Ekaterina Velmezova Kalevi Kull Stephen J. Cowley Editors Biosemiotic Perspectives on Language and Linguistics Biosemiotics
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Biosemiotics 13 Ekaterina Velmezova Kalevi Kull Stephen J. Cowley Editors Biosemiotic Perspectives on Language and Linguistics Biosemiotics Volume 13 Series editors Jesper Hoffmeyer, Professor emeritus in biochemistry, University of Copenhagen Kalevi Kull, Professor in biosemiotics, University of Tartu Alexei Sharov, National Institute of Aging, Baltimore Aims and Scope of the Series Combining research approaches from biology, semiotics, philosophy and linguistics, the fi eld of biosemiotics studies semiotic processes as they occur in and among living systems. This has important implications and applications for issues ranging from natural selection to animal behaviour and human psychology, leaving biosemiotics at the cutting edge of the research on the fundamentals of life. The Springer book series Biosemiotics draws together contributions from lead- ing scholars in international biosemiotics, producing an unparalleled series that will appeal to all those interested in the origins and evolution of life, including molecular and evolutionary biologists, ecologists, anthropologists, psychologists, philoso- phers and historians of science, linguists, semioticians and researchers in artifi cial life, information theory and communication technology More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/7710 Ekaterina Velmezova • Kalevi Kull Stephen J. Cowley Editors Biosemiotic Perspectives on Language and Linguistics Editors Ekaterina Velmezova Kalevi Kull Centre for Linguistics and Language Department of Semiotics Sciences / Department of Slavic and University of Tartu South Asian Studies Tartu , Estonia University of Lausanne Lausanne , Switzerland Stephen J. Cowley Centre for Human Interactivity and the COMAC Cluster University of Southern Denmark Slagelse , Denmark ISSN 1875-4651 ISSN 1875-466X (electronic) Biosemiotics ISBN 978-3-319-20662-2 ISBN 978-3-319-20663-9 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-20663-9 Library of Congress Control Number: 2015955149 Springer Cham Heidelberg New York Dordrecht London © Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2015 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifi cally the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfi lms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specifi c statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. Printed on acid-free paper Springer International Publishing AG Switzerland is part of Springer Science+Business Media (www. springer.com) Contents Language, Linguistics: Life, Biosemiotics… ................................................ 1 Kalevi Kull and Ekaterina Velmezova Part I Theory and Theoretical Models On Biosemiotics and Its Possible Relevance to Linguistics ......................... 13 Donald Favareau and Kalevi Kull Language and Biosphere: Blurry Contours as a Condition of Semiosis .............................................................................. 29 Anton Markoš and Dan Faltýnek Language as Primary Modeling and Natural Languages: A Biosemiotic Perspective .............................................................................. 47 Susan Petrilli and Augusto Ponzio Umwelt and Language .................................................................................... 77 Morten Tønnessen Deep Congruence Between Linguistic and Biotic Growth: Evidence for Semiotic Foundations ............................................................... 97 Jamin Pelkey Part II Observations and Case Studies Verbal Patterns: Taming Cognitive Biology ................................................. 123 Stephen J. Cowley Part III Biosemiotics and Biolinguistics Biolinguistics and Biosemiotics ...................................................................... 151 Winfried Nöth Biology, Linguistics, and the Semiotic Perspective on Language ............... 169 Prisca Augustyn v vi Contents Before Babel: The Evolutionary Roots of Human Language ..................... 191 Piera Filippi Part IV History of Ideas Biosemiotics, Politics and Th.A. Sebeok’s Move from Linguistics to Semiotics .............................................................. 207 Sara Cannizzaro and Paul Cobley How Useful Is état de langue for Biosemiotics? An Exploration of Linguistic Consciousness and Evolution in F. de Saussure’s Works ...... 223 Jui-Pi Chien Darwin’s Ethology and the Expression of the Emotions: Biosemiotics as a Historical Science .............................................................. 241 Thomas Robert Darwin’s Biosemiotics: The Linguistic Rubicon in the Descent of Man ...................................................................................... 257 Deana Neubauer The Bakhtinian Dialogue Revisited: A (Non- biosemiotic) View from Historiography and Epistemology of Humanities ..................... 275 Ekaterina Velmezova Index ................................................................................................................. 291 Language, Linguistics: Life, Biosemiotics… Kalevi Kull and Ekaterina Velmezova Abstract Since mostly human modes of action take on a symbolic aspect, and since there are many semiotic (meaning making) systems without any symbolic signs, the application of purely linguistic models in biology is mostly incongruent. However, there exist many common features between human language and other (non-human) sign systems, and even the developed linguistic universe remains internally connected to pre-linguistic expressive forms. Therefore, at least this role of biosemiotic phenomena and processes in the functioning of human language is worth paying attention to, as manifested by the contributions to this volume. Keywords History of ideas • Semiotics • Linguistics • Human sciences • Non- human sign systems • Biology The idea of this book arose during the 12th Gatherings in Biosemiotics (Tartu, July 2012), which included a special session entitled “ Language and Life: The double interface”. 1 At that time, reading Donald Favareau’s review “Twelve years with the Gatherings in Biosemiotics” published in a book describing this series of annual meetings, 2 we paid attention to the fact that he mentioned very few linguists who had given talks in the Gatherings between 2001 and 2011. They are (in the order of joining the biosemiotic gatherings): Tuomo Jämsä, Stephen Cowley, (psycho)lin- guist Joanna Rączaszek-Leonardi, Natalia Abieva, Prisca Augustyn, and Angelo N. Recchia-Luciani. Even if the choice of designations (are they “linguists”? or “philologists”? or maybe “philosophers [of language]”?) can sometimes alter the interpretation of facts ( nomina sunt odiosa ), this rather insignifi cant rate of linguists interested in 1 Cf. Cowley 2012 . 2 Favareau 2012 . K. Kull (*) Department of Semiotics , University of Tartu , Tartu , Estonia e-mail: [email protected] E. Velmezova Centre for Linguistics and Language Sciences / Department of Slavic and South Asian Studies , University of Lausanne , Lausanne , Switzerland e-mail: [email protected] © Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2015 1 E. Velmezova et al. (eds.), Biosemiotic Perspectives on Language and Linguistics, Biosemiotics 13, DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-20663-9_1 2 K. Kull and E. Velmezova biosemiotics provoked not only the question about the possible reasons for this state of affairs, but also a wish to contribute to the improvement of this situation. In par- ticular, we were inspired not only by the example of Thomas A. Sebeok , a linguist as to his basic education and one of the founders of modern biosemiotic research (his intellectual heritage is discussed in several articles of this book), but also by the idea that, in the future, for biosemioticians it would be of use as well to become more knowledgeable at least in these aspects of linguistics in which the two fi elds may overlap. Let us also refer to Juri Lotman’s words going back to 1990: “I think that zoosemiotics should become part of linguistics, or linguistics part of zoosemi- otics; let us not argue about the priority, but it seems to me that a zoologist ought to be a linguist, and maybe a linguist ought to be a zoologist”. 3 This is how the project of the volume “Biosemiotic perspectives in linguistics” was launched. The general idea of the book was to try to present new methods, directions and perspectives of studying human language in general and various lan- guages in particular within the framework of biosemiotic models, or of studying language and languages simply with an interest in biosemiotics. In particular, the (potential) contributors to the volume were invited to answer the following questions: – What can biosemiotics bring to linguistics (and vice versa)? – What are the biosemiotic implications