Literary criticism often includes ad hoc comments about onomatopoeia, synaesthesia, or other forms of iconism. In A Grammar of Iconism, Earl Anderson discusses these phenomena systematically. According to Anderson, modern post-Saussurian linguistics has as its central tenet the arbitrariness of linguistic signs. Thus, linguistic elements that bear some relationship to their referent have been seen as marginal to the system of language, or at best similar in their arbitrariness to other linguistic signs. As an example of the latter, while most languages have an onomatopoeic element, different languages imitate sounds differently. Anderson argues against the standard view, provides a detailed critique of the negative arguments against iconism, and offers a positive typology that demonstrates the extensiveness and complexity of iconism in language.

This fourth volume of the Iconicity series is like its predecessors devoted to the study of iconicity in language and literature in all its forms. Many of the papers turn the notion of iconicity ‘inside-out’, some suggesting that ‘less-is-more’; others focus on the cognitive factors ‘inside’ the brain that are important for the iconic phenomena that are produced in the ‘outside’ world. In addition this volume includes a paper related to iconicity in music and its interaction with language. Other papers range from the theoretical issues involved in the evolution of language, to those that offer many ‘inside-out’ claims, such as claiming that nouns are derived from pronouns, and as such should more properly be called ‘pro-pronouns’. Also, this volume includes perhaps the first English-language analysis of the iconic aspects of sound symbolism in a prayer from the Koran. This is a truly interdisciplinary collection that should turn some of the notions of iconicity in language and literature ‘outside-in’ and ‘inside-out’.

Insistent Images presents a number of new departures dealing with iconicity on the conceptual and the structural levels. On the level of structure, the interface between different aspects of iconicity, lexical meaning and grammar is discussed in reference to both spoken and signed languages. Novel approaches to aural iconicity investigate a wide range of phenomena from phonological iconicity to the role of iconic features in discourse, in the nineteenth century practice of reading aloud, in the almost magic incantations of fin de siècle poetry and in Tolkien's invented languages. Several papers examine the function of iconicity in visual and avant-garde poetry, where iconic features allow a reduction of means, which, paradoxically, generates textual diversification and complexity. A discussion of iconic text strategies shows how texts are comprehended through iconic holistic transfer from complex natural and action patterns. 'Liberature', which integrates text, image and physical space, is another novel area of study, as are the investigations into the iconic properties of film and of multimedia performance. Film is intrinsically iconic, while at the same time being, like photography, indexical; in multimedia performance, on the other hand, iconicity functions intermedially by both integrating and reflecting processes of perception and conceptualization. These last two new fields of inquiry further enhance this truly interdisciplinary volume's explorations of icons as 'insistent images'.

The first edition of ELL (1993, Ron Asher, Editor) was hailed as "the field's standard reference work for a generation". Now the all-new second edition matches ELL's comprehensiveness and high quality, expanded for a new generation, while being the first encyclopedia to really exploit the multimedia potential of linguistics. * The most authoritative, up-to-date, comprehensive, and international reference source in its field * An entirely new work, with new editors, new authors, new topics and newly commissioned articles with a handful of classic articles * The first Encyclopedia to exploit the multimedia potential of linguistics through the online edition * Ground-breaking and International in scope and approach * Alphabetically arranged with extensive cross-referencing * Available in print and online, priced separately. The online version will include updates as subjects develop ELL2 includes: * c. 7,500,000 words * c. 11,000 pages * c. 3,000 articles * c. 1,500 figures: 130 halftones and 150 colour * Supplementary audio, video and text files online * c. 3,500 glossary definitions * c. 39,000 references * Extensive list of commonly used abbreviations * List of languages of the world (including information on no. of speakers, language family, etc.) * Approximately 700 biographical entries (now includes contemporary linguists) * 200 language maps in print and online Also available online via ScienceDirect – featuring extensive browsing, searching, and internal cross-referencing between articles in the work, plus dynamic linking to journal articles and abstract databases, making navigation flexible and easy. For more information, pricing options and availability visit www.info.sciencedirect.com. The first Encyclopedia to exploit the multimedia potential of linguistics Ground-breaking in scope - wider than any predecessor An invaluable resource for researchers, academics, students and professionals in the fields of: linguistics, anthropology, education, psychology, language acquisition, language pathology, cognitive science, sociology, the law, the media, medicine & computer science. The most authoritative, up-to-date, comprehensive, and international reference source in its field

