Tag: (T) English
Goddard, Cliff (1997). The semantics of coming and going. Pragmatics, 7(2), 147-162. DOI: 10.1075/prag.7.2.02god
It is often assumed that the English motion verbs come and go can be glossed as motion towards-the-speaker and ‘motion not-towards-the-speaker’, respectively. This paper proposes alternative semantic analyses which are more complex, but also, it is argued, more descriptively adequate and more explanatory. The semantic framework is the Natural Semantic Metalanguage (NSM) approach developed by Anna Wierzbicka, in which meanings are stated as explanatory paraphrases (explications) couched in a small, standardized and translatable metalanguage based on natural language. A single explication is advanced for come, and it is shown that this unitary meaning is compatible with the broad range of ‘appropriateness conditions’ on its use. The same applies to go. A novel feature of the proposed analysis for come is that it does not rely on the conventional notion that ‘deictic projection’ is a pragmatic phenomenon. Instead the potential for ‘deictic projection’ is analysed as flowing directly from the lexical semantics of come. This approach, it is argued, enables an improved account of semantic differences between near-equivalents for come and go in various languages.
Tagged as: (E) come, (E) go, (E) move away, (E) move from...to, (E) move towards, (T) English
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.
Tagged as: (T) English
Goddard, Cliff (1999). Building a universal semantic metalanguage: The semantic theory of Anna Wierzbicka. RASK, 9-10, 3-35.
For some thirty years now, Anna Wierzbicka has been one of the most prolific, insightful, and lively scholars in the field of linguistic semantics. Her books and articles have ranged over diverse areas of lexical semantics, grammatical semantics, and pragmatics. At the level of theory, she is widely known for her insistence that universal semantic primitives exist as meanings of words in ordinary language. In recent years, her theory – now known as the ‘Natural Semantic Metalanguage’ (NSM) approach – has undergone considerable expansion and modification. This article presents an overview of current NSM theory, covering the expanded inventory of primitives, the novel concepts of allolexy and non-compositional polysemy, and new proposals about the syntax of the semantic metalanguage.
Tagged as: (T) English
Goddard, Cliff (2000). Polysemy: A problem of definition. In Yael Ravin & Claudia Leacock (Eds.), Polysemy: Theoretical and computational approaches (pp. 129-151). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
This paper outlines Anna Wierzbicka’s ‘Natural Semantic Metalanguage’ (NSM) method of semantic analysis and seeks to show that this method enables the traditional ‘definitional’ concept of polysemy to be applied both to individual lexical items and to lexico-grammatical constructions. There is also a discussion of how aspects of figurative language can be handled within the same framework. Naturally, given the space available, the treatment must be incomplete in many respects. The underlying contention is that many of the difficulties experienced by current treatments of polysemy do not spring from the nature of polysemy itself, but from more general problems of semantic and lexicographic methodology, in particular the lack of a clear, practical and verifiable technique for framing lexical definitions.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tagged as: (E) graceful, (E) have a + verb, (E) love, (E) send, (E) soft, (E) wrong, (T) English
Goddard, Cliff (2001). Sabar, ikhlas, setia – patient, sincere, loyal? Contrastive semantics of some ‘virtues’ in Malay and English. Journal of Pragmatics, 33(5), 653-681. DOI: 10.1016/S0378-2166(00)00028-X
The words sabar, ikhlas, and setia arguably identify core personal virtues in traditional Malay culture. Using Anna Wierzbicka’s ‘Natural Semantic Metalanguage’ (NSM) approach, this paper undertakes a contrastive semantic analysis of these terms and their usual English translations, such as patient, sincere, and loyal. A number of significant meaning differences are brought to light, allowing an improved understanding of the cultural semantics of the Malay concepts.
