Research Catalog

Title

Process, image, and meaning : a realistic model of the meaning of sentences and narrative texts / Wolfgang Wildgen.

Author

Wildgen, Wolfgang

Publication

Amsterdam ; Philadelphia : J. Benjamins, 1994.

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Description

xii, 281 p. : ill.; 23 cm.

Summary

The general topic of this book is the development of a "realistic" model of meaning; it has to account for the ecological basis of meaning in perception, action, and interaction, and is realistic in the sense of "scientific realism", i.e. it is based on the most successful paradigm of modern science: dynamical systems theory. In Part One a model of sentences is put forward. The first chapter outlines the philosophical background of a theory of meaning. Chapter 2 gives a very short summary of recent proposals for a semantic model which considers image-like schemata. In Chapter 3 a realistic model of valence and basic predication is developed in detail. Chapter 4 treats multistability in meaning and the application of chaos theory and dissipative structures in semantics. Chapter 5 outlines the global framework of a stratified universe of meanings, and Chapter 6 prepares the way for Part Two: the analysis of narrative texts. Oral narratives of personal experience are the prototypical form in which experienced events are organized with the aim of remaking a piece of reality. In Chapter 7 a discrete grammar based on vectorial schemata is developed. Chapters 8 and 9 elaborate the "syntax of narratives" in Chapter 7. Chapter 10 progress to conversational dynamics. -- Publisher description.

Series Statement

Pragmatics & beyond ; new ser., 31

Uniform Title

Pragmatics & beyond new ser., 31.

Subject

• Discourse analysis, Narrative
• Grammar, Comparative and general > Syntax
• Imagery (Psychology)
• Imagery, Psychotherapy
• Semantics

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references and indexes.

Processing Action (note)

• committed to retain

Contents

Part One: The Meaning of Sentences. 1. Meaning and Reality --- 2. A Critical Review of some proposals for a semantics using image- and process-schemata --- 3. Process and image schemata in the lexicon and in basic syntax --- 4. Multistability, chaos and dissipative structures in meaning --- 5. Global Representational spaces --- 6. Between sentences and narrative texts ---- Part Two: The Meaning of Oral Narratives. 7. Narrative Analyisis and an Imaginistic Syntax of Texts --- 8. The Semantic Interpretation of Imaginistic Syntax --- 9. Information based analysis of textual dynamics --- 10. Conversational dynamics and the Pragmatics of Narratives.

ISBN

1556192991

LCCN

^^^94031087^

OCLC

31078769

Owning Institutions

Harvard Library