Harkins, Jean & Wilkins, David P. (1994). Mparntwe Arrernte and the search for lexical universals. In Cliff Goddard & Anna Wierzbicka (Eds.), Semantic and lexical universals: Theory and empirical findings (pp. 285-310). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI: 10.1075/slcs.25.15har
The set of elements identified here are, at the very least, our best candidates for English-Arrernte lexical translation equivalents, and for elements that will appear in the basic set of propositional structures that comprise NSM definitions. Perhaps more investigation will reveal that they are truly the reflexes of universal properties of mind. Such a goal, however, seems a long way off, and need not detract from the
practical utility of establishing a descriptive metalanguage to facilitate better cross-linguistic semantic comparison.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
