Browsing results for Broad topics
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on October 19, 2019.
Yoon, Kyung-Joo (2007). Korean ethnopsychology reflected in the concept of ceng ‘affection’: Semantic and cultural interpretation. 담화와인지 [Discourse and Cognition], 14(3), 81-103.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.15718/discog.2007.14.3.81 / Open access
Abstract:
This paper contributes to a better cross-linguistic and cross-cultural understanding of Korean ethnopsychology and Korean ways of thinking and feeling through a linguistic analysis of the culture-specific concept and emotion known as 정 ceng. It uses NSM to describe the meaning of 정 ceng as well as that of ceng tteleci- ‘be disgusted’, which is one of several fixed expressions containing the word 정 ceng.
It is widely agreed that 정 ceng reflects the essence of Korean psychology in both interpersonal relations and personality characteristics. Understanding the meaning of 정 ceng and of the fixed expressions containing 정 ceng in daily conversations is therefore critical for cultural outsiders of Korean culture, and in particular for language learners. The analysis is based on linguistic evidence collected from corpus and other resources as well as on previous research in Korean cultural psychology.
Rating:
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) ceng tteleci-, (T) Korean, ceng 정
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on June 22, 2019.
Yoon, Kyung-Joo (2007). “Do you remember where you put the key?”: The Korean model of remembering. In Mengistu Amberber (Ed.), The language of memory in a crosslinguistic perspective (pp. 209-233). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1075/hcp.21.11yoo
Abstract:
The general treatment of the English concept ‘remember’ in cognitive science mistakenly suggests that it is a kind of innate human mental state that enjoys universal existence. This is denied by the existence of three translational equivalents of remember in Korean (sayngkakna-, kiekna- and kiekha-), which cannot be used indiscriminately: context is the decisive factor in the selection of the appropriate verb. This paper analyses the meanings of the selected Korean cognitive verbs that are employed as translational counterparts of remember. The NSM approach is adopted as the research framework for semantic analysis. Linguistic evidence is collected from various sources including corpora.
Rating:
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) kiekha, (E) kiekhaynay, (E) kiekna, (E) sayngkakna, (T) Korean
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on June 21, 2019.
Yoon, Kyung-Joo (2007). Mental states reflected in cognitive lexemes related to memory: A case in Korean. In Andrea C. Schalley, & Drew Khlentzos (Eds.), Mental states: Vol. 2. Language and cognitive structure (pp. 85-108). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1075/slcs.93.07yoo
Abstract:
This study explores the issue of universality and variation in conceptual systems across languages and cultures. It investigates cross-linguistic variability in such systems through a semantic study of various morphosyntactic patterns in Korean. The focus is on three words related to the mental experience of remembering: kiekha- ‘remember’, kiekna- ‘memory comes, remember’, and chwuekha- ‘reminisce’. Their semantic contents is described on the basis of linguistic evidence, using NSM as an analytical tool.
Rating:
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) chwuekha, (E) kiekha, (E) kiekna, (T) Korean
Published on August 1, 2018. Last updated on November 11, 2020.
Gladkova, Anna (2007). Russian emotions, attitudes and values: Selected topics in cultural semantics. PhD thesis, Australian National University.
Abstract:
This thesis explores the relationship between the Russian language and Russian culture through a detailed semantic analysis of selected expressions relating to emotions, attitudes, and values. The basic idea behind the study is that some words of the lexicon reflect cultural beliefs and attitudes, that is, that the meanings of these words encode ways of thinking and ways of understanding which are shared by speakers of a language. The cultural significance of the expressions under study is demonstrated by their semantic relationship to other Russian cultural key words and cultural ideas. The thesis shows the linguistic and cultural specificity of the words by comparing them with their English translational equivalents. The meanings of these English quasi-equivalents are discussed in relation to Anglo cultural norms. Natural Semantic Metalanguage (NSM) is used to explicate meanings and to state cultural nonns. The explications of meanings are presented in two NSM versions – Russian and English. To justify the use of Russian NSM version, a focused study of the exponents of semantic primitives in Russian and their syntactic properties is undertaken. This study shows that the Russian and English NSM versions are equivalent. NSM provides a culture-neutral tool of linguistic analysis which allows one to formulate the results in a manner free from ethnocentric bias. The thesis seeks to contribute to a clearer understanding of Russian culture and of ways of thinking as they are embedded in the Russian language. The results of the thesis can be applied in language instruction, teaching cross-cultural communication, bilingual sh1dies, cognitive science and cultural psychology.
