Browsing results for Main Authors
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on August 19, 2018.
Goddard, Cliff (1997). Contrastive semantics and cultural psychology: ‘Surprise’ in Malay and English. Culture & Psychology, 3(2), 153-181. DOI: 10.1177/1354067X9700300204
This paper argues that psychology has yet to come fully to grips with the extent of semantic variation between languages, and that it can benefit, in this regard, from certain developments in linguistic semantics. It outlines Anna Wierzbicka’s ‘Natural Semantic Metalanguage’ (NSM) approach to cross-cultural semantics, and demonstrates the approach through a contrastive study of ‘surprise-like’ words from two languages: Malay (terkejut, terperanjat, hairan) and English (surprised, amazed, shocked, startled). It is shown that there is no exact Malay equivalent to English surprise; and also that there is no semantic core shared by the various terms, only a loose set of cross-cutting and overlapping semantic correspondences. These results are at odds with the classic “basic emotions” position, which would have it that ‘surprise’ is a universal and discrete biological syndrome. The overriding contention of the paper is that Wierzbicka’s approach to linguistic semantics can furnish psychology with valuable new analytical and descriptive tools.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) amazed, (E) anger, (E) hairan, (E) marah, (E) shocked, (E) song, (E) startled, (E) surprised, (E) terkejut, (E) terperanjat, (T) Malay
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on September 10, 2018.
Peeters, Bert (1997). The syntax of time and space primitives in French. Language sciences, 19, 235-244. DOI: 10.1016/s0388-0001(96)00062-9
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on February 17, 2019.
Goddard, Cliff (1997). Semantic primes and grammatical categories. Australian Journal of Linguistics, 17(1), 1-41. DOI: 10.1080/07268609708599543
This paper argues that all 55 of the semantic primes currently [1997] posited in the Natural Semantic Metalanguage (NSM) theory are frequently found as components of grammatically encoded meanings. Examples are taken from a wide variety of the world’s languages, including Ewe, Kashaya, Polish, Quechua, Tibetan, and Wintu. They include phenomena such as pronoun systems, indefinites, classifiers, evidentials, locational deixis, tense systems, diminutives and augmentatives, and modality. Explications are proposed for absolute superlatives (-issimo), reflexive constructions, and constructions referred to as the active emotion construction, the emotional causer construction, the emotional stimulus construction, the impersonal emotion construction, and the object experiencer construction.
The study seeks to contribute to the development of a more rigorous semantic basis for grammatical typology, by demonstrating that the proposed semantic metalanguage is able to encompass and explicate a wide variety of grammaticalized meanings. Such a finding cuts across the commonly held view that, for the most part, grammatical semantics and lexical semantics call for rather different descriptive toolkits.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) evidentials, (E) move away, (E) move towards, (E) we, (T) English
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on August 15, 2021.
Hill, Deborah, & Goddard, Cliff (1997). Spatial terms, polysemy and possession in Longgu (Solomon Islands). Language Sciences, 19(3), 263-275. DOI: 10.1016/S0388-0001(96)00064-2
Lexical exponents of the proposed semantic primitives ABOVE, UNDER, INSIDE and ON THE SIDE are identified in Longgu (Solomon Islands). It is argued that the first three of these exponents are polysemous between a semantically primitive relational sense and a secondary topological sense. A number of issues relating to the morphosyntax of the exponents are discussed, including their status as ‘local nouns’, the significance of the fact that their basic syntactic frame employs the same system of person-number agreement suffixes as the inalienable possession construction, and the difference between this basic frame and a rarer ‘associative construction’. There is also a brief discussion of the status of the hypothetical primitive ON in Longgu.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Published on June 28, 2017. Last updated on October 19, 2018.
Goddard, Cliff (1997). Cultural values and ‘cultural scripts’ of Malay (Bahasa Melayu). Journal of Pragmatics, 27(2), 183-201. DOI: 10.1016/S0378-2166(96)00032-X
This paper documents some Malay ‘rules of speaking’ and articulates their connections with Malay cultural values, using the new theory of ‘cultural scripts’ developed by Anna Wierzbicka. Aspects of the preferred Malay discourse style, which is normally described as refined, restrained, and charming, are shown to be linked with the Malay social emotion of malu ‘shame, propriety’, with the personal qualities of maruah ‘dignity, self-respect, pride’ and harga diri ‘self-esteem’, and with the ideal of senang hati ‘a heart at ease; (lit.) easy heart’. It is argued that the cultural scripts approach enhances descriptive accuracy, helps reduce ethnocentricm, and facilitates the integration of pragmatics and cultural semantics.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) halus, (E) kasar, (E) malu, (E) maruah, (E) senang hati, (S) apologies, (S) expressing feelings, (S) expressing what one wants, (S) speaking
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on September 10, 2018.
