In the article, the vocabulary related to the wedding ceremony in the Pamiri languages is discussed. In particular, vocabulary reflecting the wedding ceremony in Ishkashimi language is almost unknown. In the Pamiri languages are still preserved all the traditional wedding ceremonies. The vocabulary associated with them is well-kept in full and is indigenous and sometimes borrowed. For the most, the terminology applied in the ritual is borrowed. Often the term is borrowed from Badakhshan dialect of the Tajik language. At the (...) same time, some Tajik words are used in specific meaning that is typical only to the dialect of Badakhshan and Dari language of Badakhshan in Afghanistan. This is mainly the vocabulary associated with traditional ways and procedures of the wedding ceremony. Some other words, such as sarbьzьrg ’to give respect, attention to mourners’, can be observed only in classical Persian literature. In view of the Islamization of the region the Arab terms are frequently used in rituals; they are associated with official terminology applied during the marriage process and designate its legal aspects. There are also Turkic lexis that was included into the dictionary because of language and cultural contacts in the region. It is significant that in the lexicon predominate metaphorical and descriptive ways of designation of the ceremonies. Remarkable specific vocabulary with original meaning is of particular use in the local minor Iranian languages in comparison with such major written national languages as Tajik language of Tajikistan and Dari Afghanistan. For example, in Ishkashimi language the word dumod is used only in the sense of ‘son-in-law‘, and in the meaning of ‘bridegroom‘ - only Å¡amard. Since the marriage and wedding ceremony has a special place in the spiritual culture of the people, the symbolic function is included into almost all the rites and ritual objects of it. During the ceremony, people wish of fertility, happiness, coming together and family well-being for the whole family and for the newlyweds. Thus, the terminology associated with these rites is preserved for a long time in the language; equally strong are numerous ritual prohibitions related to marriage. (shrink)

A tendency towards diffuse and piecemeal linguistic analysis threatens to overwhelm Anglo-Saxon philosophy to-day. Stringent linguistic analysis can indeed be valuable, but much that has been written recently, for instance, in Mind , the stronghold of linguistic analysis, shows no trace of clearly grasped method and well understood aims. The result is meandering discursiveness, the collection of trivial anecdotes and the random mixing of linguistic, psychological and sociological reflections leading to no clear conclusions.

Human attitudes about killing nonhuman animals are complex, ambivalent, and contradictory. This study attempts to elucidate those attitudes through a linguistic analysis of the terms used to refer to the killing of animals. Whereas terms used for killing human beings are highly specific and differentiated on the basis of the motivation for the killing, the nature of the participants, and evaluative and emotional content, terms used for killing animals are vague and interchangeable. Terms for animal-killing often background aspects (...) of the act, making it more palatable to humans. When a term is extended from use with humans to use with animals, it lends a connotation of compassion and mercy to the killing. When a term is extended from use with animals to use with humans, it gives the killing a connotation of brutality. These findings reflect assumptions about the human "right" to take animals' lives while serving to ameliorate the negative feelings such killings evoke. (shrink)

While nietzsche has some sympathy with the program of analytic philosophy, He offers what is in effect a powerful critique of the conception of philosophy as linguistic analysis and its presuppositions. It is therefore of some interest to consider his 'ante rem' criticisms of this conception of what philosophy is (or ought to be), With a view to evaluating the cluster of currently popular philosophical tendencies which may be subsumed under this label. Several of the most important of (...) these tendencies are described; and then those of nietzsche's methodological and programmatic arguments which bear upon them are discussed. In particular, His reasons are examined for holding that philosophical issues need not be dealt with exclusively--And cannot be dealt with satisfactorily--Within the confines of analysis either of the conceptual systems of non-Philosophical specialists, Or of ordinary language. (shrink)

The present study aims to reveal how evaluative meanings shape the depiction of Ukrainian emigration and women emigrants in Ukrainian literature of the early 2000s by employing Appraisal Theory developed within the framework of Systemic Functional Linguistics and subjecting excerpts from the following five novels to an in-depth linguistic analysis: Usi dorohy vedut’ do Rymu by Olesia Halych, Shliub iz kukhlem Pil’zens’koho pyva by Lesia Stepovychka, Ia znaiu, shcho ty znaiesh, shcho ia znaiu by Irena Rozdobud’ko, Hastarbaiterky by (...) Natalka Doliak, and Korotka istoriia traktoriv po-ukraiins’ky by Marina Lewycka. The authors employ various grammatical and lexical items to communicate their assessments of the emigrant women characters and the phenomenon of emigration from Ukraine. Appraisal Theory allows us to identify such linguistic realisations of evaluations and interpret authors’ attitudinal positions voiced or implied in text. This research is significant as the first study of its kind using Appraisal Theory to analyse literary texts written in Ukrainian thus expanding the theory’s reach and relevance. Additionally, employing linguistic techniques when assessing the depiction of women’s emigration and its agents enriches an analysis by providing a detailed and balanced perspective. The findings of this research contribute to the fields of literary studies, linguistics, and migration studies. (shrink)

