Tag: (E) ùyɔ̀

(2017) Igala – Emotions


Brise, Lillian (2017). Eating regret and seeing contempt: A Cognitive Linguistic approach to the language of emotions in Igala (Nigeria). Frankfurt: Peter Lang.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.3726/b11354

Abstract:

This book, which deals with emotions and their expression in Igala, a Nigerian minority language with about two million speakers, calls for significant revisions within the NSM framework, its universal lexicon and its universal syntax, especially with respect to the prime FEEL. It challenges the claim that, in its present form, NSM is adequate for the analysis of emotion concepts universally. The challenge is based on the way emotions are conceptualized in Igala as well as on the absence of certain semantic primes that the NSM approach considers necessary for the analysis of emotions.

The author argues that NSM’s rigid claims to universality (of its syntax, for example) hinder the elegant description of emotion concepts in Igala and that the status of FEEL has to be re-evaluated. Igala does not have a generic lexical item that fits into the allegedly universal syntax specifications for FEEL and that lends itself to the explication of both physical and emotional (mental) states. FEEL must therefore possibly be downgraded and accorded the status of a semantic molecule rather than a prime. This would make it a language-specific concept, required for the explication of emotion concepts in some languages (e.g. English) but unnecessary in others (e.g. Igala).

Rating:


Research carried out in consultation with or under the supervision of one or more experienced NSM practitioners

(2016) Igala – Emotions


Tokula, Lillian & Pütz, Martin (2016). Emotion concepts in Igala language (Nigeria): A view from NSM theory. In Gratien G. Atindogbé & Evelyn Fogwe Chibaka (Eds.), Proceedings of the 7th World Congress on African linguistics: Vol. 2 (pp. 948-976). Bamenda (Cameroon): Langaa.

Abstract:

This study highlights the various characteristics of emotion concepts in Igala and shows the areas of overlap among the members of different categories of emotion concepts. The absence of a lexical exponent for FEEL in Igala is shown not to have any relevance to the expression and comprehension of emotive language in Igala, as shown by the side by side explication done simultaneously in both languages for happiness-, love- and fear-like emotions. The authors submit that, contrary to the claims made by the leading developers of the theory, FEEL is not necessary to the semantic explication of emotion concepts universally. They therefore recommend a review of the status of FEEL. In the face of evidence to the contrary from languages such as Igala and Sidaama, its present status as a semantic prime points to (unintended and paradoxical) ethnocentric bias on the part of the developers of the theory – a phenomenon, among others, that motivated the development of the theory in the first place. A re-evaluation of the status of the concept FEEL as a semantic molecule necessary for the semantic explication of emotion concepts in English and some other languages but not as a semantic prime found in ALL languages of the world may be more fitting to the data.

Rating:


Research carried out in consultation with or under the supervision of one or more experienced NSM practitioners