The extent to which language is inseparable from thought has long been a major subject of debate across linguistics, psychology, philosophy and other disciplines. In this study, Wallace Chafe presents a thought-based theory of language that goes beyond traditional views that semantics, syntax, and sounds are sufficient to account for language design. Language begins with thoughts in the mind of a speaker and ends by affecting thoughts in the mind of a listener. This obvious observation is seldom incorporated in descriptions of language design for two major reasons. First, the role of thought is usually usurped by semantics. But semantic structures are imposed on thought by languages and differ from one language to another. Second, thought does not lend itself to familiar methods of linguistic analysis. Chafe suggests ways of describing thoughts, traces the path languages follow from thoughts to sounds, and explores ways in which thoughts are oriented in time, memory, imagination, reality, and emotions.
Author(s): Wallace Chafe
Edition: 1.
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Year: 2018
Language: English
Pages: 212
City: Cambridge
Cover
......Page 1
Half-title page......Page 3
Title page......Page 5
Copyright page......Page 6
Epigraph......Page 7
Contents......Page 9
Acknowledgments......Page 11
Prologue......Page 13
Part I Preliminaries......Page 17
1 Background......Page 19
2 Ground Rules......Page 24
Part II Thoughts and Their Properties......Page 33
3 The Priority of Thoughts......Page 35
4 The Path from a Thought to a Sound......Page 39
5 How Thoughts Are Structured......Page 45
6 How Thoughts Are Experienced......Page 54
7 How Thoughts Are Shared......Page 62
8 How Thoughts Flow through Time......Page 69
Part III Verbalization Illustrated......Page 79
9 From a Thought to a Sound in English......Page 81
10 From a Thought to a Sound in a Polysynthetic Language......Page 96
Part IV Related Issues......Page 103
11 The Translation Paradox......Page 105
12 Repeated Verbalizations of the Same Thought......Page 112
13 Rethinking Whorf......Page 117
14 Lessons from Literature......Page 125
Part V Common Ways of Orienting Thoughts......Page 133
15 Small Numbers and Subitizing......Page 135
16 Thoughts and Gender......Page 143
17 Time, Tense, Memory, and Imagination......Page 149
18 Relating Ideas to Reality......Page 163
Part VI The Emotional Component of Thoughts......Page 171
19 Emotional Involvement in a Conversation......Page 173
20 The Feeling of Nonseriousness......Page 181
21 How Language Can Be Beautiful......Page 187
Epilogue......Page 197
References......Page 199
Index......Page 209
