Homework 5: Semantics

Posted Thursday October 9th. Due Tuesday October 14th.

Reading: Fromkin & Rodman: Chapter 4. Focus on pp.128-134, 137-142, 144-147, 154-164. You will need to have read this material in order to do the homework.

Exercises: Fromkin & Rodman, Chapter 4: #4, #5, #11, #16

(1) Exercise 4 (antonyms). In addition, please give examples or arguments to support your conclusion (e.g. dead/alive: this pair is complementary, because for anything that could be alive, not dead = alive).

(2) Exercise 5 (identifying thematic roles).

(3) Exercise 11 (presuppositions).

(4) Exercise 16 (ambiguities). Find as many interpretations of the ambiguous sentences as you can, and say what the cause of the ambiguity is: e.g. lexical ambiguity of "bank", or structural ambiguity of "man with the bicycle from Italy". Be sure to paraphrase the meanings in an unambiguous fashion. Be sure that the interpretations you list really are possible. Bonus points will be available for this question!