Mental Representations
The Interface between Language and Reality

This dynamic collection provides an overview of the relationship between linguistic form and interpretation.

Ruth M. Kempson (Edited by)

9780521399050, Cambridge University Press

Paperback, published 29 June 1990

240 pages
22.9 x 15.2 x 1.3 cm, 0.36 kg

The attempt to study language as part of cognitive science is apparently being thwarted by the lack of contact and inferential links between current theoretical paradigms. This dynamic collection provides an overview of the relationship between linguistic form and interpretation as exemplified by the most influential of these paradigms - the current Chomskian Government and Binding paradigm, the conflicting Situation Semantics paradigm, the Davidsonian programme and, finally, the new relevance theory of cognition and pragmatics. More ambitiously, it works towards an overall theory of cognition, which, the editor believes, has been facilitated by the assumptions and claims of relevance theory. The contributors to the volume are well known for their work at the language-cognition interface and each essay is a stimulating and insightful consideration of the problem. The editor's introduction will be invaluable to any reader not fully conversant with current theory, providing the necessary background, and her concluding essay is a brilliant exposition of the way in which Relevance Theory can create links whereby apparently disparate views are combined into a unified modular account of language and cognitive processes.

Preface
Part I. Introduction: The Relation Between Language, Mind, and Reality
Part II. On The Direct Interpretation of Natural Languages: 1. Contexts, models, and meanings: a note on the data of semantics James Higginbotham
2. Facts in situation theory: representation, psychology, or reality? Robin Cooper
3. Relational interpretation Elisabet Engdahl
Part III. On The Syntactic Base For Interpretation: 4. Bound variable anaphora Robert May
5. On implicit arguments Michael Brody and M. Rita Manzini
Part IV. On Internal Representations and Natural Language Use: 6. Representation and relevance Deirdre Wilson and Dan Sperber
7. Implicature, explicature, and truth-theoretic semantics Robyn Carston
8. 'So' as a constraint on relevance Diane Blakemore
Part V. The Language Faculty and Cognition: 9. On the grammar-cognition interface: the principle of full interpretation Ruth M. Kempson
Index.

Subject Areas: Psycholinguistics [CFD]