This course provides practical training for anyone interested in the study of meaning, intercultural communication, or translation. It focuses on basic and universal human concepts and their role as a tool for comparing and explaining meanings and ideas across languages and cultures. The course explores semantic universals and their implications for the understanding of languages and their speakers; and it includes an evolutionary, as well as cross-linguistic and cross-cultural perspective . The course aims at improving the student's skills in explaining and translating meanings and ideas in the context of the study of languages and in the 'stream of life'.
Learning Outcomes
Upon successful completion, students will have the knowledge and skills to:
Upon successful completion of this course, students will have the knowledge and skills to:- Analyse the meaning of words, phrases and grammatical constructions in different languages.
- Articulate the basic meaning of expressions through the natural semantic metalanguage.
- Articulate cultural norms through 'cultural scripts'.
- Clarify ideas, values and norms through simple and universal concepts.
- Participate effectively in a collective thinking process leading towards a consensus about the meaning of expressions and ideas.
Indicative Assessment
Essay 1, 2000 words (45%) [Learning Outcomes 1, 2, 3, 4]Essay 2, 2,000 words (45%) – [Learning Outcomes 1, 2, 3, 4]
Class presentation, 10 mins (10%) – [Learning Outcomes 1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
The ANU uses Turnitin to enhance student citation and referencing techniques, and to assess assignment submissions as a component of the University's approach to managing Academic Integrity. While the use of Turnitin is not mandatory, the ANU highly recommends Turnitin is used by both teaching staff and students. For additional information regarding Turnitin please visit the ANU Online website.
Workload
130 hours of total student learning time made up from:a) 36 hours of contact: 3 hours of classes per week
b) 94 hours of independent student research, reading and writing.
Requisite and Incompatibility
Prescribed Texts
Information about the textbook and required readings will be available on Wattle.
Preliminary Reading
In the Reading Brick
- Goddard, Cliff. In press. The Natural Semantic Metalanguage approach to linguistic analysis. In Heine and Narrog (eds.). Oxford Handbook of Linguistic Analysis.
- Gaita, Raimond. 2009. Holocaust Resentment: the implications of the claim that the holocaust is unique and that aspects of it will forevere defeat our attempts to understand it. Lecture given at the Fritz Bauer Institute and Department of Philosophy of the University of Frankfurt on Holocaust Memorial Day.
- Wierzbicka, Anna. In press. Bilingualism and Cognition: Perspective from Semantics. In Vivian Cook and Benedetta Bassetti (eds.) Language and Bilingual Cognition.
- Goddard, Cliff. To appear. Have to, Have Got To, and Must: NSM Analyses of English Modal Verbs of "Necessity". Journal of English Linguistics.
- Goddard, Cliff and Anna Wierzbicka. Forthcoming. Men, women and children: the semantics of basic social categories. Language.
- Priestley, Carol. Forthcoming. What's in a name? Cultural values and terms of address and reference in a Papuan language.
- Wierzbicka, Anna. Forthcoming. "Sex" in a cross-linguistics, cross-cultural and historical perspective. In Fifty English Keywords. New York: Oxford University Press.
- Goddard, Cliff and Anna Wierzbicka. 2008. Universal human concepts as a basis for contrastive linguistics. In María de los Ángeles Gómez-González, Lachlan Mackenzie and Elsa González Álvarez. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
- Gladkova, Anna. 2008. Tolerance. New and traditional values in Russian in comparison with English. In Cliff Goddard. Cross-Linguistic Semantics. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins.
- Wierzbicka, Anna. 2009. Language and Metalanguage: Key issues in emotion research. Emotion Review. 1 (1) 3-14. With the Debate, four short papers. 15-23.
- Ye, Zhengdao. 2001. An inquiry into "sadness" in Chinese. In Jean Harkins and Anna Wierzbicka. Emotions in Crosslinguistic Perspective. Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter. 359-404.
- Wierzbicka, Anna. 2008. A conceptual basis for intercultural pragmatics and world-wide understanding. In Martin Pütz and JoAnne Neff-van Aertselaer. Developing Contrastive Pragmatics: Interlanguage and Cross-Cultural Perspectives.
- Yoon, Kyung-Joo. 2009. Imposition as an expression of ceng ‘affection' in the Korean cultural context. Presented at the international Cross-Culturally Speaking, Speaking Cross-culturally Conference, Macquarie University, Sydney (on July 6th 2009).
- Wierzbicka, Anna In press. All people eat and drink. Does that mean that ‘eat' and ‘drink' are universal human concepts? In John Newman (ed.). The Linguistics of Eating and Drinking. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
- Ye, Zhengdao. 2006. Why the "inscrutable" Chinese face? Emotionality and facial expression in Chinese. In Cliff Goddard. Ethnopragmatics: Understanding Discourse in Cultural Context. Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter.
- Wierzbicka, Anna. Reading human faces: Emotion components and universal semantics. Pragmatics and Cognition 1(1) 1-23.
- Wierzbicka, Anna. 2009. Case in NSM: A reanalysis of the Polish dative. In The Oxford Handbook of Case. Oxford University Press.
- Goddard, Cliff. 2008. Natural Semantic Metalanguage: The state of the art. Introduction to Cross-Linguistic Semantics. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. 1-34.
- Goddard, Cliff. 2006. Cultural Scripts. In Jan Östman and Jef Verschueren in colloboration with Eline Versluys. Handbook of Pragmatics.
- Goddard, Cliff and Anna Wierzbicka. 2004. Cultural Scripts: What are they and what are they good for? Intercultural Pragmatics. (Special Issue on Cultural Scripts) 2: 153-165.
In Chifley Library
Goddard, Cliff and Anna Wierzbicka. 2002. Meaning and Universal Grammar: Theory and empirical findings. Volumes I and II. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Wierzbicka, Anna. 2006. English: Meaning and culture. New York: OUP
Wierzbicka, Anna. 2010. Experience, Evidence, and Sense: The hidden cultural legacy of English. New York: Oxford University Press.
Majors
Minors
Fees
Tuition fees are for the academic year indicated at the top of the page.
If you are a domestic graduate coursework or international student you will be required to pay tuition fees. Tuition fees are indexed annually. Further information for domestic and international students about tuition and other fees can be found at Fees.
- Student Contribution Band:
- 1
- Unit value:
- 6 units
If you are an undergraduate student and have been offered a Commonwealth supported place, your fees are set by the Australian Government for each course. At ANU 1 EFTSL is 48 units (normally 8 x 6-unit courses). You can find your student contribution amount for each course at Fees. Where there is a unit range displayed for this course, not all unit options below may be available.
| Units | EFTSL |
|---|---|
| 6.00 | 0.12500 |
Course fees
- Domestic fee paying students
| Year | Fee |
|---|---|
| 2017 | $2856 |
- International fee paying students
| Year | Fee |
|---|---|
| 2017 | $4080 |
Offerings, Dates and Class Summary Links
ANU utilises MyTimetable to enable students to view the timetable for their enrolled courses, browse, then self-allocate to small teaching activities / tutorials so they can better plan their time. Find out more on the Timetable webpage.
