Distributed Language (Benjamins Current Topics)

✍ Scribed by Dr. Stephen J. Cowley (editor)

• Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing Company
• Year: 2011
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 231
• Series: Benjamins Current Topics 34
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

The volume presents language as fully integrated with human existence. On this view, language is not essentially ‘symbolic’, not represented inside minds or brains, and most certainly not determined by micro-social rules and norms. Rather, language is part of our ecology. It emerges when bodies co-ordinate vocal and visible gesture to integrate events with different histories. Enacting feeling, expression and wordings, language permeates the collective, individual and affective life of living beings. It is a profoundly distributed, multi-centric activity that binds people together as they go about their lives. Distributed Language pursues this perspective both theoretically and in relation to empirical work. Empirically, it reports studies on the anticipatory dynamics of reading, its socio-cognitive consequences, Shakespearean theatre, what images evoke (in brain and word), and solving insight problems. Theoretically, the volume challenges linguistic autonomy from overlapping theoretical positions. First, it is argued that language exploits a species specific form of semiotic cognition. Second, it is suggested that the central function of language lies in realizing values that derive from our ecosystemic existence. Third, this is ascribed to how cultural and biological symbols co-regulate the dynamics that shape human activity. Fourth, it is argued that language, far from being organism-centred, gives us an extended ecology in which our co-ordination is saturated by values and norms that are derived from our sociocultural environment. The contributions to this volume expand on those originally published in Pragmatics & Cognition 17:3 (2009).

✦ Table of Contents

Table of contents......Page 6
About the Authors......Page 8
1. Beyond symbol processing......Page 12
2. The distributed perspective......Page 13
3. The Distributed Language Movement: Prehistory......Page 14
4. Language: ecological, dialogical and non-local......Page 15
5. Investigating the glue of cognition......Page 17
6. Imbumba: doing things together......Page 20
7. Future Prospects......Page 22
References......Page 23
1. Introduction......Page 26
2. Information processing or anticipation?......Page 27
3.1 FSI and type of text......Page 29
3.2 FSI in relation to articulation, sentence structure, and reading experience......Page 30
3.3 FSI: Implications for reading......Page 34
4.1 The concept of anticipation......Page 35
4.2 Neural models of anticipation......Page 36
5.1 The unit of meaning in reading......Page 38
5.2 Silent and oral reading......Page 39
References......Page 40
1. Speech, text, and dynamics......Page 44
2. The linguist’s view of literacy......Page 49
3. Languaging and experience......Page 53
4. The cognitive domain of written marks......Page 55
5. Beyond code models of language......Page 58
6. Conclusion......Page 61
References......Page 63
1. Prelude......Page 68
2. Insight in internalist tradition......Page 69
2.1 Information-processing models......Page 70
3. Externalist extensions......Page 73
4. The cheap necklace problem......Page 75
4.1 Experiment 1: Paper and pen versus concretized versions......Page 76
4.2 Experiment 2: The open links experiment......Page 77
5. The experiments in theoretical context......Page 80
5.1 Beyond internalism......Page 81
5.2 Extended mind or distributed cognition?......Page 82
5.3 The parallel with language......Page 83
6. Insight spreads......Page 86
Notes......Page 87
References......Page 88
Actualizing semiotic affordances in a material world......Page 92
1.0 Introduction......Page 93
2.0 The recognition and comprehension of material signals......Page 95
2.1. The experiments......Page 96
3.0 Data analysis......Page 99
3.1 Results of coding procedure I......Page 101
3.2 Coding procedure II: Semiotic strategies......Page 103
4.0 Discussion......Page 105
5.0 Conclusion......Page 108
Notes......Page 109
References......Page 110
1. Written language bias and the code view of language......Page 112
2. Background: The conditions of playing in the early modern theatre......Page 113
3. Plays in action......Page 115
5. “Authority” and the dynamics of performance......Page 117
6. Action and accent: The gestural dimensions of the plays......Page 119
7. The limits of languaging: The writer and the clown......Page 122
8. Conclusion......Page 124
References......Page 125
1. Cognition and representation......Page 128
2. Difference......Page 131
3. Cultural evolution......Page 134
4. Self-consciousness......Page 137
5. Conclusion......Page 139
Notes......Page 140
References......Page 142
1. Beyond rules......Page 146
2. Ecological perception and action: Realizing values in driving and conversing......Page 148
3. Dialogical arrays: Conversing as a perceptual system......Page 153
4. The complexity of fractal dynamics: Conversing as an action-system......Page 155
5. Realizing values through affordances: Conversing as a caring system......Page 160
6. Attunement and alienation: Consciousness, suffering, and hope......Page 162
Note......Page 166
References......Page 167
1. Introduction......Page 172
1.1 Language without symbols?......Page 173
2. Pattee’s framework: Meaning, symbols, and rules......Page 175
2.1 Symbols of natural language: Constraints on dynamics in multiple time-scales......Page 177
2.2 The interplay of dynamics......Page 179
2.3 Syntactic rules describe emergent patterns......Page 180
3. Identifying dynamics: Examples from computer modeling......Page 183
4. Communication: Meaning mapping or coordination?......Page 185
5. Units of linguistic structure......Page 187
6. Conclusion: The specificity of natural language......Page 189
References......Page 191
Introduction......Page 196
1. Language beyond the language system......Page 199
2. From language to languaging......Page 202
3. The social dimension of languaging as human niche construction......Page 205
4. Ecologically extended cognition......Page 209
5. Ecologically extended cognition......Page 211
7. Conclusion: If you want to learn about language, forget about language!......Page 215
Notes......Page 217
References......Page 218
Subject Index......Page 222
Name Index......Page 230