Goddard, Cliff (1997). The universal syntax of semantic primitives. Language Sciences, 19(3), 197-207. DOI: 10.1016/S0388-0001(96)00059-9
Anna Wierzbicka’s ‘Natural Semantic Metalanguage’ (NSM) theory has given rise to a new approach to investigating the fundamentals of syntax. The central idea is that all languages share an irreducible core which consists of a set of universal semantic primitives with certain universal combinatorial (i.e. syntactic) properties. This paper outlines a series of hypotheses about the universal syntax of semantic primitives – hypotheses which are tested in the individual language studies which comprise the rest of the volume. Topics include: the valency options and complementation possibilities of primitive predicates such as DO, HAPPEN, WANT, THINK, SAY and KNOW, the grammar of temporal and locative primitives (such as WHEN/TIME, BEFORE, AFTER, WHERE/PLACE, ABOVE, BELOW, NEAR, FAR), and of the conditional IF…) and counterfactual IF…WOULD) constructions.
Tags: (T) English
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on August 19, 2021.
Goddard, Cliff (Ed.) (1997). Studies in the syntax of universal semantic primitives. Language Sciences, 19(3) (Special issue).
All NSM-related work in this special issue is listed separately. Recommended search term: “Language Sciences, 19(3)”.
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on June 20, 2019.
Wierzbicka, Anna (1997). Understanding cultures through their key words: English, Russian, Polish, German, Japanese. New York: Oxford University Press.
Abstract:
This book develops the dual themes that languages can differ widely in their vocabularies, and are sensitive indices to the cultures to which they belong. The author seeks to demonstrate that every language has key concepts, expressed in (cultural) key words, which reflect the core values of a given culture. She shows that cultures can be revealingly studied, compared, and explained to outsiders through their key concepts, and that NSM provides the analytical framework necessary for this purpose. The book demonstrates that cultural patterns can be studied in a verifiable, rigorous, and non-speculative way, on the basis of empirical evidence and in a coherent theoretical framework.
Table of contents:
- Introduction
- Lexicon as a key to ethno-sociology and cultural psychology: Patterns of “friendship” across cultures
- Lexicon as a key to ethno-philosophy, history, and politics: “Freedom” in Latin, English, Russian, and Polish
- Lexicon as a key to history, nation, and society: “Homeland” and “fatherland” in German, Polish, and Russian
- Australian key words and core cultural values
- Japanese key words and core cultural values
Translations:
Into Polish:
(Chapter 3 only) Wierzbicka, Anna (1999). Język – umysł – kultura [Language, mind, culture]. Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Naukowe PWN.
Wierzbicka, Anna (2007). Słowa klucze: Różne języki – różne kultury. Warszawa: Wydawnictwa Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego.
Into Russian (Chapters 1, 2 and 3 only):
Chapters 7 (pp. 263-305), 8 (pp. 306-433) and 9 (pp. 434-484) of Вежбицкая, Анна (1999), Семантические универсалии и описание языков [Semantic universals and the description of languages]. Москва [Moscow]: Языки русской культуры [Languages of Russian Culture].
Вежбицкая, Анна (2001). Понимание культур через посредство ключевых слов. Москва [Moscow]: Языки славянской культуры [Languages of Slavic Culture].
Into Japanese:
アンナ・ヴィエルジュビツカ著 [Anna Wierzbicka] (2009). キーワードによる異文化理解: 英語・ロシア語・ポーランド語・ 日本語の場合 . 東京 [Tokyo]: 而立書房 [Jiritsu Shobō].
