The Notions of Literal and Non-literal Meaning in Semantics and Pragmatics

Transcription

1 The Notions of Literal and Non-literal Meaning in Semantics and Pragmatics Dissertation zur Erlangung des akademischen Grades doctor philosophiae (Dr. phil) Eingereicht an der Philologischen Fakultät der Universität Leipzig von Kristin Börjesson Verleihungsbeschluss 10. Oktober 2011 Gutachter: PD Dr. Johannes Dölling Institut für Linguistik, Universität Leipzig Prof. em. Dr. Anita Steube Institut für Linguistik, Universität Leipzig Prof. Robyn Carston, PhD Research Department of Linguistics, University College London

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3 Contents 1 Introduction Standard Notions Are the Standard Notions Adequate? Interpretation and Levels of Meaning Aims of the Thesis Thesis Plan Against the Standard Notions of Literal Meaning and Non-literal Meaning Literal Meaning and Context-Independence Literal Meaning as Compositional Meaning? Literal Meaning as Context-Independent? Literal Meaning as Primary to Non-literal Meaning? Non-literal Meaning and Conventionality Empirical Evidence Theoretical Considerations Consequences for Lexical Meaning Problematic Data Approaches to Meaning in the Lexicon Semantic Underspecification in the Lexicon Empirical Investigations of Aspects of Semantics Polysemy vs. Underspecification in the Lexicon Empirical Evidence for Semantic vs. Pragmatic Processing Why the Standard Notions? Summary Utterance Meaning and the Literal/Non-literal Distinction Levels of Meaning Grice s Four Types of Meaning Bierwisch s Three Levels of Meaning Summary The Problem of Characterising the Level of Utterance Meaning Explicit/Implicit Meaning Unarticulated Constituents vs. Hidden Indexicals Minimal Semantic Content and Full Propositionality Minimal Proposition vs. Proposition Expressed

4 iv Contents 3.3 Summary Utterance Meaning and Communicative Sense Two Levels or One? Problematic Phenomena Metaphor Irony Conversational Implicatures Speech Acts Differentiating What is Said from What is Meant What is Said/What is Meant and Indirect Speech Reports Primary vs. Secondary Pragmatic Processes What is Said/What is Meant and Distinct Knowledge Systems Summary Varieties of Meaning, Context and the Semantics/Pragmatics Distinction Towards an Alternative Characterisation of (Non-)Literal Meaning Literal Meaning and Types of Non-literal Meaning Literal Meaning as Minimal Meaning Nature of the Processes Determining (Non)-Literal Meaning (Non-)Literal Meaning as (Non-)Basic Meaning The Nature of Context in Utterance Interpretation Context and the Interpretation of Implicit Meaning Aspects Context, Semantic Interpretation and the Semantics/ Pragmatics Distinction Summary Summary 255 Bibliography 259

5 Chapter 1 Introduction 1.1 Standard Notions One of the major issues in investigating the relation of language and meaning is the question of how to characterise and draw the line between what traditionally are called semantics and pragmatics. In describing what they take to be the characteristics of one or the other system, linguists often make use of the terms literal meaning and non-literal meaning. For example, Lyons (1987) lists a number of propositions used in the differentiation of semantics from pragmatics, amongst which is the following:... that semantics deals with literal, and pragmatics with non-literal, meaning... (ibid., p. 157). Similarly, Cole (1981, p. xi) states that semantics... is involved in the determination of conventional (or literal) meaning..., whereas pragmatics is concerned with... the determination of nonconventional (or nonliteral) meaning... and Kadmon (2001, p. 3) writes... I think that roughly, semantics only covers literal meaning. Pragmatics has to do with language use, and with going beyond the literal meaning.. More recently, Recanati (2004) summarised (and criticised) the standard view on the division of labour between semantics and pragmatics, starting with the following sentence. Semantics deals with the literal meaning of words and sentences as determined by the rules of the language, while pragmatics deals with what the users of the language mean by their utterances of words and sentences. (Recanati 2004, p. 3). Actually, the pair of terms literal meaning/non-literal meaning is only one of quite a number of dichotomies used in the characterisation of semantics and pragmatics. Thus, the two systems are often characterised in terms of the differentiation between conventional vs. non-conventional meaning, as, e.g. in the quote from Cole (1981) above. Similarly, in Lyons (1987) one finds the proposition... that semantics has to do with conventional, and pragmatics with the non-conventional, aspects of meaning... (ibid., p. 157). Another important pair of terms traditionally used is context-independent vs. context-dependent meaning. Thus, Lyons (1987, p. 157) states... that semantics deals with context-independent, and pragmatics with context-dependent, meaning. More specifically, Katz (1977) introduces the notion of the anonymous letter situation to characterise the kind of meaning captured

