Personhood constructs in language and thought: New evidence from Danish

Publikation: Bidrag til bog/antologi/rapportBidrag til bog/antologiForskningpeer review

Abstract

This chapter analyses personhood constructs, a particular type of noun whose meanings conceptualize invisible parts of a person. The meaning of personhood constructs originates in cultural discourses, and they can vary considerably across linguistic communities. They are reflective of society’s dominant ethnopsychological ideas, and they co-develop with historical changes in discourse. Drawing on insights from previous studies, a semantic template is developed in order to account for the differences but also the similarities in personhood constructs. With a detailed case study on Danish personhood constructs, the chapter tests the template on the translation-resistant Danish concept of sind, along with two other Danish nouns: sjæl ‘soul’ and ånd ‘spirit’. The case study provides a model for how personhood constructs can be empirically explored with tools from linguistic semantics.
OriginalsprogEngelsk
TitelThe Semantics of Nouns : People, Places, and Things
RedaktørerZhengdao Ye
ForlagOxford University Press
Publikationsdato2017
Sider120-144
Kapitel5
DOI
StatusUdgivet - 2017

Citer dette