Iconicity is a fundamental property of spoken and signed languages. However, quantitative analysis of sound-meaning association in Chinese has not been extensively developed, and little is known about the impact of sound symbolism in children’s literature. As sound symbolism is supposed to be a universal cognitive phenomenon, this research seeks to investigate whether iconic structures of Mandarin are embodied in native Chinese speakers’ language experience. The paper describes a case study of Chinese storybooks with the goal of testing (...) whether phonosemantic association is prominent between name sounds and character features. A quantitative method was used to investigate the distribution of different phonological units in character denomination depending on their physical and emotional traits. The results show that phonemes and syllable combination patterns are closely related to perceivable character features. By comparing schematic mapping in Chinese with other languages, the study illuminates a cross-linguistic tendency in addition to a Chinese-specific iconic relation between sound and meaning. (shrink)

In this essay, I argue that though symbolism performs many roles in different cultures, it has a uniquely moral one in Igbo land. That unique role which symbolism performs in the pristine communalistic Igbo society concerns the regulation of human freedoms and actions in order to maintain social order. But is this something that can be sustained in a modern Igbo society that is more individualistic than communalistic? This paper is of the view that through the proper maintenance (...) of such symbolism: social control between individuals and groups shall be more coordinated in the contemporary Igbo world; regulate and checkmate the Igbo moral consciousness of oneness; control some cultural maladjustment and bring more about social unity in Igbo land. Keywords: Symbol, Symbolism, Social Order, Igbo, Oji. (shrink)

Charles W. Morris' doctoral thesis Symbolism and Reality, written in 1925 at Chicago under George H. Mead, has never before been published. It sets out to prove that thought and mind are not entities, nor even processes involving a psychical substance distinguishable from the rest of reality, but are explicable as the functioning of parts of the experience as symbols to an organism of other parts of experience. Being then the symbolic portion of experience, the psychical or mental can (...) neither be sharply opposed to the rest of experience nor identical with the whole of experience. This edition includes a preface by Achim Eschbach, an extensive bibliography of Morris' works, and indices of names and subjects. (shrink)

Contents: Mandalas. I. A Study in the Process of Individuation. II. Concerning Mandala Symbolism Index Originally published in 1972. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found (...) in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905. (shrink)

This article examines the symbolism contained in the works of Jianzhi art. As a simple folk art, papercutting in Jinzhou has its own aesthetic and educational style that penetrates the hearts of people and raises them to a higher spiritual level. Jianzhi can represent the spiritual worldview of a certain era in the region. Among the symbolic images, images of animals, plants, figures, objects, hieroglyphs and patterns were studied. Jianzhi's works of art are combinations of various patterns, shapes and (...) motifs that contain deep symbolism. The study of images and symbolic meanings will expand knowledge about the culture and customs of the region, as well as create opportunities for the preservation of this unique art form containing the intangible cultural heritage of China. The article concludes about the uniqueness of the stylistics and symbolism of this art direction in the described region. It is claimed that Jianzhi's works reflect the culture, customs and peculiarities of the Jinzhou district society. From the point of view of intangible cultural heritage, the art of paper cutting in Jinzhou is the artistic embodiment of the material and spiritual culture of the people. It is concluded that it is necessary to preserve this kind of art and the subsequent study of its symbolism in order to preserve the intangible national heritage of China. (shrink)

This book presents an innovative analysis of the role of imagination as a central concept in both literary and art criticism. Dee Reynolds brings this approach to bear on works by Rimbaud, Mallarme;, Kandinsky, and Mondrian. It allows her to redefine the relationship between Symbolism and abstract art, and to contribute new methodological perspectives to comparative studies of poetry and painting. The late nineteenth and early twentieth century was a crucial period in the emergence of new modes of representation, (...) and is currently at the forefront of critical enquiry. This is the first book to examine Symbolism and abstraction in this way, and the first to treat these poets and painters together. It is an original contribution to interdisciplinary scholarship in art history, literary history, and comparative aesthetics. (shrink)

