Frame semantics (linguistics)
Encyclopedia
Frame semantics is a theory of linguistic
meaning
that extends Charles J. Fillmore
's case grammar
. It relates linguistic
semantics
to encyclopaedic knowledge.
The basic idea is that one cannot understand the meaning of a single word without access to all the essential knowledge that relates to that word. For example, one would not be able to understand the word "sell" without knowing anything about the situation of commercial transfer, which also involves, among other things, a seller, a buyer, goods, money, the relation between the money and the goods, the relations between the seller and the goods and the money, the relation between the buyer and the goods and the money and so on.
Thus, a word activates, or evokes, a frame of semantic knowledge relating to the specific concept it refers to (or highlights, in frame semantic terminology).
A semantic frame is a collection of facts that specify "characteristic features, attributes, and functions of a denotatum, and its characteristic interactions with things necessarily or typically associated with it" (Keith Alan, Natural Language Semantics).
A semantic frame can also be defined as a coherent structure of related concepts that are related such that without knowledge of all of them, one does not have complete knowledge of any one; they are in that sense types of gestalt. Frames are based on recurring experiences. So the commercial transaction frame is based on recurring experiences of commercial transactions.
Words not only highlight individual concepts, but also specify a certain perspective from which the frame is viewed. For example "sell" views the situation from the perspective of the seller and "buy" from the perspective of the buyer. This, according to Fillmore, explains the observed asymmetries in many lexical relations
.
While originally only being applied to lexeme
s, frame semantics has now been expanded to grammatical construction
s and other larger and more complex linguistic units and has more or less been integrated into construction grammar
as the main semantic principle. Semantic frames are also becoming used in information modeling, for example in Gellish
, especially in the form of 'definition models' and 'knowledge models'.
Frame semantics has much in common with the semantic principle of profiling from Ronald W. Langacker
's Cognitive Grammar
.
Linguistics
Linguistics is the scientific study of human language. Linguistics can be broadly broken into three categories or subfields of study: language form, language meaning, and language in context....
meaning
Meaning (linguistics)
In linguistics, meaning is what is expressed by the writer or speaker, and what is conveyed to the reader or listener, provided that they talk about the same thing . In other words if the object and the name of the object and the concepts in their head are the same...
that extends Charles J. Fillmore
Charles J. Fillmore
Charles J. Fillmore is an American linguist, and an Emeritus Professor of Linguistics at the University of California, Berkeley. He received his Ph.D. in Linguistics from the University of Michigan in 1961. Professor Fillmore spent ten years at The Ohio State University before joining Berkeley's...
's case grammar
Case grammar
Case Grammar is a system of linguistic analysis, focusing on the link between the valence, or number of subjects, objects, etc., of a verb and the grammatical context it requires. The system was created by the American linguist Charles J. Fillmore in , in the context of Transformational Grammar...
. It relates linguistic
Natural language
In the philosophy of language, a natural language is any language which arises in an unpremeditated fashion as the result of the innate facility for language possessed by the human intellect. A natural language is typically used for communication, and may be spoken, signed, or written...
semantics
Semantics
Semantics is the study of meaning. It focuses on the relation between signifiers, such as words, phrases, signs and symbols, and what they stand for, their denotata....
to encyclopaedic knowledge.
The basic idea is that one cannot understand the meaning of a single word without access to all the essential knowledge that relates to that word. For example, one would not be able to understand the word "sell" without knowing anything about the situation of commercial transfer, which also involves, among other things, a seller, a buyer, goods, money, the relation between the money and the goods, the relations between the seller and the goods and the money, the relation between the buyer and the goods and the money and so on.
Thus, a word activates, or evokes, a frame of semantic knowledge relating to the specific concept it refers to (or highlights, in frame semantic terminology).
A semantic frame is a collection of facts that specify "characteristic features, attributes, and functions of a denotatum, and its characteristic interactions with things necessarily or typically associated with it" (Keith Alan, Natural Language Semantics).
A semantic frame can also be defined as a coherent structure of related concepts that are related such that without knowledge of all of them, one does not have complete knowledge of any one; they are in that sense types of gestalt. Frames are based on recurring experiences. So the commercial transaction frame is based on recurring experiences of commercial transactions.
Words not only highlight individual concepts, but also specify a certain perspective from which the frame is viewed. For example "sell" views the situation from the perspective of the seller and "buy" from the perspective of the buyer. This, according to Fillmore, explains the observed asymmetries in many lexical relations
Lexical semantics
Lexical semantics is a subfield of linguistic semantics. It is the study of how and what the words of a language denote . Words may either be taken to denote things in the world, or concepts, depending on the particular approach to lexical semantics.The units of meaning in lexical semantics are...
.
While originally only being applied to lexeme
Lexeme
A lexeme is an abstract unit of morphological analysis in linguistics, that roughly corresponds to a set of forms taken by a single word. For example, in the English language, run, runs, ran and running are forms of the same lexeme, conventionally written as RUN...
s, frame semantics has now been expanded to grammatical construction
Grammatical construction
In linguistics, a grammatical construction is any syntactic string of words ranging from sentences over phrasal structures to certain complex lexemes, such as phrasal verbs....
s and other larger and more complex linguistic units and has more or less been integrated into construction grammar
Construction grammar
The term construction grammar covers a family of theories, or models, of grammar that are based on the idea that the primary unit of grammar is the grammatical construction rather than the atomic syntactic unit and the rule that combines atomic units, and that the grammar of a language is made up...
as the main semantic principle. Semantic frames are also becoming used in information modeling, for example in Gellish
Gellish
Gellish is a controlled natural language, also called a formal language, in which information and knowledge can be expressed in such a way that it is computer-interpretable, as well as system-independent. Gellish is a structured subset of natural language that is suitable for information modelling...
, especially in the form of 'definition models' and 'knowledge models'.
Frame semantics has much in common with the semantic principle of profiling from Ronald W. Langacker
Ronald Langacker
Ronald Wayne Langacker is an American linguist and professor emeritus at the University of California, San Diego. He is best known as one of the founders of the cognitive linguistics movement and the creator of Cognitive Grammar....
's Cognitive Grammar
Cognitive grammar
Cognitive grammar is a cognitive approach to language developed by Ronald Langacker, which considers the basic units of language to be symbols or conventional pairings of a semantic structure with a phonological label. Grammar consists of constraints on how these units can be combined to generate...
.