Rating:
Research carried out in consultation with or under the supervision of one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on September 10, 2018.
Wierzbicka, Anna (2007). Shape and colour in language and thought. In Andrea C. Schalley, & Drew Khlentzos (Eds.), Mental states: Vol. 2. Language and cognitive structure (pp. 37-60). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI: 10.1075/slcs.93.05wie
“Colour” and “shape” are concepts important to the speakers of English and of many other languages. They are not, however, universal: there are many languages which have no words corresponding to the English words colour and shape, and in which questions like “what colour is it?” or “what shape is it?” cannot be asked at all. Clearly, speakers of such languages do not think about the world in terms of “colour” and “shape”. How do they think about it, then?
This study shows that by using an empirically discovered set of universal semantic primes which includes see and touch we can effectively explore ways of construal of the visual and tangible world different from those embedded in, and encouraged by, English.
Tags: (E) beginning, (E) bottom, (E) colour, (E) end, (E) ends, (E) envy, (E) feel compassion, (E) gungaltja, (E) gungarlcha, (E) hands, (E) high, (E) long, (E) low, (E) podłużny, (E) round, (E) shape, (E) short, (E) threaten, (E) top, (E) umbrella, (E) warn
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on August 19, 2018.
Sun, Gui-Li, & Hsieh, Ching-Yu (2008). Three emotional adverbs in Mandarin Chinese: An application of Natural Semantic Metalanguage. Feng Chia Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences, 17, 121-139. PDF (open access)
Emotional adverbs are usually difficult for non-native speakers to comprehend. They belong to a category of function words that are not easily defined and that appear to be semantically empty. Few researchers have explored them. This study examines the emotional adverbs 明明 mingming, 萬萬 wanwan and 簡直 jianzhi by means of the NSM approach. The data for the study was mostly selected from the Academia Sinica Balanced Corpus of Modern Chinese, and from conversations among junior high school students.
The result shows that each of the adverbs has different implications and can be used in certain specific situations. For example, 明明 mingming is used to express negative emotions like disaffection or anger, while 萬萬 wanwan can be used to show speakers’ positive and negative feelings, although it is used only in negative sentences. 簡直 jianzhi is usually followed by a metaphor or simile and implies a complaint and incredibility. The underlying cognition of the three emotional adverbs is revealed by an analysis of explications.
Approximate application of NSM principles carried out without prior training by an experienced NSM practitioner
Tags: (E) jianzhi 簡直, (E) joyful, (E) mingming 明明, (E) wanwan 萬萬
Published on June 27, 2017. Last updated on September 10, 2018.
Koselak, Arkadiusz (2008). Cette personne a quelque chose que je n’ai pas: une approche contrastive de réactions du type de jalousie [This person has something I do not have: A contrastive approach of jealousy-type reactions]. In Jacques Durand, Benoît Habert & Bernard Laks (Eds.), CMLF 2008 – Congrès mondial de linguistique française (pp. 2085-2100). Paris: EDP Sciences. DOI: 10.1051/cmlf08050. PDF (open access)
Written in French.
The author analyses the French words jalousie ‘jealousy’ and envie ‘envy’ as well as some of their counterparts in Polish, Swedish, German and English. The aim of this Wierzbickian inspired study is to discover differences in conceptualization and to present them schematically.
Approximate application of NSM principles carried out without prior training by an experienced NSM practitioner
Tags: (E) envie, (E) envy, (E) jalousie, (E) missunnsamhet, (E) Schadenfreude, (E) zawiść, (E) zazdrość
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on June 22, 2019.
Yoon, Kyung-Joo (2008). An alternative model for the development of pragmatic competence. 언어연구 [The Journal of Studies in Language], 24(1), 125-148.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.18627/jslg.24.1.200805.125 / Open access
Abstract:
With the ever increasing acknowledgement of the significant role played by pragmatic competence in second language acquisition (SLA), there is a growing need for practical models of pragmatic instruction in the L2 classroom. The author critically reviews research on pragmatic competence in SLA and argues in favour of an integrative model inspired by work in the field of cross-cultural communication and ethnopragmatics.
The proposal, which is not restricted to particular L2 teaching settings, is to combine the NSM approach’s cultural scripts theory with J.M. Bennett’s Developmental Model of Intercultural Sensitivity. A call is launched for empirical studies applying the alternative model to be undertaken. The author herself provides exemplification focusing on pragmatic instruction for Korean EFL learners. A number of cultural scripts are introduced to show the utility of the proposed model in the EFL classroom in Korea.
Rating:
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) freedom, (S) address practices, (S) interactions with older people, (S) personal autonomy, (S) requests
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on December 8, 2019.
Kim, Heesoo (2008). The semantic and pragmatic analysis of South Korean and Australian English apology speech acts. Journal of Pragmatics, 40, 257-278.
DOI: https://doi.org.10.1016/j.pragma.2007.11.003
Abstract:
The aim of this study is to undertake a semantic and pragmatic analysis of South Korean apology speech acts, in particular with respect to how South Korean apologetic speech act expressions differ conceptually from Australian English expressions of apology. NSM is used to clarify how the main South Korean apologetic speech act expression mianhada differs conceptually from Australian English sorry; in the process, some distinctive features of South Korean culture are illustrated. South Korean apology speech act strategies are investigated in seven situations; this investigation is modeled on the work of Blum-Kulka and collaborators.
The findings of this study are that the attitudinal meanings of mianhada and sorry, as well as the range of illocutionary acts associated with the two expressions, are different. Decomposing mianhada and sorry into their illocutionary components provides a fine-grained description of what are assumed to be the attitudes and states of mind of South Koreans and Australians, respectively, when performing an apology. The study further suggests that conceptualizing speech act expressions through the use of semantically simple words may help second language learners acquire the proper ways of carrying out speech acts (including non-verbal expressions) in the target language and culture.
More information:
For a different analysis, see:
Yu, Kyong-Ae (2017). Perceptions and functions of Korean mianhada: comparison with American English sorry. The Sociolinguistic Journal of Korea, 25(2), 197-224.
Rating:
Crude application of NSM principles carried out without prior training by an experienced NSM practitioner
Tags: (E) mianhada, (E) sorry
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on June 18, 2019.
Goddard, Cliff (2008). Contrastive semantics and cultural psychology: English heart vs. Malay hati. In Farzad Sharifian, René Dirven, Ning Yu, & Susanne Niemeier (Eds.), Culture, body, and language: Conceptualizations of internal body organs across cultures and languages (pp. 75-102). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110199109.2.75
Abstract:
This is a contrastive NSM analysis of two ethnopsychological constructs (English heart, Malay hati). Rejecting the use of English-specific metaterminology, such as mind, cognition, affect, etc., as both ethnocentric and inaccurate, the study seeks to articulate the conceptual content of the words under investigation in terms of simple universal concepts such as FEEL, THINK, WANT, KNOW, PEOPLE, SOMEONE, PART, BODY, HAPPEN, GOOD and BAD.
For both words, the physical body-part meaning is first explicated, and then the ethnopsychological sense or senses (it is claimed that English heart has two distinct ethnopsychological senses). The chapter also reviews the phraseology associated with each word, and in the case of English heart, proposes explications for a number of prominent collocations: a broken heart, listening to your heart, losing heart and having your heart in it.
The concluding discussion makes some suggestions about experiential/semantic principles whereby body parts can come to be associated with cultural models of feeling, thinking, wanting and knowing. At a theoretical level, the study seeks to draw links between culturally informed cognitive semantics, on the one hand, and the field of cultural psychology, on the other.
Rating:
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) hati, (E) head, (E) heart, (E) mind, (T) Malay
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on September 16, 2018.
