Representing Direction in Language and Space
Published on 14. August 2003
Book
Paperback/Softback
300 pages
978-0-19-926019-5 (ISBN)
Description
This book considers how it is possible for people to use directions like 'above the table' or 'over the city'. How does our brain or any other information processing system represent a direction as a spatial entity? And, how is it possible to link such a representation to language, so that we talk about a direction we have in mind? When we look at or imagine a scene, what entities can be employed for representing a direction, and what are the parts in language that can be used to talk about directions? This book brings together research from linguistics, psychology, philosophy, computer science, anthropology, and neuroscience to answer these intriguing questions. By considering direction representation across different languages and in different information processing systems, this book gives an overview of the main issues in this area for both the interested novice and the specialized researcher.
More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
Oxford
United Kingdom
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Illustrations
numerous figures
Dimensions
Height: 234 mm
Width: 156 mm
Thickness: 16 mm
Weight
459 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-19-926019-5 (9780199260195)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Persons
Emile van der Zee is senior lecturer in Psychology at the University of Lincoln. His publications include Cognitive Interfaces: Constraints on Linking Cognitive Information (2000, together with prof. Urpo Nikanne), also published by Oxford University Press.
Jon Slack is the head of Psychology at the University of Lincoln. He
completed his PhD at Manchester University in 1976 and has held teaching
posts at the Open University and the University of Kent. His main
research interests are in neural network modeling and representational theory.
Jon Slack is the head of Psychology at the University of Lincoln. He
completed his PhD at Manchester University in 1976 and has held teaching
posts at the Open University and the University of Kent. His main
research interests are in neural network modeling and representational theory.
Content
1. The representation of direction in language and space ; 2. Spatial language and spatial cognition: the roles of axial and vector ; 3. Vectors across spatial domains: from place to size, orientation, shape and parts ; 4. Vector grammar, places, and the functional role of the spatial prepositions in English ; 5. Constraints on motion event coding: vectors or path shapes? ; 6. Defining spatial relations: reconciling axis and vector representations ; 7. Places: points, paths, and portions ; 8. Ontological problems for the semantics of spatial expressions in natural language ; 9. Change of orientation ; 10. Memory for locations relative to objects: axes and the categorization of regions ; 11. How Finnish postpositions see the axis system ; 12. Directions from shape: how spatial features determine reference axis categorization ; 13. Spatial prepositions, spatial templates, and 'semantic' versus 'pragmatic' visual representations