More information:
Chapter 4 builds on: Lexicon as a key to history, culture, and society: “Homeland” and “fatherland” in German, Polish and Russian (1995)
Chapter 5, section 2 builds on: Cross-cultural pragmatics: The semantics of human interaction (1991), chapter 5
Chapter 5, section 3 builds on: Australian b-words (bloody, bastard, bugger, bullshit): An expression of Australian culture and national character (1992)
Chapter 6 builds on: Japanese key words and core cultural values (1991)
Reviewed by:
Peeters, Bert (2000). Word, 51(3), 443-449. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/00437956.2000.11432505 / Open access
This review includes several suggestions for improvements to the explications in the book, as well as a revised explication of the Russian word друг drug.
Rating:
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
The tags mentioned below are limited to those not listed in work on which this book is based.
Tags: (E) colleagues, (E) drug друг, (E) family, (E) freedom, (E) friend, (E) koledzy, (E) libertas, (E) liberty, (E) mate, (E) omoiyari 思いやり, (E) podruga подруга, (E) prijatel' приятель, (E) przyjaciel, (E) rodnye родные, (E) rodzina, (E) svoboda свобода, (E) tovarišč, (E) volja воля, (E) wolność, (E) znajomi, (T) English
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on September 10, 2018.
Wierzbicka, Anna (1998). The semantics of English causative constructions in a universal-typological perspective. In Michael Tomasello (Ed.), The new psychology of language: Cognitive and functional approaches to language structure: Vol. 1 (pp. 113-153). New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Reissued as:
Wierzbicka, Anna (2014). The semantics of English causative constructions in a universal-typological perspective. In Michael Tomasello (Ed.), The new psychology of language: Cognitive and functional approaches to language structure: Vol. 1 (pp. 105-142). London: Psychology Press.
Translated into Russian as:
Вежбицкая, А. [Wierzbicka, Anna] (1999). Семантика английских каузативных конструкций в универсально-типологической перспективе. In Вежбицкая, А. [Wierzbicka, Anna], Семантические универсалии и описание языков, под ред. Татьяна В. Булыгиной [Semantic universals and the description of languages, ed. Tatyana V. Bulygina] (pp. 171-223). Москва [Moscow]: Языки русской культуры [Languages of Russian Culture].
(Modified) excerpt:
This chapter seeks to elucidate the differences in meaning between different causative verbs like to cause, to force, to make, to get, to let, and so on and to analyse the complex interplay between different relevant factors (the category to which the causer belongs, the category to which the causee belongs, the category to which the predicate of the complement clause belongs, the causative verb chosen in a given sentence, and so on). To do so successfully, we do not need any formidable technical formalisms. Nor do we need to endlessly concern ourselves with the perennially contested issue of how (or even if) syntax can be combined with semantics. Rather, what we need is an analytical framework in which syntax and lexical semantics are integrated from the very beginning.
The overall picture produced by an analysis that pays attention to all the relevant factors is, admittedly, complex and intricate much more so than one that operates only with tree diagrams and other similar formalisms; but it is, I believe, the only kind of analysis that can achieve descriptive adequacy and explanatory power. It is language itself that is immensely complex. At the same time, if we allow that all languages may have a relatively simple irreducible core, we can use this irreducible core of all languages as a basis for an understanding of the immensely complex and diverse systems that all human languages are.
Syntactic typology that deliberately closes its eyes to the semantic dimensions of formal diversity of languages is, ultimately, sterile and unilluminating. Opening typology to semantics may involve difficulties, but rather than avoiding them, it is surely more fruitful to sharpen our analytical tools and to develop safeguards of various kinds. Above all, we need a semantic metalanguage for a cross-cultural comparison of meanings, whether they are encoded in the lexicon or in grammar. As, I hope, this chapter illustrates, the “Natural Semantic Metalanguage” based on empirically established universal concepts can meet this need.
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on June 16, 2019.
Wierzbicka, Anna (1998). German ‘cultural scripts’: Public signs as a key to social attitudes and cultural values. Discourse & Society, 9(2), 241-282.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0957926598009002006
Abstract:
This paper is based on the following set of assumptions:
- ways of speaking characteristic of a given speech community constitute a manifestation of a tacit system of ‘cultural rules’ or ‘cultural scripts’;
- to understand a society’s ways of speaking, we have to identify and articulate its implicit cultural scripts;
- to be able to do this without ethnocentric bias we need a universal, language-independent perspective; and
- this can be attained if the ‘rules’ in question are stated in terms of lexical universals, that is, universal human concepts lexicalized in all languages of the world.