Tagged as: (E) devoted, (E) faithful, (E) ikhlas, (E) insincerely, (E) loyal, (E) patient, (E) pietas, (E) sabar, (E) setia, (E) sincerely, (T) English
Goddard, Cliff (2001). Lexico-semantic universals: A critical overview. Linguistic Typology, 5(1), 1-65. DOI: 10.1515/lity.5.1.1
Are there any word meanings which are absolute and precise lexico-semantic universals, and if so, what kind of meanings are they? This paper assesses the status, in a diverse range of languages, of about 100 meanings which have been proposed by various scholars (linguists, anthropologists, psychologists) as potential universals. Examples include: ‘I’, ‘this’, ‘one’, ‘big’, ‘good’, ‘true’, ‘sweet’, ‘hot’, ‘man’, ‘mother’, ‘tree’, ‘water’, ‘sun’, ‘wind’, ‘ear’, ‘say’, ‘do’, ‘go’, ‘sit’, ‘eat’, ‘give’, ‘die’, ‘maybe’, ‘because’. Though relatively small, the sample is variegated enough to justify the preliminary conclusion that the semantic primes proposed by Wierzbicka (1996) and colleagues are much stronger contenders for universal status than are terms designating natural phenomena, body parts, concrete objects, and other putative experiential or cultural universals.
Tagged as: (E) give, (T) English
Goddard, Cliff, & Wierzbicka, Anna (2004). Cultural scripts: What are they and what are they good for? Intercultural Pragmatics, 1(2), 153-166. DOI: 10.1515/iprg.2004.1.2.153
The term cultural scripts refers to a powerful new technique for articulating cultural norms, values, and practices in terms which are clear, precise, and accessible to cultural insiders and to cultural outsiders alike. This result is only possible because cultural scripts are formulated in a tightly constrained, yet expressively flexible, metalanguage, known as NSM, consisting of simple words (semantic primes) and grammatical patterns that have equivalents in all languages.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tagged as: (S) directives, (S) personal autonomy, (S) suggestions, (T) English
Goddard, Cliff (2004). “Cultural scripts”: A new medium for ethnopragmatic instruction. In Michel Achard & Susanne Niemeier (Eds.), Cognitive Linguistics, second language acquisition, and foreign language teaching (pp. 143-163). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
DOI: 10.1515/9783110199857.143
Abstract:
The cultural scripts approach is a descriptive technique for capturing ethnopragmatic knowledge that has grown out of the cross-linguistic semantic work of Anna Wierzbicka and colleagues. This work has established a metalanguage of simple cross-translatable terms that can be used not only for lexical semantics, but also for describing communicative norms. The paper illustrates and explains the cultural scripts approach, and makes some suggestions about its pedagogical advantages and applications in the teaching of ethnopragmatics. These include greater precision and intelligibility, a reduced risk of ethnocentrism, and enhanced opportunity to demonstrate links between discourse practices and cultural values, as embodied in cultural key words, proverbs, etc.
Examples are drawn from studies of the cultural pragmatics of English and of Malay (Bahasa Melayu, the national language of Malaysia).
Rating:
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tagged as: (E) free, (E) freedom, (E) menghormati, (E) sabar, (S) apologies, (S) freedom of action, (S) opinions, (S) personal autonomy, (S) respect for older people, (S) think first, (S) whimperatives, (T) English
Goddard, Cliff (2004). The ethnopragmatics and semantics of ‘active metaphors’. Journal of Pragmatics, 36(7). 1211-1230. DOI: 10.1016/j.pragma.2003.10.011
“Active” metaphors are a kind of metaphor that can be categorically distinguished from other metaphorical phenomena due to its reliance on “metalexical awareness”, detectable by linguistic tests as well as by intuition. Far from being a natural function of the human mind or a universal of rational communication, active metaphorizing is a culture-specific speech practice that demands explication within an ethnopragmatic perspective. The paper proposes an ethnopragmatic script (a kind of specialized cultural script) for active metaphorizing in English, and dramatizes its culture-specificity by ethnopragmatic case studies of Pitjantjatjara/Yankunytjatjara (central Australia) and Malay. Finally, in relation to English active metaphors, an attempt is made to demonstrate that expository metaphors have determinable meanings that can be stated as extended reductive paraphrases. The analytical framework is the Natural Semantic Metalanguage theory and the associated theory of cultural scripts.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tagged as: (E) food for thought, (E) graceful, (E) language is a mirror of the mind, (E) soft, (E) the past is a foreign country, (E) unemployment is a contagious disease, (S) sensitive words, (S) use of 'active' metaphors, (T) English
Goddard, Cliff (2006). Verbal explication and the place of NSM semantics in Cognitive Linguistics. In June Luchjenbroers (Ed.), Cognitive Linguistics investigations: Across languages, fields and philosophical boundaries (pp. 189-218). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI: 10.1075/hcp.15.14god
This paper argues that verbal explication has an indispensable role to play in semantic/conceptual representation. The diagrams used within Cognitive Linguistics are not semiotically self-contained and cannot be interpreted without overt or covert verbal support. Many also depend on culture-specific iconography. When verbal representation is employed in mainstream Cognitive Linguistics, as in work on prototypes, cultural models and conceptual metaphor, this is typically done in an under-theorized fashion without adequate attention to the complexity and culture-specificity of the representation. Abstract culture-laden vocabulary also demands a rich propositional style of representation, as shown with contrastive examples from Malay, Japanese and English. As the only stream of Cognitive Linguistics with a well-theorized and empirically grounded approach to verbal explication, the NSM (Natural Semantic Metalanguage) framework has much to offer cognitive linguistics at large.
