Asc Page 21 – nsm-approach.net

(2017) English, Hebrew, Arabic – Folk religious concepts

Habib, Sandy (2017). The meanings of ‘angel’ in English, Arabic, and Hebrew. In Zhengdao Ye (Ed.), The semantics of nouns (pp. 89-119). Oxford: Oxford University Press.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780198736721.003.0004

Abstract:

This chapter explores the meanings of English angels and its Arabic and Hebrew near-equivalents. Using the NSM framework, semantic analysis is carried out, and an explication is constructed for each term. The results show that there are similarities and differences between the three concepts. The similarities include, among other things, the categorization of the three non-human beings and their good nature. The differences appear mainly in the conceptualization of the hierarchy among these beings, their visual representations/appearances, and relation to people. As the explications are constructed from simple, universal human concepts, they are translatable into any language, and thus accessible to cultural outsiders.

Rating:


Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners

See also: , , , ,

(2017) English, French, Pitjantjatjara/Yankunytjatjara – Standing-water places

Bromhead, Helen (2017). The semantics of standing-water places in English, French, and Pitjantjatjara/Yankunytjatjara. In Zhengdao Ye (Ed.), The semantics of nouns (pp. 180-204). Oxford: Oxford University Press. DOI:10.1093/oso/9780198736721.003.0007

This chapter proposes semantic explications for selected words for standing-water places in English, French, and the Australian Aboriginal language Pitjantjatjara/Yankunytjatjara. It uses standing-water places as a case study to argue that languages and cultures categorize the geographic environment in diverse ways, influenced by both geography and a culture’s way of life. Furthermore, the chapter investigates the semantic nature of nouns for kinds of places, and shows how to approach the treatment of nouns for landscape within the NSM framework. The chapter finds that the meanings of landscape concepts, like those of other concepts based in the concrete world, are anchored in a human-centred perspective.


Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners

See also: , , , , , ,

(2017) The semantics of nouns [BOOK]

Ye, Zhengdao (Ed.) (2017). The semantics of nouns. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780198736721.001.0001

Abstract:

This volume represents state-of-the-art research on the semantics of nouns. It offers detailed and systematic analyses of scores of individual nouns across many different conceptual domains – ‘people’, ‘beings’, ‘creatures’, ‘places’, ‘things’, ‘living things’, and ‘parts of the body and parts of the person’. A range of languages, both familiar and unfamiliar, is examined. Each rigorous and descriptively rich analysis is fully grounded in a unified methodological framework consistently employed throughout the volume, and each chapter not only relates to central theoretical issues specific to the semantic analysis of the domain in question, but also empirically investigates the different types of meaning relations holding between nouns, such as meronymy, hyponymy, taxonomy, and antonymy.

This is the first time that the semantics of typical nouns has been studied in such breadth and depth, and in such a systematic and coherent manner. The collection of studies shows how in-depth meaning analysis anchored in a cross-linguistic and cross-domain perspective can lead to extraordinary and unexpected insights into the common and particular ways in which speakers of different languages conceptualize, categorize and order the world around them.

Table of contents:

  1. The semantics of nouns: A cross-linguistic and cross-domain perspective (Zhengdao Ye)
  2. The meaning of kinship terms: A developmental and cross-linguistic perspective (Anna Wierzbicka)
  3. The semantics of social relation nouns in Chinese (Zhengdao Ye)
  4. The meanings of ‘angel’ in English, Arabic, and Hebrew (Sandy Habib)
  5. Personhood constructs in language and thought: New evidence from Danish (Carsten Levisen)
  6. Some key body parts and polysemy: A case study from Koromu (Kesawai) (Carol Priestley)
  7. The semantics of standing water places in English, French, and Pitjantjatjara/Yankunytjatjara (Helen Bromhead)
  8. The semantics of demonyms in English: Germans, Queenslanders, and Londoners (Michael Roberts)
  9. The semantics of honeybee terms in Solega (Dravidian) (Aung Si)
  10. Furniture, vegetables, weapons: Functional collective superordinates in the English lexicon (Cliff Goddard)

More information:

Each chapter has its own entry, where additional information is provided.

Rating:


Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners

(2016) NSM syntax

Haugen, Tor Arne (2016). Semantisk metaspråk og skjematiske nettverk: Valenskonstruksjonar som tydingseiningar [Semantic metalanguage and schematic networks: Valency constructions as meaning units] [In Norwegian]. Maal og minne, 1, 101-140. PDF (open access)

Norwegian exponents for the semantic primes found in Natural Semantic Metalanguage (NSM) are identified, and some of the epistemological basis of the metalanguage is discussed. Even though the identification of many of the primes is not straightforward, it is argued that the metalanguage is a valuable tool for explicit semantic analyses. This is exemplified by corpus-based investigations of the valency constructions of two polyvalent adjectives in Norwegian, and it is argued that a semantic metalanguage of the NSM type can be a valuable supplement to the network model and to other diagrammatic representations applied in cognitive linguistics.

