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Single Idea 18008

[from 'Category Mistakes' by Ofra Magidor, in 19. Language / C. Assigning Meanings / 1. Syntax ]

Full Idea

Generative semanticists claimed that the structure of a sentence is determined by both 'syntactic' and 'semantic' considerations which interact with each other in complex ways.

Gist of Idea

Generative semantics says structure is determined by semantics as well as syntactic rules

Source

Ofra Magidor (Category Mistakes [2013], 1.3)

Book Reference

Magidor,Ofra: 'Category Mistakes' [OUP 2013], p.18


A Reaction

[She mentions George Lakoff for this view] You need to study a range of examples, but this sounds a better view to me than the tidy picture of producing a syntactic structure and then adding a semantics. We make up sentences while speaking them.

Related Idea

Idea 18006 Chomsky's 'interpretative semantics' says syntax comes first, and is then interpreted [Chomsky, by Magidor]