Problems in the psychology of meaning

pp. 135-167

in: Hans Hörmann, Meaning and context, Berlin, Springer, 1986

Abstract

In the chapters about language acquisition it has been made clear that language is essentially a means of representative communication, of steering or directing consciousness between two people. The child acquires language by realizing that a person can mean a factual situation or object in language and that a person can understand language if he is able to refer back from the language medium to what the speaker refers to with his verbal utterance. Language is a means of communication because verbal utterances mean something. The child can later acquire the necessary knowledge of the language system because he learns very early to depend on the fact that verbal utterances always mean something and to think and act accordingly. Utterances mean something because they have relationships to objects, ideas, concepts, actions, and knowledge.