Wierzbicka, Anna (2008). Why there are no ‘colour universals’ in language and thought. Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, (N.S.) 14, 407-425. DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-9655.2008.00509.x
A more recent publication building on this one is chapter 4 (pp. 80-101) of:
Goddard, Cliff, & Wierzbicka, Anna (2014). Words and meanings: Lexical semantics across domains, languages, and cultures. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Do all people live in a world full of colours? Perceptually, yes (unless they are visually impaired), but conceptually, no: there are many languages which have no word for ‘colour’ and in which the question What colour is it? cannot be asked and presumably does not arise. Yet the powerful and still immensely influential theory of Berlin and Kay assumes otherwise. While building on the author’s earlier work on colour semantics, this article brings new evidence against the Berlin and Kay paradigm, and presents a fundamentally different approach. The new data on which the argument is based come from Australian languages. In particular, the article presents a detailed study of the visual world reflected in the Australian language Warlpiri and in Warlpiri ways of speaking, showing that while Warlpiri people have no “colour talk” (and no “colour practices”), they have a rich visual discourse of other kinds, linked with their own cultural practices. It also offers a methodology for identifying indigenous meanings without the grid of the English concept ‘colour’, and for revealing “the native’s point of view”.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) colour, (E) kunjuru-kunjuru, (E) kuruwarri-kuruwarri, (E) yukuri-yukuri, (T) English
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on September 10, 2018.
Hasada, Rie (2008). Two virtuous emotions in Japanese: Nasake/joo and jihi. In Cliff Goddard (Ed.) Cross-linguistic semantics (pp. 331-347). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI: 10.1075/slcs.102.20has
This study applies the Natural Semantic Metalanguage methodology in order to explicate the meaning of two Japanese “virtuous emotions” which express the idea of ‘wanting good things to happen to other people’. Nasake/joo and jihi have been selected for detailed semantic analysis. Nasake/joo is a very important concept in Japanese society. It refers to one’s consideration or compassion for others. Another “virtuous emotion” word is jihi which has often been used as a complement of joo. However, this chapter shows jihi can be completely distinguished from nasake/joo. The apparent meaning of these two “virtuous emotion” words is spelled out in an NSM framework, which clearly shows their similarities, as
well as their differences.
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on June 21, 2019.
Yoon, Kyung-Joo (2008). The Korean conceptualization of heart: An indigenous perspective. In Farzad Sharifian, René Dirven, Ning Yu, & Susanne Niemeier (Eds.), Culture, body, and language: Conceptualizations of internal body organs across cultures and languages (pp. 213-243). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110199109.3.213
Abstract:
This chapter shows the possibility of understanding Korean ethnopsychology through culture-specific concepts, and at the same time provides evidence of cross-cultural and cross-linguistic variability in the conceptualization of human faculties and body parts.
It is widely agreed that the conceptualizations of body parts across languages and cultures may shed light on human cognition in general. This contribution attempts to establish the Korean cultural model of the heart. In Korean, there are three distinctive concepts corresponding to the English concept of heart: 심장 simcang, 가슴 kasum, and 몸 maum. These words are frequently used in daily conversation as well as in literature. Knowing their meanings is therefore crucial in understanding the Korean view on human faculties. These meanings are described here using NSM. The lexical semantic analysis of the three Korean concepts illustrates the Korean culture-specific way of conceptualizing human faculties related to the English concept of heart.
Rating:
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) kasum 가슴, (E) maum 몸, (E) simcang 심장, (T) Korean
Published on January 15, 2022. Last updated on January 15, 2022.
Wierzbicka, Anna. (2008). A conceptual basis for research into emotions and bilingualism. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 11 (2), 193–195. doi:10.1017/S1366728908003362
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) angry, (E) frustration
Published on May 10, 2008. Last updated on October 19, 2019.
