Browsing results for Language families
Published on May 10, 2017. Last updated on August 30, 2018.
Bartens, Angela, & Sandström, Niclas (2006). Towards a description of Spanish and Italian diminutives within the Natural Semantic Metalanguage framework. In Bert Peeters (Ed.), Semantic primes and universal grammar: Empirical evidence from the Romance languages (pp. 331-360). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI: 10.1075/slcs.81.20bar
This paper uses the Natural Semantic Metalanguage approach to describe Spanish and Italian diminutives, which are able to express a number of diverse emotional nuances ranging from the “affectionate” to the pejorative. Different dialects of Spanish are checked to gain a better insight into areal variation. The authors also investigate the status of the diminutive as a grammatical and/or lexical category, they attempt to establish whether diminutive formation instantiates derivation or composition, and they examine its relationship to reduplication and to the absolute superlative.
Research carried out in consultation with or under the supervision of one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) (diminutives)
Published on July 27, 2017. Last updated on August 19, 2018.
Lorenzana, Angela E. (2006). Galit: The Filipino emotion word for ‘anger’. In Tenth international conference on Austronesian linguistics (10-ICAL). http://www-01.sil.org/asia/philippines/ical/index.html. PDF (open access)
Noteworthy semantic studies have been conducted to explicate anger concepts in different languages. One tool for such cross-cultural comparisons is the Natural Semantic Metalanguage (NSM), a set of 56 indefinable words or semantic primes developed by Anna Wierzbicka over a period of 35 years. Using this tool in analysing emotion concepts through linguistic evidence such as literary excerpts, dialogs and interviews reveals the fact that while emotional universals allegedly exist, emotions are experienced and expressed differently. The use of the semantic primes allows the formulation of a detailed statement (otherwise known as explication) of the elements that compose the meaning or definition of a complex word. Semantic explications for anger words in different languages reveal marked differences in their causes, management and expression. For instance, emotion words for anger such as the Anglo-Saxon anger, the Ifaluk song, the Chinese nu or the Polish gniew were found to be different from the Filipino word galit. Using NSM as a common measure or tertium comparationis, one can correctly and meaningfully compare as many different languages as possible.
Approximate application of NSM principles carried out without prior training by an experienced NSM practitioner
Tags: (E) galit
Published on June 25, 2017. Last updated on September 10, 2018.
Afrashi, Azita (2006). On the Natural Semantic Metalanguage theory and the issue of translatability. Translation Studies [http://journal.translationstudies.ir], 4(15), 71-84.
Written in Persian.
After introducing the NSM theoretical framework, the paper addresses the idea of the innateness and universal translatability across languages of the basic semantic components that make up the Natural Semantic Metalanguage.
Approximate application of NSM principles carried out without prior training by an experienced NSM practitioner
Tags: (E) sky, (E) sun
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on August 19, 2021.
Savage, Andrew (2006). What do Tuareg proverbs mean? In Cristina Mourón Figueroa, & Teresa Iciar Moralejo Gárate (Eds.), Studies in contrastive linguistics (pp. 907-916). Santiago de Compostela: Universidade de Santiago de Compostela Publicacións.
This article demonstrates the application of the Natural Semantic Metalanguage (NSM) tool in the process of ascertaining the meaning of Tuareg proverbs. It shows how NSM is helpful in making meaning understandable to cultural outsiders.
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 August 18, 2018.
Ye, Zhengdao (2007). Taste as a gateway to Chinese cognition. In Andrea C. Schalley, & Drew Khlentzos (Eds.), Mental states: Vol. 2. Language and cognitive structure (pp. 109-132). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI: 10.1075/slcs.93.08ye
In the Western philosophical tradition, taste is regarded as a lower-level sense. This may explain why few linguistic studies have explored its role in human cognition. Yet, to fully understand the Chinese conceptual world, one has to understand the meanings of its rich ‘taste’-based vocabulary. This study seeks to bring this important aspect of Chinese sensory and cognitive experience to the attention of researchers of human cognition. It proposes a Chinese model of cognitive states in relation to taste, and discusses the cultural bases for the peculiarly Chinese “embodied” way of experiencing. It also discusses the physiological basis that seems to underpin the general principles of the cognitive system observed in Chinese and in some Indo-European languages.