6 2 Introduction by semantics. [I] draw the theoretical line between semantic interpretation and pragmatic interpretation by taking the semantic component to properly represent only those aspects of the meaning of the sentence that an ideal speaker-hearer of the language would know in an anonymous letter situation,... [where there is] no clue whatever about the motive, circumstances of transmission, or any other factor relevant to understanding the sentence on the basis of its context of utterance. (Ibid., p. 14) To summarise, whereas semantics is characterised as dealing with literal, conventional and context-independent meaning, pragmatics deals with non-literal, nonconventional and context-dependent meaning. More generally, the standard notions of semantics and pragmatics may be described as follows. Semantics deals with those aspects of meaning that both simple and complex expressions have, independent of their use. In contrast, pragmatics deals with those aspects of meaning that are determined by the actual use of language. 1 That is, semantics is concerned with meaning that is independent of any specific context, whereas pragmatics specifically draws on contextual information for the interpretation of some expression. Assuming that the borderline between semantics and pragmatics is fixed and stable, using the dichotomies mentioned above in the characterisation of the respective systems suggests that there is a correspondence between literal, conventional and context-independent meaning, on the one hand, and non-literal, non-conventional and context-dependent meaning on the other. 2 However, one usually does not find actual characterisations of the kind of meaning picked out by the terms literal meaning and non-literal meaning other than such that again (more or less explicitly) relate the two notions back to the semantics/pragmatics distinction. For instance, Bach (2001a) writes Words do not have nonliteral meanings [... ], but they can be used in nonliteral ways. [... ] In familiar cases, such as metaphor and metonymy, particular expressions are used nonliterally. [... ] But there is a different phenomenon which I call sentence nonliterality, [... ] Here a whole sentence is used nonliterally, without any of its constituent expressions being so used. (Ibid., p. 249, my emphasis). Thus, whereas literal meaning is a feature that expressions are said to have, the nonliteral meaning of an expression results from the particular use of that expression. Moreover, not only simple but also complex expressions can be used non-literally. In both cases, the non-literal meaning results from the actual use of a certain expression in a specific context. In addition to the circumscription non-literal use of language, one finds descriptions such as non-literal utterances (cf. Carston 2005) or nonliteral interpretation (cf. Papafragou 1996, Ariel 2002, Carston 2005). 1 Cp., again, Lyons (1987) who mentions the idea that... semantics has to do with meaning, and pragmatics with use... (Ibid., p. 157). 2 From the quotes given above, this is especially apparent in Cole s, who uses the terms literal and non-literal as synonymous to conventional and non-conventional, respectively.

7 Are the Standard Notions Adequate? 3 Generally, it seems that the two terms literal meaning and non-literal meaning are treated as denoting basic kinds of meaning that are intuitively clear and as such need no further description. However, although there are no clear definitions of the terms literal meaning and non-literal meaning given in the literature concerned, the fact that the two terms are used amongst others in a dichotomous characterisation of semantics and pragmatics suggests that these terms may also be used in characterising literal meaning and non-literal meaning as such (or the other way around as done by Cole). This latter characterisation has led to what might be called the standard notions of literal meaning and non-literal meaning which are summarised in what follows. Literal meaning, on the one hand, is assumed to be conventionalised, that is, it does not take any special interpretation effort to arrive at it. The literal meaning of simple expressions is listed in their lexical entries; the literal meaning of complex expressions is the result of a principled combination of the literal meanings of their parts. Thus, both the literal meaning of simple as well as complex expressions is characterised by the fact that it is context-independent. Non-literal meaning, on the other hand, is assumed to be non-conventionalised, thus, it does take a special interpretation effort to arrive at it. Intuitively, it is considered as deviating from some more basic (literal) meaning in a fairly special way. Overall, the term nonliteral meaning is used to differentiate from literal meaning a kind of meaning that is derived from the latter and, in a sense, has a secondary status. Therefore, it is traditionally assumed that in terms of the enfolding of the interpretation process, the literal meaning of an expression is processed first, whereas any potential nonliteral meanings are processed afterwards and only if the literal interpretation does not fit the given context. Finally, in accordance with the standard characterisations of semantics and pragmatics given above, literal meaning is traditionally assumed to belong to the domain of semantics (as it can apparently be determined without reference to any particular context of utterance), whereas non-literal meaning is assumed to be properly investigated by pragmatics (as it seems it can only be determined by taking into account the context of an utterance). Such a classification presumes that the definitions of the terms literal meaning and non-literal meaning, as well as the characterisation of what semantics and pragmatics are concerned with are indisputably clear. However, the ongoing debate about the proper demarcation of semantics from pragmatics show that this is not at all the case (Carston 1999, Levinson 2000, Bezuidenhout and Cutting 2002, Bianchi 2004, Carston 2004a, Recanati 2004, Cappelen and Lepore 2005, Dölling 2005, Carston 2007, etc.). 1.2 Are the Standard Notions Adequate? Note that although there is something like a standard characterisation for the terms literal meaning and non-literal meaning, they are not consistently used in accord with these characterisations. For instance, the term literal meaning is not only used in connection with such phenomena as are considered totally context-independent. Thus, Carston (2007) refers to the... literal meaning of [a speaker s] utterance (ibid., p. 21). Similarly, Recanati (1995) speaks of... the literal interpretation of