This volume examines unresolved issues in iconicity and naturalness in language. The studies discuss topics such as naturalism in the philosophy of language and the epistemology of linguistics, linguistic iconicity in semiotics, iconic structures in Sign Languages, natural and unnatural sound patterns, the iconic nature of parts of speech, the relation between (un)markedness and naturalness, and lexical and syntactic iconicity.

In this outstanding book leading scholars from around the world examine the history of linguistics from ancient origins to the present. They consider every aspect of the field from language origins to neurolinguistics, explore linguistic traditions in east and west, chronicle centuries of explanations for language structures, meanings, and usage, and look at how it has been practically applied. The book is organized in six parts. The first looks at the origins of language, the invention of writing, the nature of gesture, and sign languages. Part II examines the history of the analysis and description of sound systems. Part III considers the history of linguistics in China, Korea, Japan, India, and the Middle East, as well as the history of the study of Semitic and Afro-Asiatic. Part IV examines the history of grammar and morphology in the west from the classical world to the present. Part V surveys the history of lexicography semantics, pragmatics, and text and discourse studies. Part VI looks at the history the application of linguistics in fields that include the language classification; social and cultural theory; psychology and the brain sciences; education and translation; computational science; and the development of linguistic corpora. The book ends with a history of the philosophy of linguistics. The Oxford Handbook of the History of Linguistics makes a significant contribution to the historiography of linguistics. It will also be a valuable reference for scholars and students in linguists and related fields, including philosophy and cognitive science.

Despite attempts to suppress early women's speech, this study demonstrates that women were still actively engaged in cultural practices and speech strategies that were both complicit with the patriarchal ideology whilst also undermining it.

Inspired by Exploring the Language of Poems, Plays and Prose, Mick Short's classic introduction to stylistics, Language and Style represents the state-of-the-art in literary stylistics and encompasses the full breadth of current research in the discipline. Written by leading scholars in the field, chapters cover a variety of methodological and analytical approaches, from traditional qualitative analysis to more recent developments in cognitive and corpus stylistics. Addressing the three, key literary genres of poetry, drama and narrative, Language and Style is divided into carefully balanced sections. Based on original research, each chapter demonstrates a particular analytic technique and explains how this might be applied to a text from one of the literary genres. Framed by helpful introductory material covering the foundational principles of stylistics, the chapters act as practical exemplars of how to carry out stylistic analysis. Comprehensive and engaging, this invaluable resource is essential reading for anyone interested in stylistics.

This volume, a sequel to Form Miming Meaning (1999) and The Motivated Sign (2001), offers a selection of papers given at the Third International Symposium on Iconicity in Language and Literature (Jena 2001). The studies collected here present a number of new departures. Special consideration is given to the way non-linguistic visual and auditory signs (such as gestures and bird sounds) are represented in language, and more specifically in 'signed' language, and how such signs influence semantic conceptualization. Other studies examine more closely how visual signs and representations of time and space are incorporated or reflected in literary language, in fiction as well as (experimental) poetry. A further new approach concerns intermedial iconicity, which emerges in art when its medium is changed or another medium is imitated. A more abstract, diagrammatic type of iconicity is again investigated, with reference to both language and literature: some essays focus on the device of reduplication, isomorphic tendencies in word formation and on creative iconic patterns in syntax, while others explore numerical design in Dante and geometrical patterning in Dylan Thomas. A number of theoretically-oriented papers pursue post-Peircean approaches, such as the application of reader-response theory and of systems theory to iconicity.

An accessible introduction to poetry's unusual uses of language that tackles a wide range of poetic features from a linguistic point of view. Equally appealing to the non-expert and more experienced student of linguistics, this book delivers an engaging and often witty summary of how we define what poetry is.