Miller 1991 Scientific American Library
Miller GA (1991) The science of words. Scientific American Library New York:276 pp. |
Miller GA (1991) Scientific American Library
Abstract: Words are the building blocks of language and the foundation of human culture. The ability to use words distinguishes Homo sapiens from all other animals. Indeed, nothing else is so uniquely human about human beings. The scientific study of words, so important to our knowledge of the human mind, has gained momentum in recent decades, and George A. Miller has been central to that growth as one of the founders of cognitive science. In his book he brings to bear not only his expertise but also his graceful style and humor, offering us a lucid synthesis of what linguistic science has discovered about words - and about the power they hold over the minds.
Miller focuses our attention on the three-sided character of words: Each is the synthesis of an utterance, a concept, and a syntactic role. These three facets - articularion (or, analogously, orthography), meaning, and usage - are often studied separately. Miller's elegant account highlights all three, together with the theoretical and technological bases for their investigation - from the decipherment of the ancient syllabary known as Linear B to the earlies word association tests; from Noam Chomsky's generative grammar to the use of positron emission tomography (PET) scans to discover lexical processes in the brain.
β’ Bioblast editor: Gnaiger E
Labels: