DOCSLIB.ORG

Toward a Pragmatics of Intent

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Toward a Pragmatics of Intent TOWARD A PRAGMATICS OF INTENT: COGNITIVE APPROACHES IN CREATIVE AND CRITICAL WRITING by Lois Wolfe A Dissertation Submitted to the Faculty of The Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy Florida Atlantic University Boca Raton, Florida December 2008 ABSTRACT Author: Lois Wolfe Title: Toward a Pragmatics of Intent: Cognitive Approaches in Creative and Critical Writing Institution: Florida Atlantic University Dissertation Advisor: Dr. Andrew Furman Degree: Doctor of Philosophy Year: 2008 Locus of an author poses questions of intentionality, how intention is discovered, expressed, hidden, revealed and interpreted. The purpose of the study is to find and apply productive interdisciplinary concepts in intentionality detection, decoding and evaluation in fictional texts. The investigation integrates traditions in literature, linguistics, cognitive science and creative writing, posing a pragmatics of intent that complements and complicates precepts in reader reception-based constructivism. Basic to a vision of pragmatic strategies: 1) situating effect and affect in an embodied mind; 2) acknowledging mutual and/or oppositional intentionalities which an embodied author and embodied reader bring to the process of fictional communication; 3) accepting language as communication that requires cognitive translation of consensually-agreed upon iii symbols into private representations in an embodied mind; 4) assuming that an author’s fictionalizing consciousness is more discernible when it is navigating tensions of selection, proportion, intervention and perspective. Perceptual and close reading of J.M. Coetzee’s Foe yields descriptive problematics. Analytical readings in a neglected byway of I.A. Richards’ New Criticism provide pragmatic cues for detecting and evaluating intentionalities in prose. Three cross-disciplinary strategies emerge to enhance perceptual and close readings of fictional texts: 1) awareness of priming effects in form and content; 2) identification of markedness patterns; and 3) perception of tensible connections in prosaic language and artistic devices. The study concludes that: reading in tensible awareness of author intentionality adds productively to critical analysis and argument; acknowledging positioned voices in texts supports ethical criticism and multi- cultural aesthetics; reading to apprehend perceptual units (image structures sensed through story) supports and contextualizes close reading of propositional units (discourse/language). The formal element of perspective emerges as the most intensive locus of the reader’s sense of integrated consciousness and management of effect in fiction. Perspective can create the most ergative construction of authorial perspective, i.e., one in which transitive energy appears equalized and the subject and patient / writer and reader positions in syntax can pivot. iv Table of Contents Introduction .........................................................................................................................1 Chapter 1 ............................................................................................................................14 Conceptual Bridgework ..................................................................................................14 Writing As Cognitive Translation .................................................................................17 Disciplinary Negotiations ...............................................................................................23 Working Definitions .......................................................................................................29 Chapter 2 ............................................................................................................................39 Priming and Cognition ...................................................................................................39 Memory ..........................................................................................................................43 From Word to Image and Story ......................................................................................48 From Experience to Qualia and Judgment .....................................................................51 Initial Priming ................................................................................................................56 Priming Perspective .......................................................................................................58 Combinant Properties and Transitivity .........................................................................68 Chapter 3 ............................................................................................................................78 Markedness and Prototype Theory .................................................................................78 Markedness Values of Spatiality in Roth’s Call It Sleep ...............................................83 Markedness in Plot: Hamlet’s Imperatives ...................................................................93 v Chapter 4 ..........................................................................................................................108 Tensible Connections ...................................................................................................108 Tensible Connection in Imagery ..................................................................................118 Tensible Connection in Character and Incident ...........................................................119 Plot Intentions and Tensible Design .............................................................................125 Sickroom Space: Tensible Design in Sound and Fury ................................................131 Rupturing Tensibility: Dueling Design in King Lear ..................................................134 Chapter 5 ..........................................................................................................................145 Conceptual Infrastructure .............................................................................................145 Writing Subject Reading Subject .................................................................................157 New Criticism ..............................................................................................................166 Practical Criticism of I.A. Richards .............................................................................172 Close Reading and New Criticism ...............................................................................180 Negotiating Meanings ..................................................................................................187 Detecting Intentionality in Practical Criticism .............................................................188 Chapter 6 ..........................................................................................................................195 Positioned Perspectives ...............................................................................................195 Affective Fallacy and a “Cognitive Criticism” ............................................................210 Subjectivities ................................................................................................................219 Chapter 7 ..........................................................................................................................236 A Perceptual Reading of Coetzee’s Foe ......................................................................236 Creative Cognition .......................................................................................................243 A Moral Contour .........................................................................................................261 Conclusion .......................................................................................................................277 Work Cited .......................................................................................................................283 vi Introduction Faulkner was missing again. I was speaking to a class of high school juniors who had just finished reading Light in August. They were struggling with the elusiveness of the author, the quick shifts in time and consciousness which Faulkner uses to render the hard alienated life of young Joe Christmas and other characters in a Southern community of jagged realism and mixed mores. Which one’s the author? a student asked. He was asking which perspectives in a novel are an author’s and which are fictional. Literally speaking, all perspectives in a novel are fictional and all derive from an author, but when all is relative to all, there are no distinctions. Finding distinctive features – an edge, a gap, repetition, change – is basic to the human ability to distinguish patterns, identify objects, recognize subjects, detect likeness and difference, i.e., to perceive in natural and fictional space. If we take the question analytically as invitation to evaluate context, meaning and implication in communication, we may answer more contingently, dependently. Perspectives occur in context, and context is a construction of how and what we perceive. There may be no matter of perception more risky and interesting to interpret as deception, no more important knowledge to gain and weigh than when, under what 1 circumstances and
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Literary Awards 2018
    Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction The Golden Man Booker Home Fire (winner) 2018 marked the 50th year of the Man Kamila Shamsie Booker Prize for fiction. Of all the winning Isma, Aneeka and Parvaiz are novels over the years, one from each decade siblings from an immigrant was nominated for the shortlist. family in the UK. After their In a Free State (1971) by V.S. Naipul mother’s death Isma looked Moon Tiger (1987) by Penelope Lively after her brother and sister. The English Patient (1992) by Michael Now free to pursue her own Ondaatje dreams she can’t stop worrying about her Wolf Hall (2009) by Hilary Mantel sister who she left behind, or her brother Lincoln in the Bardo (2017) by George who has fled to pursue the jihadist legacy of Saunders a father they never knew. st From the shortlist, readers voted The English Sing, Unburied, Sing (finalist) Patient as their favourite. Jesmyn Ward The English Patient (winner) This is a novel of how far the bonds of family Michael Ondaatje stretch, particularly when they are tested by 1 Four lives cross paths in an poverty, drugs and race. With Italian villa at the end of a loving but mostly absent the Second World War. A mother, Jojo is a 13 year old boy looking for a role model. 2018 nurse, a soldier and a thief are all troubled by the past While he finds one in his of the English patient, a grandfather where does his man who has been burnt father, about to be released Literary beyond recognition who from prison, fit in? lies in the upstairs bedroom.
    [Show full text]
  • A Study of Place in the Novels of VS Naipaul
    A University of Sussex DPhil thesis Available online via Sussex Research Online: http://sro.sussex.ac.uk/ This thesis is protected by copyright which belongs to the author. This thesis cannot be reproduced or quoted extensively from without first obtaining permission in writing from the Author The content must not be changed in any way or sold commercially in any format or medium without the formal permission of the Author When referring to this work, full bibliographic details including the author, title, awarding institution and date of the thesis must be given Please visit Sussex Research Online for more information and further details Towards a New Geographical Consciousness: A Study of Place in the Novels of V. S. Naipaul and J. M. Coetzee Thesis submitted by Taraneh Borbor for the qualification of Doctor of Philosophy in English literature The University of Sussex September 2010 1 In the Name of God 2 I declare that the work in this thesis was carried out in accordance with the regulations of the University of Sussex. The work is original except where indicated by special reference in the text and no part of the thesis has been submitted for any other degree. The thesis has not been presented to any other university for examination either in the United Kingdom or overseas. Signature: 3 ABSTRACT Focusing on approaches to place in selected novels by J. M. Coetzee and V. S. Naipaul, this thesis explores how postcolonial literature can be read as contributing to the reimagining of decolonised, decentred or multi-centred geographies. I will examine the ways in which selected novels by Naipaul and Coetzee engage with the sense of displacement and marginalization generated by imperial mappings of the colonial space.
