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The main theme of the volume is the exploration and identification of the fundamental principles involved in constructing and understanding the microstructures found within etymological references. The authors offer an in-depth examination of designing etymological dictionaries, focusing on the principles behind constructing their microstructures. It begins by exploring the evolution of lexicographic sources and their role in societal knowledge organization. The work then delves into the methodology of building dictionary entries, discussing the integration of traditional and cognitivesynergetic principles to better capture the linguistic nuances of words. Through comprehensive analysis and detailed examples, this volume provides a profound understanding of how etymological information is systematically organized and presented.

This edited volume provides a comparative exploration of corresponding concepts of the abyss in various languages and cultures. Fourteen chapters investigate ancient cultures such as Hebrew, Ancient Greek, Sanskrit and Old Norse, but also more contemporary American, African and Asian languages, such as Hawaiian, Umbundu, Chinese and Khasi, as well as European languages, such as German, Estonian, English, French, Polish and Russian. The book combines ethnolinguistics with history of ideas, literature, folklore, religion and translation, based on the conviction that language and our linguistic concepts give evidence of and shape our ideas about the world and about ourselves.

This book explores the rich history of the keyword from its earliest manifestations (long before it appeared anywhere in Google Trends or library cataloging textbooks) in order to illustrate its implicit and explicit mediation of human cognition and communication processes. The author covers the concept of the keyword from its deictic origins in primate and proto-speech communities, through its development within oral traditions, to its initial appearances in numerous graphical forms and its workings over time within a variety of indexing traditions and technologies. The book follows the history all the way to its role in search engine optimization and social media strategies and its potential as an element in the slowly emerging semantic web, as well as in multiple voice search applications. The author synthesizes different perspectives on the significance of this often-invisible intermediary, both in and out of the library and information science context, helping readers to understand how it has come to be so embedded in our daily life.This book: Provides a thorough history of the keyword, from primate and proto-speech communities to current timesExplains how the concept of the keyword relates to human cognition and communication processesHighlights the applications of the keyword, both in and out of the library and information science context

This essay presents Gould's distinctive system for analyzing kin terminologies showing the system's power, importance, and usefulness—and showing its relationship to other approaches and the payoffs each aims at. In revealing significant new empirical regularities and simplifications, Gould's analytic system implies important constraints on future analytic and interpretative approaches to kin terminologies. Some of these new insights involve the demonstration of the effect of distributed collective cognitive systems over and above the effects of repeated iterations of individual cognitive constraints or pressures. It is the peculiar nature of the kinterm domain that allows these findings to be so directly shown, but the implication is that these findings apply more generally to the collective cognitive systems that make up language and culture.

How have we come to depend so greatly on the words terror and terrorism to describe broad categories of violence? David Simpson offers here a philology of terror, tracking the concept's long, complicated history across literature, philosophy, political science, and theology—from Plato to NATO. Introducing the concept of the “fear-terror cluster,” Simpson is able to capture the wide range of terms that we have used to express extreme emotional states over the centuries—from anxiety, awe, and concern to dread, fear, and horror. He shows that the choices we make among such words to describe shades of feeling have seriously shaped the attribution of motives, causes, and effects of the word “terror” today, particularly when violence is deployed by or against the state. At a time when terror-talk is widely and damagingly exploited by politicians and the media, this book unpacks the slippery rhetoric of terror and will prove a vital resource across humanistic and social sciences disciplines.

Unter linguistisch-epistemologischen Vorzeichen widmet sich der Band zentralen Aspekten der Trias Sprache, Wissen und Diskurs. Dies geschieht in systematischer Auseinandersetzung mit dem vielschichtigen Konzept einer linguistischen Epistemologie.Im Einzelnen stehen folgende Forschungsfelder im Vordergrund: historische Semantik und Frame-Semantik; bedeutungstheoretische Grundlagen; Sprache und (Welt-)Wissen, Sprache als Medium der Wirklichkeitskonstruktion; Sprachtheorie und Sprachverstehenstheorien: verstehensrelevantes Wissen, linguistische Hermeneutik; Rechtslinguistik; Diskurstheorie und diskurssemantische Analysen; öffentlicher Sprachgebrauch: semantische Grundfiguren, politische'Begriffe'.Die AutorInnen des Sammelbandes greifen unterschiedliche Gesichtspunkte aus diesen zusammenhängenden Feldern auf, um zu zeigen, wie einerseits theoretische, methodologische und empirische Aspekte einer linguistischen Epistemologie zur fruchtbaren Weiterentwicklung der Germanistischen Linguistik beigetragen haben und in welche Richtungen diese andererseits ausgebaut wie auch empirisch erprobt werden (können).

