A resource base of publications using the Natural Semantic Metalanguage approach. 1,100+ detailed notices, and counting!
Levisen, Carsten, Fernández, Susana S., and Hein, Jan (2022) Cognitive Cultural Semantics: A Nordic Guide to Natural Semantic Metalanguage. Scandinavian Studies in Language 13(1): 1–38. https://tidsskrift.dk/sss/article/view/135133.
No abstract available
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Romero-Trillo, Jesús. (2021). The good, the bad… and the ugly? The conceptualization of aesthetics in Spanish. International Journal of Language and Culture 8(1): 147–168
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1075/ijolc.00039.rom
Abstract:
The present article describes the conceptualization of aesthetics in Spanish through the analysis of the two prototypical terms that describe positive and negative sensory appreciation, i.e., “bonito” (beautiful) and “feo” (ugly). Following a mixed-approach methodology combining Natural Semantic Metalanguage and Corpus Pragmatics, the article compares the use of these adjectives in spoken and written language, analyzes their realization in the corpora under analysis, provides the explications that support their poly- semy, and describes their distribution in different contexts. The final part of the paper is devoted to the comparison of the use of these adjectives with their counterparts in English, as evidenced by another paper in this special issue.
Research carried out in consultation with or under the supervision of one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Goddard, Cliff (2017). Natural Semantic Metalanguage and lexicography. In Patrick Hanks, & Gilles-Maurice de Schryver (Eds.), International handbook of modern lexis and lexicography (online). Berlin: Springer. DOI: 10.1007/978-3-642-45369-4_14-1
Abstract:
This chapter gives perspectives on meaning description in lexicography from the standpoint of the Natural Semantic Metalanguage (NSM) approach to linguistics, which among contemporary approaches to linguistics can claim the longest and most serious engagement with lexical semantics.
Note:
The Handbook is classified as a “Living Reference Work”, which means it is being continously updated. It was first published in 2017.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
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
Goddard, Cliff (2012). Semantic primes, semantic molecules, semantic templates: Key concepts in the NSM approach to lexical typology. Linguistics, 50(3), 711-743.
DOI: 10.1515/ling-2012-0022
Abstract:
The NSM approach has a long track record in cross-linguistic lexical semantics. It is therefore not surprising that it has a clear theoretical position on key issues in lexical semantic typology and a well-developed set of analytical techniques.
From a theoretical point of view, the overriding issue concerns the tertium comparationis. What are the optimal concepts and categories to support the systematic investigation of lexicons and lexicological phenomena across the world’s languages? The NSM answer to this question is that the necessary concepts can – and must – be based on the shared lexical-conceptual core of all languages, which NSM researchers claim to have discovered over the course of a thirty-five year program of empirical cross-linguistic semantics. This shared lexical-conceptual core is the minilanguage of semantic primes and their associated grammar.
In addition, NSM researchers have developed certain original analytical constructs that promise to enhance the power and systematicity of the approach: in particular, the notions of semantic molecules and semantic templates. This paper sets out to explain and illustrate these notions, to report some key analytical findings (updated, in many cases, from previously published accounts), and to extrapolate their implications for the further development of lexical typology.
This paper contains detailed explications of the English verb drink and its closest Kalam counterpart ñb ‘eat/drink’, as well as of the English verb cut and its Japanese counterpart 切る kiru.
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Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Ye, Zhengdao (2001). Los sentimientos morales de la “tristeza” china: una ilustración del acercamiento del Metalenguaje Semántico Natural (MSN) al análisis de algunas emociones chinas “básicas” [Moral feelings of “sadness” in Chinese: An illustration of the NSM approach to the analysis of some “basic” Chinese emotions]. Isegoría, 25, 201-222.
Written in Spanish.
This study undertakes, within the framework of the Natural Semantic Metalanguage (NSM) approach developed by Anna Wierzbicka and colleagues, a detailed contrastive and comparative semantic analysis of a couple of Chinese emotion concepts: 悲 bēi and 哀 ai (often glossed interchangeably as sadness, sorrow, and grief), which are considered to be basic emotions in traditional Chinese philosophical texts. It illustrates that (a) they are by no means interchangeable, nor are they equivalent of the Western idea of sadness, (b) they are artifacts of the Chinese culture, shaped by Chinese people’s social and moral experiences, and their view of life and the universe. Essentially, 悲 bēi encompasses a fatalistic view, and 哀 ai is a moral emotion.