This paper applies the cultural script approach to German and compares German norms with Anglo norms (that is, norms prevailing in English-speaking societies). The author notes that, in recent decades, great changes have undoubtedly occurred in German ways of speaking and, it can be presumed, in underlying cultural values. For example, the dramatic spread of the use of the “familiar” form of address (du, as opposed to Sie), and the decline in the use of titles (e.g., Herr Müller instead of Prof. Müller) point to significant changes in interpersonal relations, in the direction of more egalitarian informality. At the same time, evidence of contemporary public signs, which are discussed here, suggests that some traditional German values, like the value of social discipline and of Ordnung (order) based on legitimate authority, are far from obsolete. It is shown that, in studying such values, we can rely on concepts more precise and more illuminating than ‘authoritarianism’ or ‘authoritarian personality’, often used in the past in analyses of German culture and society, and that the cultural scripts approach offers a rigorous and efficient tool for studying change and variation, as well as continuity, in social attitudes and cultural values.
Above all, rather than perpetuating stereotypes based on prejudice and lack of understanding, cultural scripts help outsiders grasp the ‘cultural logic’ underlying unfamiliar ways of speaking that may otherwise look like a strange collection of idiosyncracies — or worse.
Translations:
Into Russian:
Chapter 15 (pp. 682-729) of Вежбицкая, Анна (1999), Семантические универсалии и описание языков [Semantic universals and the description of languages]. Москва [Moscow]: Языки русской культуры [Languages of Russian Culture].
Chapter 4 (pp. 159-217) of Вежбицкая, Анна (2001), Сопоставление культур через посредство лексики и прагматики [Comparison of cultures through vocabulary and pragmatics]. Москва [Moscow]: Языки Славянской Культуры [Languages of Slavic Culture].
Rating:
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) (imperative constructions), (E) (infinitive-as-imperative constructions), (E) Achtung!, (E) bitte, (E) dürfen, (E) important, (E) nicht gestattet, (E) no [verb]ing, (E) verboten, (S) personal authority
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on October 19, 2019.
Wierzbicka, Anna (1998). Angst. Culture & Psychology, 4(2), 161-188.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/1354067X9800400202
Abstract:
The author examines the meaning, and the cultural history, of the German word Angst (roughly a cross between ‘anxiety’ and ‘fear’ but with a touch of mystery or existential insecurity), which is much more common, and culturally more salient, than the word Furcht (roughly ‘fear’). She shows that from a German point of view ‘Angst’ seems a far more ‘basic’ emotion than ‘fear’, and she investigates the possible roots of the concept of ‘Angst’ in Luther’s language, inner struggles and theology. The author seeks to demonstrate that by studying the semantic system of a language in a rigorous way and within a coherent methodological framework, one can both reveal and document the cultural underpinnings of emotions – even the most elusive and unfathomable ones such as Angst.
Translations:
Into Russian:
Chapter 12 (pp. 547-610) of Вежбицкая, Анна (1999), Семантические универсалии и описание языков [Semantic universals and the description of languages]. Москва [Moscow]: Языки русской культуры [Languages of Russian Culture].
Chapter 2 (pp. 44-122) of Вежбицкая, Анна (2001), Сопоставление культур через посредство лексики и прагматики [Comparison of cultures through vocabulary and pragmatics]. Москва [Moscow]: Языки Славянской Культуры [Languages of Slavic Culture].
More information:
A more recent publication building on this one is chapter 3 (pp. 123-167) of:
Wierzbicka, Anna (1999). Emotions across languages and cultures: Diversity and universals. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Rating:
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) Angst
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on September 10, 2018.
Wierzbicka, Anna (1998). *The semantics of illocutionary forces. In Asa Kasher (Ed.), Pragmatics: Critical concepts (pp. 114-169). London: Routledge.
Published on September 26, 2018. Last updated on September 26, 2018.
Asano, Yuko (1998). Evidentiality and indirectness in Japanese. Master’s thesis, Australian National University.
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.