Sound-symbolism is the nonarbitrary link between the sound and meaning of a word. Japanese-speaking children performed better in a verb generalization task when they were taught novel sound-symbolic verbs, created based on existing Japanese sound-symbolic words, than novel nonsound-symbolic verbs (Imai, Kita, Nagumo, & Okada, 2008). A question remained as to whether the Japanese children had picked up regularities in the Japanese sound-symbolic lexicon or were sensitive to universal sound-symbolism. The present study aimed to provide support for the (...) latter. In a verb generalization task, English-speaking 3-year-olds were taught novel sound-symbolic verbs, created based on Japanese sound-symbolism, or novel nonsound-symbolic verbs. English-speaking children performed better with the sound-symbolic verbs, just like Japanese-speaking children. We concluded that children are sensitive to universal sound-symbolism and can utilize it in word learning and generalization, regardless of their native language. (shrink)

An ancient and enduring cross-cultural mythology explores what the texts generally perceive as a paradox: the birth of white offspring to black parents, or black offspring to white parents. This mythology in the Hebrew Bible is limited to animal husbandry, but in Indian literature from the third century B.C.E. and Greek and Hebrew literature from the third or fourth century C.E. it was transferred to stories about human beings. These stories originally express a fascination with the dark skin of “Ethiopians” (...) , and a fantasy of white children born to them. But when ideas about human race arise in Europe after the sixteenth century, the stories reverse their color schemes and shift their emphasis to investigations of the paradox of black children born to white parents. In our day, racism is clearly a strong factor in the media fascination with court cases about in vitro fertilization in which black children are born to white parents. This development suggests that the symbolism of black and white was not originally, nor need be now, racist, but that, once racism is current, it is hard to reclaim the nonjudgmental innocence of the earlier texts. Many of these texts explained the paradox of children who differ from their parents in color by invoking the concept of parental impression , which argues that whatever a woman thinks of or sees at the moment of conception influences the physical form of the child. This doctrine, which was known in ancient Israel, in Greece, in ancient India, and in Europe well into the twentieth century, primarily addresses an entirely different obsession—the problem of paternal insecurity—and generally draws heavily on sexist and misogynist attitudes toward women. Yet, when it was appropriated into the narratives of off-color offspring, it offered, in place of the more obvious explanation , an alternative fantasy that softened the culpability of women. So, too, when applied to stories of color-contrasting offspring in European narratives, even after the sixteenth century,the idea of parental impression functioned as a force against racism ; the Lamarckian or Lysenkan idea of the inheritance of acquired characteristics—the privileging of nurture over nature—argues against the belief that one’s racial stock determines who one is. Thus this doctrine, farfetched as it seems to us , dulled the edge of ancient antagonism toward women and modern European antagonism toward the descendants of the “Ethiopians.” A study of the variations of this myth across cultures has much to tell us about the ways in which myths about women and myths about people of dark skin color are transformed under the pressure of later tropes of sexism and racism. (shrink)

My aim in this paper is to explicate the diversity of Indian Symbolism and to show the changing patterns of symbols. The first part is mostly descriptive and interpretative and tries to bring out the different forms of Indian Symbolism. The second part tries to bring out the different kinds of changes that are possible with regard to symbols.

As a traditional clothing symbol that is unique to the Chinese nation, the dragon symbol combines the distinctive features of the Chinese nation, reflecting the depth of mental changes and the historical context of Chinese culture. The image of the dragon has formed a kind of dragon pattern as a certain set of ideas about the culture that encoded all its changes. Therefore, in national clothing the dragon image has been one of the most favorite patterns for thousands of years. (...) With the interweaving of world cultures and the deepening of the concept of clothing design, the dragon pattern will incorporate fresh elements of Western culture while maintaining the essence of traditional Chinese culture, and show a new design image through the utilization of various innovative ideas and design methods. The following methods were used for the study: literature review, field research, analysis of design cases, analysis of fashion trends. Using these methods, the specifics of using dragon designs in the fashion industry in different seasons and years are analyzed, and the trend of their evolution in the field of high fashion is studied. In the article we analyzed modern trends of clothing design and gave their characteristics. The results of the study showed that even in modern youth fashion this national symbol is actively used, which indicates that the patterns and images of the dragon have real applicability and wide prospects of application in modern fashion design. Modern clothing design provides a rich cultural heritage for modern clothing to retain the characteristics of civilization on the basis of continuous innovation. The use of dragon motifs in modern clothing not only meets the aesthetic concepts of modern people, but also adds vitality to clothing design. (shrink)

