LIN 509 - FORMAL SEMANTICS

College of Arts and Sciences

Credit(s): 3

This course is an introduction to modern, model-theoretic approaches to natural language semantics. We examine a range of issues relating to the notions of meaning and truth in language; to the interface of semantics with syntax; and to the relation between semantics and pragmatics. Students attend a large number of essential lectures; participate in several discussions with their classmates; and submit several written analyses addressing specific problems in the semantics of English. Topics include the relation of denotation to truth and meaning; quantification in natural language; speech acts and illocutionary force; conversational implicature; intensional constructions; indexicality; presuppositions; uses of lambda abstraction in semantic analysis; lexical meaning; and generalized quantifiers.

Prereq: LIN 221 and LIN 305 (or permission of instructor).