This book provides for the first time a systematical analysis of all the divine names and epithets etymologically interpreted by Plutarch in his works. By following Plato's Cratylus, he applies the etymological analysis to Hellenic gods, as well as to barbarian and Roman ones. The systematic focus upon contexts and aims of Plutarch's argument makes clear that etymology in antiquity was intended as a very adaptable tool for understanding reality. It also points to show the multiple fields to which Plutarch's interests were committed. Through etymologycal analysis he negotiates a philosophical revision of Greek religion without overturning tradition. The comparison with other cultures in the field of religion confirms Greece's first place; nevertheless, Plutarch shows genuine interest in the religious traditions of other peoples. As an outcome, the complexity of Plutarch's personality comes to light, not only as a philosopher, but also as an anthropologist and a psychologist of religion.

The volume seeks to establish socio-onomastics as a field of linguistic inquiry not only within sociolinguistics, but also, and in particular, within pragmatics. The linguistic study of names has a very long history, but also a history sometimes fraught with skepticism, and thus often neglected by linguists in other fields. The volume takes on the challenge of instituting onomastic study into linguistics and pragmatics by focusing on recent trends within socio-onomastics, interactional onomastics, contact onomastics, folk onomastics, and linguistic landscape studies. The volume is an introduction to these fields – with the introductory chapter giving an overview of, and an update on, recent onomastic study – and in addition offers detailed in-depth analyses of place names, person names, street names and commercial names from different perspectives: historically, as well as from the point of view of the impact of globalization and glocalization. All the chapters focus on the use and function of names and naming, on changes in name usage, and on the reasons for, processes in, and results of names in contact.

This book deals with shared verb morphology in Japanese and other languages that have been identified as Transeurasian (traditionally: “Altaic”) in previous research. It analyzes shared etymologies and reconstructed grammaticalizations with the goal to provide evidence for the genealogical relatedness of these languages.

If you're logofascinated, you are literally spellbound by language. This surprising compendium of 1,000 facts about words, language and etymology is here to inspire your curiosity and delight in discovery. In Word Drops, you can delve into a smattering of unexpected connections and weird juxtapositions, stumble upon a new or remarkable word, or learn of many a bizarre etymological quirk or tall tale. - Did you know that the bowl made by cupping your hands together is called a gowpen? - And speaking of bowls, the earliest known reference to bowling in English dates from 1555, when bowling alleys were banned by an Act of Parliament. - And that ties in nicely with the fact that the English called the Germans'Alleymen'during the First World War. - But in Navajo, Germany is called Béésh Bich'ahii Bikéyah-or'metal cap-wearer land'. Word Drops is a language fact book unlike any other, its linguistic tidbits all falling together into one long interconnected chain just like the example above with each fact neatly'dropping'into place beside the next. What's more, throughout, footnotes are used to give some informative and intriguing background to some of the most bizarre facts, covering everything from traditional Inuit games to the origin of the Bellini cocktail, from the precise length of one'jiffy'to what the Romans thought hoopoe birds ate, and from what to expect on a night out with Dr Johnson to Samuel Pepys's cure for a hangover. Want to know the longest palindrome in Morse code, or who The Great Masticator was? Curious to know what Norwegian steam is, or what a jäääär is? The answers are all here. For all of the logofascinated among us, this is an immensely pleasurable and unpredictable collection that is guaranteed to raise eyebrows (the literal meaning, incidentally, of supercilious).

Ever wonder what the most popular and unpopular baby names are? And how certain people and places got their names? Or are you just looking for guidance in choosing your child's name? ALL THOSE WONDERFUL NAMES is an amusing exploration of names, familiar words, phrases, and the stories behind their origins. From the common to the confounding, this book has it all. Hear the true stories behind the naming of tropical storms, cars, fictitious characters, major league baseball teams, and more. Find out the real names of celebrities, such as Elton John, Cher, Rip Torn, Cary Grant, Liberace, and Conway Twitty. Discover counties, towns, and cities with strange names like Difficult, Tennessee; Jiggs, Nevada; Virgin, Utah; and Bosom, Wyoming. Learn unusual names for newborns—and perhaps the origin of your own surname as well.