By the end of the twelfth century in the south of Europe, new methods of calculating with Hindu-Arabic numerals developed. This tradition of sub-scientific mathematical practices is known as the abbaco period and flourished during 1280–1500. This paper investigates the methods of justification for the new calculating procedures and algorithms. It addresses in particular graphical schemes for the justification of operations on fractions and the multiplication of binomial structures. It is argued that these schemes provided the validation of mathematical practices (...) necessary for the development towards symbolic reasoning. It is shown how justification schemes compensated for the lack of symbolism in abbaco treatises and at the same time facilitated a process of abstraction. (shrink)

The essay explores the special features of French Symbolist aesthetics, which consist of the conceptions of symbolization as correspondence between the spiritual and objective worlds, suggestion, artistic synthesis and synesthesia, beauty, the beautiful and the sublime. The author analyzes the main trends of Symbolist aesthetics in France – the Neoplatonic/Christian and the Solipsistic symbolism – and traces their influence on art. She shows that the attitude toward aesthetic philosophy inherent in French Symbolism turned out to be the backbone (...) for Euro-American culture in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. (shrink)

PARTI FOREWORD "Knowledge of a thing engenders love of it; the more exact the knowledge, the more fervent the love." Leonardo Da Vinci ) The stream of ...

This essay suggests what M. Merleau-Ponty’s conceptions of primordial symbolism and embodied intersubjectivity imply for the problem of the existence and manifestation of dynamically unconscious experiences. First, the paper draws attention to two distinct approaches to the unconscious in the Phenomenology of Perception. One line of argumentation proceeds from the notion of bad faith, which plays a pivotal role in J.-P. Sartre’s critique of psychoanalysis; another line subsumes unconscious thoughts under the neurological notion of body schema. Later, in Lectures (...) on Passivity, Merleau-Ponty combines this expanded notion of body schema with his conception of “promiscuity,” which he illustrates with Freud’s case study of Dora. The paper explains how this new approach to intersubjectivity provides a basis for the manifestation of experiences against which the subject adopts defensive reactions. Finally, it is argued that this position does not equal a straightforward rejection of the notion of pre-reflective cogito and the problem of awareness of unconscious experiences thus remains open. (shrink)

In man's unending search for knowledge of God, three interconnected paths lie before him: those of sensuous symbolism, of rational philosophy, and of faith and belief.

Javier Legris examines my views on symbolism and logical form in relation to two important distinctions emphasized by Jean van Heijenoort—the distinction between logic as calculus and logic as universal language, and the distinction between absolutism and relativism in logic. I generally agree with his considerations and focus my response on some relevant aspects of classical logic.Javier Legris examina minhas considerações sobre simbolismo e forma lógica em relação à duas distinções enfatizadas por Jean van Heijenoort: a distinção entre lógica (...) como cálculo e lógica como linguagem universal, e a distinção entre absolutismo e relativismo na lógica. Estou basicamente de acordo com suas observações e em minha réplica enfoco alguns aspectos relevantes da lógica clássica. (shrink)

The article reviews about esoteric symbolism of the tree of life in shamanic cultures and oriental traditions including classical Hindu and Buddhist systems, together with various esoteric and indigenous traditions. The very idea of the tree of life, in indigenous cultures, which is often called the ‘world tree’ or ‘shamanic tree’, is connected with human illumination process in the form of mystical or ecstatic experience gained through the process of the self-realization. These various forms of mystico-religious experiences could be (...) found in many religious traditions, considered to be cross-cultural phenomena. The author made an attempt to make a classification of chakras and energetic structure of the human body according to cross-cultural analysis of various cultures. (shrink)

All of Charles Thomas Taylor's previous writings have attempted to reveal the universal rational foundation that undergirds all of the various ethical, political, and economic systems that best nurture human existence. With a latent recognition that the presence of symbolism in other areas of human concern, such as in religion or the fine arts, essentially communicates ethical value, Taylor presents his new book to consider the current relevance or irrelevance of religion and art for the ethical life.