8 4 Introduction an utterance (the proposition literally expressed by that utterance)... (ibid, p. 2) and Sag (1981) speaks of the... propositional content of an utterance (i.e., its literal meaning)... (ibid, p ). What makes such descriptions interesting in the present context is that what the authors refer to by the description literal meaning of an utterance does not necessarily correspond to the context-independent meaning of the expression used to make the particular utterance, since, as we will see, this need not actually be a full proposition. Rather, they use the term literal here to differentiate the meaning of some expression in a particular context from the meaning that the speaker actually intended to express (or at least is taken by the hearer to have expressed). Bezuidenhout and Cutting (2002, p. 435) make a similar observation when they say that [t]he phrases literal meaning or literal interpretation have been used to cover both the literal meaning of a sentence and what is said by the utterance of a sentence in a context. This is also noted by Korta and Perry (2008), who write that [w]hat is said has been widely identified with the literal content of the utterance.... Generally, the term literal meaning is used with respect to a level of meaning which can no longer be said to be context-independent. It should be noted that it is authors who reject the standard characterisation of semantics and pragmatics that use the terms literal meaning and non-literal meaning in a non-standard understanding. The problem is that they do so implicitly. That is, these authors do not explicitly say anything new concerning the understanding of the terms literal meaning and non-literal meaning. As Wilson and Sperber (2000, p. 250) put it, [t]he notion of literal meaning, which plays such a central role in most theories of language use, is unclear in many respects. Note also that it is not only the pair of terms literal (meaning)/non-literal (meaning) that is employed differently in the various approaches. Such notions as (non)-conventionality and context-(in)dependence are problematic as well. Thus, the use of the pair of terms conventional vs. non-conventional as exemplified above suggests that conventionality is an all-or-nothing property. However, as is suggested by the results of various experiments investigating the nature of the interpretation process on the one hand (cf. Giora 1997, 1999, Gibbs 2002), as well as theoretical considerations within the field of historical semantics on the other (cf. Busse 1991), this view is an oversimplification of the facts. Similarly, not all approaches that are characterised as essentially semantic by their proponents necessarily share the view that what semantics deals with is context-independent meaning only (cf. Sag 1981, Borg 2004b, Cappelen and Lepore 2005). The problem that arises is that if the terms in which the notions literal meaning and non-literal meaning are defined are put under closer scrutiny, it might turn out that they do not capture the aspects that we intuitively and pre-theoretically associate with the notions of literal meaning and non-literal meaning. Another problem is that with only the standard notions of literal meaning and non-literal meaning to rely on, it is no trivial question to ask how these two meaning aspects are related to other kinds of meaning aspects identified in the individual approaches, such as e.g., explicit/implicit meaning aspects of an utterance, so-called ad-hoc concepts or conversational implicatures. For instance, metaphor one particular type of non-literal meaning has actually been treated in terms of conversational implicature and so has irony. In fact, conversational implicatures in general have been characterised as

9 Interpretation and Levels of Meaning 5 non-literal (cf. Recanati 2004), although, intuitively at least and especially if one actually does not count metaphor and irony amongst them this is a questionable claim. 1.3 Interpretation and Levels of Meaning A further point to note is that the assumption that two systems, namely semantics and pragmatics, are involved in the interpretation of natural language utterances suggests that there is also only a differentiation of two levels of meaning necessary. Thus, the semantic component takes the lexical meanings of the individual expressions used in an utterance and combines them in a principled manner, resulting in the truth-conditional or semantic meaning of the complex expression used in an utterance, traditionally taken to be a proposition. This semantic meaning, then, is the input to the pragmatic component which determines what the speaker who uttered the expression in question actually meant in a particular situation. This is the view usually taken to underlie Grice s differentiation of the two levels of meaning what is said and what is meant. 3 In Grice s terminology then, literal meaning is part of the level of what is said, whereas non-literal meaning is to be found only at the level of what is meant. However, it has been pointed out both in Neo- as well as Post-Gricean approaches that Grice s notion of what is said is problematic. More specifically, it has been argued that what is said cannot both be the semantic meaning of an utterance as well as the basis for drawing conversational implicatures (cf. Sperber and Wilson 1995, Levinson 2000, Carston 2002c, Recanati 2004). As a consequence of such problems of Grice s approach, more than two levels of meaning have been assumed: a level that captures the semantic meaning of an expression, a context-dependent level that can function as the basis for further pragmatic inferences to be drawn (call this what is said for now) and the level of what is meant. What is interesting to note with respect to the differentiation of three levels of meaning is the various possibilities this opens up for the classification of literal meaning and non-literal meaning. Thus, with the differentiation of semantic meaning from what is said, the question arises where to put literal meaning: is it part of the level of semantic meaning or part of the level of what is said? The quotations above suggest that different linguists hold different views concerning this question. Note also that a similar question can be asked concerning non-literal meaning. That is, with the differentiation of the two distinct levels of contextsensitive meaning what is said and what is meant, the question arises whether nonliteral meaning aspects exclusively belong to the latter level or whether they might not already arise at the former. Note that if both literal meaning and non-literal meaning are assumed to arise at the level of what is said already, then this would suggest that the two types of meaning are not as different from one another as traditionally assumed. However, the various approaches to the interpretation of natural language differ in the characterisations they assume for the individual levels of meaning identified. 3 It should be noted that in his efforts to explicate the notions of saying vs. meaning, Grice actually contemplated four different types of meaning. For more on this issue see chapter 3.