Language is an essential part of what makes us human. Where did it come from? How did it develop into the complex system we know today? And what can an evolutionary perspective tell us about the nature of language and communication? Drawing on a range of disciplines including cognitive science, linguistics, anthropology and evolutionary biology, Speaking Our Minds explains how language evolved and why we are the only species to communicate in this way. Written by a rising star in the field, this groundbreaking book is required reading for anyone interested in understanding the origins and evolution of human communication and language.

Germania Semitica explores prehistoric language contact in general, and attempts to identify the languages involved in shaping Germanic in particular. The book deals with a topic outside the scope of other disciplines concerned with prehistory, such as archaeology and genetics, drawing its conclusions from the linguistic evidence alone, relying on language typology and areal probability. The data for reconstruction comes from Germanic syntax, phonology, etymology, religious loan names, and the writing system, more precisely from word order, syntactic constructions, word formation, irregularities in phonological form, lexical peculiarities, and the structure and rules of the Germanic runic alphabet. It is demonstrated that common descent is neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition for reconstruction. Instead, lexical and structural parallels between Germanic and Semitic languages are explored and interpreted in the framework of modern language contact theory.

Idiomantics is a unique exploration of the world of idiomatic phrases. The very etymology of the word'idiom'reveals what's so endlessly fascinating about the wide range of colourful phrases we use in everyday speech: their peculiarity. They're peculiar both in the sense of being particular or unique to the culture from which they originate, and in the sense of being downright odd. To cite three random examples - from American English, Dutch and Italian - what on Earth are a snow job, a monkey sandwich story, and Mr Punch's secret? Fascinating and illuminating, Idiomantics explains all...The ideal gift for word buffs and in fact, anyone who enjoys a good yarn, this playful book looks at 12 groups of idioms around the world, looking at subjects such as fun and games, gastronomic delights and the daily grind.

Description based on print version record.

This practical introduction to word history investigates every aspect of where words come from and how they change. Philip Durkin, chief etymologist of the Oxford English Dictionary, shows how different types of evidence can shed light on the myriad ways in which words change in form and meaning. He considers how such changes can be part of wider linguistic processes, or be influenced by a complex mixture of social and cultural factors. He illustrates every point with a wide range of fascinating examples. Dr Durkin investigates folk etymology and other changes which words undergo in everyday use. He shows how language families are established, how words in different languages can have a common ancester, and the ways in which the latter can be distinguished from words introduced through language contact. He examines the etymologies of the names of people and places. His focus is on English but he draws many examples from languages such as French, German, and Latin which cast light on the pre-histories of English words. The Oxford Guide to Etymology is reliable, readable, instructive, and enjoyable. Everyone interested in the history of words will value this account of an endlessly fascinating subject.

Con la presente obra, su autor intenta solamente paliar la marginación, casi total, de las lenguas clásicas de los planes de estudio del actual Bachillerato, con la consiguiente ignorancia del léxico científico, especialmente en el campo de la medicina. No pretende, en absoluto, practicar un intrusismo injustificado en esta ciencia, sino poner a su servicio algunos datos que la Filología Clásica puede aportar para el mejor conocimiento de la terminología médica. Santiago Segura Munguía, Doctor en Filología Clásica, Catedrático de Latín y actualmente profesor emérito de la Universidad de Deusto, inició sus publicaciones el año 1952 en la Editorial Gredos. Durante los años 1957-1966 publicó todos los textos propuestos oficialmente para el Curso Preuniversitario. En 1961, su Gramática Latina y Método de Latín. La Editorial Anaya ha publicado sus textos de latín desde1963, el Diccionario Etimológico de Latín (1985), Los Juegos Olímpicos (1992), etc. La Universidad de Deusto ha publicado, entre otras obras, su Diccionario Etimológico de Latín y de las otras voces derivadas (2001, 2.ª ed. 2003).

This book presents the theory that the linguistic and cultural landscape of Europe north of the Alps and the Pyrenees was shaped in prehistoric times by the interaction of Indo-European speakers with speakers of languages related to Basque and to Semitic. These influences on the lexicon, grammar, and toponymy of the West Indo-European languages (with special focus on Germanic) are demonstrated in German and English research papers, provided here with summaries, commentaries, and a new introduction in English, and with general and etymological indexes.