Bułat Silva, Zuzanna (2008). Amor em português [Love in Portuguese]. In Anna Kalewska (Ed.), Diálogos com a Lusofonia: Colóquio comemorativo dos 30 anos da secção Portuguesa do Instituto de Estudos Ibéricos e Ibero-americanos da Universidade de Varsóvia (pp. 408-420). Warszawa: Universidade de Varsóvia, Instytut Studiów Iberoamerykanskich UW. PDF (pre-publication version with different page numbering)
Written in Portuguese.
Every culture has its own ways of speaking, thinking, acting and even feeling, which are reflected in language. In this paper, I analyse a lexical meaning of one Portuguese word, amor. Having as a base a corpus consisting of Lisbon fado songs, I try to look for a semantic invariant of the word amor in fado and to define it in terms of a Portuguese-based NSM.
Sound application of NSM principles carried out without prior training by an experienced NSM practitioner
Tags: (E) amor
Published on May 10, 2017. Last updated on August 18, 2018.
Bułat Silva, Zuzanna (2008). Fado – podejście semantyczne: Próba interpretacji słów kluczy [Fado – a semantic approach: An attempt at interpreting key words]. Wroclaw: Oficyna Wydawnicza ATUT.
Written in Polish.
This book interprets a dozen Portuguese-based lexical units, mainly from the domain of emotion, selected through a frequency-based survey of Lisbon fado songs. It is the published version of the author’s PhD thesis, University of Wrocław (2007).
Sound application of NSM principles carried out without prior training by an experienced NSM practitioner
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on August 19, 2018.
Wierzbicka, Anna (2009). Language and metalanguage: Key issues in emotion research. Emotion Review, 1(1), 3-14. DOI: 10.1177/1754073908097175
Building on the author’s earlier work, this paper argues that language is a key issue in understanding human emotions and that treating English emotion terms as valid analytical tools continues to be a roadblock in the study of emotions. Further, it shows how the methodology developed by the author and colleagues, known as NSM (Natural Semantic Metalanguage), allows us to break free of the shackles of English psychological terms and explore human emotions from a culture-independent perspective. The use of NSM makes it possible to study human emotions from a genuinely cross-linguistic and cross-cultural, as well as a psychological, perspective and thus opens up new possibilities for the scientific understanding of subjectivity and psychological experience.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) adēmonein αδημονείν, (E) ekthambeisthai εκθαμβεισθαι, (E) fear, (T) English
Published on August 2, 2018. Last updated on September 10, 2018.
Besemeres, Mary, & Wierzbicka, Anna (2009). Emotion terms as a window on culture, social psychology and subjective experience. In S. V. Ionov et al. (Eds.), Language and emotions: Semantic and pragmatic aspects. Festschrift for Viktor Ivanovich Shakhovsky (pp. 14-32). Volgograd: Volgograd University Press.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Published on August 2, 2018. Last updated on September 1, 2018.
Besemeres, Mary, & Wierzbicka, Anna (2009). The concept of frustration: A culture-specific emotion and a cultural key word. In Agata Błachnio, & Aneta Przepiórka (Eds.), Closer to emotions: Vol. 3 (pp. 211-226). Lublin: KUL.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on September 13, 2018.
Wierzbicka, Anna (2009). Exploring English phraseology with two tools: NSM semantic methodology and Google. Journal of English Linguistics, 37(2), 101-129. DOI: 10.1177/0075424209334338
A more recent publication building on this one is chapter 10 (pp. 395-406) of:
Wierzbicka, Anna (2010). Experience, evidence, and sense: The hidden cultural legacy of English. New York: Oxford University Press.
The study of phraseology, which not long ago was often dismissed as a linguistic activity of only minor interest, has now come into its own and is an increasingly popular and diversified field, with many different approaches and foci of interest. Significantly, regardless of their particular focus and goals, more and more writers adopt corpus-based approaches to phraseological phenomena. This article arises from a larger study of various phraseological networks based on the English cultural key word sense (as in, e.g., a sense of humour, a sense of direction and a sense of relief), and it explores some types of sense-based collocations with two tools: the NSM (Natural Semantic Metalanguage) semantic methodology and Google. The article argues that the use of corpora and the Web combined with the use of NSM methodology opens new perspectives for the semantic and cultural study of English phraseology.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) mission, (E) sense, (T) English