B a c k g r o u n d. Genre-wise the article is a form of publication of analytical conclusions resulting from researching religious symbolism within the movie. The material for interpretation was derived from mass media, in particular cinematography. The article describes religious symbolism within the movie "Barbie" (2023). It is made apparent that the wide array of religious symbols in modern cinema requires a new approach. M e t h o d s. Issues with defining (...) religious symbolism in cinema have inspired a search of appropriate methods and research methodology. The article utilizes analytical approach based on religious symbolism found in the artistic source material – in this case a movie. R e s u l t s. With that considered the goal of the scientific research was to track down instances of religious symbolism in "Barbie" movie; such was confirmed to be abundant within otherwise mundane work. Barbieland symbolises paradise withiin the movie's fictional universe: it's a perfect place with no diseases or suffering, populated by perfect people ignorant of sorrow, problems, and worries. Naturally, the exile from paradise is a theme that is also predent. C o n c l u s i o n s. Brief research concludes that the "Barbie" movie features disguised religious symbolism – a common trope for many works within modern cinema. (shrink)

The starting point of many feminist studies on information technology is the question of how to create equal access to the computer and computer science for women. This question has raised further more profound questions concerning the computer and its effects on the relationship between the sexes.In my contribution, I will firstly look at those symbolic constructions whichgenderise this technology itself and the ways of handling it. Secondly, I will look into how information technology influences the area of private reproduction (...) and the public division of labour between the sexes. With the advent of information technology, new tendencies, their outcome still undecided, can be seen in both areas. These tendencies could lead to a stabilisation of the current relationship between the sexes. The (inherent) contradictions could however, be used by the women's movement to promote changes which further emancipate. (shrink)

In this article, I examine the discourse around evil from the perspective of philosophical anthropology. Through an analysis of the religious symbolism of evil and an associated quest for a complete study of being, I intend in this article to explore fresh ways of establishing the relation between our rhetorical practices of evil and moral responsibility. I draw on Ricoeur’s work on the primary symbols of evil, which can be seen as a means for clarifying and extending our understanding (...) of evil and moral responsibility. I employ the concept of “the double intentionality of symbol” to advance an expressive-performative model of speaking about the full shape of moral responsibility. At stake in my paper is the possibility of recognizing the need to valorise subordinate resources of knowledge that might prevent us from studying and responding to the elusive reality of evil in intellectual abstraction. (shrink)

11 essays by leading Whitehead scholars re-examinae Whitehead's Barbour-Page lectures, published as the book Symbolism: Its Meaning and Effect in 1927, to give you exciting insights into the contemporary implications of Whitehead's symbolism in an era of new scientific, cultural and technological developments.

We have considered two strategies for using native utterances as evidence for assigning native beliefs. We have shown that each of these two strategies (literalism and symbolism) can avoid the logical difficulties mentioned in section 1 — so long, at least, as we employ an account of the logical form of belief sentences developed by Burdick. We have also considered the methodological principles which provide the basis for translational practice. Based on our consideration of these principles, we then argued (...) that we must prefer the literalist strategy for attributing beliefs. Only the literalist strategy enables us to provide a recursive account of the significance of native utterances, and only the literalist strategy enables us to maximize the truth of our claims about native beliefs. (shrink)

The subject of this article is the works of the Russian artists of the late XIX – early XX centuries in the context of problematic of symbolism and Art Nouveau, as well as the scientific foundation that has developed as yet in studying this topic. Research methodology is based on the conceptual synthesis of classical art history approaches towards the analysis of artistic material with the theoretical interdisciplinary methods of humanities, such as iconology and hermeneutics, as well as the (...) contextual-associative method developed by the author. The goal of this article consists in determination of the peculiarities of symbolism in Russia due to the transformation of the attitude towards the spiritual problematic of art of the turn of the XIX – XX centuries, which is relevant for the modern art history. The author is firs in the Russian art history to conduct a comprehensive analytical overview of the development stages of symbolism in the Russian visual art based on the years-long work with the archival materials, scientific publications, and works of the Art Nouveau authors stored in the museum funds, many of which after 1917 appeared to be on the periphery of attention of art historians due to ideological reasons. The revealed individual characteristics of symbolism as a holistic artistic phenomenon, created on the level of modern humanistic knowledge, determine the novelty of this work and can valuable in further study of symbolism and Art Nouveau. Broadening of representations on the Russian art of the late XIX – early XX centuries, allow returning the heritage of the symbolist artists into the context of art, which is of undeniable importance from the perspective of restoration of natural logic of the development of the history of art in Russia, making this publication valuable in various fields of study of art and culture. (shrink)