Chinese words explicated in NSM have approximate counterparts in English nouns such as ‘taste’, ‘feeling’; in adjectives such as ‘flavourful’, ‘absorbed [in doing something]’; and in verbal phrases such as ‘enjoy in retrospect’, ‘recollect the pleasant flavour of’, ‘understand through thinking about experience’, ‘taste so as to appreciate’ and hence ‘appreciate’, ‘have good taste’.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) cháng 尝, (E) huíwèi 回味, (E) pĭnwèi 品味, (E) rùwèi 入味, (E) tĭwèi 体味, (E) zīwèi 滋味
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on January 26, 2020.
Ye, Zhengdao (2007). ‘Memorisation’, learning and cultural cognition: The notion of bèi (‘auditory memorisation’) in the written Chinese tradition. In Mengistu Amberber (Ed.), The language of memory in a crosslinguistic perspective (pp. 139-180). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI: 10.1075/hcp.21.09ye
This study examines a cultural practice of ‘remembering’ – 背 bèi (‘auditory memorization’) that plays a prominent role in the learning experience of Chinese people. It first conducts a detailed semantic analysis of 背 bèi, using Natural Semantic Metalanguage to reveal a culture-internal view of and belief about memory formation and learning, and contrasts it with Chinese 记 jì (‘try to remember/write down’) and with memorize and learn by heart in English. It then explores linguistic, cognitive and cultural reasons that could explain such a practice. Finally, it addresses the question of why 背 bèi, which exhibits some key features of knowledge transmission in oral cultures, is so prized by the Chinese people, possessors of a long written history.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) bèi 背, (E) jì 记, (E) learn by heart, (E) memorize, (E) zì 字
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on June 18, 2019.
Evans, Nicholas (2007). Standing up your mind: Remembering in Dalabon. In Mengistu Amberber (Ed.), The language of memory in a crosslinguistic perspective (pp. 67-95). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1075/hcp.21.06eva
Abstract:
This paper explores the vocabulary of mental states, knowing, thinking and remembering in Dalabon, an Australian Aboriginal language. Though Dalabon has a rich vocabulary for the overall semantic domain of attention, thought, memory and forgetting, there are no expressions specifically dedicated to remembering. Rather, the ontology of cognitive states and processes is categorized into short-term versus long-term mental states and events. Aspectual choices are used to express transitions into mental states and events (‘remembering’ is ‘coming to have in mind’, and ‘forgetting’ is ‘coming to not have in mind’), without the entailments found in English, which distinguishes previously experienced mental states (remember, remind) or mental states experienced for the first time (get the idea that, realize).
The only section of the paper to include NSM-inspired explications is the appendix. One of the explications relates to two bound morphemes of Dalabon that refer to something akin to the English ‘mind’, viz. beng and kanûm. The latter also denotes the ear. Other NSM-inspired explications relate to the verbs bengdi ‘have in mind’ and bengkan ‘keep in mind’.
Rating:
Approximate application of NSM principles carried out without prior training by an experienced NSM practitioner
Tags: (E) beng, (E) bengdi, (E) bengkan, (E) kanûm
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on January 26, 2020.
Goddard, Cliff (2007). A “lexicographic portrait” of forgetting. In Mengistu Amberber (Ed.), The language of memory in a crosslinguistic perspective (pp. 119-137). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1075/hcp.21.08god
Abstract:
This study aims to provide a detailed NSM analysis of the English verb forget. It examines its three main clausal complement types (to-complement, e.g. I forgot to lock the door; that-complement, e.g. I forgot that the door was locked; and wh-complement, e.g. I forgot where I put the key), NP-complements, and several more specialized constructions.
The picture that emerges is of a set of interrelated lexicogrammatical constructions, each with a specific meaning, forming a polysemic lexical “family”. Although the study concentrates on English alone, the semantic differences between the various constructions it has identified make it rather clear that one cannot expect a similar range of meanings to map across to apparently similar lexemes in other languages.
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Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) forget
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on September 27, 2018.