Research carried out in consultation with or under the supervision of one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tagged as: (E) empathy, (E) ikhlas, (E) omoiyari 思いやり, (E) sincerely, (T) English
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
Tagged as: (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
Goddard, Cliff (2007). Semantic molecules. In Ilana Mushin, & Mary Laughren (Eds.), Proceedings of the 2006 Conference of the Australian Linguistic Society. PDF (open access)
This paper explains and explores the concept of semantic molecules in the NSM methodology of semantic analysis. A semantic molecule is a complex lexical meaning that functions as an intermediate unit in the structure of other, more complex concepts. The paper undertakes an overview of different kinds of semantic molecule, showing how they enter into more complex meanings and how they themselves can be explicated. It shows that four levels of “nesting” of molecules within molecules are attested, and it argues that while some molecules, such as ‘hands’ and ‘make’, may well be language-universal, many others are language-specific.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tagged as: (E) cats, (E) chairs, (E) chop, (E) cut, (E) eyes, (E) hands, (E) head, (E) legs, (E) long, (T) English, (T) Japanese
Goddard, Cliff (2010). Semantic molecules and semantic complexity (with special reference to “environmental” molecules). Review of Cognitive Linguistics, 8(1), 123-155. DOI: 10.1075/ml.8.1.05god
In the NSM approach to semantic analysis, semantic molecules are a well-defined set of non-primitive lexical meanings in a given language that function as intermediate-level units in the structure of complex meanings in that language. After reviewing existing work on the molecules concept (including the notion of levels of nesting), the paper advances a provisional list of about 180 productive semantic molecules for English, suggesting that a small minority of these (about 25) may be universal. It then turns close attention to a set of potentially universal level-one molecules from the “environmental” domain (‘sky’, ‘ground’, ‘sun’, ‘day’, ‘night’ ‘water’ and ‘fire’), proposing a set of original semantic explications for them. Finally, the paper considers the theoretical implications of the molecule theory for our understanding of semantic complexity, cross-linguistic variation in the structure of the lexicon, and the translatability of semantic explications.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tagged as: (E) children, (E) day, (E) ends, (E) fire, (E) ground, (E) hands, (E) head, (E) hot, (E) legs, (E) long, (E) moon, (E) night, (E) podłużny, (E) round, (E) sky, (E) sun, (E) sweet, (E) tapu, (E) water, (E) women, (T) English, (T) Japanese, (T) semantic molecules, (T) Spanish
Goddard, Cliff (2010). Cultural scripts: Applications to language teaching and intercultural communication. Studies in Pragmatics (Journal of the China Pragmatics Association) 3, 105-119.
