environment of (-male), such as a
pregnant woman, but not a pregnant man. However, we can also say ‘a pregnant horse’ which is
a general term (unmarked for gender). In this case, the (-male) component has come from the
adjective not the noun, yet the rules will have made no provision for this. There are many other
similar examples: pretty child- buxom neighbor, where the noun phrase is presumably (-male),
but the nouns ‘child- neighbor’ are not.

8.2.4 Predicate Calculus

We have already noted that in a sentence the verb is often best seen as a relational feature, and
that active and passive sentences could be handled as if they we relational opposites. Analysis
in relational terms seems to offer a far more satisfactory solution to the problem of the deep
meaning of sentences than componential analysis. This analysis has much in common with ‘the
predicate calculus’ used by logicians. Semantics isn’t directly concerned with logical relations
between sentences, but rather their meanings.

A. Sentences vs. Propositions

A sentence is a linguistic expression composed of words arranged according to grammatical
rules. A proposition, by contrast, is the underlying idea or assertion that the sentence expresses.
It represents the informational content that can be evaluated as true or false. This distinction
becomes clearer when considering that the same sentence can express different propositions
depending on the context. For instance, the sentence “It is raining” can refer to different
propositions depending on where and when it is spoken. If spoken in Cairo on Monday, it refers
to one specific event; if spoken in London on Tuesday, it refers to another. The sentence form
remains the same, but the proposition differs.

According to the calculus analysis, the meaning of a sentence is a proposition (propositional/

cognitive meaning). Propositions consist of predicates and arguments; the predicate is the
relational term and usually correspond to verbs in sentences; the arguments are the terms that
are related and usually correspond to nouns. For example, ‘John loves Mary’ consists of the
predicate ‘loves’ and two arguments ‘Mary’ and ‘John’, which can be presented in the formula
[love] John, Mary. One important thing about this formula is that the arguments are ordered in
that [Love] Mary, John will be the formula for something different: Mary loves John.

8.2.5 Truth-Conditional Theory

We said that propositions can be true or false. This concepts sheds light on one of the
important theories in semantics: the truth-conditional theory. This theory, largely developed
from the work of philosophers like Donald Davidson, holds that: The meaning of a sentence is
understood in terms of the conditions under which it would be true. So, to know what a
sentence means, you must know what must be the case in the world for the sentence to be true.
Consider the sentence “Ali is fasting.” According to truth-conditional theory, this sentence is
meaningful because we can describe the conditions that make it true: it must be the case that a
person named Ali exists and is currently fasting. If those conditions are met, the sentence is
true; if not, it is false. Thus, understanding the sentence means understanding the truth
conditions associated with it. Truth-conditional semantics helps distinguish between two kinds
of truth: analytic (what’s true by definition) and synthetic (what’s true according to the real
world/ logical relations).

8.2.3 Analytic and Synthetic:

There is an assumption that logical relations that hold between words can be isolated and
handled within a semantics theory, which leads to another assumption that there are two kinds
of truth; the one necessary and depending upon logical relations, the other conditional and
depending upon the facts of the words.

Ex: A. All bachelors are unmarried.

B. All bachelors are miserable.

The truth of sentence A is logical as it depends on the definitions of the word ‘bachelor’ and its
relations to unmarried. This is analytic truth, and the sentence is analytically true. The truth of
the second depends wholly on an observed fact about bachelors, and in no way results from the
definition of the words involved. This is synthetic truth, and the sentence is synthetically true.
It’s clear that all sense relations and those in the componential analysis are related to analytical
truth.
8.3 Utterance Meaning
The distinction between sentence meaning and utterance meaning cannot be taken for granted
in the way that the one between sentence-meaning and word-meaning can be, due to its
controversy among specialists.
8.3.1 Definition
Roach defines ‘utterance’ as a continuous piece of speech beginning and ending with a clear
pause. Utterances aren’t just sequences of word-forms. They consist of both ‘verbal
components’ and ‘non-verbal components’, which are sub-divided into ‘prosodic
subcomponents, such as intonation and stress-patterns, and ‘paralinguistic subcomponents’,
such as loudness, rhythm, and tone of voice. These features are just as relevant to the
determination of the meaning of the utterance as are the meanings of the words and the
grammatical structure that encode the verbal components.

8.3.2 Difference between sentence meaning & utterance meaning

There are two general points regarding the difference between ‘utterance meaning’ and
‘sentence meaning’. First, ‘a sentence’ is an abstract linguistic unit, existing independently of
specific instances of use. ‘An utterance’, however, is a concrete event in time: a real-world
instance of a sentence being spoken in a particular context. For example, the sentence ‘It’s cold
here' has a general meaning, but its utterance meaning varies if said in a snowy room (literal)
vs. a tense meeting (metaphorical). Second, there is an intrinsic connection between meaning of
a sentence and the grammatical structure. For example, there might be connection between the
declarative sentence and its use to make statements, as in ‘Exercise is good for you.’ Or
between the interrogative structure and its use to ask a question, as in ‘what time is lunch?’
However, in ‘utterance’, these sentences can be used indirectly. For example, ‘Mary won’t
come?’ can function as a question requiring more information, and ‘could you close the
window?’ can function as a request. Third, sentence-meaning is context-independent, whereas
utterance-meaning is context-dependent. In other words, the meaning of the utterance is
determined by the context in which it is said and the non-verbal features. For example, ‘Mary
won’t come’ can be read in different ways to show boredom, surprise, or certainty.

8.3.3 Context and meaning

Context help clarify the meaning of ‘utterance’ at three different levels: surface structure, deep
structure, and pragmatic level (illocutionary force). First, it disambiguates the lexical meaning
of the surface structure; for example, in ‘they passed the port at midnight’, ‘passed’ is
polysemous: it refers to handing something to someone, or going past, and ‘port’ is
homonymous: it refers to a kind of wine or a harbor. Only the context can help us determine the
sense of each of these words. Second, it determines the propositional meaning of an utterance.
The deictic expressions in any utterance cannot be identified without the context. For example,
‘I haven’t seen Mary yesterday’; only the context allows us to know the reference of ‘I’ and the
deictic term ‘yesterday’. Third, the context is important to identify the illocutionary force of an
utterance; one utterance can have different illocutionary forces. For example, ‘I’ll give you 500
L.E’ can be used as a promise or prediction.
Conclusion:
In the end, studying meaning in language shows us something important: words, sentences,
and the way we say things all work together to help us communicate. Words don’t always have
clear-cut definitions, sentences rely on grammar but can still be tricky, and the real meaning of
what we say often depends on the situation. Language isn’t rigid—it’s flexible, changing based
on how we use it. This reminds us that meaning isn’t just about rules; it’s about people
connecting, sharing ideas, and understanding each other. The more we explore how meaning
works, the more we see how powerful and alive language really is.

References:
Lyons, J. (1995). Linguistic semantics: An introduction. Cambridge University Press.

Palmer, F. R. (1976). Semantics (2nd ed.). Cambridge University Press.

Palmer, F. R. (1984). Grammar (2nd ed.). Penguin Books.

Roach, P. (2009). English phonetics and phonology (4th ed.). Cambridge University Press.