10 6 Introduction Again, the different characterisations are dependent on the particular views held regarding the nature of the semantic and pragmatic components, the roles they play in the overall interpretation process as well as the type of information they are assumed to have access to. 1.4 Aims of the Thesis I want to show that the standard notions of literal meaning and non-literal meaning are not consistent and that, as a result, the two terms cannot be used to differentiate between the types of meaning aspects semantics and pragmatics are usually assumed to deal with. In contrast, I want to develop a characterisation of literal meaning and non-literal meaning that is consistent and captures the various uses the two terms are put to. In addition, I want to defend the view that differentiating between two context-dependent levels of meaning what is said/utterance meaning and what is meant/communicative sense is possible and necessary. In particular, I will propose a modelling of the process that provides implicit meaning aspects to the level of what is said/utterance meaning that allows viewing this process as the processes contributing to this level of meaning in general as operating independently of considerations of speaker intentions. Finally, I want to show that a differentiation of semantics from pragmatics that implicitly relies on a logical or temporal ordering of the two systems is inappropriate. Rather, the processes constituting these two systems should be seen as operating in tandem. 1.5 Thesis Plan The thesis is structured as follows. In chapter 2, I will argue against the standard notions of literal meaning and non-literal meaning. In particular, I will argue against the traditional characterisation of literal meaning and non-literal meaning, according to which the former is taken to be context-independent and the latter non-conventional. Having established that literal meaning does not necessarily have to be taken to be context-independent and as such semantic in nature, I will discuss the consequences this view has for the nature of lexical meaning. After reviewing a number of different types of approaches to lexical meaning, I will argue for a view that assumes a high degree of underspecification of lexical meaning. Generally, in the discussions in chapter 1, I will consider both theoretical viewpoints as well as empirical data. In particular, one section is dedicated to empirical studies on aspects of the semantics component, namely that lexical meaning is characterised by underspecification and that, generally, semantic processes of meaning construction should be differentiated from pragmatically based plausibility checks. In the last part of chapter 1, I will try to answer the question of why the standard notions of literal meaning and non-literal meaning came to be assumed in the first place. Here, the idea of stereotypical interpretations of linguistic expressions presented out of context will be considered. Having argued against the standard notions in chapter 2, and more specifically, having argued for viewing literal meaning, similarly to non-literal meaning as essen-

11 Thesis Plan 7 tially context-dependent as well, chapter 3 is dedicated to looking in detail at the first context-dependent level of meaning called what is said by Grice, to see how this has been characterised subsequently and to identify the processes potentially involved in determining literal meaning at this level of meaning. I will start with Grice s differentiation of four different types of meaning and relate them to the two levels of meaning Grice introduced: what is said and what is meant. Following that, I will present Bierwisch s threefold differentiation of levels of meaning, based on the different knowledge systems made use of in their determination. In the second part of chapter 3, I will discuss a range of approaches that give alternative characterisations for Grice s level of what is said. The overall aim is to identify the different processes at work in determining what is said, how these processes are characterised and which types of meaning aspects can be found at this level of meaning (appart from potentially literal or non-literal meaning). At the same time, the various approaches discussed also all offer slightly different views on the nature of the semantics and pragmatics components and how they interact in the process of utterance interpretation. While the greater part of chapter 3 is taken up by theoretical considerations, towards the end of that chapter a few empirical results will also be discussed. Chapter 4, then, is concerned, on the one hand, with phenomena traditionally assumed to arise at Grice s level of meaning what is meant, and, on the other hand, with the more basic question of whether a differentiation of two context-dependent levels of meaning what is said and what is meant actually is necessary/possible. Thus, in the first part of chapter 4, alternative approaches to the phenomena of metaphor, irony, (primarily generalised) conversational implicature and (primarily indirect) speech acts will be reviewed as well as empirical results considered that test the predictions following from the individual approaches. Here, the aim is to establish, on the one hand, how these different meaning aspects are determined and, on the other hand, which of the phenomena actually can be usefully considered as non-literal. More generally, the question is addressed at which level of meaning (i.e. what is said or what is meant) the individual phenomena should be taken to arise. In the second part of chapter 4, various arguments will be presented for and against differentiating the two levels what is said and what is meant from one another. I hope to make clear that such a differentiation is useful and necessary, although it might be difficult to decide on the criteria to be used in this differentiation. Chapter 5, finally, turns back to the basic question that chapter 2 ends with, namely how literal meaning and non-literal meaning actually should be characterised if one wants to capture the various uses the two terms are put to. I will start out with two alternative characterisations of what literal meaning and non-literal meaning should be taken to be, before presenting my own characterisation, based on the discussion in the preceding chapters. As a preliminary for my characterisation, I will review the various processes identified in the preceding chapters as involved in the overall interpretation of utterances. The main consequence drawn from my characterisation of literal meaning and non-literal meaning will be that these two notions actually cannot be used in the characterisation of the distinction between semantics and pragmatics, if the former, in contrast to the latter, is essentially taken to be context-independent. The last part of chapter 5 will take up exactly this point, namely the nature of contextual information in utterance interpretation and