Cultural scripts provide a powerful new technique for articulating cultural norms, values and practices using simple, cross-translatable phrasing. The technique is based on many decades of research into cross-cultural semantics by Anna Wierzbicka and colleagues in the Natural Semantic Metalanguage approach. This paper illustrates the cultural scripts approach with three examples of pragmatics of Anglo English: request strategies, personal remarks, and phatic complimenting in American English. It argues that the cultural scripts approach can be readily adapted for use in teaching intercultural pragmatics and intercultural communication, and shows with concrete examples (so-called pedagogical scripts) how this can be done.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tagged as: (S) compliments, (S) expressive positivity, (S) personal autonomy, (S) personal remarks, (S) pleasant interaction, (S) requests, (T) Chinese, (T) English
Goddard, Cliff (2010). Universals and variation in the lexicon of mental state concepts. In Barbara C. Malt, & Phillip Wolff (Eds.), Words and the mind: How words capture human experience (pp. 72-92). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195311129.003.0005
Abstract:
The first two sections of this chapter provide an overview of NSM research and findings, with a particular focus on mental state concepts. The next two sections show how NSM techniques make it possible to reveal complex and culture-specific meanings in detail and in terms that are readily transposable across languages. Examples include emotion terms, epistemic verbs, and ethnopsychological constructs in English, Chinese, Russian, and Korean. The next section discusses the relationship between linguistic meanings (word meanings) and cognition and elucidates the theoretical and methodological implications for cognitive science. The chapter concludes with the suggestion that people’s subjective emotional experience can be shaped or coloured to some extent by the lexical categories of their language.
Rating:
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tagged as: (E) bēi 悲, (E) believe that, (E) chóu 愁, (E) heart, (E) maum 몸, (E) mind, (E) sad, (E) sčitat’ считать, (E) unhappy, (T) English
Goddard, Cliff & Wierzbicka, Anna (2014). Words and meanings: Lexical semantics across domains, languages, and cultures. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199668434.001.0001
Abstract:
This book presents a series of systematic, empirically based studies of word meanings. Each chapter investigates key expressions drawn from different domains of the lexicon – concrete, abstract, physical, sensory, emotional, and social. The examples chosen are complex and culturally important; the languages represented include English, Russian, Polish, French, Warlpiri, and Malay. The authors ground their discussions in real examples and draw on work ranging from Leibniz, Locke, and Bentham, to popular works such as autobiographies and memoirs, and the Dalai Lama’s writings on happiness.
The book opens with a review of the neglected status of lexical semantics in linguistics and a discussion of the Natural Semantic Metalanguage methodology, which is used in all chapters. The discussion includes a wide range of methodological and analytical issues including lexical polysemy, semantic change, the relationship between lexical and grammatical semantics, and the concepts of semantic molecules and templates.
Table of contents:
- Words, meaning, and methodology
- Men, women, and children: The semantics of basic social categories
- Sweet, hot, hard, heavy, rough, sharp: Physical quality words in cross-linguistic perspective
- From “colour words” to visual semantics: English, Russian, Warlpiri
- Happiness and human values in cross-cultural and historical perspective
- Pain: Is it a human universal? The perspective from cross-linguistic semantics
- Suggesting, apologising, complimenting: English speech act verbs
- A stitch in time and the way of the rice plant: The semantics of proverbs in English and Malay
- The meaning of abstract nouns: Locke, Bentham and contemporary semantics
- Broader perspectives: Beyond lexical semantics
More information:
Chapter 3 builds on: NSM analyses of the semantics of physical qualities: sweet, hot, hard, heavy, rough, sharp in cross-linguistic perspective (2007)
Chapter 4 builds on: Why there are no “colour universals” in language and thought (2008)
Chapter 5 builds on: “Happiness” in cross-linguistic and cross-cultural perspective (2004); The “history of emotions” and the future of emotion research (2010); What’s wrong with “happiness studies”? The cultural semantics of happiness, bonheur, Glück and sčas’te (2011)
Chapter 6 builds on: Is pain a human universal? A cross-linguistic and cross-cultural perspective on pain (2012)
Chapter 8 builds on an unpublished English original translated in Russian as: Следуй путем рисового поля”: семантика пословиц в английском и малайском языках [“Sleduy putem risovogo polya”: semantika poslovits v angliyskom i malayskom yazykakh / “Follow the way of the rice plant”: The semantics of proverbs in English and Malay (Bahasa Melayu)] (2009)
The proverbs explicated in Chapter 8 include: (English) A stitch in time saves nine, Make hay while the sun shines, Out of the frying pan into the fire, Practice makes perfect, All that glitters is not gold, Too many cooks spoil the broth, You can’t teach an old dog new tricks; Where there’s smoke there’s fire; (Malay) Ikut resmi padi ‘Follow the way of the rice plant’, Seperti ketam mangajar anak berjalan betul ‘Like a crab teaching its young to walk straight’, Binasa badan kerana mulut ‘The body suffers because of the mouth’, ‘Ada gula, ada semut ‘Where there’s sugar, there’s ants’, Seperti katak di bawah tempurung ‘Like a frog under a coconut shell’, Keluar mulut harimau masuk mulut buaya ‘Out from the tiger’s mouth into the crocodile’s mouth’, Bila gajah dan gajah berlawan kancil juga yang mati tersepit ‘When elephant fights elephant it’s the mousedeer that’s squashed to death’.
