Expressive Content and the Semantics of Contexts

几乎我们所说的每一句话都蕴含着关于我们的感受和态度的信息。 这种表达性的内容可以仅仅是暗示，但它往往是直接编码的。我们有短语，单词和词素（单词的一部分）来表达我们对周围人的敬意和认可。 我们也有，通常是禁忌，短语，单词和词素，诋毁，这传达了我们的不满。使用这些词汇的效果可能是戏剧性的。 他们创造了紧张的情绪状态。它们揭示了说话者的观点，并且它们显著地影响了人们对当前和未来话语的感知。这一内容的重要性早已被认识到，但直到最近，从语言学理论的角度来看，它看起来完全陌生。波茨博士的研究将有助于改变这一点。 该项目的总体目标是将表达性内容确定为一个重要的、连贯的研究领域，并将整个认知科学领域的研究人员聚集在一起，共同研究这一主题。 波茨目前的结果和他的整体方法与神经学证据吻合得很好，而且他们是从算法的角度对语言意义进行研究的。 除了为理论语言学界提供关于这一主题的第一个主要研究机构外，这项工作还可以在话语分析，法律和普通公众话语中产生影响。

Nearly everything we say carries an undercurrent of information about our feelings and attitudes. This expressive content can be merely suggested, but it is often directly encoded. We have phrases, words, and morphemes (parts of words) for honoring those around us and conveying our approval. We also have, often taboo, phrases, words and morphemes that denigrate, that convey our displeasure. The effects of using these lexical items can be dramatic. They create charged emotional states. They are revealing of the speaker's perspective, and they significantly impact how current and future utterances are perceived. The importance of this content has long been recognized, but it has, until recently, looked utterly foreign from the perspective of linguistic theory.Dr. Potts's research will help change that. The project's overarching goal is to identify expressive content as an important, coherent area of research and to bring together researchers throughout the cognitive sciences to work on the topic. Potts's current results, and his overall approach, square well with the neurological evidence and they are informed by an algorithmic perspective on linguistic meaning. In addition to providing the first major body of research on this topic to the theoretical linguistics community, the work can have an impact in discourse analysis, in law, and in the general public discourse.