Wierzbicka, Anna (2007). ‘Moral sense’. Journal of Social, Evolutionary, and Cultural Psychology, 1(3), 66-85. PDF (open access)
A more recent publication building on this one is chapter 7 (pp. 313-327) of:
Wierzbicka, Anna (2010). Experience, evidence, and sense: The hidden cultural legacy of English. New York: Oxford University Press.
The concept of ‘moral sense’ plays an important role in books on philosophy, psychology and popular science written by authors who write in English and who take the English language for granted. Yet there is no expression like moral sense in other languages, not even European ones like Spanish or German, let alone non-European ones, like Chinese. Nor was there any moral sense in English before the phrase was invented by so-called “British moralists” – Shaftesbury, Hutcheson, and Hume. This paper traces the origins of the modern Anglo/English concept of ‘moral sense’ in the influence of Locke’s empiricist philosophy on the eighteenth-century ‘British moralists’, and through them, on the language of British natural scientists, and especially Darwin’s.
Thus, the paper argues that when contemporary scientists of the English language like Dawkins, Hauser, and others write about ‘moral sense’ and present it as a panhuman characteristic evolved through biological evolution, they are looking at “human nature” and “human morality” through the prism of the English language. Seeing the phrase moral sense, and the discourse based on it, in a cross-linguistic and historical perspective can help us to stretch our imagination as to different possible conceptions of “morality” and to go beyond the culture-bound vision of what Dawkins calls “moral sense” and Hauser, a “universal sense of right and wrong”.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) moral sense, (E) sense of right and wrong, (T) English
Published on June 5, 2018. Last updated on September 10, 2018.
Wierzbicka, Anna (2007). ‘Reasonable man’ and ‘reasonable doubt’: The English language, Anglo culture and Anglo-American law. International Journal of Speech Language and the Law, 10(1), 1-22.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on September 10, 2018.
Peeters, Bert (2007). Australian perceptions of the weekend: Evidence from collocations and elsewhere. In Paul Skandera (Ed.), Phraseology and culture in English (pp. 79-107). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. DOI: 10.1515/9783110197860.79
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 June 18, 2019.
Goddard, Cliff (2007). A culture-neutral metalanguage for mental state concepts. In Andrea C. Schalley, & Drew Khlentzos (Eds.), Mental states: Vol. 2. Language and cognitive structure (pp. 11-35). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1075/slcs.93.04god
Abstract:
In contemporary cognitive science, mental state concepts from diverse cultures are typically described via English-specific words for emotions, cognitive processes, and the like. This is terminological ethnocentrism, which produces inaccurate representations of indigenous meanings. The problem can be overcome by employing a metalanguage of conceptual analysis based on simple meanings such as KNOW, THINK, WANT and FEEL. Cross-linguistic semantic research suggests that these and other semantic primes are shared across all languages and cultures. After summarizing this research, the chapter shows how complex mental state concepts from English, Malay, Swedish, and Korean can be revealingly analysed into terms that are simple, clear and transposable across languages.
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Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) amazed, (E) believe, (E) hati, (E) maum 몸, (E) mind, (E) shocked, (E) surprised, (E) terkejut, (E) terperanjat, (E) tro, (E) tycka
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.
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Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (S) deference, (S) expressiveness, (S) personal autonomy
Published on July 18, 2017. Last updated on August 20, 2018.
Moonan, Robert John (2007). A cultural script analysis of an English-Thai bilingual speaker’s nominative usage of mommy in English yes/no question formation. PhD thesis, University of South Carolina.
Each culture has its own specific linguistic norms, values, and practices. To avoid any ethnocentric bias in the attempt to capture these linguistic norms, values, practices, Cultural Script Theory proposes the use of Natural Semantic Metalanguage in describing the linguistic practices of a specific culture. Natural Semantic Metalanguage consists of semantic primitives, words whose meaning cannot be reduced any further. These semantic primitives, of which there are currently over sixty, provide the tools to illustrate the grammatical structures and to capture the pragmatic meaning within the world’s languages.