    [Show full text]
  • A Study of the Inheritance of Loss and Half a Life
    Orientalising the Postcolonial Nation-State: A Study of The Inheritance of Loss and Half a Life A Dissertation Submitted to the Central University of Punjab For the Award of Master of Philosophy in Comparative Literature by Manpreet Kaur Administrative Guide: Prof. Paramjit Singh Ramana Dissertation Coordinator: Dr. Zameerpal Kaur Centre for Comparative Literature School of Languages, Literature and Culture Central University of Punjab, Bathinda August, 2012 CERTIFICATE I declare that the dissertation entitled “Orientalising the Postcolonial Nation-State: A Study of The Inheritance of Loss and Half a Life,” has been prepared by me under the guidance of Prof. Paramjit Singh Ramana, and Dr. Zameerpal Kaur, Assistant Professor, Centre for Comparative Literature, School of Languages, Literature and Culture, Central University of Punjab. No part of this dissertation has formed the basis for the award of any degree or fellowship previously. (Manpreet Kaur) Centre for Comparative Literature, School of Languages, Literature and Culture, Central University of Punjab, Bathinda-151001. Date: ii Acknowledgement It is a pleasure to thank God, for making me able to achieve what I am today. I want to express my thanks to God, my parents and my family members. I would like to express my deepest gratitude to the stalwart of my department my supervisor and Professor. P. S. Ramana, Dean, School of Languages, Literature and Culture and my dissertation Coordinator Dr. Zameerpal Kaur, Assistant Professor, Centre for Comparative Literature for their ingenuous guidance. I want to express my thanks to Dr. Amandeep Singh, Assistant Professor, Centre for Comparative Literature for his continuous and extremely useful assistance.
    [Show full text]
  • Addition to Summer Letter
    May 2020 Dear Student, You are enrolled in Advanced Placement English Literature and Composition for the coming school year. Bowling Green High School has offered this course since 1983. I thought that I would tell you a little bit about the course and what will be expected of you. Please share this letter with your parents or guardians. A.P. Literature and Composition is a year-long class that is taught on a college freshman level. This means that we will read college level texts—often from college anthologies—and we will deal with other materials generally taught in college. You should be advised that some of these texts are sophisticated and contain mature themes and/or advanced levels of difficulty. In this class we will concentrate on refining reading, writing, and critical analysis skills, as well as personal reactions to literature. A.P. Literature is not a survey course or a history of literature course so instead of studying English and world literature chronologically, we will be studying a mix of classic and contemporary pieces of fiction from all eras and from diverse cultures. This gives us an opportunity to develop more than a superficial understanding of literary works and their ideas. Writing is at the heart of this A.P. course, so you will write often in journals, in both personal and researched essays, and in creative responses. You will need to revise your writing. I have found that even good students—like you—need to refine, mature, and improve their writing skills. You will have to work diligently at revising major essays.
