Semantics and pragmatics

Research in the field of semantics is concerned with the meaning of words or morphemes (lexical semantics) and how the meaning of such simple elements together contribute to the meaning of phrases and sentences (compositional semantics). Pragmatics refers to the meaning of linguistic elements in context, i.e. how interlocutors use their knowledge of the world to shape and interpret meaning in language.

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©PHAISITSAWAN - stock.adobe.com

The following linguists work in the field of semantik and pragmatic

Jennifer Brunner (Department of Linguistics):

  • Interactives
  • Animal Communication

Martina Barili (Department of German Studies):

  • The syntax-semantics interface
  • Subject-predicate relationship
  • Pro-forms
  • Grading

Branislava Ciganović (Department of Slavonic Studies):

  • Focus theory
  • Information Structure
  • Syntax–Semantics Interface

Maya Cortez Espinoza (Department of German Studies):

  • compositional semantics
  • Formal semantics and pragmatics
  • Semantics/pragmatics of modal particles
  • Pragmatics of questions

Simon Dampfhofer (Department of German Studies):

  • Formal Semantics
  • Semantics and pragmatics of pronouns

Jeannique Darby (Department of German Studies): 

  • Syntax-Semantics Interface
  • Information Structure
  • Semantics/Pragmatics of Questions and Focus

Dina El Zarka (Department of Linguistics):

Information Structure

Steffen Heidinger (Department of Romance Studies):

  • Information structure
  • Animatedness

Sabine Heinemann (Department of Romance Studies):

  • Cognitive Semantics
  • mono- and multimodal metaphors

Martin Hummel (Department of Romance Studies):

  • Semantics of constructions
  • Theory of signs

Zi Huang (Department of Linguistics):

  • Ontology of Natural Language
  • Referentiality
  • genericity

Gianina Iordachioaia (Department of Linguistics):

  • lexical semantics
  • Syntax-semantics interface
  • Aspect and action type
  • plurality
  • quantification
  • negation

Gunther Kaltenböck (Department of English Studies):

  • Discourse markers
  • information packaging constructions

Rebecca Karrer (Department of German Studies): 

  • Semantik und Pragmatik grammatischer Kategorien
  • sprachliche Perspektivierung 
  • Syntax-Semantik-Schnittstelle

Veronika Mattes (Department of Linguistics):

Pragmatic acquisition (register variation in L1 acquisition)

Monika Messner (Department of Romance Studies):

Conversation analysis, multimodality in institutional settings (orchestra rehearsals, musical masterclasses), multimodal instructions and corrections.

Aleksandra Milosavljević (Department of Slavic Studies):

  • Formal semantics and pragmatics
  • information structure

Stefan Milosavljević (Institute for Slavic Studies):

Situation Semantics

Sergei Monakhov (Department of Linguistics):

  • Distributional Semantics
  • Word embedding
  • Distributional models

Edgar Onea (Department of German Studies):

Formal Semantics of German

Hermine Penz (Department of English Studies):

  • Pragmatics and Society
  • Intercultural communication (communication strategies)
  • pragmatic aspects of English as a lingua franca
  • Analysis of environmental discourses

Daria Seres (Department of Slavic Studies):

  • (In)definiteness
  • genericity
  • referentiality

Vesela Simeonova (Institute for Slavic Studies):

  • decompositional semantics
  • impoliteness

Elnora ten Wolde (Department of English Studies):

  • Modification and Classification in the Nominal Phrase
  • Adverbial clauses

Philipp Trojan (Deaprtment of English Studies): 

  • Modification in the noun phrase: the syntax-semantics interface

Anna Volodina (Department of German Studies):

  • Pragmatics-semantics interface
  • Semantics of connectors and discourse markers in German
  • speech act-related causality and conditionality