The ‘between Wars’ period in England in the early twentieth century was extraordinary, philosophically. It was marked by a profusion of new, controversial, and revolutionary ideas. Developments in formal logic, the rise of the method of ‘analysis’, and logical atomism were already changing the face of philosophy in England. From this mix emerged two distinctive views about language and its connection to philosophical methodology: one championing the concept of an ideal language; and one rejecting this and favoring appeal to (...) ordinary language. The origin of both views is to be found in the (earlier and later) work of Ludwig Wittgenstein. In this paper, I will examine the emergence of these views in relation to one another: an ideal language conception represented by A.J. Ayer in his Language, Truth and Logic, and the reaction against this conception in the early phases of ordinary language philosophy, in particular in the work of John Wisdom. (shrink)

This volume contains the proceedings of the six symposia of the 'Philosophers into Europe' conference held under the joint auspices of the Royal Institute of ...

This paper argues against both conceptual and linguistic analysis as sources of a priori knowledge. Whether such knowledge is possible turns on the nature of concepts. The paper's chief contention is that none of the main views about what concepts are can underwrite the possibility of such knowledge.

This paper explores a hitherto overlooked chapter in the history of analytic philosophy, namely the role that psychical research (i.e. the study of phenomena like telepathy, clairvoyance, ghosts, or communication with spirits of the dead) played in British philosophy between 1940 and 1960. This paper focuses on Casimir Lewy’s (1919–1991) engagement with psychical research and demonstrates that Lewy’s early work constitutes a move towards sustained application of the linguistic method to psychical research between 1940 and 1960. I argue that (...) paying attention to psychical research during this period is significant for two reasons. The first is that this period represents a unique chapter in the history of the analytic tradition, namely, a philosophical preoccupation with the meaning of the language used by psychical researchers. The second is that a foundational moment in the history of analytic philosophy of religion is inseparable from its origin in psychical research. (shrink)

If the figure of philosophical sandhogs is appropriately descriptive of this recent work, still one must recognize the manner in which modern philosophers are working away in different caissons; the workers differ in judgment concerning what is hardpan and what bedrock; while some believe only hardpan confronts us all the way down, a philosophic version of the bends would seem not to be uncommon in the analogate. And it is tempting, while possibly not unfair, to think of the linguistic (...) philosopher functioning in the equipment of the skin-diver, boldly setting off destructive charges at the foot of any piling which might be capable of furnishing support to a prospective "metaphysical edifice." Or, more modestly, one might say that whereas both Collins and Tillich are at work on the "foundations of the theory of being" Smart's enterprise, in "a spirit of higher-order neutrality," is directed toward the linguistic foundations of the theory of "being'," carefully bracketed from ontological reference through a rich use of inverted commas. (shrink)

We present Activity Analysis as a new method for the quantification of subjective reports of altered states of consciousness with regard to the indicated level of simulated motor activity. Empirical linguistic activity analysis was conducted with dream reports conceived immediately after EEG-controlled periods of hypnagogic hallucinations and REM-sleep in the sleep laboratory. Reports of REM-dreams exhibited a significantly higher level of simulated physical dreamer activity, while hypnagogic hallucinations appear to be experienced mostly from the point of passive (...) observer. This study lays the groundwork for clinical research on the level of simulated activity in pathologically altered states of subjective experience, for example in the REM-dreams of clinically depressed patients, or in intrusions and dreams of patients diagnosed with PTSD. (shrink)

One of the major problems for Critical Discourse Analysts is how to move on from their insightful critical analyses to successfully ‘acting on the world in order to transform it’. This paper discusses, with detailed exemplification, some of the areas where linguists have moved beyond description to acting on and changing the world. Examples from three murder trials show how essential it is, in order to protect the rights of witnesses and defendants, to have audio records of significant interviews with (...) police officers. The article moves on to discuss the potentially serious consequences of the many communicative problems inherent in legal/lay interaction and illustrates a few of the linguist-led improvements to important texts. Finally, the article turns to the problems of using linguistic data to try to determine the geographical origin of asylum seekers. The intention of the article is to act as a call to arms to linguists; it concludes with the observation that ‘innumerable mountains remain for those with a critical linguistic perspective who would like to try to move one’. (shrink)

