Browsing results for Slavic
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on June 16, 2019.
Wierzbicka, Anna (2002). Russian cultural scripts: The theory of cultural scripts and its applications. Ethos, 30(4), 401-432.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1525/eth.2002.30.4.401
Abstract:
Cultural scripts reflect shared cultural understandings. They are representations of cultural norms that are widely held in a given society and that are reflected in language (in culture-specific key words, phrases, conversational routines, and so on). A key methodological principle in the theory underlying this article (a study in ethnopragmatics avant la lettre) is that the proposed cultural scripts must be formulated in NSM. The author argues that cultural scripts formulated in universal human concepts allow us to understand cultural norms and attitudes from within, that is, from the perspective of cultural insiders, while at the same time making them intelligible to outsiders as well.
In this article, the theory of cultural scripts is applied to Russian culture and, in particular, the Russian cultural scripts concerning speech, truth, and interpersonal communication (“obščenie”).
Rating:
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) govorit' nepravdu, (E) iskrenno, (E) istina, (E) sincerely, (E) truth, (S) bodily contact, (S) commands, (S) depth of feeling, (S) disagreement, (S) emphasis on verbal interaction, (S) freedom of expression, (S) physical closeness, (S) praise, (S) questions, (S) sincerity, (S) truth and untruth
Published on June 16, 2019. Last updated on June 25, 2019.
Вежбицкая, Анна [Wierzbicka, Anna] (2002). Русские культурные скрипты и их отражение в языке [Russian cultural scripts and their reflection in the language]. Русский язык в научном освещении, 2(4), 6-34.
More information:
Reissued as:
Вежбицкая, Анна (2005). Русские культурные скрипты и их отражение в языке. In Анна А. Зализняк, И.Б. Левонтина, А.Д. Шмелев (Eds.), ключевые идеи русской языковой картины мира [Key ideas of the Russian linguistic worldview] (pp. 467-499). Москва (Moscow): Языки славянских культур [Languages of Slavic Culture].
Chapter 11 (pp. …-…) of Вежбицкая, Анна (2011). Семантические универсалии и базисные концепты [Semantic universals and basic concepts]. Москва [Moscow]: Языки славянских культуры [Languages of Slavic Culture].
Rating:
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (T) Russian
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on August 20, 2018.
Trnavac, Radoslava (2002). Koncept nade u srpskom jeziku u svetlu Prirodnog Semantickog Metajezika [The concept of hope in Serbian in the light of the Natural Semantic Metalanguage]. Zbornik Matice srpske za filologiju i lingvistiku, 45(1-2), 245-269.
Written in Serbian.
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on February 16, 2019.
Goddard, Cliff (2003). Whorf meets Wierzbicka: Variation and universals in language and thinking. Language Sciences, 25(4), 393-432. DOI: 10.1016/S0388-0001(03)00002-0
Probably no contemporary linguist has published as profusely on the connections between semantics, culture, and cognition as Anna Wierzbicka. This paper explores the similarities and differences between her ‘‘Natural Semantic Metalanguage’’ (NSM) approach and the linguistic theory of Benjamin Lee Whorf. It shows that while some work by Wierzbicka and colleagues can be seen as ‘‘neo-Whorfian’’, other aspects of the NSM program are ‘‘counter-Whorfian’’. Issues considered include the meaning of linguistic relativity, the nature of conceptual universals and the consequences for semantic methodology, the importance of polysemy, and the scale and locus of semantic variation between languages, particularly in relation to the domain of time. Examples are drawn primarily from English, Russian, and Hopi.
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on August 20, 2018.
Trnavac, Radoslava (2003). Koncept nade u srpskom jeziku [The concept of hope in Serbian]. Slavia Meridionalis, 4, 215-246.
Written in Serbian.
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on September 10, 2018.
Wierzbicka, Anna (2004). Polish and universal grammar. Studies in Polish Linguistics, 1, 9-28.
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on November 11, 2018.
Koselak, Arkadiusz (2005). Quelle honte! Ale wstyd! Observations sémantiques sur quelques emplois de honte et de wstyd [Quelle honte! Ale wstyd! Semantic observations on a few uses of honte et wstyd]. Roczniki Humanistyczne, 53(5), 105-124.
Written in French.
