Formal Meaning

Contextual meaning, then, is the relationship between a linguistic item, pattern or term from a system and an element of situation. It is a relationship between things at different points on the scale of realisation.

Formal meaning, on the other hand, is the relationship between a linguistic item, pattern or term from a system and other linguistic items, patterns or terms from systems belonging to the same level of language. Formal meaning is a relationship between things at the same point on the scale of realisation.

Formal meaning of a lexical item is its potentiality for collocating with other lexical items and its potentiality far contrasting with other lexical items.

The formal meaning of the lexical item cat, for instance, is its ability to collocate with mew, purr, lap, milk, fur, tail, etc. and its ability to contrast with dog, mouse, kitten, etc. A complete statement of the formal meaning of the lexical item would involve a comprehensive list of all the other lexical items with which it could collocate and a comprehensive list of all the other lexical items with which it could contrast. A complete statement would also involve an assessment of the likeli­hood of the item collocating with or contrasting with each of the items on the lists.

The formal meaning of a grammatical item or pattern is its potentiality for collocating with other grammatical items and patterns, it potentiality for contrasting with other grammatical items and patterns, and its potentiality for being substituted for other grammatical items and patterns.

The formal meaning of the grammatical item drank, for instance, includes its ability to occur with he, she, John, Mary, the horse, etc. preceding it and its ability to occur with water, beer, a pint, etc, following it (but not with water, beer, an pint, etc, preceding it and not with he, she, John, Mary, the horse, etc. following it). The formal meaning also includes the item’s ability to contrast with drink and drunk. The formal meaning also includes the fact that drank is grammatically substitutable for ate, sewed, chose, broke, etc. (but not for John, horse, beer, etc., or for happy, beautiful, nasty, etc. or even for was, became, seemed, etc.).

It should not be forgotten of course that in grammar we are concerned with formal items as members of classes, not as individual items. [...]

The term formal meaning often worries people who meet it for the first time, since the use of the term meaning here is so far removed from the usual use of the term. The term contextual meaning presentsmuch less difficulty, since although this use of the term meaning extends the everyday sense of the term it does not radically change it.

It would perhaps be helpful to think of formal meaning as ‘the means of meaning’ rather than actually as ‘meaning’. Contextual meaning could then be regarded as ‘meaning proper’. It is through its formal meaning that language is able to have contextual meaning. It is because of its formal contrasts and patterns that language is able to have regular associations with elements of situation. Before an item can become regularly associated with an element of situation it must be identifiable as a distinct item. An item takes its identity from the patterns in which it occurs and the contrasts into which it enters. Language itself is structured and it is therefore able to express in an ordered way generalisations about situation. [...]