Tag: (E) red
Wierzbicka, Anna (1984). Cups and mugs: Lexicography and conceptual analysis. Australian Journal of Linguistics, 4(2), 205-255.
DOI: 10.1080/07268608408599326
A more recent publication building on this one is chapter 1 (pp. 10-103) of:
Wierzbicka, Anna (1985). Lexicography and conceptual analysis. Ann Arbor: Karoma.
Abstract:
In contrast to most other recent [1984] writings on the subject, this paper tries to demonstrate not only that it is possible to say what ordinary words mean, but also that both the process and the results of establishing these meanings can be exciting and illuminating. It tries to do this not by arguing theoretically that it is possible to define everyday words, but by actually defining them in practice. The focus is on names of simple artefacts, and in particular on the words cup and mug, which have acquired a special notoriety in the literature.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tagged as: (E) blue, (E) cups, (E) devils, (E) handle, (E) mugs, (E) niebieski, (E) rather, (E) red
Wierzbicka, Anna (1985). Lexicography and conceptual analysis. Ann Arbor: Karoma.
Abstract:
This book is about the meaning of words – simple everyday words, such as bottle or jar; trousers or skirt; tree, flower or bird. Stating the meaning of such words is infinitely more difficult and challenging than might be expected. However, the book proves that everyday words are definable; it does so not just by reasoning (which can always turn out to be fallacious) but by way of demonstration ad oculos. The definitions provide evidence towards resolving the much debated issue of dictionaries vs. encyclopedias.
At the same time, the book is an attempt to narrow the gap between lexicography and semantics. The latter has an obligation to provide theoretical foundations for the former. But it will never be able to do so if it doesn’t come down from its speculative heights and engage in the humble task of actually trying to define something. Serious analysis of concrete lexical data requires a well thought-out theoretical framework; but a theoretical framework cannot be well thought-out if it is not grounded on a solid empirical basis. What is needed is a union of the two, lexicography and semantics, and this is the goal to which the present book aspires. Both the definitions and the discussion are free of any technical items, and can be followed by the intelligent layperson.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Reviews:
Peeters, Bert (1989). Journal of English Linguistics, 22(2), 249-250.
DOI: 10.1177/007542428902200209
Tagged as: (E) animal, (E) apple, (E) apricot, (E) ask, (E) banana, (E) barrel, (E) bicycle, (E) bird, (E) blue, (E) bottle, (E) bucket, (E) cabbage, (E) car, (E) carafe, (E) cardigan, (E) carrot, (E) cat, (E) cauliflower, (E) cherry, (E) cow, (E) cucumber, (E) cup, (E) devil, (E) dog, (E) dress, (E) elephant, (E) fish, (E) flower, (E) fox, (E) fruit, (E) grape, (E) handle, (E) horse, (E) jacket, (E) jar, (E) jug, (E) jumper, (E) lemon, (E) lettuce, (E) lid, (E) lie, (E) lion, (E) mouse, (E) mug, (E) niebieski, (E) onion, (E) orange, (E) order, (E) peach, (E) pear, (E) pineapple, (E) plum, (E) potato, (E) pumpkin, (E) radish, (E) red, (E) saucer, (E) skirt, (E) spout, (E) squirrel, (E) strawberry, (E) tiger, (E) tomato, (E) tree, (E) trousers, (E) vegetables, (E) wolf
Wierzbicka, Anna (1989). Prototypes in semantics and pragmatics: Explicating attitudinal meanings in terms of prototypes. Linguistics, 27(4), 731-769.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/ling.1989.27.4.731
Abstract:
This paper shows how pragmatic meanings encoded in different forms of address (such as titles, ‘polite’ pronouns, and personal names, including their expressive derivates) can be portrayed in a rigorous and illuminating way in NSM, and that such explications allow us to make the similarities and the differences between different pragmatic categories clear and explicit – both within a language and across language and culture boundaries.
It is argued that abstract features such as ‘solidarity’, ‘familiarity’, ‘(in)formality’, ‘distance’, ‘intimacy’, and so on do not provide adequate tools for the description and comparison of pragmatic meanings, because they are not self-explanatory and because they do not have any constant, language-independent value. (For example, the ‘distance’ implied by the English title Mr. is different from that implied by the French title Monsieur; and the ‘familiarity’ implied by Russian forms such as Misa or Vanja is quite different from that implied by English forms such as Mike or John.)
It is shown that many pragmatic meanings have a prototypical semantic structure: they present emotions and attitudes in terms of certain prototypical human relationships, rather than in terms of fully specified mental states and social relations. In particular, social and existential categories, such as children, women, and men, or people one knows well and people one does not know, provide important signposts in the universe of human relations encoded in language. The exact role such prototypes play in different pragmatic categories can be shown in a precise and illuminating way in verbal explications constructed in the proposed metalanguage.