Tags listed below are in addition to those listed at the end of the entries for the earlier work on which this book builds.
Rating:
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tagged as: (E) 'happiness' (Dalai Lama), (E) aching, (E) altruism, (E) apologize, (E) arnkelye, (E) ask, (E) babies, (E) blue, (E) ból, (E) boyish, (E) boys, (E) childish, (E) childlike, (E) children, (E) commit suicide, (E) complain, (E) compliment, (E) criticize, (E) death, (E) depressed, (E) depression, (E) devočki, (E) devuški, (E) disease, (E) douleur, (E) eu prattein, (E) female, (E) girls, (E) goluboj, (E) greet, (E) ill, (E) illness, (E) insult, (E) interpersonal warmth, (E) kill, (E) kill oneself, (E) life, (E) mal, (E) male, (E) mana, (E) marry, (E) men, (E) niebieski, (E) offer, (E) order, (E) parricide, (E) patricide, (E) praise, (E) problem, (E) promise, (E) proverb, (E) real, (E) recommend, (E) saying, (E) sinij, (E) size, (E) souffrir, (E) suffer, (E) suggest, (E) tell, (E) temperature, (E) thank, (E) threaten, (E) trauma, (E) typical, (E) violence, (E) vzaimopomoshch, (E) warn, (E) women, (S) expressiveness, (S) personal autonomy, (T) English
Goddard, Cliff, & Wierzbicka, Anna (2014). Semantic fieldwork and lexical universals. Studies in Language, 38(1), 80-126. DOI: 10.1075/sl.38.1.03god
The main goal of paper is to show how NSM findings about lexical universals (semantic primes) can be applied to semantic analysis in little-described languages. It is argued that using lexical universals as a vocabulary for semantic analysis allows one to formulate meaning descriptions that are rigorous, cognitively authentic, maximally translatable, and free from Anglocentrism.
A second goal is to shed light on methodological issues in semantic fieldwork by interrogating some controversial claims about the Dalabon and Pirahã languages. We argue that reductive paraphrase into lexical universals provides a practical procedure for arriving at coherent interpretations of unfamiliar lexical meanings. Other indigenous/endangered languages discussed include East Cree, Arrernte, Kayardild, Karuk, and Maori.