This paper deals with the lexical expression of French honte and Polish wstyd (‘shame’), both through the two base words and through some of their derivatives. There are subtle differences between the two, in line with the cognitive and anthropological linguistics premise according to which language accounts for the construction of a worldview in a given culture. The author relies on a certain number of utterances in the two languages to compare honte and wstyd and identify what they share and what the differences are.
Sound application of NSM principles carried out without prior training by an experienced NSM practitioner
Tags: (E) honte, (E) honteux
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on September 17, 2018.
Gladkova, Anna (2005). New and traditional values in contemporary Russian: Natural Semantic Metalanguage in cross-cultural semantics. In Ilana Mushin (Ed.), Proceedings of the 2004 Conference of the Australian Linguistics Society (16 pp.). http://ses.library.usyd.edu.au/handle/2123/93. PDF (open access)
Revised and expanded as:
Gladkova, Anna (2008). Tolerance: New and traditional values in Russian in comparison with English. In Cliff Goddard (Ed.), Cross-linguistic semantics (pp. 301-329). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Work in contrastive semantics can tell us a great deal about differences between cultures in which the words that are being contrasted are used. Linguists can contribute to the social sciences and to the investigation of values prevailing in different cultures and different societies by detailed semantic analysis, which in turn can be successful if the appropriate methodology is used. NSM is able to reveal subtle differences in the meaning of value words and proves to be an adequate tool for this kind of task.
A detailed semantic analysis allows us to show differences between the concepts терпимы terpimyj and tolerant. Tolerant has a more “social” character since it is an attitude towards something seen as different from social norms. Tерпимы terpimyj is more “personal” in its attitude as it is a reaction towards personal offence. Tolerant is related to the recognition of personal autonomy of thinking and behaviour as well as the idea of social harmony as an opportunity for people to behave and think in the way they want. Tерпимы terpimyj is linked to the value of смиренеи smirenie; it is about not developing bad feelings and negative reactions to those seen as doing bad things and about maintaining the social harmony of positive feeling among people. Thus, tolerant is more “rational” and “liberal” and терпимы terpimyj is more “emotional” and “moral”. The proposed definition of tolerant, formulated in simple universal concepts, also allows us to gauge the possible difference between the new Russian word tolerantnyj and the English tolerant.
Research carried out in consultation with or under the supervision of one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) terpet' терпеть, (E) terpimyj терпимый, (E) tolerate, (T) tolerant
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on September 17, 2018.
Gladkova, Anna (2005). Sočuvstvie and sostradanie: A semantic study of two Russian emotions. The Natural Semantic Metalanguage approach. Lidil, 32. 35-47. PDF (open access)
Semantic analysis of the word сочувствие sočuvstvie (usually translated into English as ‘sympathy’) shows that it is a complex feeling caused by the awareness of a negative emotional state of another person associated with some misfortunate event and resulting in the sharing of this negative emotional state. When experiencing сочувствие sočuvstvie, a person develops a positive attitude towards another person who is in trouble due to the desire to stop the negative emotional experience of that person and to do something good for that person. Cочувствие sočuvstvie is characterized by the desire to reveal this attitude to the suffering person.
Cострадание sostradanie (usually translated into English as ‘compassion’) has the same semantic structure as сочувствие sočuvstvie, but it is characterized by a stronger character of emotional experience of another person and a consequent stronger negative feeling of the one who feels cострадание sostradanie. The component of showing one’s attitude and feeling is absent in cострадание sostradanie.
Cочувствие sočuvstvie and cострадание sostradanie are important cultural words that support the idea of the significant role of emotional expressions in Russian language and culture. They also extend the value ascribed to communal actions and states to the importance of sharing the negative emotional experiences of others.
Research carried out in consultation with or under the supervision of one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) sočuvstvie сочувствие, (E) sostradanie сострадание
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on September 17, 2018.
Гладкова, А. Н. [Gladkova, Anna] (2005). Чем русское сопереживание отличается от английского empathy? Опыт применения естественного семантического метаязыка в контрастивной семантике. In what ways the Russian sopereživanie is different from the English empathy? The Natural Semantic Metalanguage in contrastive semantics (pp. 102-108). In И. М. Кобозева, А. С. Нариньяни & В. П. Селегей (ред.) [I. Kobozeva, A. Narin’jani & V. Selegej (Eds.)], Компьютерная лингвистика и интеллектуальные технологии: Труды международной конференции «Диалог 2005» [Computational linguistics and intellectual technologies: Proceedings of the International Conference “Dialogue 2005”]. Москва [Moscow]: Nauka. PDF (open access)
Written in Russian. No English abstract available.
