Languages & Linguistics
Connotative Meaning
Connotative meaning refers to the additional, subjective associations and emotions that a word carries beyond its literal definition. These associations can vary among different individuals or cultures and are influenced by personal experiences and societal norms. Understanding connotative meanings is important in communication and language interpretation, as it can impact how words are perceived and understood.
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eBook - ePub- Kristin Denham, Anne Lobeck(Authors)
- 2018(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
In this chapter we’ve discussed some of the different ways that linguists pursue the study of meaning. We’ve discussed some of the principles and rules that govern how we interpret the meanings of words and sentences (semantics). We have also discussed some of the ways in which we interpret the meanings of sentences and words in context (pragmatics).When you study semantics you learn about linguistic meaning, meanings that we derive from words and sentences themselves.When you study pragmatics, or meaning in context, you learn about how we create meaning through language.• You can recognize the different meaning relationships among words (synonymy, antonymy, polysemy, ambiguity).• You can recognize figurative language (metaphor, metonymy, synesthesia, personification, idiom).• You can identify the different semantic relationships among sentences (entailment, paraphrase).• You gain insights into the semantics of sentences and how syntax and semantics interact (selectional restrictions, thematic roles).• You learn about how we create meaning in conversations through conversational implicature, maxims of conversation, and the cooperative principle.• You learn about how meaning is shaped by politeness practices.• You learn about how we use different speech acts to create meaning, and how those speech acts are governed by felicity conditions.The study of meaning has many different applications. Linguists may be involved in advertising and branding, forensic linguistics (analyzing legal language), or they may study how meanings of words shift and change over time, and how new meanings come into the language. What we learn about speech acts can be applied not only in our everyday conversational practices with family and friends but also in the courtroom (what constitutes a threat, or hate speech?), in the workplace (what kinds of speech acts constitute sexual harassment?), the study of literature (speech acts in poetry, drama, and prose), politics (how does context shape political discourse?), and in many other areas. The study of pragmatics also provides us with a window into different cultural practices and how they are expressed in language. Politeness practices differ in Japanese and English, for example, and how one apologizes differs in Korean and English (see Hatfield & Hahn, 2011). Linguists who study Hmong immigrant communities in Wisconsin, have shown how pragmatic differences among Hmong youth, in contact with Anglo-American pragmatics, and older generations who lack such contact, can lead to miscommunication and a shift from Hmong to English among Hmong youth (Burt & Ratliff, 2011).
eBook - ePub- Jonathan Culpeper(Author)
- 2015(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
DENOTATIVE MEANING of the two words. But there must be more to meaning than this, since we know that there is a difference between these two words – we know they can be used to mean different things. Consider these words placed in the context of the sentences below.She’s only thirteen, but she’s a woman already She’s only thirteen, but she’s a lady already- What differences in meaning – what different associations or CONNOTATIONS – do the words have?
One way in which dictionaries try to give us clues about usage is by providing quotations where the word is used. However, even the dictionaries that do contain quotations cannot, for practical reasons, contain every usage of a word. It becomes a matter of selection and interpretation by the editor, and inevitably dictionaries lag behind actual usage. Also, dictionaries, particularly traditional ones, tend to underplay associative meaning. In fact, often the associative meaning of a word becomes the central meaning of a word. For example, sinister , a borrowing from Latin, originally meant ‘left’ or ‘left hand’. But even in Latin it had associations of bad luck. By the seventeenth century these associations formed the denotative meaning of the word, the notion of ‘leftness’ having died out.Etymological meaningOne particular area of meaning we need to note is ETYMOLOGICAL MEANING . This is precisely the kind of meaning we examined in Unit 1, where we tried to uncover the earlier meanings of particular words. The important point here is that people generally assume that the earlier meaning of a word is the ‘correct’ and legitimate one. Consider this statement:Decimate means to destroy a proportion (originally a tenth) of a group of people or things, not to destroy them all or nearly all.(The Economist Style Sheet , 1986)It articulates a prescriptive view, but not a view that reflects how language really works. I defy anybody to go out and use decimate
eBook - ePubA Class Room Logic
Deductive and Inductive, with Special Application to the Science and Art of Teaching
- George Hastings McNair(Author)
- 2018(Publication Date)
- Perlego(Publisher)
THE EXTENSION AND INTENSION OF TERMS.1. TWO-FOLD FUNCTION OF CONNOTATIVE TERMS. (See page 52 .)
It has been indicated that a connotative term is one which possesses the double function of signifying a subject as well as an attribute. It may be observed here that an attribute of a notion is any mark, property or characteristic of that notion. Attribute, then, represents quality, relation or quantity. By a subject is meant anything which possesses attributes. Most subjects stand for objects and most attributes are qualities; consequently, for the sake of simplicity, we may use subject and object interchangeably; likewise, attribute and quality.A connotative term, therefore, denotes an object at the same time it implies a quality. To illustrate: The symbol man stands for the various individual men of the world, such as Lincoln, Washington, Alfred the Great, etc. , or for certain qualities like rationality, power of speech and power of locomotion. The connotative term teacher may be used to denote Socrates, Pestalozzi, Thomas Arnold, or connote such qualities as ability to instruct, sympathy, and scholarship. The term planet stands for such objects as Venus, Earth, and Mars, and for such qualities as rotation upon axis, revolution about sun, and opaque or semi-opaque bodies. In each of the three illustrations the term is employed in the two-fold sense of denoting objects and of implying qualities.2. EXTENSION AND INTENSION DEFINED.
This double function of connotative terms furnishes an important topic for the student of logic—the Extension and Intension of Terms. In short, some authorities claim that to master the extension and intension of terms is virtually to master the entire subject of logic. Though this position may be an exaggerated one, yet it tends to emphasize the importance of the topic.
