Explorations On Making And Existing Mechanisms Of Language Meaning

Language meaning is a focus of concern for almost all the disciplines in language study. This thesis introduces the European continental phenomenological hermeneutics into the study of language meaning to explore making and existing mechanisms of natural language meaning based on Heidegger’s Dasein theory. Primarily, the research aims to answer two questions: How does language meaning generate? How does language meaning exist?The thesis widely absorbs and takes examples from the research fruits of each branch disciplines and inter-disciplines of linguistics on the basis of philosophy of language. To take the combination of analysis and interpretation as research methods, to build up the structure as from theory basis research to theory construction and to theory analysis and interpretation, the research initially proposes and demonstrates two points of view as followed:(1)The making of language meaning relies on people’s interpretation of the world and themselves based on all their knowledge endowed by the history and era;(2)The existence and development of language meaning is realized in hermeneutic circle.Based on interpretation and hermeneutic circle, exploration of language meaning mechanisms suggests that, interpretation has limitivity, which uncovers limitivity of human being; hermeneutic circle has relativity, which reveals relativity of language.This further shows that there is an intrinsic identity between human and language;speaker belongs to specific era; natural language belongs to specific system. Language meaning study should pay attention to the essence of natural language and the core of Dasein: time, space and subject. The study finds out, in time dimension, language meaning incessantly generates, develops and updates along with historical evolution and development, which uncovers historical inheritance and feature of the times of language meaning. In space dimension, national tradition and regional culture act on making and existing of language meaning; cross-cultural communication highlights the significance of interpretation. In subject dimension, language meaning continually generates from generation to generation; there’s mutual supplement between the born and survival ofhuman being and making and existing of language meaning.It follows that interpretation and hermeneutic circle introduce time, space and subject into language meaning exploration, and lead making and existing of language meaning into real life. With the action of the two mechanisms, making and existing of language meaning present dynamic deduction of the multidimensional world, and explain endless lifecycle of language and human being.