8.Cultural linguistics. Language and culture

Ethnolinguistics (sometimes called cultural linguistics) is a field of linguistics which studies the relationship between language and culture, and the way different ethnic groups perceive the world. It is the combination between ethnology and linguistics. The former refers to the way of life of an entire community, i.e., all the characteristics which distinguish one community from the other. Those characteristics make the cultural aspects of a community or a society.

Ethnolinguists study the way perception and conceptualization influences language, and show how this is linked to different cultures and societies. An example is the way spatial orientation is expressed in various cultures.

Cultural Linguistics refers to a related branch of linguistics that explores the relationship between language, culture, and conceptualisation. Cultural Linguistics draws on, but is not limited to, the theoretical notions and analytical tools of cognitive linguistics and cognitive anthropology. Central to the approach of cultural linguistics are notions of 'cultural schema' and 'cultural model'. It examines how various features of language encode cultural schemas and cultural models. In Cultural Linguistics, language is viewed as deeply entrenched in the group-level, cultural cognition of communities of speakers. Thus far, the approach of Cultural Linguistics has been adopted in several areas of applied linguistic research, including intercultural communication, second language learning, and World Englishes.

9.Universal human concepts

To analyse "emotions" (or any other semantic domain) in a clear and precise manner we need an appropriate semantic metalanguage. Up to a point, informal English can serve well enough, as can also technical, academic English. At some point, however, the fundamental concepts on which our analysis is based have to be defined clearly and precisely; and

to define anything (without direct or indirect circularity) we need some indefinables. If our indefinables, or primitives, are not intuitively intelligible and self-explanatory, then our definitions will explain nothing. If we want to define emotion concepts in a way which would be

truly explanatory we must define them in terms of words which are intuitively understandable (non-technical) and which themselves are not names of specific emotions or emotional states. This can be done using a small set of simple and universal concepts such as 'feel', 'want', 'say', 'think', 'know', 'good', 'bad', and so on, which have been independently justified as plausible candidates for the status of conceptual primitives.

Substantives: I, YOU, SOMEONE (PERSON), SOMETHING (THING),

PEOPLE, BODY

Determiners: THIS, THE SAME, OTHER

Quantifiers: ONE, TWO, SOME, ALL, MANY(MUCH)

Attributes: GOOD, BAD, BIG, SMALL

Mental predicates: THINK, KNOW, WANT, FEEL, SEE, HEAR

Speech: SAY, WORD, TRUE

Actions, events and movement: DO, HAPPEN, MOVE

Existence and possession: THERE IS, HAVE

Life and death: LIVE(ALIVE), DIE

Logical concepts: NOT, MAYBE, CAN, BECAUSE, IF

Time: WHEN(TIME), NOW, AFTER, BEFORE, A LONG TIME, A SHORT

TIME, FOR SOME TIME

Space: WHERE(PLACE), HERE, UNDER, ABOVE, TOUCH (CONTACT);

FAR, NEAR; SIDE, INSIDE

Intensifier, Augmentor: VERY, MORE

Taxonomy, partonomy: KIND OF, PART OF

Similarity: LIKE