Contenu du sommaire : La constitution extrinsèque du référent, sous la direction de Pierre Cadiot et Franck Lebas

The french verb monter (engl. to go up/raise/assemble . . .) is analysed in this paper to show that the hypothesis of "transparency" of language is essential to Semantics. While the common "opacity" hypothesis leads to several problematic dualisms and needs artificial construals - such as the "subjectivisation" notion - transparency opens to a theory of reference directly compatible with a phenomenological view of language. In that theory, referred-to objects are themselves constituted by "Extrinsic Properties".

We reconsider the traditional notion of opposed lexical meanings ("antagonyms") through a stratification of this notion onto various levels: lexical, syntactic, enunciative, inferential, etc. This stratification reveals the artificiality of the term "opposed meanings" which oversimplifies constitutive uncertainties, smoothing over the complexities of a word's usage and profiling, and overlooking the investment made in different points of view. The apparent structural symmetry of this notion is a shallow characterization of the asymmetrical principles and forces which operate at the most basic level of meaning of these words. Inseparable from uses, these principle and forces function through different intertwined levels - motifs, profiles, themes - which call for less symmetrical ways of construing and viewing lexical entries.

This paper deals with the dynamic dimension of the nominal sign, whose signification is usually considered to be static (for example, the perfective aspect of the word signifié). We refer to two different "phenomenological" theories in order to reveal the embodiment of the linguistic sign in the mind: Peirce's semiotics and J. Garelli's phenomenological thesis. This theoretical study is completed by a semantic analysis of the archetypical meanings of the words homme and village.

The semantic representations used within the framework of the conceptual integration are mostly based on the objective specificities of the lexicon. From this perspective, the integration theory constitutes a return to the traditional opposition between literal and figurative sense. This article, in which we treat the issue of the polysemy and the metaphor, is aimed at setting off the descriptive limitations resulting from such presuppositions.

The aim of this paper is to propose a description of lexical meaning which claims that a part of a speaker's knowledge can be formulated in terms of constraints. The meaning of a given word is described, on one hand, as a set M (p) of possible affirmative propositions and, on the other, as a set N (-q) of necessary negative propositions. The negative propositions have an instructional interpretation in designating contexts where they are crucial for truth conditions, but it is not the case in other contexts such as indices or metaphors.

The aim of this paper is to propose what we call an indexical-indicial theory of lexical meaning. The diversity of uses of individual words calls for a conception where only relational properties are coded. Contextual interpretations (which can of course be conventionnal and specifically memorized) are values over such coded functions.

My claim in this paper is that the notion of linguistic category currently used in anthropology is outdated. This is particularly clear in the study of kinship systems, and the article starts from the classical example of the Aranda people in Central Australia to make this point. It is therefore necessary to elaborate a new linguistic theory if linguistic categories used in kinship terminology are to be understood. The linguistic theory advocated in this paper establishes the specific function of ritual in the construction of linguistic meaning, which is not considered any longer as a mere propositionnal content encapsulated in pragmatic communication. A major consequence is that the notion of totemism, which was once dismissed by the structuralist anthropology theory and which reappears in contemporary anthropological discourse, can be fitted again within this new framework.