Unit 3 Study Guide and Exercises Directions

4 Give an example of an expression not found in this unit that has an
invariable referent and of one that has no referent.
5 Explain this sentence from this unit in your own words: ‘Every expression
that has meaning has sense, but not every expression has reference’.
6 Characterize a typical dictionary de
finition of a word. Does the definition
include everything a typical native speaker knows about the word’s
meaning? Is it possible to write such an entry which is complete?
Comment on the following examples, making reference to concepts
introduced in this unit.
7 the Evening Star / the Morning Star
8 the President of the United States / the Commander-in-Chief / the Leader of
the Republican Party
9 Visiting relatives can be boring
10 the planet Mars
11 Smoking grass can be dangerous
U N I T   3
Reference and sense
35

36
2
From reference . . .
UNIT 4 REFERRING EXPRESSIONS
Entry requirements REFERENCE and SENSE (Unit 3). If you feel you understand these notions,
take the entry test below. If not, review Unit 3 before continuing.
Entry test Answer the following questions:
(1) Give an example of an expression that might be used to refer to the
President of the United States in 2007.
..........................................................................................................................
(2) Give an example of an expression that could have variable reference.
..........................................................................................................................
(3) Give an example of an expression that always (in normal everyday
conversation) has constant reference.
..........................................................................................................................
(4) Give an example of di
fferent expressions having one referent.
..........................................................................................................................
(5) Give an example of an expression that has no reference.
..........................................................................................................................
(6) Which of the following is a correct description of ‘reference’? Circle
your choice.
(a) a relationship between expressions and other expressions which
have the same meaning
(b) the set of all objects which can potentially be referred to by an
expression
(c) a relationship between a particular object in the world and an
expression used in an utterance to pick that object out
Feedback
(1) George W. Bush, the former Governor of Texas, etc. (2) my car, this 
page, etc. (3) England, the sun, etc. (4) the Morning Star and the Evening
Star, etc. (5) and, if, etc. (6)(c)
If you got at least 5 out of 6 correct, continue to the introduction.
Otherwise, review Unit 3 before proceeding.

U N I T   4
Referring expressions
37
Introduction In this unit we develop the notion of reference (introduced in Unit 3), and
consider more closely the range of expressions that speakers may use to refer
to some object or person in the world. We will see that some expressions can
only be used as referring expressions, some never can, and some expressions
can be used to refer or not, depending on the kind of sentence they occur in.
We introduce a notion (equative sentence) that is closely bound up with the
idea of referring expressions.
Definition A REFERRING EXPRESSION is any expression used in an utterance to refer
to something or someone (or a clearly delimited collection of things or
people), i.e. used with a particular referent in mind.
Example The name Fred in an utterance such as ‘Fred hit me’, where the speaker has
a particular person in mind when he says ‘Fred’, is a referring expression.
Fred in ‘There’s no Fred at this address’ is not a referring expression,
because in this case a speaker would not have a particular person in mind in
uttering the word.
Practice Could the following possibly be used as referring expressions? Circle the
answer of your choice.
(1) John
Yes / No
(2) My uncle
Yes / No
(3) and
Yes / No
(4) the girl sitting on the wall by the bus stop
Yes / No
(5) a man
Yes / No
(6) my parents
Yes / No
(7) send
Yes / No
(8) under
Yes / No
Feedback
(1) Yes (2) Yes (3) No (4) Yes (5) Yes, as in ‘A man was in here looking for 
you’. (6) Yes (My parents refers to a pair of things. For convenience at this
point we use the idea of reference to include clearly delimited collections
of things.) (7) No (8) No
Comment The same expression can be a referring expression or not (or, as some would
put it, may or may not have a ‘referring interpretation’), depending on the
context. This is true of inde
finite noun phrases.
Practice (1) When a speaker says, ‘A man was in here looking for you 
last night’ is a man being used to refer to a particular man?
Yes / No
(2) So, in the above example, is a man a referring expression?
Yes / No

PA RT  T WO
From reference . . .
38
(3) When a speaker says, ‘The 
first sign of the monsoon is 
a cloud on the horizon no bigger than a man’s hand’, is 
a man being used to refer to a particular man?
Yes / No
(4) Is a man in this example a referring expression?
Yes / No
(5) Is forty buses, used in ‘Forty buses have been withdrawn from 
service by the Liverpool Corporation’, a referring expression?
Yes / No
(6) Is forty buses, used in ‘This engine has the power of forty 
buses’, a referring expression?
Yes / No
Feedback
(1) Yes (2) Yes (3) No (4) No (5) Yes, assuming that the speaker has 40 
speci
fic buses in mind (6) No
Comment In the above examples the linguistic context often gave a vital clue as to
whether the inde
finite noun phrase was a referring expression or not. But it
does not always give a clear indication.
Practice Are the following referring expressions? (Imagine normal circumstances for
the utterance.)
(1) a Norwegian, used in ‘Nancy married a Norwegian’
Yes / No
(2) a Norwegian, used in ‘Nancy wants to marry a Norwegian’
Yes / No
(3) a car, used in ‘John is looking for a car’
Yes / No
(4) a man with a limp, used in ‘Dick believes that a man 
with a limp killed Bo Peep’
Yes / No
(5) a man with a limp, used in ‘A man with a limp killed Bo Peep’
Yes / No
(6) a swan, used in ‘Every evening at sunset a swan 
flew 
over the house’
Yes / No
Feedback
(1) Yes (2) Yes and No: the sentence is ambiguous. It depends on whether 
the speaker has in mind a particular person whom Nancy wants to marry.
(3) Yes and No: the sentence is ambiguous. It depends on whether the
speaker has a particular car in mind. (4) Yes and No (5) Yes, it can be.
(6) Yes and No
Comment All of the ambiguities in the above examples could in fact be resolved by the
use of the word certain immediately following the inde
finite article a, as in,
for example: ‘Nancy wants to marry a certain Norwegian’ or ‘John is looking
for a certain car’.
All of the above examples involve inde
finite noun phrases. It is clear that,
given our de
finitions, which allude to what is in the mind of the speaker on a

tải về 1.74 Mb.

Chia sẻ với bạn bè của bạn: