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Description:
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This book explores current semantic theory applied to Spanish, focussing on
a number of key aspects within non-truth-conditional semantics. It involves
applications of this branch of semantics to various areas of Spanish
language. In doing so, it critically considers earlier approaches to the
study of semantic meaning, such as truth-conditional semantics, Speech Act
theory, and Gricean conventional implicatures.The book argues that those
earlier approaches to linguistic semantics do not stand up to closer
scrutiny and thus are subject to a number of counterexamples. In
particular, there are various arguments which show that those approaches
are not sufficient, and often not even necessary, for the development of a
comprehensive and unified account of linguistic semantics involving
non-truth-conditional meaning.An alternative approach is then discussed
based on recent developments in the field which shows that it is possible
to provide a unified account of linguistic semantics by making two
fundamental new distinctions: on the one hand, a distinction between
conceptual and procedural meaning; and, on the other, a distinction between
explicit and implicit communication. These two distinctions combined with
the various levels of representation available in linguistic communication
allow us to capture the variety of linguistic meaning encountered in
language.In applying and developing these concepts, a number of areas are
covered within Spanish. Firstly, the current framework is applied to
sentence adverbials and parentheticals. Secondly, discourse and pragmatic
connectives will be discussed in the light of the new developments.
Thirdly, the new framework is applied to discourse particles and
interjections. Finally, a number of mood indicators are considered,
including imperative and interrogative forms, where a third distinction
between descriptive and interpretive propositional attitudes is used to
develop an alternative account.
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