    [Show full text]
  • Image Schema of the Verb “Sè” in Igbo Semantics B.M
    Research on Humanities and Social Sciences www.iiste.org ISSN 2222-1719 (Paper) ISSN 2222-2863 (Online) Vol 2, No.7, 2012 Image Schema of the Verb “Sè” in Igbo Semantics B.M. Mbah and P.N. Edeoga Department of Linguistics, Igbo and other Nigerian Languages, University of Nigeria, Nsukka [email protected] Abstract The study of conceptual interaction has attracted the attention of many scholars. Analyses have been done on different areas of this field of study in English. Hardly has any work been done on cognitive semantics in the Igbo language. This study therefore looks at the semantics of the verb se $. Using a descriptive method, the meanings of the verb are analysed in the light of image schemas. The findings reveal that the meanings of the verb follow three image schemas: the containment, path and force schemas. It also reveals that the verb root is not an empty dummy as some writers contend. 1. Introduction Cognitive semantics is generating a lot of interest in linguistics. There are indepth studies on the subject in some languages especially European languages. In Igbo, there is hardly any studies to attest its application to the Igbo language. The need arises to find out how the Igbo verb can be described using the approach. This study, against the view of some scholars that the Igbo verb root is a semantic dummy, examines how imaging and analogical mapping, two principles of cognitive semantics, may be used to analyse the Igbo verb. In the study, the tone of every verb marked. 2.
    [Show full text]
  • The Word 'Diaspora' Has Been Taken from Greek Meaning 'To Disperse'
    Indo-anglian Diaspora Writers Arti Gupta Ph.D. Scholar Jharkhand Rai University Ranchi India Abstract In today‟s world Short Stories are widely accepted among the readers as they are read in one sitting .Besides entertaining, they are the simplest way of communicating the way of life. Indo-Anglian short stories are exceptionally rich and varied in content. The writers of the genre through their literary contributions have greatly enriched the English Literature. Revolution caused by printing, population explosion, literacy and the development of modern mass media of communication added to its scope. Owing to such developments this fiction has taken a U-turn in the recent years. New attitudes have been struck, new areas of experience have been exposed. A greater awareness of values in the context of increased westernisation and urbanisation in republic India and freedom from sentiment seem to distinguish the new writing. There, emerged hence the diaspora writers of Indian origin. Today people all over the world are being nourished by the writres of the Indian Diaspora and contempraneity namely- V.S.Naipaul, Salman Rushdie, Chetan Bhagat, Jhumpa Lahiri etc. Diaspora is a journey towards seif-realization, self-recognition, self-knowledge and self- definition. The diasporic literature has helped in providing a link between India and the rest of the world.that enhanced tremendous seif-confidence with a combative spirit, by spreading values, virtues and universal peace. Perhaps, this helps in understanding various cultures, breaking the barriers between different countries, The word „diaspora‟ has been taken from Greek meaning „to disperse‟. It may be defined as the voluntary or forcible movement of people from their homelands into new regions.
    [Show full text]
  • Embodiment and Image Schemas: Interpreting the Figurative Meanings of English Phrasal Verbs
    languages Article Embodiment and Image Schemas: Interpreting the Figurative Meanings of English Phrasal Verbs Efthymia Tsaroucha School of Economics and Administrative Sciences, University of Thessaly, 38221 Volos, Greece; efi[email protected] Received: 3 December 2019; Accepted: 20 January 2020; Published: 22 January 2020 Abstract: The present article suggests that the figurative meanings of English phrasal verbs can be interpreted by means of image schemas. It is argued that image schemas reflect bodily experiences which constitute configurations of spatial perception. The article classifies image schemas and draws examples from English phrasal verbs. The article discusses how the semantics of the particle (which prototypically denotes space and motion) encourages various types of image schemas which can be extended into more abstract and metaphoric readings. The article investigates how English phrasal verbs of the form take plus particles encourage the image schemas of containment, the journey and its component parts, goal, path, proximity-distance, linkage-separation, front-back orientation, part-whole relationship and linear order. The article also argues for image schematic transformations. Keywords: embodiment; image schemas; image schematic transformations; literal; non-literal; extension; English phrasal verbs 1. Introduction English phrasal verbs constitute one of the most difficult areas of English grammar as far as their teaching and learning is concerned (cf. Rudzka-Ostyn 2003). Foreign learners of English and even native speakers of English often find it challenging to use and/or interpret the correct phrasal verb within the appropriate context (cf. Tsaroucha 2018). Such difficulties are due to the special grammatical status of English phrasal verbs which derives from the verb plus particle composition (cf.
