Natural Semantic Metalanguage Rationales and Prospects

Transcription

1 FOREIGN LANGUAGE RESEARCH 2012 No. 4 Serial No. 167 *? * H030 A Natural Semantic Metalanguage Rationales and Prospects Pu Dong-mei Northwestern Polytechnical University Xi an China The Natural Semantic Metalanguage NSM is a decompositional system of meaning representation based upon empirically established universal semantic primes. It deals with the cross-cultural language in reductive semantic analysis by means of cultural script. Compared with the traditional cross-cultural semantic analysis approach NSM has the merits of direct perception and neutral description and therefore is of great importance to the research of contemporary cross-cultural semantics and pragmatics. The exploration in its rationales and current situation enables us to position NSM historically and theoretically meanwhile contributes to the deeper understanding of its research prospects. Key words Natural Semantic Metalanguage semantic primes cultural script cross-cultural semantic analysis 1 NSM Metalanguage NSM 2 NSM Wierzbicka Anna Wierzbicka 20 NSM 70 Natural Semantic Metalanguage NSM 1629 René Descartes Semantic 17 Primes Gottfried Leibniz Wierzbicka NSM NSM 63 * ESKAS

2 Leibniz 1666 Wierzbicka Leibniz Whorf 1 2 John Lucy Wierzbicka Whorf 3 1 Leibniz 2 3 Lucy Lucy Wierzbicka NSM Cliff Goddard Semantics and Lexical Universals theory and empirical findings 1994 NSM 2. 2 NSM NSM NSM Chomsky Noam Chomsky Sapir Benjamin Lee Whorf 3 Lucy Lucy Wierzbicka Goddard Hopi Nahuatl 1 Chomsky Chomsky Whorf Wierzbicka Wierzbicka 46

3 NSM Goddard Wierzbicka 2006 Goddard & Wierzbicka NSM NSM Wierzbicka 14 Wierzbicka NSM Goddard & Wierzbicka NSM Goddard Goddard NSM I YOU SOMEONE /PERSON SOME- Substantives THING /THING PEOPLE BODY Relational substantives KIND PART Goddard Determiners THIS THE SAME OTHER /ELSE 2005 ONE TWO MUCH /MANY SOME Quantifiers ALL Evaluators GOOD BAD NSM Descriptors BIG SMALL cultural Mental /experiential predicates THINK KNOW WANT FEEL SEE script / HEAR 40 Wierzbicka Speech SAY WORDS TRUE Actions events movement Wierzbicka contact DO HAPPEN MOVE TOUCH I SOMETHING GOOD BECAUSE WHEN DO THINK Location existence possession specification EXIST HAVE BE SOMEONE / BE SOMEWHERE THERE IS / SOMETHING Life and death LIVE DIE WHEN /TIME NOW BEFORE AF- Time TER A LONG TIME A SHORT TIME FOR SOME TIME MOMENT WHERE /PLACE HERE ABOVE Goddard NSM Space BELOW FAR NEAR SIDE INSIDE Logical concepts NOT MAYBE CAN BECAUSE IF Goddard Augmentor intensifier VERY MORE Similarity LIKE 47

4 NSM 63 A LONG TIME NSM BECAUSE THING this something = this thing Wierzbicka Chomsky S Goddard Gladkova Anna Felix Ameka Hilary Chappell David Wilkins Nick Enfield NP + VP NSM 3 NSM Lyons Lyons NSM NSM Goddard Wierzbicka NSM Goddard & Wierzbicka NSM NSM NSM Grice 3 plants living things these things can t feel something these things can t do something sky something very big people can see it people can think like this about this something it is a place it is a- bove all other places it is far from people sad X feels sad = X feels something sometimes a person thinks something like this something bad happened if I didn t know that it happened I would say I don t want it to happen I don t say this now because I know I can t do anything because of this person feels something bad X feels something like this. Goddard NSM 1975 Brown & Levinson 1978 Blum-Kulka 1989 Duranti NSM NSM William A. Foley Foley NSM NSM ethnopragmatics Goddard & Wierzbicka 2006 NSM NSM NSM X NSM NSM NSM NSM 1 48

5 Special Issue on Cultural Scripts Goddard C. & Wierzbicka A. Semantic Primes and Cultural Scripts in Language Learning and Intercultural Com- 4 munication A. In Farzad Sharifian and Gary B. Palmer eds. Applied Cultural Linguistics Implications for NSM Second Language Learning and Intercultural Communica-. Lucy J. Language Diversity and Thought. A Reformulation M J CUP Lucy J. Presentation at Workshop on Cross-cultural Semantics and Fieldwork M.. J. Nijmegen MPI Blum-Kulka S. House J. & G. Kasper. Cross-cultural Pragmatics Requests and Apologies C. Norwood NJ Ablex Brown P. & S. C. Levinson. Politeness Some Universals in Language Usage M. Cambridge CUP Foley W. A. Anthropological Linguistics An Introduction M. Malden Mass. and Oxford Blackwell Goddard C. Semantic Analysis A Practical Introduction M. Oxford Oxford University Press Goddard C. The Search for the Shared Semantic Core of all Language A. In C. Goddard. & A. Wierzbicka eds.. Meaning and Universal Grammar Theory and Empirical Findings. Volume I C. Amsterdam John Benjamins Goddard C. & Wierzbicka A. Cultural Scripts What are They and What are They Good for J. Intercultural Pragmatics tion C. Amsterdam John Benjamins Goddard C. Cross-Linguistic Semantics C. Amsterdam John Benjamins Nahuatl Grice H. P. Logic and Conversation A. In P. Cole and J. L. Morgan eds.. Speech Acts C. New York Academic Press Aztecs Nahuatl 16 Duranti A. Linguistic Anthropology A Reader C. Malden Mass. Blackwell Duranti A. A Companion to Linguistic Anthropology C. London Blackwell of the Linguistic Relativity Hypothesis C. Cambridge Lyons J. Semantics M. Cambridge Cambridge University Press Wierzbicka A. Semantic Primitives M. Frankfurt Athenaum Wierzbicka A. The Semantics of Grammar M. Amsterdam John Benjamins Wierzbicka A. Russian Cultural Scripts The Theory of Cultural Scripts and Its Applications J. Ethos 2002a 4. Wierzbicka A. The Ongoing Development of the NSM Research Program A. In C. Goddard & A. Wierzbicka eds. Meaning and Universal Grammar Theory and Empirical Findings C. Amsterdam John Benjaming 2002b. Wierzbicka A. Cross-cultural Pragmatics The Semantics of Human Interaction M. Berlin Mouton de Gruyter