Semantics and Signs

The availability of more than one structurally or lexically supported interpretation.

Use of a sign to refer to itself as an expression rather than to its ordinary referent.

A bold, strained or necessary transfer of an expression into a domain it does not literally fit.

Contextually enforced adjustment of meaning, through which an expression conforms to the semantic requirements of its context.

Integration of selected structures from several mental spaces into a new meaning space with emergent properties.

Associated evaluative, emotional, or cultural meaning carried alongside a more direct designation.

A rule stabilized through common usage that renders signs and actions intelligible.

A sign that represents the relationships of its subject through corresponding relationships among its own parts.

The combination of opposing meanings within the same word form.

The relation between expressions of identical form but unrelated meanings.

A semantic relation in which the meaning of a term is contained within the meaning of a more general term.

A sign that refers to its object through perceived similarity or structural correspondence.

The absence of sufficient semantic, logical, or pragmatic connections among parts of an utterance or text.

A sign connected with its object through a factual, spatial, temporal, or causal relation.

The property of a sign to retain its reference or meaning beyond the specific context of utterance.

In Peircean semiotics, the effect or understanding through which a sign relates an object for an interpreter.

The absence of an established single word for a concept that can, in principle, be expressed.

A relationship of inference derived from the conventional meanings of the words involved.

A coherent domain of related verbal images organising experience through a shared underlying conception.

A sequence of metonymic transfers in which a reference moves across several adjacent stages.

The coexistence of several related meanings within one lexical expression.

An account of categories organised around more and less representative members.

An enduring relation of response: a sound, image, word, thought, or counterpart is received and answered, allowing other levels to reverberate and the participants or their field of meaning to change.

The loss of concrete lexical meanings during grammaticalization or frequent use.

A network of semantically related expressions whose meanings are shaped by differences and neighbourhoods.

The branch of linguistics that studies meaning, relations among meanings, and the interpretation of linguistic expressions.

The process through which something functions as a sign and generates further interpretation.

A dynamic process in which something functions for someone, in a certain respect, as a sign of something else.

A sign whose meaning arises primarily through conventional use.

Repetition of the same thought in identical or only apparently altered form.

A present sign that refers to something absent.

A linguistic distinction between inherently belonging and transferable possession.

A lexical relation in which expressions organise a semantic dimension through opposition.

A plural construction meaning ‘X and the people associated with X’ rather than ‘several Xs’.

A relationship between terms that are subordinate to the same superordinate term.

A system of signs and combinatory conventions through which distinctions can be produced and interpreted.

A typical, statistically or conventionally preferred combination of words.

Identical grammatical coding for accompaniment and an instrument of action.

Description of word meanings through the combination of elementary semantic features.

The principle according to which the meaning of a complex expression arises from its parts and their interrelationships.

A cognitive process in which elements from different mental spaces are selectively combined into a new structure of meaning.

The more direct referential or descriptive content conventionally associated with an expression.

A sign that represents something as an actually existing relationship or proposition.

A sentence in which an indefinite expression is picked up by a pronoun outside its ordinary binding domain.

A model of the linguistic sign as the relation between a signifier and a signified.

A category structure held together by overlapping similarities rather than one feature shared by every member.

A knowledge frame that determines which roles, relations, and expectations a term activates.

An account of meaning in which expressions activate structured scenes, roles, and background knowledge.