A CONCEPT OF GENERAL MEANING: SELECTED THEORIES IN COMPARISON TO SELECTED SEMANTIC AND PRAGMATIC THEORIES

The paper discusses a concept of general meaning with reference to various relevant semantic and pragmatic theories. It includes references to Slavic axiological semantics (e.g. Krzeszowski (1997); Puzynina (1992)), Wierzbicka’s (e.g. 1980, 1987) atomic expressions and classical pragmatics theories, such as speech acts, Gricean theory of conversational implicature, politeness theory and and relevance theory

The semantic structure of words for emotions

Based on the analysis of Leo Tolstoy’s novel Anna Karenina, the article deals with semantic structure of words for emotions.Based on the analysis of Leo Tolstoy’s novel Anna Karenina, the articledeals with semantic structure of words for emotions

Why there are no 'colour universals' in language and thought

Do all people live in a world full of colours? Perceptually, yes (unless they are visually impaired), but conceptually, no: there are many languages which have no word for 'colour' and in which the question 'what colour is it?' cannot be asked and presumably does not arise. Yet the powerful and still immensely influential theory of Berlin and Kay assumes otherwise. While building on my earlier work on colour semantics, this article brings new evidence against the Berlin and Kay paradigm, and presents a fundamentally different approach. The new data on which the argument is based come from Australian languages. In particular, the article presents a detailed study of the visual world reflected in the Australian language Warlpiri and in Warlpiri ways of speaking, showing that while Warlpiri people have no 'colour-talk' (and no 'colour-practices'), they have a rich visual discourse of other kinds, linked with their own cultural practices. It also offers a methodology for identifying indigenous meanings without the grid of the English concept 'colour', and for revealing 'the native's point of view'

Komunikacja językowa i grzeczność w Internecie

Udostępnienie publikacji Wydawnictwa Uniwersytetu Łódzkiego finansowane w ramach projektu „Doskonałość naukowa kluczem do doskonałości kształcenia”. Projekt realizowany jest ze środków Europejskiego Funduszu Społecznego w ramach Programu Operacyjnego Wiedza Edukacja Rozwój; nr umowy: POWER.03.05.00-00-Z092/17-00

Bodies and their parts: An NSM approach to semantic typology

This paper puts forward, on the basis of evidence and analysis, seven general principles of conceptualization of the body, reflected in the semantic organization of the 'body and body-parts' field across languages. It supplies a large set of semantic explications of English body-part terms, and it shows how ethno-anatomies can be described and compared through the use of the natural semantic metalanguage (NSM). It also returns to the controversial issue of the body-centric character of language and cognition. The paper is, to some extent, a reaction to the Special Issue on "Parts of the body: cross-linguistic categorization" (Language Sciences 28:2-3). One of its goals is to vindicate well-established semantic universals such as body and part, which the Special Issue questions on the basis of raw data, discussed (as is it is argued) in a theoretical vacuum. More generally, the paper argues that semantic typology requires a semantic methodology and it shows what a theoretically-anchored semantic typology can look like

What Christians Believe: the story of God and People

What Christians Believe: The Story of God and People aims to present the essentials of Christian faith in narrative form, in very simple words, without assuming any previous knowledge, and without using any specifically Christian vocabulary (e.g. words like “grace” or “salvation”). The purpose of using a limited vocabulary of simple and intelligible words is not to “dumb down” religious ideas and truths but, on the contrary, to elucidate them, and to articulate their components with clarity and precision. Furthermore, the words used in this “Story” are not only simple, but also, for the most part, universal: while “The Story” is written in English, it is not phrased in a “full English”, shaped by history, culture and tradition, but in “Minimal English”, in words most of which have exact semantic equivalents in all, or nearly all languages. While “The Story of God and People” presented here corresponds to the foundational Christian creeds (the Apostles’ creed and the Nicene creed) and has strong ties with one particular culture (from Abraham and Moses to Jesus), it can be understood by, and resonate with, readers of any cultural and ethnic background. “The Story of God and People” starts with the concept of ‘God’, seen here as including love for people. It continues with the creation of the world, with God’s plans in relation to people; and with the stages of the realisation of these plans, with a focus on God’s special ‘covenants’ with Abraham and Moses. Then comes the culmination of the plan: God’s turning to the Jewish woman Mariam of Nazareth, the birth of Jesus, Jesus’ life, death and resurrection. The final chapters relate the sending of the Holy Spirit, the activities of the Apostles and the emergence of the Church. The last chapter echoes the theme of God’s love for people with which the story opens. Throughout, the focus is not only on the events, but also on their meaning. The interpretation of that meaning is nourished by Christian theology East and West, past and present, and is presented from the perspective of faith

Back to 'Mother' and 'Father' Overcoming the Eurocentrism of Kinship Studies through Eight Lexical Universals

This paper addresses one of the most controversial issues in cultural anthropology: the conceptual foundations of kinship and the apparent inevitability of ethnocentrism in kinship studies. The field of kinship studies has been in turmoil over the past few decades, repeatedly pronounced dead and then again rising from the ashes and being declared central to human affairs. As this paper argues, the conceptual confusion surrounding ‘kinship’ is to a large extent due to the lack of a clear and rigorous methodology for discovering how speakers of the world’s different languages actually navigate their kinship systems. Building on the author’s earlier work on kinship but taking the analysis much further, this paper seeks to demonstrate that such a methodology can be found in natural semantic metalanguage theory (developed by the author and colleagues), which relies on 65 universal semantic primes and on a small number of universal “semantic molecules,” including ‘mother’ and ‘father’. The paper offers a new model for the interpretation of kinship terminologies and opens new perspectives for the investigation of kinship systems across languages and cultures