12 8 Introduction whether the notion of context-(in)dependence actually is useful in differentiating between semantics and pragmatics. Thus, I will first offer a proposal concerning the nature of the contextual information the process of free enrichment makes use of. Free enrichment is one of the processes assumed to contribute to the level of utterance meaning and crucially is taken to depend on a consideration of potential speaker intentions for its operation. I will show that this assumption is not necessary. In the final section of chapter 5, I will turn back to the characterisation of the semantics/pragmatics distinction and after discussing a number of views on that characterisation present my own.

13 Chapter 2 Against the Standard Notions of Literal Meaning and Non-literal Meaning In this chapter, I will argue against the standard notions of literal meaning and non-literal meaning described in chapter 1 (sections 2.1 and 2.2, respectively). The main aim of this chapter is to show that the dichotomies traditionally used to differentiate literal meaning from non-literal meaning either cannot in fact differentiate the two meanings (as is the case with the feature of context-(in)dependence) or are not such all-or-nothing concepts as traditionally implied (as is the case with the property of conventionality). Generally, the arguments presented point to the crucial conclusion that literal meaning and non-literal meaning are in fact not so different from one another as traditionally assumed. Having argued against viewing literal meaning as essentially context-independent and non-literal meaning as essentially non-conventional, I will consider the consequences this has for the nature of lexical meaning (section 2.3). Moreover, I will consider empirical evidence supporting the assumption of underspecification of lexical meaning and, more generally, a distinction between distinctly semantic and pragmatic processes in interpretation (2.4). In addition, I will address the question of why the standard assumptions came into existence in the first place (section 2.5). 2.1 Literal Meaning and Context-Independence Traditionally, complex expressions are assumed to have literal meaning in the form of what formal semantics 1 calls sentence meaning, which results from the process of semantic composition which combines the literal meanings of the simple expressions that together constitute the complex expression and which captures the proposition expressed by that sentence. 2 Moreover, during interpretation, the literal meaning of 1 Note that in what follows, on the semantics side, I am primarily interested in assumptions made in the programme of formal semantics. 2 In this section, I will primarely be concerned with two of the three properties literal meaning is standardly claimed to exhibit, namely that it is context-independent and primary to non-literal meaning. Thus, I will concentrate on complex expressions, leaving the discussion of the nature of

14 10 Against the Standard Notions of Literal Meaning and Non-literal Meaning a complex expression is computed first, whereas its potential non-literal meaning is computed afterwards and only if the literal meaning does not fit the given context (cf. Grice 1975; Searle 1979). Intuitively, these characterisations seem to be sound. They give a fairly general description of what we take to be literal meaning with respect to complex expressions. However, looking at each of the characteristics in more detail reveals that they are not unproblematic. Thus, it is questionable whether what we usually take to be a complex expression s literal meaning does in fact correspond to its contextindependent, compositional meaning. Put differently, the question is whether the formal semantic notion of sentence meaning can be assumed to both be the sum of the lexical meanings of the simple expressions involved as well as having a fully propositional form. Furthermore, in computing the speaker-intended non-literal meaning of an expression, it may not actually be necessary to first compute the literal meaning of the expression the speaker used as an intermediate step Literal Meaning as Compositional Meaning? Concentrating on the traditional characterisation of the programme of formal semantics and the role of literal meaning therein reveals that, in a sense, the characterisation of literal meaning and non-literal meaning is interdependent on the characterisations of semantics and pragmatics. Thus, basically, formal semantics can be characterised as dealing with the context-independent meaning of simple and complex expressions. 3 More specifically, it aims at formulating truth conditions for sentences. That is, it takes as a starting point for analysis the level of sentence meaning, mainly for two reasons. First, it seems that sentences express propositions, that is, complete thoughts, something of which it makes sense to ask whether it is true or not. Second, intuitively at least, the meaning of a sentence can be grasped without any reference to an actual utterance of that sentence and is thus context-independent. It contrasts with interpretations of a sentence that can only be derived by considering the actual context in which that sentence is uttered (e.g., cases of irony or particularised conversational implicature). Thus, sentence meaning is considered literal in the sense that its derivation is independent of contextual information. Moreover, sentence meaning also is the level from which the meanings of the individual expressions involved are derived, following the principle of compositionality. And since sentence meaning is context-independent, the meanings of the simple expressions derived from it are context-independent too. They are the lexical meanings of the expressions concerned. Thus, primarily, what the term literal meaning refers to is a certain type of meaning that, intuitively, seems to differ from other types of meaning mainly by virtue of the fact that it is context-independent and fully propositional (sentence meaning). Derivatively, the term also refers to types of meaning which are not propositional, but crucially are context-independent and are derived from a full proposition via the principle of compositionality (lexical meaning). lexical meaning to section See below, however, for formal semantic approaches that also take into account contextual information.

