This paper shows that three kinds of phenomena typically subject to disparate analyses are all forms of 'associative meaning': (i) extralinguistic-based, (ii) linguistic-based, and (iii) scalar implicature-based. It argues that scalar implicature in particular may be of three types: hyponymous, quasi-hyponymous, and pseudo-hyponymous. The paper begins with a basic definition of denotative and connotative meaning, and within connotative meaning of associative meaning. A formal model is provided for utterance-meaning, based around the notions of referent and ascription. This allows for a detailed formal analysis of extralinguistic- and linguistic-based associative meaning. The model is refined to address scalar implicature-based associative meaning, through a theory-based account of the distinction between ambiguity and indeterminacy, allowing for a formal analysis of 'some' and cardinal numbers. I also briefly consider a fourth type of associative meaning -- contextually determined associative meaning -- using Arabic examples, to illustrate the profound conventionality and language-specificity of the relevant aspects of meaning. Rather than providing a new account of how we understand the meaning of scalar implicatures, or other aspects of utterance-meaning, this paper adopts the standpoint that in order to understand how a hearer understands what an utterance means, we need to know first what it means; i.e. a coherent model of utterance-meaning is a sine qua non for the investigation of utterance cognition.
CORE (COnnecting REpositories)
CORE (COnnecting REpositories)