An Introduction to English Semantics and Pragmatics (Paperback)

Paperback. This clear and accessible textbook introduces the crucial concepts essential to your study of the semantics and pragmatics of English. Coverage is wide-ranging, taking you from word meaning to the level of discourse, and explaining how these topics are treated in contemporary linguistic research. Chapters cover adjective, noun and verb meanings, situation types, figurative language, tense, aspect, modality, quantification, topic and focus. Explanations of entailment, compositionality and scope provide a foundation for subsequent study of formal semantics. Supported by chapter summaries and with plenty of usage examples, exercises and discussion questions, you will not only gain a systematic overview of meaning in English but be equipped with the tools to argue for specific analyses as well. An introduction to the linguistic study of meaning, this book outlines the meaning potential (semantics) of English and how language knowledge is put to use (pragmatics). Shipping may be from multiple locations in the US or from the UK, depending on stock availability.…