15 Literal Meaning and Context-Independence 11 meaning context-independent context-dependent lexical m. sentence m literal non-literal Figure 2.1: Traditional differentiation of types of meaning So far so good. However, the characterisation of formal semantics as stated above has proven to be problematic. And, as we will see, these problems also extend to the characterisation given to the notion of literal meaning. Thus, to summarise: in its traditional form, three of formal semantics main assumptions are the following: a) semantics is concerned with the context-independent meaning of natural language expressions, b) for sentences, what is determined by the semantic component of a natural language grammar is the proposition expressed by that sentence and c) for simple expressions their semantics (or lexical meaning) is whatever aspects of their meaning remain constant across different uses of that expression. However, as Sag (1981) points out: a formal semantic theory which does not allow for any contextual information to be made use of in determining the proposition expressed by a sentence... appears to be falsified by the mere existence of sentences containing tense morphemes or other indexical expressions. (Ibid, p. 274). Thus, consider the sentence in (1). (1) He went to the bank yesterday. For the sentence in example (1), it is clearly not the case, that semantics determines a truth-evaluable proposition, due to the occurrences of the context-dependent expressions he and yesterday as well as the homonymous noun bank. As is the case for all indexical expressions, the exact reference of he and yesterday differs with the contexts in which they are uttered. Thus, for such expressions semantics only gives rules for where to look in the search for potential referents. In the case of the occurrence in a sentence of homonymous expressions such as bank, the assumption is that the process of semantic composition has to build up as many different structures for the sentence, as there are ambiguous expressions in it. Thus, for (1) to express a full proposition, the references of the occurring indexical expressions have to be fixed, that is, recourse has to be taken to the context of the utterance. Moreover, the sentence has to be disambiguated, which, again, is only possible with the help of contextual information. Even then, the sentence does not express a proposition until the reference of the NP the bank to some unique location has been fixed. What this shows is that the proposition expressed by some sentence can only actually be

16 12 Against the Standard Notions of Literal Meaning and Non-literal Meaning determined once the context in which it is uttered is taken into consideration. Thus, it seems that the semanticist cannot uphold both assumptions a) and b). If he wants to rescue assumption a), it seems he has to concede that, in fact, the semantic component does not determine the truth-evaluable proposition expressed by a sentence; if he wants to rescue the assumption in b), he has to allow for context-sensitive processes to take place during the determination of the proposition expressed by a sentence. However, formal semantic approaches exist which attempt to capture the difference between context-sensitive and context-insensitive expressions and at the same time uphold assumptions a) and b). One such approach is Kaplan (1989b). Thus, Kaplan proposes to differentiate between, in a sense, two meanings of expressions: their character and their content. 4 Consider example (2). (2) a. Mary: I am hungry. b. John: I am hungry. On the one hand, the notion of character captures the intuition that Mary and John in a way have said the same thing: both used the same sentence. The notion of content, on the other hand, captures the intuition that, at the same time, Mary and John have not expressed the same idea. Kaplan s suggestion is that a sentence s character is a function that takes a context in order to deliver a proposition or the content of that sentence in that context. Thus, although Mary and John use the same sentence, they express different propositions: Mary says that she is hungry, whereas John says that he is hungry. This difference is due to the character of I, which can be glossed as referring to the speaker or writer. Applying I s character to a particular context determines the actual speaker in that context, i.e., the content (or intension) of I in that particular context. Having determined the proposition expressed by a sentence in a particular context, the proposition can then be evaluated with respect to a circumstance of use or possible world. Thus, the content (or intension) of a sentence in a particular context is a function from possible worlds to truth values. In Kaplan s approach, then, context-sensitive expressions are such that their character applied to different contexts yields different contents. However, a contextsensitive expression s content in turn is a constant function from possible worlds to extensions since regardless of the world at which the content of the expression is evaluated, it will always have the same extension. For example, the content of an expression such as I varies depending on the context in which it is used. However, once the content is determined, it stays the same for all possible worlds. In contrast, the content of hungry does not depend on the context in which it is used. It always is the property being-hungry. However, the actual extension of this predicate depends on the possible world that is assumed. That is, the set of individuals to which the predicate applies may differ across different worlds. Thus, contextinsensitive expressions have varying extensions, while their characters are such that regardless of the context the respective character is applied to, the same content will be determined. In a way, for context-insensitive expressions their character and content fall together. 4 Cf. Chierchia and McConnell-Ginet (2000), Braun (2010) for accessible introductions to these notions.

