How to Show Things with Words is an interdisciplinary research study at the interface between linguistics and philosophy which sheds new light on the narrative-theoretical issue of proximal vs. distal stance adoption in discourse. Narrative distance ultimately depends on the epistemological source of the information conveyed, but English and other Indo-European languages have no inflectional systems for (en)coding that source of knowledge. To fill in the gap, speech act theory is (re)considered in the light of philosophical research on linguistic functions and a parallel is drawn between grammaticalized evidential categories and the objectifying acts of Husserl's phenomenology of constitution. These intuitive vs. signitive intentional acts do, indeed, roughly correspond to direct vs. indirect evidentiary forms and can be inferred from the temporal-perspectival organization of discourse by the so-called intimation or announcement function of language-systems. It turns out that perspectival immediacy requires tenses with overlapping event- and reference-points, but predictions of the sort are non-monotonic forms of reasoning defeasible by quantificational aspect distinctions, on the one hand, and inherent meaning considerations, on the other. To substantiate this claim, the bulk of the book provides an in-depth formal semantic account of tense, aspect and Aktionsart, interwoven with a detailed analysis of the cognitive processes associated with eventuality-description types. The book adresses an audience of linguists in general, formal semanticists, cognitive scientists, philosophers and narratologists with an interest in natural language semantics.
Reihe
Sprache
Verlagsort
Verlagsgruppe
Zielgruppe
Für Beruf und Forschung
US School Grade: College Graduate Student
Illustrationen
Includes a print version and an ebook
Gewicht
ISBN-13
978-3-11-179954-4 (9783111799544)
Schweitzer Klassifikation
Rui Linhares-Dias, Universidade dos Açores,Ponta Delgada, Azores Archipelago, Portugal.
Chapter 1 The linguistics structure of narrative
transmission1. Introduction2. The showing-telling distinction3.
Narrative transmission as cognitive distance: from evidential modalities to
indication signs4. The role of tense, aspect and 'Aktionsart'
Chapter 2 Linguistics in Narratology. A critical historical survey1.
Introduction2. Ingarden, Stanzel, Hamburger: the neutralization of the
'episches Präteritum' as a past tense 3. Müller: quantitative
indicators and beyond4. Weinrich's textlinguistic theory: a tense-centered
approach to backgrounded narrative discourse5. Uspensky: synchronic and
retrospective viewpoints as a function of both tense and aspect
oppositions6. Barthes: the semiotics of 'l'effet de réel'7. Chatman,
Prince, Toolan: 'Aktionsart' revisited8. Caenepeel: perspectivally situated
vs. perspectivally non-situated sentences
Chapter 3 The narrating instance as locutionary subjectivity1.
Introduction2. Speech-act theory and narrative discourse3. The
philosophical research on linguistic functions4. The phenomenological
make-up of the narrating instance as locutionary subjectivity5. Locutionary
subjectivity as a(n) (indexical) function of tense, aspect and
'Aktionsart'
Chapter 4 Tense1. Introduction2. Reichenbach's theory of tense3.
Tense in narrative discourse4. Tense, perception and memory
Chapter 5 Aspect1. Introduction2. Classificatory systems of aspectual
oppositions3. Viewpoint aspect and point of view: a first view on the role
played by imperfective meaning4. Imperfectivity as a two-edged aspectual
form or another view on viewpoint aspect and point of view5. A note on
iterativity
Chapter 6 "Aktionsart"1. Introduction2. Vendler's aspectual
classes3. Formal semantic approaches to 'Aktionsart'
Chapter 7 The effect of "Aktionsart" on narrative transmission1.
Introduction2. - STAT eventuality descriptions3. + STAT eventuality
discriptions4. World-knowledge based event semantics