I suggest a revised meta-linguistic account that distinguishes between the language used to talk about a particular language -- the meta-language -- from direct speech reports made within a language -- the object language. Making this distinction leads to a kind of meta-linguistic analysis of competence with names that is not simply tautologous, so long as competence with names is not construed as knowing this: 'Tyler' is whatever is called 'Tyler'. Rather, it should be this: the name (...) 'Tyler' is whatever speakers of an object language call "Tyler," where the double quotes represent direct speech acts. This makes it possible that the schema, 'X' is whatever speakers of an object language call "X," could very well be informative, and serve as an explanation of what a speaker understands when competent with a name. Well, it would insofar as a speaker could learn something about the meaning of the the name 'Tyler' by examining its utterances. In fact, something like this must have to have some truth to it. After all, even non-fluent children learn to speak a language, in part, by attending to utterances of certain expressions in particular situations. The major difference is that when we are finally competent with the expression 'duck' it is not because we have grasped the previous schema. It is because we will engage in duck-awareness behaviors when our environment has something to with ducks at a certain time. In contrast, simply understanding the previous schema is exactly what competence with names consists in. (shrink)

The goal of this study was to assess the relationships between computational approaches to analyzing constructed responses made during reading and individual differences in the foundational skills of reading in college readers. We also explored if these relationships were consistent across texts and samples collected at different institutions and texts. The study made use of archival data that involved college participants who produced typed constructed responses under thinking aloud instructions reading history and science texts. They also took assessments of vocabulary (...) knowledge and proficiency in comprehension. The protocols were analyzed to assess two different ways to determine their cohesion. One approach involved assessing how readers established connections with themselves. The other approach involved assessing connections between the constructed responses and the texts that were read. Additionally, the comparisons were made by assessing both lexical and semantic comparisons. The result showed that both approaches for analyzing cohesion and making the comparisons were correlated with vocabulary knowledge and comprehension proficiency. The implications of the results for theory and practice are discussed. (shrink)

The British movement of Linguistic Analysis is now comparatively mature, although it has not yet greatly expanded from the private circle in which its early pioneers, Moore and Wittgenstein guided its first steps and early mistakes. Its admittedly revolutionary character lies not so much in a new statement of traditional British empiricism as in a new conception of the philosophical activity itself. It is a new philosophy about philosophy, which claims to be more ‘skilful’ in professional method and (...) application than any of its predecessors. It claims not so much to make new statements as to clarify those already and commonly made, and to remove many of them which concern problems which, Analysts allege, arise through plain misunderstanding of ‘the logic of our language’. Philosophy thus becomes a method of therapy rather than a set of fundamental doctrines and Wittgenstein considered that its work ‘is best done in piece–meal fashion in short essays and articles and, most successfully of all, in private discussion’. Hence the movement remained almost completely unknown outside Britain, while inversely it bred itself within a passing atmosphere of insular superiority. (shrink)

A Linguistic Analysis of Prior, Quine, and Searle on Propositional Attitudes, Martinich on Fictional Reference, Taglicht on the Active/Passive Mood Distinction in English, etc.

It is a commonplace that philosophical doctrines, like old soldiers, are not vanquished, but merely fade away. It might have been added that, like old soldiers, they occasionally return. What is sound in the commonplace, aside from whatever merit it may have as sociological comment, is found in its underscoring the peculiarities of philosophical refutation. Did Aristotle refute Plato? Did Ockham refute Scotus? Did Reid refute Locke? Did Moore refute Bradley? Did Strawson refute Russell? Part of what I wish to (...) show in this paper is that there are ways of posing questions like these so that they are at least answerable; it is not, however, so to pose them, much less to answer them. My chief concern is with the fact that one of the peculiarities of philosophical refutation is that it commonly contains a metaphilosophical component. Indeed, after considerable stage-setting, I shall argue that some important doctrines of Linguistic Analysts and Phenomenologists rest upon metaphilosophical mistakes and that, even where some of their doctrines are sound, the intellectual ambiance in which they are placed invites confusion. It is visionary to expect the ending of the intellectual embarrassment constituted by the coming and going of philosophical styles and fads; the attempt to expose metaphilosophical mistakes and confusions may, nevertheless, help to wither the exuberant cynicism of the commonplace. (shrink)

This paper reports the first case in which a linguist served as an expert witness in Hong Kong, a former British colony that has operated as a special administrative region of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) since 1997. The dispute was on the meaning of the political slogan “Liberate Hong Kong, Revolution of Our Times”, which was widely adopted during the 2019–2020 protests. The keywords “liberate” and “revolution” are smoking gun evidence for the prosecution in a large cluster of (...) cases that involve sedition law and national security offences. Section I of the paper provides background information about a case the author was involved in, which was concerned with whether the slogan was seditious. Section II describes the analysis conducted, which concludes that the slogan as a whole refers to a need to rectify a problem and to return to the original, a more desirable state of affairs for Hong Kong, without specifying what problem there is and what the desirable state of affairs looks like. Section III highlights some critical issues in the analysis, discussing challenges faced and ethical questions for the expert witness. Section IV is a postscript that briefly describes the outcome of the case. (shrink)