Goddard, Cliff, & Wierzbicka, Anna (1998). Language, culture and meaning: Cross-cultural semantics. In René Dirven, & Marjolijn Verspoor (Eds.), Cognitive exploration of language and linguistics (pp. 137-159). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
2nd ed.:
Goddard, Cliff, & Wierzbicka, Anna (2004). Language, culture and meaning: Cross-cultural semantics. In René Dirven, & Marjolijn Verspoor (Eds.), Cognitive exploration of language and linguistics. Second revised edition (pp. 127-148). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
This chapter looks into cross-linguistic semantic differences in a systematic way. We present a method for pinpointing semantic distinctions and for exploring their cultural relevance. A key question is whether differences in linguistic conceptualization play a central role in language and thought or whether they are rather marginal. Both positions have been advocated. The first is known as linguistic relativity, in its extreme form as linguistic determinism. The second is known as universalism and holds that all people all over the world basically think in the same way. This chapter proposes a compromise between the extremes: Most linguistic concepts are indeed language-specific, but there is also a small number of universal linguistic concepts which occur in all languages. These universal concepts can be used as a “neutral” basis for paraphrasing the huge variety of language-specific and culture-specific concepts in the languages of the world. This is illustrated firstly for lexical concepts, then for grammatical concepts, and finally for the cultural norms of behaviour which underlie people’s behaviour in different cultures.
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on September 10, 2018.
Wierzbicka, Anna (1998). THINK – A universal human concept and a conceptual primitive. In Jacek Juliusz Jadacki, & Witold Strawiński (Eds.), In the world of signs: Essays in honour of professor Jerzy Pelc (pp. 297-308). Amsterdam: Rodopi.
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on September 10, 2018.
Wierzbicka, Anna (1998). Anchoring linguistic typology in universal semantic primes. Linguistic Typology, 2(2), 141-194. DOI: 10.1515/lity.1998.2.2.141
In essence, “grammar is one and the same in all languages”, but to establish what this universal grammar really looks like we have to investigate and compare many diverse languages, and for this we need a powerful and universally applicable metalanguage based on empirically established lexico-grammatical universals. The rough and incomplete outline of universal grammar sketched in this paper constitutes both a summary of the results arrived at by theoretical and empirical work over more than three decades (in the so-called “NSM” framework) and a program for further investigations. The author tries to show that it is possible to base investigations of universal grammar and typology on a truly universal, non-technical, non-arbitrary and intuitively intelligible tertium comparationis, and thus give it a secure and reliable foundation.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) [grammatical] patient, (E) information questions, (E) kivat', (E) opustit', (E) polar questions, (E) that [relative pronoun], (E) when, (E) where, (T) English
Published on July 3, 2017. Last updated on February 17, 2019.
Goddard, Cliff (1998). Universal semantic primes of space – A lost cause? LAUD Working Papers, Series A, General and Theoretical Papers, 434. PDF (open access)
Reissued in 2007 with divergent page numbering.
In recent years, a new wave of research on language and space has uncovered surprising variation in the linguistic coding of spatial relationships. It is now known that some languages, e.g. Tzeltal, exhibit remarkable lexico-grammatical elaboration of spatial relationships; that in many languages of Africa and Oceania apparently simple spatial relationships such as INSIDE and ABOVE are encoded by means of noun-like words, or by a combination of a preposition and a postposition, each of which may be independently meaningful. It has also been shown that children’s early acquisition of spatial terminology differs markedly between typologically different languages.
In almost all this recent work, the emphasis has been on cross-linguistic variation in spatial semantics. The question then arises whether there any semantic universals of space that are still viable in the light of the attested variation in formal realization and lexico-grammatical elaboration. In particular, what of the semantic primes of space proposed within the Natural Semantic Metalanguage (NSM) framework, namely: WHERE/PLACE, HERE, ABOVE, BELOW, INSIDE, ON (ONE) SIDE, NEAR, FAR?
After an introduction, the body of the paper has three sections. The first argues that three languages that exhibit markedly different spatial characteristics to English (Tzeltal, Longgu, Ewe) nevertheless still contain exponents of the NSM spatial primes. The second takes a fresh look at some of the new results on cross-linguistic variation in the acquisition of spatial semantics, with particular reference to Korean. The third surveys the grammaticalization of spatial meaning in a typological perspective, concluding that the items on the NSM inventory of spatial primes are all found as recurrent dimensions of grammaticalized meaning in a range of languages.