This article takes up, but in a different key, an argument of postmodernists that the over-rationalized conception of society tends to ignore important phenomena such as those belonging to the symbolic domain. It is suggested that the emerging programme of symbolic sociology may contribute toward a new synthetic and interdisciplinary thinking in social sciences. The concept of symbolism as a social phenomenon rather than as an autonomous linguistic or semiotic system is presented; and the argument is made that if (...) social knowledge is constitutive of society, similarly collective sentiments, temporality and collective memory are also symbolically produced. They are created from and create discursive symbolism, symbolic objects and symbolic behaviours. Finally, the article focuses on collective actions where the sociology of symbolic processes is most promising. (shrink)

In this paper Russian Symbolist philosophy is represented primarily by Viacheslav Ivanov (1866--1949), but its conclusions are intended to be valid for other philosophers we classify as Symbolist, including Nikolai Berdiaev and S. L. Frank. It is posited that, by comparing Ivanov''s cosmology, aesthetics, and anthropology to those of Martin Heidegger, one can reconceive of Symbolist philosophy as an existential hermeneutic. This, it is claimed, can help to identify a common basis among the Symbolist philosophers, and also to place Russian (...) thought in the context of modern European philosophy and vice versa. (shrink)

‘Information’ and ‘code’ originated as technical terms within linguistics and information theory but are now widely used in genetics and developmental biology. Against this background, it is examined if coded information distinguishes genes from other information carriers, i.e., whether there are genetic words or sentences by virtue of the genetic code, and, if so, whether they have any semantic content. It is concluded that there is no genetic language with semantic content, but that the genetic code still enables unique language-like (...) modes of transmission and interpretation of causal information. (shrink)

This essay reconstructs the steps by which Cassirer moved from the philosophy of language in the early 1920s to his more general theory of symbolism. The linguistic turn in philosophy overcame idealism without falling into naturalism or psychologism, but according to Cassirer proclaiming the primacy of language was one-sided. He claimed that language is but one symbolic form among many and, what is more, it is not the most fundamental kind of symbolism. The basic function of symbolism (...) is neither "reference" nor "pure signification," but the unification of sensory phenomena in perception, a function he termed symbolic "Prägnanz." The essay explains how Cassirer argued for a continuity of symbolic processes linking expressive perceptual qualities with scientific theory. (shrink)

Freud, Psychoanalysis and Symbolism offers an innovative general theory of symbolism, derived from Freud's psychoanalytic theory and relocated within mainstream scientific psychology. It is the first systematic investigation of the development of Freud's treatment of symbolism throughout his published works, and discovers in those writings a broad theory which is far superior to the widely accepted, narrow, 'official' view. Agnes Petocz argues that the treatment of symbolism must begin with the identification and clarification of a set (...) of logical constraints and psychological requirements which any general theory of symbolism must respect, and that these requirements have been neglected by existing accounts across a number of disciplines. Her newly proposed 'Freudian broad' theory of symbolism, by contrast, does meet these requirements, but only after it has been rehabilitated within a revised psychoanalytic context, encompassing major changes to our understanding of the concepts of unconscious and repression and the role of language. (shrink)

The disenchantment of 1848 -- The pessimistic view -- Science, the new god -- The bourgeois world -- The realism of Flaubert -- Optimistic realism -- Russian realism -- Social realism -- Social realism and socialist realism -- The continuing march of science -- The book of despair -- Life in the raw -- The natural history of morality -- Naturalism and moralism -- Painting: the impressionists -- A critique of naturalism -- Human nature in politics -- The natural history (...) of the soul -- The poet as seer -- The mystery of poetry -- A critique of symbolism -- Against the Grain -- The aesthetic ideal -- The decadence -- Some Wilde epigrams -- The influence of Richard Wagner -- Just before the war. (shrink)

In “An Obscure Rider Obstructing Science,” Sarah Rodriguez, Lisa Campo-Engelstein, Candace Tingen, and Teresa Woodruff (2011) adopt a “developmental view” when contrasting the moral status of embry...