Catastrophe Theoretic Semantics
An elaboration and application of Rene Thom's theory
Published on 1. January 1982
Book
Paperback/Softback
124 pages
978-90-272-2525-2 (ISBN)
Description
Rene Thom, the famous French mathematician and founder of catastrophe theory, considered linguistics an exemplary field for the application of his general morphology. It is surprising that physicists, chemists, biologists, psychologists and sociologists are all engaged in the field of catastrophe theory, but that there has been almost no echo from linguistics. Meanwhile linguistics has evolved in the direction of Rene Thom's intuitions about an integrated science of language and it has become a necessary task to review, update and elaborate the proposals made by Thom and to embed them in the framework of modern semantic theory.
More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
Amsterdam
Netherlands
Target group
College/higher education
Professional and scholarly
Dimensions
Height: 240 mm
Width: 160 mm
Weight
200 gr
ISBN-13
978-90-272-2525-2 (9789027225252)
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Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
Wolfgang Wildgen
Catastrophe Theoretic Semantics
An elaboration and application of René Thom's theory
E-Book
01/1982
1st Edition
John Benjamins Publishing Company
€84.49
Available for download
Content
1. Introduction; 2. 1. Applied catastrophe theory: a short introduction; 3. 1.1. A sketch of the mathematical basis; 4. 1.2. Catastrophe conventions; 5. 1.3. The finite set of typical paths in the elementary unfoldings; 6. 1.4. An example: the standard cusp; 7. 2. Semantics from a dynamic perspective; 8. 2.1. Aspects of dynamic semiotics; 9. 2.2. The type of semantics aimed at by our model construction; 10. 2.3. Formal semantics on the basis of catastrophe theory: a comparison with logical semantics; 11. 2.4. Principles of interpretation; 12. 2.5. Rene Thom's list of semantic archetypes; 13. 3. The heart of catastrophe theoretic semantics: the set of semantic archetypes; 14. 3.1. The semantic archetypes derivable from the zero-unfolding; 15. 3.2. The semantic archetypes derivable from the fold; 16. 3.3. The semantic archetypes derivable from the cusp; 17. 3.4. The semantic archetypes derivable from the swallowtail; 18. 3.5. The semantic archetypes derivable from the butterfly; 19. 3.6. Archetypes derivable from unfoldings with codimension > 4 and corank 1; 20. 3.7. Semantic archetypes derivable from the compactified umbilics; 21. 4. Applications of catastrophe theoretic semantics; 22. 4.1. Dynamic inferences; 23. 4.2. Word semantics; 24. 4.3. Linguistic vagueness; 25. 4.4. Compositional processes; 26. 4.5. Application in neurolinguistics; 27. 5. Beyond catastrophe theoretic semantics; 28. 5.1. Beyond semantics: towards a dynamic theory of language; 29. 5.2. Beyond catastrophe theory; 30. Footnotes; 31. References; 32. Index