Translations:
Into Polish:
Chapter 2 (pp. 49-81) of Wierzbicka, Anna (1999), Język – umysł – kultura [Language, mind, culture]. Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Naukowe PWN.
More information:
More recent publications building on this one are:
Chapters 7 and 8 (pp. 225-307, 309-325) of Wierzbicka, Anna (1992), Semantics, culture, and cognition: Universal human concepts in culture-specific configurations. New York: Oxford University Press.
Rating:
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tagged as: (E) (personal names), (E) Father, (E) given names, (E) madame, (E) mademoiselle, (E) miss, (E) monsieur, (E) Mr, (E) Mrs, (E) Ms, (E) nicknames, (E) Pan, (E) Pani, (E) Professor, (E) red, (E) salty, (E) Sir, (E) uncle, (E) vous, (E) vy, (E) woman, (E) wy
Wierzbicka, Anna (1994). Semantics and epistemology: The meaning of ‘evidentials’ in a cross-linguistic perspective. Language Sciences, 16(1), 81-137. DOI: 10.1016/0388-0001(94)90018-3
A more recent publication building on this one is chapter 15 (pp. 427-458) of:
Wierzbicka, Anna (1996). Semantics: Primes and universals. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Meaning is encoded not only in words but also in grammatical categories. The meanings encoded in grammar (just like those encoded in the lexicon) are language-specific. Attempts to identify the meanings encoded in different languages by means of arbitrarily invented labels only conceals and obfuscates the language-specific character of the categories they are attached to. To be able to compare grammatical categories across language boundaries, we need constant points of reference, which slippery labels with shifting meanings cannot possibly provide. Universal (or near-universal) semantic primitives (or near-primitives) can provide such constant and language-independent points of reference. They offer a secure basis for a semantic typology of both lexicons and grammars. At the same time, they offer us convenient and reliable tools for investigating the universal and the language-specific aspects of human cognition and human conceptualization of the world.
In this paper, the author illustrates and documents these claims by analysing one area of grammar in a number of different languages of the world: the area that is usually associated with the term evidentiality. As the goal of the paper is theoretical, not empirical, the data are drawn exclusively from one source: a volume entitled Evidentiality, edited by Chafe and Nichols (1986). The author reexamines the data presented in this volume by experts on a number of languages, and tries to show how these data can be reanalysed in terms of universal semantic primitives, and how in this way they can be made both more verifiable (that is, predictive) and more comparable across language boundaries.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tagged as: (E) ?el, (E) 'dug, (E) 'yuu, (E) a, (E) bes, (E) beti, (E) biw, (E) bos, (E) boti, (E) chi, (E) dó, (E) in, (E) ishi, (E) ja, (E) jilli, (E) ke‧, (E) mâ, (E) mela, (E) mi, (E) miyă, (E) mte, (E) mtʰer, (E) mu?a, (E) mute, (E) mutʰer, (E) nnă, (E) nok, (E) ntʰEr, (E) pacha, (E) pi, (E) psa, (E) psilli, (E) qă, (E) qilli, (E) re, (E) red, (E) shi, (E) sk''amna, (E) sk''apsa, (E) sun, (E) ŵă, (E) ŵela, (E) wi, (E) xa, (E) yă, (E) yin, (E) yod, (E) yowă
Wierzbicka, Anna (2006). The semantics of colour: A new paradigm. In Carole P. Biggam, & Christian J. Kay (Eds.), Progress in colour studies: Vol. 1. Language and culture (pp. 1-24). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1075/z.pics1.05wie
Abstract:
To be able to establish the true universals of visual semantics we must first of all reject the ones that are false. Above all, we must reject the widespread view that there are some ‘colour universals’, whether absolute or implicational. There are no ‘colour universals’ because ‘colour’ itself is not a universal concept. What is universal is the concept of SEEing. SEEing, not colour, must be the starting point, and the cornerstone, of our investigations.
It appears that in all languages there are visual descriptors referring to some features of the natural environment. Apart from such universal or widespread environmental features, all languages appear to have visual descriptors referring to some features of the local environment, in particular to visually salient local minerals and other pigments, especially those that can be used for painting, decoration, or dyeing. It also appears that in all languages there are some visual descriptors linked to the human (and sometimes animal) body. In addition to such commonalities in the visual descriptors, there is also a wide variety of more restricted and even idiosyncratic types.
To understand the human conceptualization of the visual world in both its diversity and its commonalities, we need to recognize the role of environmental and bodily prototypes recurring in human experience (such as fire, sun, blood, sky and grass), and to base our analysis on the bedrock of universal human concepts; and it is only on this basis that we can hope to arrive at a tenable and enduring synthesis.
Rating:
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tagged as: (E) gungaltja, (E) gungundja, (E) piros, (E) red, (E) vörös
