Formal and Experimental Semantics
Cogmaster
- LC2
Emmanuel
Chemla (Institut Jean-Nicod and LSCP) and Philippe Schlenker (Institut
Jean-Nicod & NYU)
École Normale
Supérieure, Winter 2009
|
Instructors: Emmanuel
Chemla
Post-doctorant, Institut Jean-Nicod & LSCP (DEC)
E-mail: chemla@ens.fr
Philippe
Schlenker
Directeur de
Recherche, Institut Jean-Nicod (DEC) & NYU
E-mail:
philippe.schlenker@gmail.com
Schedule:
3 hours per week during 7 weeks
Monday, 1pm-4pm
First
Meeting: November 23, 2009
Location
Textbook:
Heim & Kratzer, Semantics in
Generative Grammar.
Pre-requisites:
Some experience with elementary logic and/or an introduction to
linguistics. In case of doubt, please contact the instructors by e-mail.
Description: This
course will offer an intensive introduction to the formal and
experimental methods used in contemporary research on meaning. We
characterize
knowledge of meaning as
knowledge of
truth conditions. The goal of
semantics
is thus to uncover the rules that allow the speakers of a language to
know
under what conditions any sentence is true; or in other words, to
construct
a
theory of truth for natural
language. We will do so for fragments (i.e. simple formal
languages) that include: proper names, pronouns and predicates;
generalized quantifiers (e.g.
some,
every,
most); definite descriptions (
the); and simple
temporal
and modal expressions. Special attention will be
devoted
to the division of labor between semantics and pragmatics, and we will
offer
simplified analyses of presuppositions and implicatures. An unusual
feature of this course is that it will include several examples of
experimental methods used to
investigate the semantic and pragmatic phenomena under consideration.
The course will be given in French, but the course materials will be in
English.
Requirements:
-Do the readings and participate actively in class discussions.
-Homeworks will be assigned on a weekly basis. They may take a variety
of
forms: formal exercises, empirical investigations, article discussion,
etc.
-One short final paper is expected as well.
Semantics and Pragmatics at
ENS: SIGMA
(Structures and
Interpretations: Grammars, Models and Analyses)
To access the rest of this page (and
links to
papers), you will need a password. (You
may send e-mail to the instructor to obtain it).
Password (write to the lecturer if you
have lost the password)