We urge field linguists to take the NSM metalanguage, based on lexical universals, into the field with them, both as an aid to lexicogrammatical documentation and analysis and as a way to improve semantic communication with consultants.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tagged as: (E) bengdi, (E) bengkan, (T) English, (T) semantic molecules
Goddard, Cliff (2014). Jesus! vs. Christ! in Australian English: Semantics, secondary interjections and corpus analysis. In Jesús Romero-Trillo (Ed.), Yearbook of Corpus Linguistics and Pragmatics 2014: New empirical and theoretical paradigms (pp. 55-77). Cham: Springer. DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-06007-1_4
Using corpus-assisted semantic analysis, conducted in the NSM framework, this chapter explores the meanings and uses of two closely related secondary interjections, namely, Jesus! and Christ!, in Australian English. The interjections Shit! and Fuck! are touched on briefly. From a methodological point of view, the chapter can be read as a study in how corpus techniques and semantic analysis can work in tandem; in particular, how interaction with a corpus can be used to develop, refine and test fine-grained semantic hypotheses. From a content point of view, this study seeks to demonstrate two key propositions: first, that it is possible to identify semantic invariants, i.e. stable meanings, even for highly context-bound items such as interjections; second, that it is possible to capture and model speakers’ awareness of the degree and nature of the “offensiveness” of secondary interjections, in a Metalexical Awareness component that attaches, so to speak, to particular words. Both these propositions challenge conventional assumptions about the nature and interfacing between semantics and pragmatics. A final question raised in the study is how linguists can come to terms with the fact that people use interjections not only orally but also mentally, in “inner speech”.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tagged as: (E) Christ!, (E) Fuck!, (E) Jesus!, (E) Shit!, (T) English
Goddard, Cliff (2015). “Swear words” and “curse words” in Australian (and American) English: At the crossroads of pragmatics, semantics and sociolinguistics. Intercultural Pragmatics, 12(2), 189-218. DOI 10.1515/ip-2015-0010
This study seeks to show that Natural Semantic Metalanguage (NSM) analytical techniques allow an integrated semantic-pragmatic approach to the use of “swear words” and “curse (cuss) words”. The paper begins with a semantic exegesis of the lexical items swear word and curse word. This is helpful to delimit and conceptualize the phenomena being studied, and it also hints at some interesting differences between the speech cultures of Australian English and American English. Subsequent sections propose semantic explications for a string of swear/curse words and expressions as used in Australian English, including: exclamations (Shit! Fuck! Damn! Christ! Jesus!), abuse formulas (Fuck you!, Damn you!), interrogative and imperative formulas (e.g. Who the fuck do you think you are?; Get the hell out of here!), and the free use of expressive adjectives, such as fucking and goddamn, in angry swearing. A novel aspect, with interesting implications for the relationship between semantics and pragmatics, is that the explications incorporate a metalexical awareness section, modelling speaker awareness of the ethnometapragmatic status of the word in the community of discourse. The study goes on to address so-called “social/conversational” swearing. Cultural scripts are proposed to capture some Anglo ethnopragmatic assumptions about how the use of swear/curse words can be affected by perceptions of familiarity, solidarity, and mutuality. Differences between Australian English and American English are discussed at various points.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tagged as: (E) Christ!, (E) curse words, (E) cuss words, (E) Dammit!, (E) Damn you!, (E) Damn!, (E) Fuck you!, (E) Fuck!, (E) fucking, (E) Get the hell out of here!, (E) goddamn, (E) Jesus!, (E) Shit!, (E) swear words, (E) Where (who/what...) the hell, (S) swear/curse words and children, (S) swear/curse words and gender, (S) swear/curse words in high solidarity situations, (T) English
Goddard, Cliff, & Wierzbicka, Anna (2016). Explicating the English lexicon of ‘doing and happening’. Functions of Language, 23(2), 214-256. DOI: 10.1075/fol.23.2.03god
This study proposes NSM semantic explications for a cross-section of the English verbal lexicon of ‘doing and happening’. The twenty-five verbs are drawn from about a dozen verb classes, including verbs for non-typical locomotion (crawl, swim, fly), other intransitive activities (play, sing), manipulation (hold), activities that affect material integrity (cut, grind, dig), creation/production (make, build, carve), actions that affect people or things (hit, kick, kill) or cause a change of location (pick up, put, throw, push), bodily reactions to feelings (laugh, cry), displacement (fall, sink) and weather phenomena (rain, snow).
Though the verbs explicated are specifically English verbs, they have been chosen with an eye to their relevance to lexical typology and cross-linguistic semantics (many are drawn from the Verb Meanings List of the Leipzig Valency Patterns project) and it is hoped that the analytical strategy and methodology exemplified in this study can be a useful model for research into other languages. The study demonstrates the application of the NSM concept of semantic templates, which provide a clear “skeletal” structure for explications of considerable internal complexity and which help account for shared semantic and grammatical properties of verbs of a given subclass.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Tagged as: (E) build, (E) carve, (E) crawl, (E) cry, (E) cut, (E) dig, (E) fall, (E) fly, (E) grind, (E) hit, (E) hold, (E) kick, (E) kill, (E) laugh, (E) make, (E) pick up, (E) play, (E) push, (E) put, (E) rain, (E) sing, (E) sink, (E) snow, (E) swim, (E) throw, (T) English, (T) semantic molecules
