Carsten Levisen – författare

This volume sets out a new framework for intercultural semantics, an innovative approach to making sense of the complexities of meaning-making in language encounters through the lens of migration.The book moves beyond structuralist approaches and research on English as an international language for a meaning-centered perspective to the study of language and communication. With “language migrants” moving from one linguistic sphere to another in which their lives and livelihoods depend on acquiring new languages, the volume makes the case for a new framework that bridges diverse sub-disciplines across linguistics with that of semantic work on meaning to better understand these realities. The first section introduces the theoretical foundations, drawing on work from migration linguistics, linguistic worldview, and cross-cultural and intercultural pragmatics. The second part highlights case studies across different domains in the Danish context, from children in society to the workplace to interpersonal relationships to climate and the environment, with implications for other geographic contexts. The final section addresses the metalinguistic, idiomatic, technological, and intercultural challenges of intercultural semantics toward outlining future directions for this area of study. This book will appeal to scholars interested in semantics, pragmatics, language and culture, language learning and teaching, and migration studies.

Presenting original, detailed studies of keywords of Danish, this book breaks new ground for the study of language and cultural values. Based on evidence from the semantic categories of everyday language, such as the Danish concept of hygge (roughly meaning, ‘pleasant togetherness’), the book provides an integrative socio-cognitive framework for studying and understanding language-particular universes. It is argued that the worlds we live in are not linguistically and conceptually neutral, but rather that speakers who live by Danish concepts are likely to pay attention to their world in ways suggested by central Danish keywords and lexical grids. By means of a sophisticated semantic methodology, the author accounts for the meanings of even highly culture-specific and untranslatable linguistic concepts.The book offers new tools for comparative research into the diversity of semantic and cultural systems in contemporary Europe. Additionally, it contributes to the emerging discipline of cultural semantics, and to the ongoing debates of linguistic diversity, metalanguage, and the use of linguistic evidence in studies of culture and social cognition.

Presenting original, detailed studies of keywords of Danish, this book breaks new ground for the study of language and cultural values. Based on evidence from the semantic categories of everyday language, such as the Danish concept of hygge (roughly meaning, ‘pleasant togetherness’), the book provides an integrative socio-cognitive framework for studying and understanding language-particular universes. It is argued that the worlds we live in are not linguistically and conceptually neutral, but rather that speakers who live by Danish concepts are likely to pay attention to their world in ways suggested by central Danish keywords and lexical grids. By means of a sophisticated semantic methodology, the author accounts for the meanings of even highly culture-specific and untranslatable linguistic concepts.

The book offers new tools for comparative research into the diversity of semantic and cultural systems in contemporary Europe. Additionally, it contributes to the emerging discipline of cultural semantics, and to the ongoing debates of linguistic diversity, metalanguage, and the use of linguistic evidence in studies of culture and social cognition.