LINGUIST List 12.2891

Mon Nov 19 2001

Books: Semantics

Editor for this issue: Richard John Harvey <richardlinguistlist.org>

Directory

1. Paul Peranteau, Semantics: Communicative Organization in Natural Language, Mel'cuk

John Benjamins Publishing is pleased to present a new work in Semantics:

Communicative Organization in Natural Language
The semantic-communicative structure of sentences
Igor MEL'CUK (University of Montreal)

US & Canada: 1 58811 101 6 / USD 86.00 (Hardcover)
Rest of world: 90 272 3060 9 / NLG 190.00 / EUR 86.22 (Hardcover)

The book defines the concept of Semantic-Communicative Structure [=
Sem-CommS]-a formal object that is imposed on the starting Semantic
Structure [= SemS] of a sentence (under text synthesis) in order to
turn the selected meaning into a linguistic message. The Sem-CommS is
a system of eight logically independent oppositions: 1. Thematicity
(Rheme vs. Theme), 2. Givenness (Given vs. Old), 3. Focalization
(Focalized vs. Non-Focalized), 4. Perspective (Foregrounded
vs. Backgrounded), 5. Emphasis (Emphasized vs. Non-Emphasized),
6. Presupposedness (Presupposed vs. Non-Presupposed), 7. Unitariness
(Unitary vs. Articulated), 8. Locutionality (Communicated
vs. Signaled). The values of these oppositions mark particular
subnetworks of the starting SemS and thus allow for the distinction
between sentences such as (a) A man killed a dog vs. The dog was
killed by a man, (b) John washed the window vs. It was John who washed
the window or (c) It hurts! vs. Ouch! The proposed
Sem-Comm-oppositions are conceived as an attempt at sharpening the
well-known notions of Topic ~ Comment, Focus, etc. Possible linguistic
strategies for expressing the values of the Sem-Comm-oppositions in
different languages are discussed at some length, with linguistic
illustrations.

Studies in Language Companion Series 57 2001. xii, 393pp.

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