Semiotics, or the study of signs, plays an increasingly important role within marketing as a guide to psychological and social aspects of communication. Jean-Marie Floch provides an introduction to the potential offered by a semiotic approach to a variety of marketing and communication problems or situations. Key semiotic concepts and principles are gradually introduced using real life studies.

"Caged in Our Own Signs: A Book About Semiotics" is a primer of semiotics, intended for general readers as well as communication majors. The first five chapters introduce the basic constructs, models, assumptions, frameworks for semiotic thinking, and other elements that underpin contemporary semiotics. This volume also provides the reader with semiotic methodology to analyze issues of postmodernism, of text semiotics, and of mass cultural semiotics. This book is written in such a way that the reader may easily apply the semiotic knowledge to the everyday conversation and discourse.

This book provides a corpus-led analysis of multi-word units (MWUs) in English, specifically fixed pairs of nouns which are linked by a conjunction, such as 'mum and dad', 'bride and groom' and 'law and order'. Crucially, the occurrence pattern of such pairs is dependent on genre, and this book aims to document the structural distribution of some key Linked Noun Groups (LNGs). The author looks at the usage patterns found in a range of poetry and fiction dating from the 17th to 20th century, and also highlights the important role such binomials play in academic English, while acknowledging that they are far less common in casual spoken English. His findings will be highly relevant to students and scholars working in language teaching, stylistics, and language technology (including AI).

GOAL This is the funniest book I have ever written - and the ambiguity here is deliberate. Much of this book is about deliberate ambiguity, described as unambiguously as possible, so the previous sentence is probably the fIrst, last, and only deliberately ambiguous sentence in the book. Deliberate ambiguity will be shown to underlie much, if not all, of verbal humor. Some of its forms are simple enough to be perceived as deliberately ambiguous on the surface; in others, the ambiguity results from a deep semantic analysis. Deep semantic analysis is the core of this approach to humor. The book is the fIrst ever application of modem linguistic theory to the study of humor and it puts forward a formal semantic theory of verbal humor. The goal of the theory is to formulate the necessary and sufficient conditions, in purely semantic terms, for a text to be funny. In other words, if a formal semantic analysis of a text yields a certain set of semantic proptrties which the text possesses, then the text is recognized as a joke. As any modem linguistic theory, this semantic theory of humor attempts to match a natural intuitive ability which the native speaker has, in this particular case, the ability to perceive a text as funny, i. e. , to distinguish a joke from a non-joke.

The success of VietnaM's August Revolution of 1945 can be attributed in part to Ho Chi Minh's reconstitutive rhetoric, a form of rhetorical discourse that gave the Vietnamese people a new sense of identification. This reawakened identity in turn influenced a renewed demand for nationalism and independence. This study explores the reconstitutive rhetoric of Ho Chi Minh. In doing so, it advances rhetorical theory founded on nonWestern premises and examines the cultural differences responsible for creating a rhetoric whose focus is nonEurocentric.

Most current thinking on reconstitutive discourse has focused on Western premises. Decaro challenges some of these premises and adds a new dimension to reconstitutive understanding. Ho Chi Minh utilized the cultural heritage of the Vietnamese people as a means of creating his persona--a powerful aspect of his ability to persuade. In understanding Ho Chi Minh's unique form of discourse, it is then possible to see how he was able to unify his country in order to sustain a protracted conflict with the goal of securing national independence.

Racing the Street traces the history of how race was used as a technology for gathering, assembling, and networking the early cosmopolitan city. Drawing on an archive that ranges from engineering blueprints and parliamentary committee reports to sensationalistic pamphlets and periodical press accounts, Robert J. Topinka conducts an original genealogy of the nineteenth-century London street, demonstrating how race as a technology gathers, sorts, and assembles the teeming particularities of the street into a manageable network. This interdisciplinary study offers a novel approach to the intersections of race, rhetoric, media, technology, and urban government.

In this book leading scholars from every relevant field report on all aspects of compositionality, the notion that the meaning of an expression can be derived from its parts. Understanding how compositionality works is a central element of syntactic and semantic analysis and a challenge for models of cognition. It is a key concept in linguistics and philosophy and in the cognitive sciences more generally, and is without question one of the most exciting fields in the study of language and mind. The authors of this book report critically on lines of research in different disciplines, revealing the connections between them and highlighting current problems and opportunities. The force and justification of compositionality have long been contentious. First proposed by Frege as the notion that the meaning of an expression is generally determined by the meaning and syntax of its components, it has since been deployed as a constraint on the relation between theories of syntax and semantics, as a means of analysis, and more recently as underlying the structures of representational systems, such as computer programs and neural architectures. The Oxford Handbook of Compositionality explores these and many other dimensions of this challenging field. It will appeal to researchers and advanced students in linguistics and philosophy and to everyone concerned with the study of language and cognition including those working in neuroscience, computational science, and bio-informatics.

Split constructions are widespread in natural languages. The separation of the semantic restriction of a quantifier from that quantifier is a typical example of such a construction. This study addresses the problem that such discontinuous strings exhibit--namely, a number of locality constraints, including intervention effects. These are shown to follow from the interaction of a minimalist syntax with a semantics that directly assigns a model-theoretic interpretation to syntactic logical forms. The approach is shown to have wide empirical coverage and a conceptual simplicity. The book will be of interest to scholars and advanced students of syntax and semantics.

Silence, Civility, and Sanity addresses the reclamation of civil communication and healthy public conversation at a time when people are very divided. Throughout this book, Stephanie Bennett focuses on the importance of silence to temper speech and embrace the art of listening to foster a more positive dialogue and civil society. Throughout this book, the author addresses the place of silence as a communicational good, intrapersonal silence in the history of contemplative prayer, the importance of attentive silence, the reflective use of silence, the ethnical dimensions of silence, and the abuses of silence. This book also delves into the layers of technological advancement that obscure perception and act as noise that poses as silence, phantom silence. Bennett offers readers an alternative to the false binaries of culture-warring that plague our relationships, institutions, and public sphere. Scholars of communication, rhetoric, and media studies will find this book of particular interest.

Adverbial Clauses, Main Clause Phenomena, and Composition of the Left Periphery uses the cartographic theory to examine the left periphery of the English clause and compare it to the left-peripheral structures of other languages. Liliane Haegeman argues that the dissimilar surface characteristics of these languages (primarily English and Romance, but also Gungbe, Hungarian, Hebrew, Dutch, and others) can be explained by universal constraints, and that the same structures apply across the languages. Haegeman focuses on main clause transformations--movement operations that can only take place in main clauses.

This book discusses fundamental topics on contemporary Ockhamism. The collected essays show how contemporary Ockhamism can impact areas of research such as semantics, metaphysics and also the philosophy of science. In addition, the volume hosts one historian of Medieval philosophy who investigates the way in which William of Ockham "in flesh and bone" construed time and, more generally, future contingency. The essays explore the different meanings of this theory. They cover three main topics, in particular. The first examines the thesis that sentences and propositions about the future have a definite truth value, without any ensuing commitment to determinism or fatalism. The second topic looks at the problem whether the branching-time model needs to countenance a privileged branch (the so-called Thin Red Line). Finally, the third topic considers the idea that there are so-called soft facts. These would be the subject matter of sentences and propositions verbally about the present or the past, but metaphysically about a later time, and which might change in the future. Overall, the book provides an updated and rigorous idea of the debate about Ockhamism. It gives readers a deeper understanding into this philosophical approach influenced by William of Ockham, characterized by the rejection of the Aristotelian idea that, in order to preserve the contingency of the future, future contingents must be deemed neither true nor false.

Rhetoric of Masculinity: Male Body Image, Media, and Gender Role Stress/Conflict lends depth and global nuance to discourse associated with the masculinity concept as it brings to bear on males' self-image, role in society, media representations of them, and the gender role stress/conflict experienced when they fail to measure up to social standards associated with what it means to be manly. Even though the concept of masculine gender role stress/conflict has received substantial scholarly attention in psychology, social learning effects of masculinity as it plays out in media warrant further study given that representations offer audiences restrictive male gender roles that may contribute to toxic masculinity. Men and boys are taught to be self-sufficient, to act tough, to be muscular, heterosexual, and to use aggression to resolve conflicts. Such contexts provide restrictive images that can result in self harm and an inflexible social milieu. Scholars and students of communication, rhetoric, and gender studies will find this book particularly interesting.

The anthology 'Meaning and Analysis' addresses the key topics of H. Paul Grice's philosophy of language, such as rationality, non-natural meaning, communicative actions, conversational implicatures, the semantics-pragmatics distinction and recent debates concerning minimalist versus contextualist semantics.

Discursive Change in Hong Kong: Sociopolitical Dynamics, Metaphor, and One Country, Two Systems is a comprehensive interdisciplinary study of socio-political and discursive change in Hong Kong, a westernized Chinese society once under British rule, now decolonized but without independence, and with a constitution promising universal suffrage sometime in the future. Starting off with interesting and frequently contradictory debates surrounding the discussions on the handover of Hong Kong to mainland China, Jennifer Eagleton provides a stimulating, politically well informed, detailed, and comprehensive "insider" account of many aspects of the press media and official discourse on democracy and political change in Hong Kong as part of "One Country, Two Systems." The book shows how historical, cultural, and identity issues have shaped and molded post-1997 political discourse and how the seemingly dramatic changes in the city since 2020 may not have been that surprising for long-term observers of Hong Kong. By going beyond consideration of the purely linguistic dimension of the selected texts to encompass the larger historical and socio-political context, and incorporating textual, discursive, and metaphoric analysis over time, this book provides a comprehensive examination of Hong Kong political discourse and its constituent themes.

Food Justice Activism and Pedagogies: Literacies and Rhetorics for Transforming Food Systems in Local and Transnational Contexts brings together national and transnational scholars in the field of rhetoric, composition, writing studies, and other interdisciplinary fields to address food as a topic of inquiry and a matter of social and environmental justice. The contributors in this edited collection demonstrate that analyzing the literacies, rhetorics, and pedagogies needed to transform food systems is vital to creating sustainable food systems. The contributors advocate that food learning be taught and engaged at all levels of schooling and in society, including college courses and community settings. Scholars of rhetoric, interdisciplinary food studies, and sociology will find this book of particular interest.

A comprehensive guide to the language of argument, Rhetorical Style offers a renewed appreciation of the persuasive power of the English language. Drawing on key texts from the rhetorical tradition, as well as on newer approaches from linguistics and literary stylistics, Fahnestock demonstrates how word choice, sentence form, and passage construction can combine to create effective spoken and written arguments. With examples from political speeches, non-fiction works, and newspaper reports, Rhetorical Style surveys the arguer's options at the word, sentence, interactive, and passage levels, and illustrates the enduring usefulness of rhetorical stylistics in analyzing and constructing arguments.

Digital Discourse offers a distinctly sociolinguistic perspective on the nature of language in digital technologies. It starts by simply bringing new media sociolinguistics up to date, addressing current technologies like instant messaging, textmessaging, blogging, photo-sharing, mobile phones, gaming, social network sites, and video sharing. Chapters cover a range of communicative contexts (journalism, gaming, tourism, leisure, performance, public debate), communicators (professional and lay, young people and adults, intimates and groups), and languages (Irish, Hebrew, Chinese, Finnish, Japanese, German, Greek, Arabic, and French). The volume is organized around topics of primary interest to sociolinguists, including genre, style and stance. With commentaries from the two most internationally recognized scholars of new media discourse (Naomi Baron and Susan Herring) and essays by well-established scholars and new voices in sociolinguistics, the volume will be more current, more diverse, and more thematically unified than any other collection on the topic.

This book argues that languages are composed of sets of 'signs', rather than 'strings'. This notion, first posited by de Saussure in the early 20th century, has for decades been neglected by linguists, particularly following Chomsky's heavy critiques of the 1950s. Yet since the emergence of formal semantics in the 1970s, the issue of compositionality has gained traction in the theoretical debate, becoming a selling point for linguistic theories.

Yet the concept of 'compositionality' itself remains ill-defined, an issue this book addresses. Positioning compositionality as a cornerstone in linguistic theory, it argues that, contrary to widely held beliefs, there exist non-compositional languages, which shows that the concept of compositionality has empirical content. The author asserts that the existence of syntactic structure can flow from the fact that a compositional grammar cannot be delivered without prior agreement on the syntactic structure of the constituents.

This book documents an understudied phenomenon in Austronesian languages, namely the existence of recurrent submorphemic sound-meaning associations of the general form -CVC. It fills a critical gap in scholarship on these languages by bringing together a large body of data in one place, and by discussing some of the theoretical issues that arise in analyzing this data. Following an introduction which presents the topic, it includes a critical review of the relevant literature over the past century, and discussions of the following: 1. problems in finding the root (the "needle in the haystack" problem), 2. root ambiguity, 3. controls on chance as an interfering factor, 4. unrecognized morphology as a possible factor in duplicating evidence, 5. the shape/structure of the root, 6. referents of roots, 7. the origin of roots, 8. the problem of distinguishing false cognates produced by convergence in root-bearing morphemes from legitimate comparisons resulting from divergent descent, and 9. the problem of explaining how submorphemes are transmitted across generations of speakers independently of the morphemes that host them. The remainder of the book consists of a list of sources for the 197 languages from which data is drawn, followed by the roots with supporting evidence, a short appendix, and references.

Anglo-Saxons valued education yet understood how precarious it could be, alternately bolstered and undermined by fear, desire, and memory. They praised their teachers in official writing, but composed and translated scenes of instruction that revealed the emotional and cognitive complexity of learning. Irina Dumitrescu explores how early medieval writers used fictional representations of education to explore the relationship between teacher and student. These texts hint at the challenges of teaching and learning: curiosity, pride, forgetfulness, inattention, and despair. Still, these difficulties are understood to be part of the dynamic process of pedagogy, not simply a sign of its failure. The book demonstrates the enduring concern of Anglo-Saxon authors with learning throughout Old English and Latin poems, hagiographies, histories, and schoolbooks.

This book presents the latest work in the field of complementation studies. Leading scholars and upcoming researchers in the area approach complementation from various perspectives and different frameworks, such as Cognitive Grammar and construction grammars, to offer a broad survey of the field and provide thought-provoking reading.

Traditional grammar instruction often focuses too much on what's right or what's wrong, hiding the true power of conventions—the creation of meaning, purpose, and effect. Instead of hammering high school students with the mistakes they should avoid, Jeff Anderson, Travis Leech, and Holly Durham suggest exploring grammar through the celebration of author's purpose and craft. In Patterns of Power: Teaching Grammar Through Reading and Writing, Grades 9–12, they invite you to create an environment in which writers thrive while studying and appreciating the beauty, effects, and meaning of grammar. Inside this book, teachers will find a comprehensive explanation of the brain-based Patterns of Power invitational process, as well as: 35 standards-aligned lesson sets built around practical, engaging, inquiry-based methods that take deeper dives into grammar and craft than any worksheet, quiz, or editing exercise ever could A variety of high-interest model texts from authentic and diverse sources, including excerpts from classic and current novels, memoirs, plays, graphic novels, poems, and media Real-life classroom examples and tips with suggestions for scaffolding new learning and ideas for how to use the lessons in AP courses Templates for extended application, easy to locate printables, and ready-to-go visuals Additional Models for Further Study for extension opportunities in every lesson set An entire chapter devoted to helping high school writers master citations in research With hundreds of teach-tomorrow resources and implementation supports such as quick-reference guides, specific applications to reading instruction, and soundtrack suggestions to infuse the joy of music into grammar instruction, Patterns of Power gives you everything you need to inspire your high school writers to move beyond limitation and into the endless possibilities of what they can do as writers. The Patterns of Power series also includes Patterns of Power: Inviting Adolescent Writers into the Conventions of Language, Grades 6-8, Patterns of Power: Inviting Young Writers into the Conventions of Language, Grades 1-5, Patterns of Wonder: Inviting Emergent Writers to Play with the Conventions of Language, PreK-1, and Patterns of Power en Español: Inviting Bilingual Writers into the Conventions of Spanish, Grades 1-5.