Kinds of meaning

~ Referential meaning - something that a word or sentence refers to

- what the communication is about - the word refers to a certain thing, event,

attribution

Ex. The word apple refers to a fruit Mary peeled an apple and Mary ate an apple.

~ Organizational meaning - Put together and expressed by a variety of

combinations - Signaled by deictics,repetition,groupings and by many other features in the grammatical structure of text.

Ex. If apple has been referred to in the text and then apple is referred to again

Mary peeled an apple, and then the other Mary ate it.

~ Situational meaning - When it takes place,age,gender and social status of the speaker and hearer, the relationship between them, cultural background of the speaker and the addressee, and many other situational matters.

Ex. A man named John Smith may be referred to as John, Mr. Smith,and Professor Smith

Implicit and explicit meaning

Implicit - capable of being understood from something else though unexpressed , unspoken

- No form but the information is part of the total communication intended or assumed by the writer

> Explicit - Fully revealed or expressed - The information which is overtly stated

by lexical items and grammatical forms, part of surface structure form

Example:

"The Raegan tax bill passed in the Senate today."

"The tax bill proposed by the President of the United States Ronald Reagan, was passed in the senate of the United States today."

- The reference to certain events, things, attributes and relations will be left implicit

Ex. "How many people came?"

"I saw some dogs walking down the streets" "Help will come" The shooting of the hunters

- Characterized by cohesion, continuity, grouping and patterns of prominence Ex. "The school was founded in 1902"

- Information which is left implicit when talking to one person might be explicit when talking to

another

- There is much which is going on in the situation which makes it possible to understand exactly what is meant without using many words

- Its quite possible for a person from one culture to read a story written about a happening in another culture and not understand the story at all because so much information is left implicit

Ex. "Peter is sick" "My son Peter in sick"

"No!" ( "Don't put your hand in the fire!")

("Did you go to town today?")

"John made the Queen's list"