Semantic Field Theory
Eva Feder Kittay · Metaphor · 1990
This chapter describes semantic field theory and gives valid points for argument for its inclusion within a complete semantics of natural language. Semantic field theory develops, historically and conceptually, from the work of Ferdinand de Saussure who put forward the view of language as an interconnected system of signs such that an alteration of any of the elements involved a change in the entire system. The argument set forth in this chapter states that even an act as elementary as ostension requires first, that the language speakers share an understanding of what constitute the salient acoustic differences among the acoustic phenomena, and secondly, that the language speakers share an understanding of what counts as a salient differentiation within the conceptual frame of language.