17 Literal Meaning and Context-Independence 13 Kaplan s approach, thus, allows a differentiation of three levels of meaning: character, content or intension and extension. For sentences this means one can differentiate between the context-independent sentence meaning, the proposition expressed by a sentence in a context and the truth value of a sentence in a context with respect to a possible world. Thus, implementing these ideas in a model-theoretic semantic apparatus leads to the truth of a sentence not only being determined with respect to a world and time, but also a context of utterance (cf. Sag 1981). In a way, within such an approach, both assumptions a) and b) can be maintained. That is, what is determined by the semantic component is the contextindependent meaning of a sentence and the conditions under which that sentence is true. Using the indices w, i and c, the instruction of how to determine the proposition expressed by a sentence is also given. However, it should be noted that the proposition expressed only actually is determined, once the functions are applied to a particular world, time and context. In other words, although it is possible within such an approach to formulate conditions under which a particular sentence is true, due to the indices used the sentence s meaning thus given may be compatible with quite a number of different situations. Thus, it cannot be taken to represent the proposition expressed in a particular utterance situation. Traditionally, formal semanticists have assumed that the semantic component of the language faculty determines the meaning both of simple and complex expressions and then there are a restricted number of processes (namely, resolving of reference, fixing of indexicals and disambiguation) that lead to the proposition expressed by a sentence. However, these processes are not explicitly referred to as being of a pragmatic nature. This is quite obvious in the works of Grice, who mentions the processes that lead to what he called what is said, but does not seem to consider them as pragmatic in the same sense as the processes that result in conversational implicatures (Grice 1975) (cf. figure 2.2). However, if pragmatic processes are characterised by the fact that they take into account contextual information then, surely, the processes of fixing indexicals, resolving references and disambiguation are of pragmatic nature. Semantics lexical meaning? Pragmatics sentence meaning what is said what is meant semantic composition reference resolution fixing indexicals disambiguation conversational implicature... basis for further pragmatic inferences Figure 2.2: Grice s distinction of what is said and what is meant

18 14 Against the Standard Notions of Literal Meaning and Non-literal Meaning Thus, as Strawson (1950) noted, it is not sentences which express something of which it makes sense to ask whether it is true or false but rather the utterances of those sentences. Thus, one and the same sentence can be used to express something true at one point and something false at another. That is, regardless of whether sentences include indexical or ambiguous expressions, it is not a general property of sentences, but rather of utterances that they express propositions. If it is not sentences per se that express propositions and are truth-evaluable but rather their utterances, what exactly, then, does the concept of sentence meaning capture? This is an important question considering that formal semantics takes sentence meaning as the starting point from which to deduce the meanings of simple expressions, which presupposes that the notion of sentence meaning is clearly defined. A possible answer is to still regard both the meaning of simple as well as complex expressions, in particular sentences, as essentially context-independent. That is, as traditionally assumed, semantics deals with the meaning of both simple and complex expressions, where the meaning of simple expressions forms part of their lexical entries and the meaning of complex expressions is a function of the meanings of their parts and their syntactic combination. However, such a view does not claim that sentence meaning necessarily is propositional; it simply assumes that sentence meaning is context-independent Literal Meaning as Context-Independent? But what about the correlation between sentence meaning and literal meaning suggested above? There it was stated that, apparently, literal meaning refers to a level of meaning identified as sentence meaning by traditional formal semantics and characterised as being context-independent and fully propositional. The assumption was that the notion of literal meaning mainly captures the fact that sentence meaning is context-independent, thus, with the revised characterisation of sentence meaning as only context-independent but not necessarily fully propositional, the term literal meaning should still be applicable to that level of meaning. There are a number of considerations that go against this characterisation. Thus, recall the uses of the term literal meaning mentioned in chapter 1, where the term, on the one hand, is used to refer to a kind of context-dependent but at the same time in some sense basic meaning and, on the other hand, is contrasted with a kind of meaning that is not only context-dependent but crucially in some sense derived or non-basic (cf. Sag 1981, Recanati 1995, Carston 2007). As mentioned before, such a use calls into question the adequacy of characterising literal meaning as context-independent meaning. In fact, already in his (1978) paper, Searle criticised this characterisation of literal meaning. He argues that there is no such thing as a solely linguistically determined literal meaning of a complex expression. As regards sentence meaning, one cannot speak of the literal meaning of a sentence in the standard sense. As Recanati (2004) puts it, Searle holds the view of contextualism, according to which... there is no level of meaning which is both (i) propositional (truth-evaluable) and (ii) minimalist, that is, unaffected by top-down factors. (Ibid., p. 90). Thus, Searle assumes that the expression of a determinate proposition takes place against a set of background assumptions. To illustrate his point of view, Searle