Research carried out in consultation with or under the supervision of one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Gladkova, Anna, & Romero-Trillo, Jesús (2014). Ain’t it beautiful? The conceptualization of beauty from an ethnopragmatic perspective. Journal of Pragmatics, 60, 140-159.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pragma.2013.11.005
Abstract:
This study addresses the question of the ethnopragmatic conceptualization of ‘beautiful’ in three European languages – English, Russian and Spanish. Specifically, it investigates the polysemy and the spheres of application of English beautiful, Russian красивый krasivyj, and Spanish bonito/a. Through corpus analysis methodology, the authors investigate the most common collocations and the pragmatic and contextual uses of these terms. On the basis of the analysis, the study then adopts NSM to propose semantic explications of the three words in universal human concepts. In particular, it investigates the presence of the perception universals SEE, HEAR, and FEEL, which in the data are central to the analysis of the aesthetics vocabulary, along with the primes GOOD, SOMEONE, SOMETHING and THINK.
The data for the study comes from three online corpora: the Russian National Corpus (Russian), Cobuild’s Wordbanks Online (English) and the Corpus de referencia del español actual (Spanish).
Rating:
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Bułat Silva, Zuzanna (2002). Un intento de aplicación del metalenguaje semántico natural a las fórmulas de tratamiento españolas [An attempt at applying Natural Semantic Metalanguage to Spanish address forms]. Estudios hispánicos, 10, 61-68.
Written in Spanish.
A lot has been written on address forms from a pragmatic, psycholinguistic and sociolinguistic perspective. This short study is an attempt at providing a semantic analysis of some of the factors that impact on the use of nominal address forms in Spanish. Semantic components, expressed in a Spanish-based NSM, are provided, but focus on what is conveyed by the address forms – cordiality, spontaneity, emotionality, irony, machismo, etc. – as opposed to what specific address forms stand for.
Sound application of NSM principles carried out without prior training by an experienced NSM practitioner
Bułat Silva, Zuzanna (2011). El dolor y el tango [Pain and tango]. Estudios hispánicos, 19, 27-37. PDF (open access)
Written in Spanish.
The present paper is dedicated to the analysis of the Spanish word dolor (‘pain’) on the basis of a corpus consisting of 100 tango lyrics. I describe the linguistic picture of dolor in tangos, demonstrating its cultural specificity. To describe its lexical and cultural meaning without an ethnocentric bias I rely on the Natural Semantic Metalanguage (NSM) approach.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
Barrios Rodríguez, María Auxiliadora, & Goddard, Cliff (2013). ‘Degrad verbs’ in Spanish and English: Collocations, lexical functions and contrastive NSM semantic analysis. Functions of Language, 20(2), 219-249. DOI: 10.1075/fol.20.2.04bar
The Lexical Function Degrad is a device used in Meaning-Text Theory (MTT) to select the appropriate verb for expressing ‘to become permanently worse or bad’ in combination with different nouns. For example, in English one says that fruit rots, milk goes off, shoes wear out, flowers wilt, and iron rusts; thus, the verbs rot, go off, wear out, etc. can all be considered “values” of Degrad. Comparing these verbs with their translation equivalents in Spanish shows that verbs in the two languages have somewhat different collocational possibilities. Are such collocational differences arbitrary or do they result from subtle meaning differences between the translation equivalents? In this study we undertake a contrastive semantic analysis of a selection of words in the Degrad domain, using the Natural Semantic Metalanguage (NSM) method of semantic explication. We conclude that collocational preferences are indeed semantically motivated, but at the same time we recognize that Degrad is a valuable lexicological tool for verb classification, as well as for coordinating translation equivalents across languages at an approximate level. The paper aims to encourage productive engagement between two well developed approaches to lexical semantics, while at the same time demonstrating the explanatory power of the detailed “micro-semantic” analysis enabled by the NSM methodology.
Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners
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Crude application of NSM principles carried out without prior training by an experienced NSM practitioner |
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Approximate application of NSM principles carried out without prior training by an experienced NSM practitioner |
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Sound application of NSM principles carried out without prior training by an experienced NSM practitioner |
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Research carried out in consultation with or under the supervision of one or more experienced NSM practitioners |
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Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners |