Compositionality: Semantic Aspects

The principle of compositionality has been influential throughout the history of formal and empirical semantics. According to it, the meaning of a complex expression is a function of the meanings of its constituents and of the way in which they have been combined, and of these only. In this article, we focus on its logical properties first, and thereafter explore its use in the case of both formal and natural languages. We also discuss systematicity and the context principle as distinct but equally important principles.