19 Literal Meaning and Context-Independence 15 uses the sentence in (3), which, taken out of context, seems to have a quite obvious literal meaning, which Searle (1978) depicts as in 2.3. (3) The cat is on the mat. Figure 2.3: The typical cat-on-the-mat configuration The problem with this literal sentence meaning is that although speakers or hearers are not necessarily aware of the fact, a number of preconditions are assumed to hold 5. To show this, Searle constructs a context of utterance for the sentence in (3), where it is questionable whether one would want to say that the sentence correctly describes the state of affairs at hand.... suppose the cat and the mat are in exactly the relations depicted only they are floating freely in outer space, perhaps the Milky Way galaxy altogether. In such a situation the scene would be just as well depicted if we turn the paper on edge or upside down since there is no gravitational field relative to which one is above the other. Is the cat still on the mat? (Searle 1978, cited from Searle 1979, p. 122) Thus, if what the meaning of a sentence does is determine a set of truth-conditions, Searle argues that for most sentences this determination can only take place against specific background assumptions. These background assumptions are not part of the semantic structure of the sentence, that is, they are unarticulated. Moreover, due to possible variations in the background assumptions, the same sentence might have varying truth-conditions. For any sentence, there is no fixed set of background assumptions of which it could be said that it determines that sentence s literal meaning. To illustrate this fact, Searle construes a context of utterance for (3), in which it could be used to truthfully describe a situation such as depicted in figure A further example for the fact that the literal meaning of a sentence depends on background assumptions can be found in Searle (1980). Searle gives a number of sentences containing the verb to cut; here are the first five. 5 Note that Searle is not referring to the fact that the sentence in (3) additionally contains indexical elements. That is another matter. 6 This is Searle s context: The mat is in its stiff angled position, as in [figure 2.4], and it is part of a row of objects similarly sticking up at odd angles - a board, a fence post, an iron rod, etc. These facts are known to both speaker and hearer. The cat jumps from one of these objects to another. It is pretty obvious what the correct answer to the question Where is the cat? should be when the cat is in the attitude depicted in [figure 2.4]: The cat is on the mat. (Searle 1978, cited from Searle 1979, p. 125).

20 16 Against the Standard Notions of Literal Meaning and Non-literal Meaning Figure 2.4: A rather unusual cat-on-the-mat configuration (4) a. Bill cut the grass. b. The barber cut Tom s hair. c. Sally cut the cake. d. I just cut my skin. e. The tailor cut the cloth. As Searle notes, in each of the example sentences in (4) cut occurs in its literal meaning. There is nothing in these sentences as such that would lead one to interpret them as metaphorical or figurative. However, although cut occurs in its literal meaning, the situations that it is used to describe differ conceptually. Thus, although cut is used in its literal meaning, for the different sentences in (4), it determines different truth conditions. This can be seen if one considers what it would mean to obey an order of cutting something. Searle puts it as follows. If someone tells me to cut the grass and I rush out and stab it with a knife, or if I am ordered to cut the cake and I run over it with a lawnmower, in each case I will have failed to obey the order. That is not what the speaker meant by his literal and serious utterance of the sentence. (Searle 1980, p. 223). Thus, again, in the examples in (4), the literal meaning of the individual sentences (and of the word cut) is determined against a set of background assumptions, namely what we know about lawns and cakes and so on and what are usual actions in which we involve with regard to those things. Furthermore, in his discussion on the cut examples, Searle points out that it is not sufficient to assume that the different readings of cut its different literal meanings are due to some intrasentential interaction between the verb and its internal argument. That is, he argues against the view according to which cut together with the respective argument determines that cut in cut the grass will receive a different interpretation from the one it receives in cut the cake. His reasoning is that it is possible to... imagine circumstances in which cut in cut the grass would have the same interpretation it has in cut the cake... (Searle 1980, p. 224). Suppose you and I run a sod farm where we sell strips of grass turf to people who want a lawn in a hurry. [... ] Suppose I say to you, Cut half an acre of grass for this customer ; I might mean not that you should mow it, but that you should slice it into strips as you could cut a cake or a loaf of bread. (Searle 1980, p ).