What is semantics?
A simple and easily understandable answer is that semantics is the meaning of signals. The signals can exist in any form: as text, as an image, etc. The most frequently studied semantics is that of words.
This is a good reason to examine the relationship of linguistics and semantics. Can semantics be regarded as a subdiscipline of linguistics?
Linguistics and semantics
Linguistics, the science of language and languages, has always examined the structure (grammar, syntax) of languages. Once the syntax of a sentence has been understood, linguists see two further tasks, i.e. secondly to examine the semantics of the sentence and thirdly to examine its pragmatics. “Semantics” is about the meaning of sentences, “pragmatics” about the “why” of a statement.
The linguists’ three steps
In the linguists’ eyes, there are thus three steps in understanding language: syntax -> semantics -> pragmatics. These three fields are weighted very differently by linguists: a conventional textbook predominantly deals with syntax, whereas semantics and pragmatics play a marginal role – and always on the basis of the previously conducted syntactic analysis. The linguists’ syntactic analysis thus already sets the course for what is based on it, namely semantics and pragmatics.
This is not really ideal for semantics. When you deal with semantics in more detail, it becomes clear that the grammar and other properties of individual languages constitute externals which may circumscribe the core of the statements – their meaning – in an occasionally very elegant manner, but they merely circumscribe them and do not represent them completely, let alone directly. A direct formal representation of what is meant by a text, however, would be the actual objective of a scientific semantics.
Can this objective be attained? First, we will have to clarify the relationship between words and concepts – words and concepts are not the same. Concepts are the basic elements of semantics and have a special, but not entirely simple relationship with the words of a language.
Word does not equal concept
One could flippantly assume that there is a one-to-one relationship between words and concepts, i.e. that behind every word, there is a concept which summarises the meaning of the word. But this is precisely what is wrong. Words and concepts cannot unequivocally be mapped on each other. The fact that this is the case can be recognised by everybody who observes himself while reading, talking and thinking.
It is obvious that a word can have several meanings depending on the context in which it is uttered. Occasionally, a word may even have no meaning at all, for instance if it is a technical term and I don’t know the specialist field. In such a case, I may be able to utter the word, but it remains devoid of meaning for me. Yet somebody who understands the specialist field will understand it.
Meaning has much to do with the addressee
Even perfectly normal words which we all know, not always have an unequivocal meaning but can evoke slightly different ideas (meanings) depending on the listener or the context. This does not only concern abstract words or words to which various values are attached, such as happiness, democracy, truth, etc.: absolutely concrete terms like leg, house and dog are interpreted differently by different people, too. The reception of the words as meaningful concepts has much to do with the addressee, his situation and expectations. There is definitely no 1:1 relation between words and concepts.
Meanings vary
Even in ourselves, there are quite different ideas for the same word; depending on the situation, we associate different ideas with the same word, depending on the situation and the everchanging state of our momentary knowledge of words and topics.
A dynamic process
The transition from one language to another shows how the link between words and concepts is a dynamic process in time and changes the meaning of the words. The English word ‘brave’ is the same word as the word ‘bravo’ in Italian, which we use if a musical performance inspires us. But the same word also exists in German, where today it means prissy or well-behaved – certainly not exactly the same as brave, though it is the same word and once meant the same in German as in English.
Semantics examines the play of meanings
We have to accept that a word and a concept cannot be mapped on each other just like that. Although in individual cases it may seem that there is precisely one concept (one semantics) behind every word, this idea is completely inappropriate in reality. And it is this idea which prevents the play of meanings from being understood correctly. Yet it is precisely this play of meanings which, in my view, constitutes semantics as a field of knowledge. In this field, it is possible to represent concepts formally in their own proper structure – which is completely independent from the formal representation of words.
Translation: Tony Häfliger and Vivien Blandford