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Questions and Answers
In the sentence 'The girl cleaned her room', what is the semantic role of 'the girl'?
What is the semantic role of 'a knife' in the sentence 'The lady opened with a knife'?
Which of the following sentences represents an Experiencer semantic role?
In the sentence 'They traveled from Jeddah to London', what is the semantic role of 'Jeddah'?
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What is the semantic role of 'his father' in the sentence 'Ali helped his father'?
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In the sentence 'She feels happy', what is the semantic role of 'she'?
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Which of the following sentences represents an Instrumental semantic role?
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What is the semantic role of 'her room' in the sentence 'The girl cleaned her room'?
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What is the primary focus of semantics?
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What type of meaning is concerned with the literal use of a word?
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What is an example of an associative meaning of the word 'needle'?
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What is the term for the entity that performs the action described by the verb in a sentence?
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What is the term for the entity that is affected by the action described by the verb in a sentence?
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What is the term for the entity that is used to perform the action described by the verb in a sentence?
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What is the term for the entity that experiences the action described by the verb in a sentence?
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What is the term for the study of how words and phrases combine to form meaningful sentences?
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What is the semantic feature of the noun 'boy' in the context of the verb 'ate'?
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In the sentence 'The boy kicked the ball', what is the semantic role of the noun phrase 'the ball'?
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What type of entity can be an agent in a sentence?
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In the sentence 'The dog chased the boy', what is the semantic role of the noun phrase 'the boy'?
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What is the semantic role of the noun phrase 'a car' in the sentence 'A car ran over the ball'?
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In the sentence 'The boy cut himself', what is the semantic role of the noun phrase 'himself'?
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What is the semantic role of the noun phrase 'the wind' in the sentence 'The wind blew the ball away'?
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In the sentence 'The dog caught the ball', what is the semantic role of the noun phrase 'the dog'?
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Study Notes
Semantic Roles
- The NP "an old razor" and "a crayon" are used in the semantic role of Instrument.
- Experiencer: when a NP represents an entity as the person who has a feeling, perception, or state.
- Example: "The boy feels sad." (The boy is experiencer)
Location
- Location: where an entity is in the description of an event.
- Example: "on the table", "in the room"
Source and Goal
- Source: where an entity moves from.
- Goal: where an entity moves to.
- Example: "We drove from Blacksburg to Orlando." (Blacksburg is source, Orlando is goal)
Identify Semantic Roles
- ① "The girl cleaned her room." (girl is Agent, room is Theme)
- ② "Ali helped his father." (Ali is Agent, father is Theme)
- ③ "She feels happy." (She is Experiencer)
- ④ "The lady opened with a knife." (lady is Agent, knife is Instrument)
- ⑤ "He found his key under the table." (He is Agent, key is Theme, under the table is Location)
- ⑥ "They traveled from Jeddah to London." (They are Agent, Jeddah is Source, London is Goal)
Lexical Relations
- Lexical relations: when words have relationships with each other.
- Synonymy: words with closely related meanings that can be substituted for each other.
- Antonymy: words with opposite meanings.
- Hyponymy: words with a specific-to-general relationship.
Synonymy
- Synonyms: words with very closely related meanings.
- Examples: "big" and "large", "buy" and "purchase", "couch" and "sofa"
Semantic Features
- Semantic features: important features of meaning that any noun must have in order to be used in a sentence.
- Example: "boy" has the feature [+animate], "hamburger" does not have the feature [-animate]
Words as Containers of Meaning
- Words carry meaning components.
- Semantic roles: roles that fulfill within the situation described by a sentence.
Agent and Theme
- Agent: the entity that performs the action.
- Theme: the entity that is involved or affected by the action.
- Example: "The boy kicked the ball." (boy is Agent, ball is Theme)
Instrument
- Instrument: an entity that performs an action.
- Example: "The boy cut the rope with an old razor." (old razor is Instrument)
Semantics
- Semantics: the study of the meaning of words, phrases, and sentences.
- Meaning: there are two types of meaning - conceptual and associative.
Conceptual and Associative Meaning
- Conceptual meaning: covers basic components of meaning that are conveyed by the literal use of a word.
- Associative meaning: covers different connotations or associations attached to a word.
- Example: "needle" has conceptual meaning (thin, sharp, or steel instrument) and associative meaning (pain, illness, blood, drugs, thread, knitting, or hard to find)
Odd Sentences
- Sentences that are syntactically good but semantically odd.
- Examples: "The hamburger ate the boy.", "The table listens to the radio.", "The horse is reading the newspaper."
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Description
Identify the semantic roles of NPs in sentences, such as instrument and experiencer. Learn about the differences between agents and experiencers in linguistics.