The overall conclusion is that NSM’s spatial primes are both viable and necessary for the description of spatial meanings within and across languages.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) move away, (E) move towards, (E) on
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on June 16, 2019.
Wierzbicka, Anna (1998). “Sadness” and “anger” in Russian: The non-universality of the so-called “basic human emotions”. In Angeliki Athanasiadou, & Elzbieta Tabakowska (Eds.), Speaking of emotions: Conceptualisation and expression (pp. 3-28). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110806007.3
Abstract:
The English words sad and angry (or sadness and anger) do not have exact equivalents in Russian, just as the Russian words грусть grust’, печаль pečal’, and сердиться serdit’sja do not have exact equivalents in English. How, then, are we to understand claims that ‘sadness’ or ‘anger’ are universal human emotions?
Emotions cannot be identified without words, and words always belong to particular cultures and carry with them a culture-specific perspective. The only words that are, in a sense, culture-independent are lexical universals, realized in English as good and bad, want, know, feel, think, and say, and so on. Any innate and universal cognitive scenarios that play a special role in human emotional lives all over the world would have to be identified via such lexical universals, not via culture-specific words such as sadness or anger. It may be true that ‘sadness’ and ‘anger’ are universally found in all cultures; but they are found there by native speakers of English. Observers looking at these cultures from a different cultural perspective will probably find something else.
Translations:
Into Russian:
Chapter 10 (pp. 503-525) of Вежбицкая, Анна (1999), Семантические универсалии и описание языков [Semantic universals and the description of languages]. Москва [Moscow]: Языки Русской Культуры [Languages of Russian Culture].
Chapter 1 (pp. 15-43) of Вежбицкая, Анна (2001), Сопоставление культур через посредство лексики и прагматики [Comparison of cultures through vocabulary and pragmatics]. Москва [Moscow]: Языки Славянской Культуры [Languages of Slavic Culture].
Rating:
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) anger, (E) angry, (E) gnev гнев, (E) grust' грусть, (E) pečal' печаль, (E) sadness, (E) serdit'sja сердиться
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on September 3, 2018.
Wierzbicka, Anna (1998). Russian emotional expression. Ethos, 26(4), 456-483. DOI: 10.1525/eth.1998.26.4.456
Translated into Russian as:
Вежбицкая, А. [Wierzbicka, Anna] (1999). Выражение эмоций в русском языке: заметки по поводу «Русско-английского словаря коллокаций, относящихся к человеческому телу». In Вежбицкая, А. [Wierzbicka, Anna], Семантические универсалии и описание языков, под ред. Татьяна В. Булыгиной [Semantic universals and the description of languages, ed. Tatyana V. Bulygina] (pp. 526-546). Москва [Moscow]: Языки русской культуры [Languages of Russian Culture].
This article examines Russian “emotional ideology” as reflected in the Russian language, and especially in the Russian collocational system. Colloquial collocations involving the human body, seen as an organ of emotional expression, are the focusfor comparingfolk models of the body and emotion in Russian and Anglo cultures. A theory of “cultural scripts” forms the basis of generalizations from the linguistic evidence.
Published on May 12, 2017. Last updated on September 26, 2018.
Goddard, Cliff (1998). Bad arguments against semantic primitives. Theoretical Linguistics, 24(2/3), 129-156. DOI: 10.1515/thli.1998.24.2-3.129
Semantic primitives have fallen on hard times. Though their existence was once widely accepted in linguistics, a variety of counter-arguments have since engendered widespread scepticism. This paper examines a selection of anti-primitives arguments with the aim of showing that they fail to apply to the semantic primes of the Natural Semantic Metalanguage approach.
The most serious of the faulty arguments invalidly link semantic primitives with ‘objectivism’, or with abstractness and non-verifiability, or with implausible views about language acquisition or language processing. Others rely on misanalysed linguistic ‘facts’, or simply fail to come to grips with the most credible pro-primitives position. The anti-primitives arguments are drawn from a broad range of sources, including the philosophy of language, psycholinguistics, language acquisition studies, and cognitive linguistics.
The paper includes explications of the English words break, happy, lie and on.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tags: (E) break, (E) happy, (E) lie, (E) on