Research carried out in consultation with or under the supervision of one or more experienced NSM practitioners
The (E) tags listed below are added on the basis of information in the title of this paper, which also proposes other explications.
Tags: (E) empathy, (E) sopereživanie сопереживание, (T) Russian
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on September 10, 2018.
Wierzbicka, Anna (2005). There are no “color universals” but there are universals of visual semantics. Anthropological Linguistics, 47(2), 217-244. Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25132327
The search for the “universals of colour” that was initiated by Berlin and Kay’s classic book is based on the assumption that there can be, and indeed that there are, some conceptual universals of colour. This article brings new evidence, new analyses, and new arguments against the Berlin and Kay paradigm, and offers a radically different alternative to it. The new data on which the argument is based come, in particular, from Australian languages, as well as from Polish and Russian. The article deconstructs the concept of “colour,” and shows how indigenous visual descriptors can be analysed without reference to colour, on the basis of identifiable visual prototypes and the universal concept of seeing. It also offers a model for analysing semantic change and variation from “the native’s point of view”.
Tags: (E) blue, (E) colour, (E) goluboj, (E) gungaltja, (E) gungarlcha, (E) gungundja, (E) gungunyja, (E) maru-maru, (E) niebieski, (E) shiny, (E) sinij, (E) yukuri-yukuri
Published on November 22, 2017. Last updated on August 16, 2021.
Wierzbicka, Anna (2006). Współczesne dylematy moralne przez pryzmat dwóch języków – angielskiego i polskiego [Contemporary moral dilemmas through the perspective of English and Polish]. Etnolingwistyka, 18, pp. 145-164.
Written in Polish.
The linguistic communities of Poles and English-speaking Australians live in their respective linguistic worlds and coherent “moral languages”. The two languages, however, differ from each other in their key words and concepts. As a result, the moral dilemmas of these communities also differ. The author, a speaker of English and Polish belonging to two “moral worlds”, analyzes a few key English concepts with no adequate Polish equivalents. Examples are taken from a discussion in the newspaper The Australian in 2006. Questions sent to the editor were answered by eminent figures (a writer, historian, editor, judge, archbishop), who used moral concepts expressed with English words and expressions privacy, invasion of privacy, entitled, to commit oneself, to move on, unreasonable, committed, evidence, fair and unfair or experience. The questions and answers are supplemented in the article with the author’s comments and precise explications in the form of “cultural scripts”. The latter are constructed from the elements of the Natural Semantic Metalanguage, developed and used by the author for many years. It is concluded that “the way we think depends to some extent on the language we speak”. In order to liberate oneself from the grips of language, one must, while explicating the meanings of words, use universal primes.
Published on May 19, 2019. Last updated on May 19, 2019.
Deka, Sebastian (2006). O metodzie wyodrębniania skryptów kulturowych i kilku skryptach niemieckich i polskich [About the method of extracting cultural scripts, with several German and Polish scripts]. Oblicza Komunikacji, 1, 164–179.
More information:
Written in Polish.
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on September 17, 2018.
Gladkova, Anna (2006). Russian praise words molodec and umnica: A semantic and cultural analysis. In Keith Allan (Ed.), Selected papers from the 2005 Conference of the Australian Linguistic Society (18 pp.). http://www.als.asn.au/proceedings/als2005.html. PDF (open access)
This paper investigates the semantics of two very commonly used Russian language-specific praise words, molodec and umnica. The meanings of these nouns combine the evaluation of an action of another person with the evaluation of the person him- or herself. For this reason, they can be regarded as words with a culture-specific meaning. The study applies the methodology of the Natural Semantic Metalanguage. The meanings of molodec and umnica are related to several important cultural themes of Russian culture.
Research carried out in consultation with or under the supervision of one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) molodec молодец, (E) umnica умница, (T) Russian
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on September 17, 2018.
Gladkova, Anna (2006-07). New and traditional emotion terms in Russian: Semantics and culture. Transcultural Studies, 2-3, 123-137. DOI: 10.1163/23751606-00201007
This article focuses on borrowings as a reflection of the influence of other cultures and languages on Russian. New words that enter Russian from other languages signify changes in way of life, thought and behaviour. The most revealing in this respect are emotion and value terms because their meanings are reflective of cultural beliefs, assumptions and understandings. Therefore, the approach implemented in this article is that language, and its lexicon in particular, can be considered a gateway into a people’s culture. Moreover, changes in a language are indicative of cultural changes.
