How Language Makes Meaning

Erscheinungsjahr 2019
ISBN: 978-1-108-42165-2
Verlag: Cambridge University Press

Buch, Englisch, 300 Seiten, Format (B × H): 157 mm x 235 mm, Gewicht: 591 g

Language's key function is to enable human social interaction, for which people are motivated to engage by powerful brain mechanisms. This book integrates recent work on embodied simulations, traditional meaning-making processes and a myriad of semantic and other meaning contributors to formulate a new model of how language functions following a pattern of conjoined antonymy. It investigates how embodied simulations,semantic information, deviation, omission, indirectness, figurativity, language play, and other processes leverage rich meaning from only a few words by using inherently biological, cognitive and social frameworks. The interaction of these meaning-making components of language is described and a language-functioning model based on recent neuroscientific research is laid out to allow for a more complete understanding of how language operates.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Colston, Herbert L.

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Sprachwissenschaft Psycholinguistik, Neurolinguistik, Kognition
• Sozialwissenschaften Psychologie Allgemeine Psychologie Kognitionspsychologie

Inhaltsverzeichnis

1. The coin toss; 2. Deviance; 3. Omission; 4. Imprecision; 5. Indirectness; 6. Figurativeness; 7. Language play; 8. The social media; 9. The art of language; 10. The end game; Epilogue: a clearing revealing an eclipse; References; Index.

Über Autor(innen)

Colston, Herbert L.
Herbert L. Colston is Professor and Chair for the Department of Linguistics at the University of Alberta, Canada.