Meaning in English： Discuss critically the role of context in the understanding of meaning

許詩詩

Introduction

Context plays a significant role in understanding the meaning. This essay will firstly introduce the definition of context， then， it will analyze the significance of context combining with specific examples from four perspectives： identifying the meaning of words， clearing the ambiguity， prompting the omitted meaning and helping to understand the implication.

Definition of context

The concept of context was first put forward by Malinowski in 1923. He categorizes context as “context of culture” and “context of situation”. The former one refers to the social culture where the speaker lives， while the later one means the particular circumstance when the conversation occurs. Moreover， Firth （Firth， 1957） states that context of situation includes not only speaking words， but also facial expression， gestures， body movements， staff participating the conversation and the certain environment where the speakers are. Subsequently， Halliday （Halliday 1964） classifies the factors of situation into three categories： “field of discourse”， “tenor of discourse” and “mode of discourse”. After that， sociolinguist Fishman （Fishman 1972） carries out the concept “domain” embodied in his famous saying “who speaks what language to whom and when”.

The significance of context

1. Defining word meaning according to context

Polysemy is including denotation， connotation， figurative meaning， etc. Sometimes Context restricts the understanding of meaning. In the huge net of context information， the varied relationships affecting the meaning of words， it needs adequate consideration and the exact meaning of words under certain context can be defined.

Language has been changing with the history. The new words come into being all the way， and some words might be changed completely from their original meaning. For example， “nice” meant “foolish” or “silly” in old French. With the historical evolution， it means “pleasant” now. As for “bird”， it means a lot of things in modern society， such as “person”， “girl” and “plane”. In the sentence “My mother is an early bird.”， the bird obviously refers to person. Similarly， “She is a bird woman.” means she is an aviatrix. Thus， meaning can be defined with the contextual words.

2. Disambiguation/ Ambiguous

From the perspective of distinguishing and dispelling ambiguity， psycholinguistics and cognitive linguistics come up with the theory context-guided lexical access. This theory states that context information can confirm picking up the related meaning from ambiguous terms.

For instance， the word “country” has meanings of state and village area. Thus， the sentence “I love my country.” may cause ambiguity. Nevertheless， when the supplementary information is added， the ambiguity is dispelled immediately. “I love my country whose independence I have been fighting for.”， in which the country obviously means the state. When the additional information is added as “where I once went for holidays”， the country probably means the village area.

3. Completing omitted meaning

Context plays a key role in some incomplete sentences. People are used to omitting the information indicated in surrounding environment.

For example， in train station a traveler says to the conductor， “two tickets， one London， and one Birmingham”. It is easy to understand that the traveler wants to buy two tickets， one ticket to London and one ticket to Birmingham. The context here is the train station where the conversation occurs. Similarly， in library a man asks， “What are you looking for？”， then the girl answers， “Animal Farm”. So the Animal Farm here refers to a book.

Prompting the implication

A sentence may express the meaning literally. It may also mean the subaudition which is a deeper implication given by context. But the implication only is acquired by combining with the specific context.

For example， “It is cold here.” may just mean the weather without certain context. But in different contexts， understanding of the meanings could be completely different. If it is said in a room without fire in winter， the speaker may be reminding the host to make a fire. So， the implication is complementary information provided by particular context.

In conclusion， a good grasp of context helps to understand the meaning in a proper way.

References：

[1]Firth，J.R.（1957）.Papers in Linguistics.London：Oxford University Press.

[2]Fishman，J.（1972）.Language in Sociocultural Change.Stanford：Stanford University.

[3]Halliday，M.（1964）.The Linguistic Sciences and Language Teaching.London：William Clowes and Sons Ltd.，.

[4]Lyons，J.（1977）.Semantics.Cambridge：CUP.

[5]Malinowski，B.（1923）.The Problem of Meaning in Primitive Languages.In C.K.Ogden，& I.A.Richardsq，The Meaning of Meaning（pp.32-41）.London：Harcourt Brace Jovanovich Inc.，.