The focus of the paper is on a term from the domain of emotions – емпатииа ėmpatiia (empathy). This word has been used in translated psychology literature for the last two to three decades, but it is gradually entering other spheres of Russian discourse. Against the claim that the content of the term емпатииа ėmpatiia is fully conveyed by the Russian word сопереживание sopereživanie, it is argued that English empathy and Russian сопереживание soperezhivanie are words with significantly different meanings that are largely related to the cultural assumptions of the societies they belong to. For this purpose, the author carries out a detailed comparative semantic analysis of the English word empathy and its closest Russian equivalent сопереживание sopereživanie.
Research carried out in consultation with or under the supervision of one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) empathy, (E) sopereživanie сопереживание, (S) compassion, (S) empathy, (S) pity, (S) sympathy, (T) Russian
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on May 19, 2019.
Goddard, Cliff & Wierzbicka, Anna (2007). NSM analyses of the semantics of physical qualities: sweet, hot, hard, heavy, rough, sharp in cross-linguistic perspective. Studies in Language, 31(4), 765-800.
DOI: 10.1075/sl.31.4.03god
Abstract:
All languages have words such as English hot and cold, hard and soft, rough and smooth, and heavy and light, which attribute qualities to things. This paper maps out how such descriptors can be analysed in the Natural Semantic Metalanguage (NSM) framework, in terms of like and other semantic primes configured into a particular “semantic schema”: essentially, touching something with a part of the body, feeling something in that part, knowing something about that thing because of it, and thinking about that thing in a certain way because of it. Far from representing objective properties of things “as such”, it emerges that physical quality concepts refer to embodied human experiences and embodied human sensations. Comparisons with French, Polish and Korean show that the semantics of such words may differ significantly from language to language.
More information:
A more recent publication building on this one is chapter 3 (pp. 55-79) of:
Goddard, Cliff & Wierzbicka, Anna (2014). Words and meanings: Lexical semantics across domains, languages, and cultures. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
The term schema, used in the 2007 version of the text, refers to what has since been called a semantic template.
Rating:
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) chaud, (E) cold, (E) eat, (E) gładki, (E) hard, (E) heavy, (E) hot, (E) light, (E) miękki, (E) rough, (E) salty, (E) sharp, (E) smooth, (E) soft, (E) sour, (E) sugar, (E) sun, (E) sweet, (E) szorstki, (E) twardy, (E) warm, (T) English
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on January 26, 2020.
Wierzbicka, Anna (2007). Is “remember” a universal human concept? “Memory” and culture. In Mengistu Amberber (Ed.), The language of memory in a cross-linguistic perspective (pp. 13-39). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1075/hcp.21.04wie
Abstract:
This paper argues that ‘remembering’ is not a universal human concept but a cultural construct, shared by some languages but not others. It also shows that culture-specific concepts like ‘remember’ and ‘memory’ can be explained and compared through genuinely elementary and universal NSM notions such as KNOW, THINK and BEFORE. To illustrate these general themes, the paper offers a detailed analysis of the Polish field of ‘memory’, linking Polish semantics with Polish history and culture.
Rating:
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) memories, (E) memory, (E) pamiątka, (E) remember, (E) wspomnienia
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on May 19, 2019.
Goddard, Cliff, & Anna Wierzbicka (2007). Semantic primes and cultural scripts in language learning and intercultural communication. In Farzad Sharifian, & Gary B. Palmer (Eds.), Applied cultural linguistics: Implications for second language learning and intercultural communication (pp. 105-124). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
DOI: 10.1075/celcr.7.08god
Abstract:
This chapter illustrates a number of potential practical applications of the NSM approach: as a guide to core vocabulary in the early L2 syllabus, as a means of writing cultural scripts and interpreting cultural key words for language learners, and as the basis for a culture-neutral international auxiliary language. Illustrative material is drawn from English, Russian, and Korean.
Rating:
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (S) deference, (S) expressiveness, (S) personal autonomy
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on September 10, 2018.
Koselak, Arkadiusz (2007). Sémantique des sentiments: “Quand je pense à toi, je ressens quelque chose de mauvais” en français et en polonais [The semantics of emotions: “When I think of you, I feel something bad” in French and in Polish]. PhD thesis, Université Paul-Verlaine (Metz). PDF (open access)
Written in French.
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