(2011) Reflections on Wierzbicka’s explications & related essays

Bogusławski, Andrzej (2011). *Reflections on Wierzbicka’s explications & related essays. Warszawa: BEL Studio. PDF (Table of contents only)

The book is devoted to reflections on the great achievements of Anna Wierzbicka, a Polish-Australian linguist of world renown. There are certain problems in the field particularly strongly represented in Wierzbicka’s work, namely in research aimed at establishing universal expressions of content, which at the same time constitute the “alphabet of human thought”, postulated by Leibnitz. The book includes an Introduction, which generally characterizes the project pursued by Wierzbicka, her main co-worker Cliff Goddard, and other academics belonging to their school called NSM [Natural Semantic Metalanguage], a reprint of the 2001 article referred to in the title, and 13 other reprints, as well as a number of statements by the author spanning the last 20 years (in English, Polish, Russian and German). In rare cases the author has introduced some modifications and additions.

(Translated from Polish by Google translate, then slightly edited)

(1993) NSM syntax

Wierzbicka, Anna (1993). Les universaux de la grammaire [Universals of grammar]. Langue française, 98, 107-120. DOI : 10.3406/lfr.1993.5836

Written in French.

This paper explores the area of universal grammar, a concept which, in the context of natural semantics, is to be understood as the set of grammatical universels and other strategies allowed as part of the Natural Semantic Metalanguage. It is very much a tentative paper with a large number of proposals and observations which await further exploration.

(1993) NSM primes (history of search)

Wierzbicka, Anna (1993). La quête des primitifs sémantiques: 1965-1992 [The search for semantic primes: 1965-1992]. Langue française, 98, 9-23. DOI : 10.3406/lfr.1993.5831

Written in French.

This paper provides a state of the art report on the search for semantic primitives as carried out over the last 28 years. It is argued that the failure of the philosophical speculation triggered by the reflections of the great 17th century thinkers (Leibniz, Descartes, Pascal, Arnauld) is not irreversible: the challenge lies in replacing the speculation with a linguistic approach based on the observation of the most diverse languages in the world.

(2008) NSM and the crossing-the-creek syndrome

Peeters, Bert (2008). La métalangue sémantique naturelle et la lutte contre le syndrome du franchissement du gué. In Jacques Durand, Benoît Habert, & Bernard Laks (Eds.), CMLF 2008 – Congrès mondial de linguistique française (pp. 2235-2243). Paris: EDP Sciences. DOI: 10.1051/cmlf08311

(2010) French – UN X PEUT EN CACHER UN AUTRE

Peeters, Bert (2010). “Un X peut en cacher un autre”: étude ethnosyntaxique [“Un X peut en cacher un autre”: An ethnosyntactic investigation]. In F. Neveu, V. Muni Toke, T. Klingler, J. Durand, L. Mondada & S. Prévost (Eds.), CMLF 2010 – 2ème Congrès mondial de linguistique française (pp. 1753-1775). Paris: EDP Sciences. DOI: 10.1051/cmlf/2010056

(2012) French – Adjectives (PETIT)

Peeters, Bert (2012). Les petites idées d’un petit Belge, ou quand petit ne renvoie pas à la taille [Les petites idées d’un petit Belge, or when petit doesn’t refer to size]. In F. Neveu, V. Muni Toke, P. Blumenthal, T. Klingler, P. Ligas, S. Prévost & S. Teston-Bonnard (ed.), CMLF 2012 – 3e Congrès mondial de linguistique française (pp. 1893-1907). Paris: EDP Sciences. DOI: 10.1051/shsconf/20120100071

(2013) French – Cultural key words (LANGUE DE BOIS)

Peeters, Bert (2013). La langue de bois: un pèlerinage ethnolexicologique [La langue de bois: An ethnolexicological pilgrimage]. In Pierre Marillaud & Robert Gauthier (Eds.), La mauvaise parole: 33e Colloque d’Albi Langages et Signification (pp. 196-210). Albi/Toulouse: CALS/CPST.

(1993) French – Verbs (commencement)

Peeters, Bert (1993). Commencer et se mettre à: une description axiologico-conceptuelle [Commencer and se mettre à: An axiologico-conceptual description]. Langue française, 98, 24-47. DOI: 10.3406/lfr.1993.5832. PDF (open access)

This paper examines in full detail all syntactic environments in which the Modern French aspectual verbs commencer and se mettre à are currently used. It also investigates the precise semantic differences between both verbs. Definitions are couched in semantic primitives. The author attempts to take a stand with respect to all observations made by others on these verbs over the last thirty years. Most examples are drawn from a corpus of weekly magazines and/or 20th century novels.

See also: ,

(1997) English (Australia) – French migrants

Peeters, Bert (1997). Les pièges de la conversation exolingue: le cas des immigrés français en Australie [The pitfalls of exolingual conversation: the case of French migrants to Australia]. Bulletin suisse de linguistique appliquée, 65, 103-118.

(1999) French – Greetings

Peeters, Bert (1999). ‘Salut! Ça va? Vous avez passé un bon weekend?’ Journal of French Language Studies, 9, 239-257.

(2002) Natural Semantic Metalanguage and cross-cultural research

Peeters, Bert (2002). La métalangue sémantique naturelle au service de l’étude du transculturel [Natural Semantic Metalanguage at the service of cross-cultural research]. Travaux de linguistique, 45, 83-101. DOI: 10.3917/tl.045.083. PDF (open access)

Written in French.


Research carried out by one or more experienced NSM practitioners