Over the past few decades, the book series Linguistische Arbeiten [Linguistic Studies], comprising over 500 volumes, has made a significant contribution to the development of linguistic theory both in Germany and internationally. The series will continue to deliver new impulses for research and maintain the central insight of linguistics that progress can only be made in acquiring new knowledge about human languages both synchronically and diachronically by closely combining empirical and theoretical analyses. To this end, we invite submission of high-quality linguistic studies from all the central areas of general linguistics and the linguistics of individual languages which address topical questions, discuss new data and advance the development of linguistic theory.

In the present book, the starting line is defined by a morphogenetic perspective on human communication and culture. The focus is on visual communication, music, religion (myth), and language, i.e., on the "symbolic forms" at the heart of human cultures (Ernst Cassirer). The term "morphogenesis" has more precisely the meaning given by Rene Thom (1923-2002) in his book "Morphogenesis and Structural Stability" (1972) and the notions of "self-organization" and cooperation of subsystems in the "Synergetics" of Hermann Haken (1927- ). The naturalization of communication and cultural phenomena is the favored strategy, but the major results of the involved disciplines (art history, music theory, religious science, and linguistics) are respected. Visual art from the Paleolithic to modernity stands for visual communication. The present book focuses on studies of classical painting and sculpture (e.g., Leonardo da Vinci, William Turner, and Henry Moore) and modern art (e.g., Jackson Pollock and Joseph Beuys). Musical morphogenesis embraces classical music (from J. S. Bach to Arnold Schoenberg) and political songwriting (Bob Dylan, Leonhard Cohen). The myths of pre-literary societies show the effects of self-organization in the re-assembly (bricolage) of traditions. Classical polytheistic and monotheistic religions demonstrate the unfolding of basic germs (religious attractors) and their reduction in periods of crisis, the self-organization of complex religious networks, and rationalized macro-structures (in theologies). Significant tendencies are analyzed in the case of Buddhism and Christianism. Eventually, a holistic view of symbolic communication and human culture emerges based on state- of- the- art in evolutionary biology, cognitive science, linguistics, and semiotics (philosophy of symbolic forms).

The French mathematician Rene Thom (Fields medal 1958) died in 2002. In this volume his contributions to biology, semiotics and linguistics are discussed by a group of scholars who have continued his work and have shaped the new paradigm of dynamic semiotics and linguistics. Thom's heritage is full of revolutionary ideas and deep insights which stem from a rich intuition and a sharp awareness of the current state of the sciences, including their potentials and risks. The contributions to this volume are elaborations of papers given at a colloquium at the International Center for Semiotics and Linguistics of the University of Urbino (Italy), in 2005. The central concern of this volume is semiogenesis, i.e. the evolution and differentiation of meaningful ("pregnant") forms in the field of symbolic systems - from bio-communication to language and cultural forms like music, art, architecture or urban forms. The basic questions are: How are meanings created and further differentiated? Where do they come from? What kind of forces drive their unfolding? How can complex cultural forms be understood based on simple morphodynamic principles? Applications concern the perception of forms by animals and humans, the categorization of forms e.g. in a lexicon, and predication or other complex symbolic behaviors which show up in grammar or in cultural artifacts like the unfolding of urban centers.

Until now an overview of the history of linguistics during the 20th century has been lacking. With this book, Wolfgang Wildgen fills this gap. Starting with the predecessors of Saussure, the main chapters highlight the most important trends. Special attention is given to sustainable approaches. Wildgen also evaluates the yield of linguistic research and completes the book by describing the challenges of the 21st century. An appendix discusses the problem of the mathematization of linguistics.

Cognitive grammar transforms insights from the cognitive sciences into grammatical descriptions and attempts to use the grammar of natural languages to understand human thinking. The presentation is centred on the classical paradigms of Cognitive Grammar as they have been developed from 1975 and later systematically expanded. The initial chapters deal with the questions of the nature of thought and how experiences are converted into language. Subsequent sections indicate the perspectives of how neurolinguistic insights can be deepened. Key features: concise introduction to a much debated subject in linguistics

This book is about the interrelationship between nature, semiosis, metarepresentation and (self-)consciousness, and the role played by metarepresentation in evolution. Representations must have emerged via self-organization from non-representational systems (found in physics, chemistry and biology). Major steps have been the evolution of molecules, macromolecules, life, and finally cultural and symbolic systems. Representations and signs are therefore parts of a huge, possibly branching «ladder of beings. Metarepresentations - images representing images, language about language and language-use, thoughts about thoughts - constitute a fascinating theme within such diverse areas of research as philosophy, literature, theology, anthropology and history, neuroscience, psychology and linguistics. The contributions to this book reflect this variety of different, but often interrelated perspectives on metarepresentation. They also exemplify the difficulties of a truly interdisciplinary discourse and show how one may start such a discourse in the field of semiotics, understood as a meta-discipline which brings together all scientific enterprises dealing with human mind and human culture.

Partendo dai temi cari e mai completamente risolti della traduttologia, che si potrebbero esemplificare nell'affermazione per cui la pratica traduttiva e da sempre alla ricerca di una teoria che la spieghi, la modelli e le dia un fondamento scientifico, questo lavoro ha l'ambizione di fornire, adottando l'approccio semiotico della scuola di Parigi, una nuova sistematizzazione della traduzione in quanto concetto, pratica e testo. Le relazioni identitarie e veridittive, articolate nel quadrato semiotico, determinano le condizioni ontologiche della traduzione; la schematizzazione narrativa modellizza la pratica traduttiva ed esplicita le competenze del traduttore, gli aspetti manipolativi e le condizioni aletiche ed etiche insiti nella traduzione. L'analisi si sposta poi su terreni piu empirici e la proposta teorica si misura con il testo tradotto; su quest'ultimo si identificano i rapporti identita-alterita, la dimensione assiologica e la prensione timica del traduttore. La prospettiva generativa permette di situarsi in una dimensione epistemica e metodologica piu ampia, che al contempo impone una riflessione sulle condizioni di felicita specifiche della traduttologia.

Mankind is the only speaking species on earth. Hence language is supposed to have a genetic basis, no matter whether it relies on general intelligence, or on a linguistic module. This study proposes that universal formal properties of the linguistic code emerged from the genetic code through duplication. The proportion of segmental duplication is clearly higher in the human genome than in any other species, and duplication took place 6 million years ago when humans separated from the other hominid branches. The evolution of language is therefore supposed to be a gradual process with a break. This book describes a lot of striking formal resemblances the genetic code and the linguistic code hold in common. The book aims to reconcile generative grammar with cognitive semiotics showing that both of them constitute instances of embodiment.