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The first volume of the two-volume set Body, Language and Mind focuses on the concept of embodiment, understood in most general terms as "the bodily basis of phenomena such as meaning, mind, cognition and language". The volume offers a representative, multi- and interdisciplinary state-of-the-art collection of papers on embodiment and brings together a large variety of different perspectives, from cognitive linguistics, cognitive science, philosophy, psychology, semiotics and artificial intelligence. Being envisioned as a reader of sorts in theoretical and empirical research on embodiment, the book revolves around several core issues that have been addressed previously, to a large degree ind...
This volume explores the essential issues involved in bringing phenomenology together with the cognitive sciences, and provides some examples of research located at the intersection of these disciplines. The topics addressed here cover a lot of ground, including questions about naturalizing phenomenology, the precise methods of phenomenology and how they can be used in the empirical cognitive sciences, specific analyses of perception, attention, emotion, imagination, embodied movement, action and agency, representation and cognition, inters- jectivity, language and metaphor. In addition there are chapters that focus on empirical experiments involving psychophysics, perception, and neuro- and...
The 1987 landmark publications by G. Lakoff and M. Johnson made image schema one of the cornerstone concepts of the emerging experientialist paradigm of Cognitive Linguistics, a framework founded upon the rejection of the mind-body dichotomy and stressing the fundamentally embodied nature of meaning, imagination and reason - hence language. Conceived of as the pre-linguistic, dynamic and highly schematic gestalts arising directly from motor movement, object manipulation, and perceptual interaction, image schemas served to anchor abstract reasoning and imagination to sensori-motor patterns in the conceptual theory of metaphor. Being itself informed by preceding crosslinguistic work on semanti...
Meaning is embodied - but it is also social. If Cognitive Linguistics is to be a complete theory of language in use, it must cover the whole spectrum from grounded cognition to discourse struggles and bullshit. This book tries to show how. Cognitive Linguistics knocked down the wall between language and the experiential content of the human mind. Frame semantics, embodiment, conceptual construal, figure-ground organization, metaphorical mapping, and mental spaces are among the results of this breakthrough, which at the same time provided cognitive science as a whole with an essential human dimension. A new phase began when Cognitive Linguistics started to see itself as part of the wider move...
The cognitive and language sciences are increasingly oriented towards the social dimension of human cognition and communication. The hitherto dominant approach in modern cognitive science has viewed social cognition through the prism of the traditional philosophical puzzle of how individuals solve the problem of understanding Other Minds. "The Shared Mind" challenges the conventional theory of mind approach, proposing that the human mind is fundamentally based on "intersubjectivity" the sharing of affective, conative, intentional and cognitive states and processes between a plurality of subjects. The socially shared, intersubjective foundation of the human mind is manifest in the structure of early interaction and communication, imitation, gestural communication and the normative and argumentative nature of language. In this path breaking volume, leading researchers from psychology, linguistics, philosophy and primatology offer complementary perspectives on the role of intersubjectivity in the context of human development, comparative cognition and evolution, and language and linguistic theory.
Language and Imaginability pursues the hypothesis that natural language is fundamentally heterosemiotic, combining as it does the symbolicity of word sounds with the iconicity of motivated signifieds conceived as socially organized mental events. Viewed phenomenologically, language is regarded as an ontically heteronomous construct performed by speakers within the boundaries of sufficient semiosis under the control of the speech community. From both angles, a commitment to some form of intersubjective mentalism appears unavoidable. This, the author argues, forces us to conclude that imaginability plays a central role in the constitution of linguistic meanings as indirectly public phenomena. ...
Extraterrestrial Altruism examines a basic assumption of the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI): that extraterrestrials will be transmitting messages to us for our benefit. This question of whether extraterrestrials will be altruistic has become increasingly important in recent years as SETI scientists have begun contemplating transmissions from Earth to make contact. Technological civilizations that transmit signals for the benefit of others, but with no immediate gain for themselves, certainly seem to be altruistic. But does this make biological sense? Should we expect altruism to evolve throughout the cosmos, or is this only wishful thinking? Is it dangerous to send messages ...
This book is a cognitive semantic study of the Chinese conceptualization of the heart, traditionally seen as the central faculty of cognition. The Chinese word xin, which primarily denotes the heart organ, covers the meanings of both "heart" and "mind" as understood in English, which upholds a heart-head dichotomy. In contrast to the Western dualist view, Chinese takes on a more holistic view that sees the heart as the center of both emotions and thought. The contrast characterizes two cultural traditions that have developed different conceptualizations of person, self, and agent of cognition. The concept of "heart" lies at the core of Chinese thought and medicine, and its importance to Chin...
This volume brings together new work in the philosophy of dance for a general philosophical audience. Scholars working across the fields of philosophy, dance studies, and related areas explore the nature of dance as a practice and an artform. This collection of essays covers topics such as the experience of dancing, the nature and appreciation of dance artworks, and the distinctive contribution of dance to philosophical understanding.
This collected volume presents radically new directions which are emerging in cognitive lexical semantics research. A number of papers re-ignite the polysemy vs. monosemy debate, and testify to the fact that polysemy is no longer simply taken for granted, but is currently a much more contested issue than it was in the 1980s and 1990s. Other papers offer fresh perspectives on the prototype structure of lexical categories, while generally accepted notions about the radial network structure of categories are questioned in papers on the development of word meaning in child language acquisition and in diachrony. Additional topics include the interaction of lexical and constructional meaning, and the relationship between word meanings and the contexts in which the words are encountered. This book is of interest to semanticists and cognitive linguists, as well as to scholars working in the broader field of cognitive science.