Benjamin Lee Whorf

Anthropologist Benjamin Lee explores various questions regarding the relationship between language, subjectivity, community, and the external world. TALKING HEADS synthesizes the views and works of a breathtaking range of the most influential modern theorists of the humanities and social sciences.

Anthropology is a discipline very conscious of its history. Alan Barnard has written a clear, detailed overview of anthropological theory that brings out the historical contexts of the great debates, tracing the genealogies of theories and schools of thought. His book covers the precursors of anthropology; evolutionism in all its guises; diffusionism and culture area theories, functionalism and structural-functionalism; action-centered theories; processual and Marxist perspectives; the many faces of relativism, structuralism and poststructuralism; and recent interpretive and postmodernist viewpoints. This is a balanced and judicious survey, which also considers the problems involved in assessing anthropological theories.

This work offers a rigorously reasoned defense of the metaphysical relativism often associated with the "postmodern" condition. Andrew L. Blais takes as his point of departure our occasional suspicion that others live in different worlds, and the philosophical thesis that articulates this suspicion; namely, that there are many actual worlds and truths. He argues that this thesis, far from being fanciful, is a necessary presupposition of coherent thought about ourselves. Grounding his analysis in a Kantian notion of what it means to be a "world", Blais articulates his argument through a discussion of the views of other philosophers. He begins by examining the doctrines of Protagoras and Plato, then looks more closely at those of Whorf, Quine, Goodman, Putnam, and other major contemporary thinkers. Blais concludes by considering the implications of the argument for social and literary theory, focusing on the question of why socially constructed objects are sometimes experienced as if they were not constructions. In his view, there is no social and political reality independent of perspective, no neutral position from which one can make sense of the truth or falsity of social and political thought.

In this revised text on language, culture and society, two of the original chapters have been subdivided, additional examples have been included, and the discussions of some of the more abstract topics have been edited.

Much of the groundbreaking work in many fields is now occurring at the intersection of traditional academic disciplines. This development is well demonstrated in this important and unique volume, which offers a multidisciplinary view of current findings and cutting-edge issues involving the relationship between mind, brain, and language. Marie T. Banich and Molly Mack have edited a collection of 11 invited chapters from top researchers (and have contributed two of their own chapters) to create a volume organized around five major topics-language emergence, influence, and development; models of language and language processing; the neurological bases of language; language disruption and loss; and dual-language systems. Topics range from the evolution of language and child-language acquisition to brain imaging and the "bilingual brain." To maintain continuity throughout, care has been taken to ensure that the chapters have been written in a style accessible to scholars across many disciplines, from anthropology and psycholinguistics to cognitive science and neurobiology. Because of its depth and breadth, this book is appropriate both as a textbook in a variety of undergraduate and graduate-level courses and as a valuable resource for researchers and scholars interested in further understanding the background of and current developments in our understanding of the mind/brain/language relationship.

Language: The Basics provides a concise introduction to the study of language. Written in an engaging and entertaining style, it encourages the reader to think about the way language works. New features include:* a chapter on 'Language in Use' which introduces pragmatics, metaphor, speech and writing and discourse analysis* a section on sign language* a glossary of key terms* an expanded further reading section Language: the Basics provides an overview for students and anyone who's ever been accused of splitting an infinitive.