lecture8专用课件.pptVIP

Lecture 8 Meaning and Context Overview Two types of contexts The vital role of context in determination of word meaning Suggested Ways for the Correct Comprehension of Word Meaning Development of the ability to determine the meaning of a word from its context Warming-up! What is the meaning of the following sentence? This is a difficult operation. The doctor will perform an operation on her for a diseased lung. The skillful operation of this machine is hard to learn. The army’s operation in that country were very successful. Meaning and Context Two types of contexts Linguistic context Non-linguistic context Three functions of context Eliminating ambiguity Indication of referents Conveying emotional overtones Context No matter how many meanings a word may have, there will be no risk of misunderstanding, when it occurs in a particular context. Then what is a context? Two types of contexts The meaning s of words, especially those of polysemous words may be viewed as determined either by linguistic (verbal) contexts or extra-linguistic (non-verbal) contexts. Linguistic (verbal) context (言语) Extra-linguistic (non-verbal) context (非言语） Two types of contexts Linguistic context refers to words, clauses, sentences, paragraphs, or whole books in which a word appears. Extra-linguistic context refers to a particular time, space, or culture in which a word appears. Linguistic context Linguistic context can be further divided into Lexical context Grammatical context Verbal context in its broad sense Lexical context : the lexemes that co-occur with the word in question. The meaning of the word is affected or determined by the neighboring lexemes. Example: paper The word “paper” has a number of meanings in the dictionary, but in each of the following context, it conveys only one meaning. a sheet of paper a white paper a term paper today’s paper examination paper Grammatical context In some cases, the meaning of a polysemous word may be determined by the gram