    [Show full text]
  • Image Schema Theory As a Foundation for Concept Invention∗
    Journal of Artificial General Intelligence 6(1) 21-54, 2015 Submitted 2015-08-16 DOI: 10.1515/jagi-2015-0003 Accepted 2015-11-26 Choosing the Right Path: Image Schema Theory as a Foundation for Concept Invention∗ Maria M. Hedblom [email protected] Department for Knowledge and Language Engineering (IWS) Otto-von-Guericke University of Magdeburg, Germany Oliver Kutz [email protected] Research Centre for Knowledge and Data (KRDB) Free University of Bozen-Bolzano, Italy Fabian Neuhaus [email protected] Department for Knowledge and Language Engineering (IWS) Otto-von-Guericke University of Magdeburg, Germany Editor: Tarek R. Besold, Kai-Uwe Kuhnberger,¨ Tony Veale Abstract Image schemas are recognised as a fundamental ingredient in human cognition and creative thought. They have been studied extensively in areas such as cognitive linguistics. With the goal of exploring their potential role in computational creative systems, we here study the viability of the idea to formalise image schemas as a set of interlinked theories. We discuss in particular a selection of image schemas related to the notion of ‘path’, and show how they can be mapped to a formalised family of microtheories reflecting the different aspects of path following. Finally, we illustrate the potential of this approach in the area of concept invention, namely by providing several examples illustrating in detail in what way formalised image schema families support the computational modelling of conceptual blending. Keywords: image schemas, grounded cognition, computational creativity, concept invention, conceptual blending 1. Introduction The cognitive processes underlying concept invention are still largely unexplored ground, although promising theories have been developed within the last few decades.
    [Show full text]
  • Analyzing Image Schemas in Literature
    Michael Kimmel Analyzing Image Schemas in Literature The notion of image schema has been enjoying popularity among cognitive literary scholars, sensitizing them to the ways through which language gives rise to gestalt imagery. Yet, critics of a more traditional bent have rightly pointed out that image schémas tend to pop up as an ad hoc con- struct in the study of narrative and remain too arbitrary. Methodology is at best mentioned in passing and scholars interested in a text-linguistic "how to" easily come away with the impression that it is all a matter of interpretive ingenuity, even alchemy. In addition, the predominance of case studies does not give enough visibility to the broad range of possi- ble applications. In order to consolidate image schémas as a state-of-the-art tool, this paper takes up the twin task of distinguishing their loci in narratological theory and of clarifying under which conditions their application is ap- propriate. The main sections survey approaches based on image schema cohesion (in passages), coherence (across a text), and higher-level canities (be- tween coherent patterns). The relevant topics range from metaphorical themes/motifs, via rich characterization, space and action representa- tions, characterization and actancy, literary embodiment, to megameta- phor and plot models. Several of these are new theoretical applications that have emerged from a full-scale analysis of metaphor and imagery in seven short novels within a recent comparative project My essay begins with a brief definition of image schémas and a critical look at how lite- rary analysis applies them, a point resumed in the concluding discussion of methodology.