This dissertation uses the theoretical and methodological frameworks of Cultural Script Theory to analyse the speech practices of a Thai-American woman, whom I refer to as Lucy, who is English-Thai bilingual and bicultural. Specifically, I examine Lucy’s choice of referring expressions in her construction of yes/no questions in two sets of data. The first set of data is a conversation between Lucy and her mother, a native speaker of Thai. The second set of data is a conversation between Lucy and her mother-in-law, a native speaker of English. The analysis consists of three steps. First, I provide semantic explications of the Thai terms of address แม่ mâe ‘mother’ and แม่ mâe ‘an older woman’. Additionally, I provide semantic explications of the English terms of address mother, ma’am, mrs. last name, miss first name, and first name and the English speech act verbs ask and inquire. Second, I construct Thai cultural scripts for แม่ mâe ‘mother’ and แม่ mâe ‘an older woman’ and Anglo-American cultural scripts for the use of the aforementioned English terms of address. Lastly, I use those explications and cultural scripts to help provide a discourse analysis of the two sets of data.
In this dissertation I hypothesize that the distinctive linguistic behavior of Lucy is explained by her use of two different cultural scripts, one based on Anglo-American cultural speaking practices and the other based on Thai cultural speaking practices.
Sound application of NSM principles carried out without prior training by an experienced NSM practitioner
Tags: (E) ask, (E) female, (E) first name, (E) given names, (E) inquire, (E) last name, (E) ma'am, (E) mâe แม่, (E) male, (E) marriage, (E) miss, (E) mother, (E) Mrs, (S) addressing someone, (S) interactions with female, (S) interactions with mother, (S) interactions with older female, (T) English
Published on May 24, 2017. Last updated on September 10, 2018.
Goddard, Cliff (2007). A response to N. J. Enfield’s review of Ethnopragmatics (Goddard, ed. 2006). Intercultural Pragmatics, 4(4), 531-538. DOI: 10.1515/IP.2007.027
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (S) attitude towards someone older, (S) display of emotions, (S) terms of endearment
Published on May 10, 2017. Last updated on September 10, 2018.
Ameka, Felix K. (2007). He died old dying to be dead right: Transitivity and semantic shifts of ‘die’ in Ewe in crosslinguistic perspective. In Melissa Bowerman & Penelope Brown (Eds.), Crosslinguistic perspectives on argument structure: Implications for learnability (pp. 231-253). Mahwah: Erlbaum.
This chapter examines the structure and semantics of the equivalent of ‘die’ in Ewe, a Kwa (Niger–Congo) West African language, against the backdrop of universalist expectations about such a verb. It also discusses the potential problems the Ewe verb may pose to the learner and to theories of verb learning. In particular, it is demonstrated that the Ewe verb kú ‘die’ is not just a one-participant verb, as is universally expected of verbs that represent a dying situation, but it is also a two-place verb, that is, a transitive verb. Some syntactic and semantic properties of ‘die’ predicates are presented from a crosslinguistic perspective. The variation in behavior that we find means that there is very little about ‘die’ predicates that can be attributed to innate knowledge. The focus then shifts to the argument structure properties of the verb kú ‘die’ in Ewe. The semantic shift that ‘die’ predicates undergo from ‘die’ to ‘intensity’ and ‘desiderative’ (which can be positive or negative) is reviewed, as well as the attendant syntactic ramifications. Such shifts provide further evidence that the language learner cannot be guided by a simple form–meaning pairing. The chapter concludes with potential learnability problems.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Published on May 24, 2017. Last updated on January 15, 2022.
Waters, Sophia (2007). “Ben, voilà, quoi”: les significations et les emplois des particules énonciatives en français parlé [“Ben, voilà, quoi”: The meanings and uses of discourse particles in spoken French]. BA(Hons) thesis, University of New England, Armidale.
Written in French.
The aim of this thesis is to extract the meanings of three French utterance particles, used in the spoken language, viz. quoi, voilà and ben. The author relies on authentic examples to describe the use of each. The tool used to this end is the Natural Semantic Metalanguage, which allows us to make explications accessible both to speakers of French and to those for whom French is a second language.
The author also emphasizes the importance of a thorough understanding of the particles of a language.
Research carried out in consultation with or under the supervision of one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) ben, (E) quoi, (E) voilà, (T) French
