# semantics

Pronunciation: US say "si-MAN-tiks" /sɪˈmæntɪks/; UK

## Noun

1. The meaning or range of meanings carried by a linguistic element, such as a word, a morpheme, or an utterance.
   - Simple: The meaning of a word, part of a word, or something someone says.
   - _Linguists compared the semantics of color terms across dozens of languages._
   - _The semantics of the suffix shifted over the centuries, from 'full of' to merely 'having'._
2. Triviality or pettiness in a detail or distinction, especially a quibble over words that changes nothing of substance. *(colloquial)*
   - Simple: A small, unimportant difference, like an argument about words that does not really matter.
   - _Whether we call it a layoff or a restructuring is semantics; forty people still lost their jobs._
   - _Let's not get bogged down in semantics when the deadline is tomorrow._
3. The meaning of the constructs in a computer language, as distinct from their form or syntax.
   - Simple: What the parts of a computer language actually do, not just how they are written.
   - _In this language, assignment has copy semantics, so changing the new variable never alters the original._
   - _The specification defines the semantics of every operator, including what happens on overflow._
4. The branch of linguistics that studies the meanings of words and how words relate to what they mean.
   - Simple: The part of language study that looks at what words mean.
   - _Her research in lexical semantics focuses on how children learn verbs of motion._
   - _Semantics is often taught alongside syntax, which deals with how sentences are built._
5. The meanings of the individual words in a text, as distinct from the overall meaning of the passage.
   - Simple: What each single word in a text means, not what the whole text means.
   - _You can follow the semantics of a poem word by word and still miss its point._
   - _A good translator gets the semantics of each word right without losing the sense of the paragraph as a whole._

## Origin

From French sémantique, from Ancient Greek σημαντικός (sēmantikós); it displaced the earlier term semasiology. By surface analysis, it is semantic + -ics.

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/semantics (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).