    [Show full text]
  • OCCASIONAL PAPERS on LITERATURES and CULTURES (Monograph-1) 2011
    OCCASIONAL PAPERS ON LITERATURES AND CULTURES (Monograph-1) 2011 Social Exclusion in Postcolonial Fiction: A Reading of Kiran Desai’s The Inheritance of Loss Ashok K Mohapatra Department of English U.G.C. Special Assistance Programme (DRS-I) Sambalpur University, Odisha INDIA 1 Occasional Papers on Literatures and Cultures Monograph 1 Editorial Board B.K. Tripathy, Professor R.S. Nanda, Professor K Misra, Professor Ashok K Mohapatra, Professor S. Tripathy, Reader A. Patel, Lecturer Copy-right Holder & Publisher © Department of English, Sambalpur Uniuversity, Jyoti Vihar, Burla-768019, Sambalpur, Odisha, INDIA OPLC brings out monographs annually in areas of Postcolonial Studies, Cultural Studies, Translation Studies and Literary Theory. It invites long essays from interested scholars, with word-length from 10,000 to 15,000 words, on topics pertaining to the areas in question. The monographs should make original, comprehensive and intensive engagement texts or issues. The essays should conform to the 7th edition of MLA style manual. Individual Subscription- Rs 100/- Institutional Subscription- Rs 150/- Overseas Subscription- $ 10/- 2 Social Exclusion in Postcolonial Fiction: A Reading of Kiran Desai’s The Inheritance of Loss Ashok K Mohapatra A man was only what he saw of himself in others- V.S. Naipaul Where man is at his greatest, he is unconscious – Rabindranath Tagore This essay deals with the problem of social exclusion characterizing the existence of the major characters in Kiran Desai’s The Inheritance of Loss from ontological and epistemological perspectives. Although social exclusion is usually an object of sociological enquiry with its own disciplinary justification, this essay critiques those tendencies of conservative social sciences that reify the social categories and generally claim as a virtue the positivist knowledge they produce – a knowledge that is devoid of ideology, value and politics.
    [Show full text]
  • A Cognitive Linguistic Approach to Teaching English Prepositions
    A Cognitive Linguistic Approach to Teaching English Prepositions Xin Song First supervisor: Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Schnotz Second supervisor: J. Prof. Dr. Constanze Juchem-Grundmann Date for submission: 13.06.2013 Author Note Xin Song, Department of Psychology, University of Koblenz-Landau Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Xin Song, Department of Psychology, University of Koblenz-Landau, Landau, Germany 76829. E-Mail: [email protected] Acknowledgements Acknowledgements The most important thing I have learnt in doing my PhD program is that an individual can achieve nothing without others’ cooperation and assistance. That is why we need to have family, friends and society. Numerous people have helped me in doing this research project. I would like to convey my gratitude and appreciation to them, and to pass their kindness unto those who are in need of my help, which is the best way I know to show my thanks. First and foremost, my sincere thanks go to my supervisor, Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Schnotz at the University of Koblenz-Landau, Campus Landau. He first sparked my interest in the field and encouraged me to carry on my research on teaching English prepositions with psycho-linguistic theoretical background. He has not only stimulated my thinking about some critical issues of the thesis, recommend the most useful reference books, reviewed the thesis draft with great care and patience, ferreted out weaknesses, provided constructive suggestions for improvement, but also spent a lot of time on giving me helpful suggestions on my experiments and statistic analysis as well as accompanying me on visiting secondary schools.
    [Show full text]
  • Golden Man Booker Prize Shortlist Celebrating Five Decades of the Finest Fiction
    Press release Under embargo until 6.30pm, Saturday 26 May 2018 Golden Man Booker Prize shortlist Celebrating five decades of the finest fiction www.themanbookerprize.com| #ManBooker50 The shortlist for the Golden Man Booker Prize was announced today (Saturday 26 May) during a reception at the Hay Festival. This special one-off award for Man Booker Prize’s 50th anniversary celebrations will crown the best work of fiction from the last five decades of the prize. All 51 previous winners were considered by a panel of five specially appointed judges, each of whom was asked to read the winning novels from one decade of the prize’s history. We can now reveal that that the ‘Golden Five’ – the books thought to have best stood the test of time – are: In a Free State by V. S. Naipaul; Moon Tiger by Penelope Lively; The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje; Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel; and Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders. Judge Year Title Author Country Publisher of win Robert 1971 In a Free V. S. Naipaul UK Picador McCrum State Lemn Sissay 1987 Moon Penelope Lively UK Penguin Tiger Kamila 1992 The Michael Canada Bloomsbury Shamsie English Ondaatje Patient Simon Mayo 2009 Wolf Hall Hilary Mantel UK Fourth Estate Hollie 2017 Lincoln George USA Bloomsbury McNish in the Saunders Bardo Key dates 26 May to 25 June Readers are now invited to have their say on which book is their favourite from this shortlist. The month-long public vote on the Man Booker Prize website will close on 25 June.
    [Show full text]