Cognitive Anthropology

“語言與現代化”學術研討會
  2017年10月18-20日，澳門

主旨演講：
論語言與認知的跨學科研究成果與趨勢
—— 以工作記憶為視角

溫植勝博士、副教授
澳門理工學院語言暨翻譯學校

【摘要】：本文的目的旨在展示國內外認知科學界和語言學界圍繞工作記憶與語言學習所展開的跨學科研究所取得的最新成果，並藉此對今後的相關研究做出展望。文章首先扼要回顧總結認知（神經）科學界對工作記憶進行的多層面本體研究，然後將這些研究成果與語言學界研究界近年探討工作記憶對語言學習不同方面影響作用的實證研究結果想結合，繼而提出一個工作記憶與語言習得的創新性理論假設與研究框架。文章將結合現有的研究成果著重對今後的相關研究提出多方面的具體建議。



【演講者簡介】：溫植勝博士，現為澳門理工學院語言暨翻譯高等學校副教授，中國英漢語比較研究會心理語言學專業委員會理事。香港中文大學應用語言學博士，美國密歇根大學訪問研究學者。任教於粵港澳多所重點高校本科和研究生課程多年，在國內外重要學術期刊發表論文30多篇；近年致力於語言習得與認知科學等交叉學科的理論與實踐研究，其英文學術專著（2016）和編著（2015）由英國著名的Multilingual Matters出版。曾獲語言學界國際頂尖期刊《語言學習》2012年度頒發的“《語言學習》期刊圓桌會議專項研究基金”獎項資助。
(Contact: (853)8599-6389; Email: edwardwen@ipm.edu.mo)

Ce chapitre analyse la médicalisation de la naissance à partir du cas de l'épisiotomie et depuis une perspective  d'anthropologie des habiletés. Il critique notamment l'appréhension des savoirs issus de l'expérience dans le cadre de l'EBM.
https://www.cairn.info/accompagner-la-naissance--9782940516148-page-133.htm
Référence complète: Perrenoud, P. (2014). Naissance et évolution des pratiques: entre Evidence Based Medicine, expérience et intuition. In I. Maffi, C. Burton-Jeangros, & R. Hammer (Eds.), Accompagner la naissance: terrains socio-anthropologiques en Suisse Romande. Lausanne: BSN Press.

In his oft-cited discussion of the “culturally constituted behavioral environment,” Irving Hallowell argued that any given cultural ontology must be considered to be “real” insofar as people believe in it; and inasmuch as it exist as an object of belief, it becomes an effective constituent of thought, feeling, and action—in short, ethno-ontologies become basic dynamic elements in the psychic economy of individuals. In this paper, I build on the contributions of Hallowell and others (including George Devereux), sketching the outlines of what I have referred to elsewhere as a “cultural psychodynamic” approach—one that integrates contemporary psychoanalytic insights into the dynamics of human subjectivity with a phenomenological and ethno-ontological approach (such as that advocated by Hallowell). Such an approach emphasizes the ways in which local beliefs, social structure, symbolic resources, and the practices of everyday life serve to structuralize the psychic field, encouraging certain culturally specific psychodynamic configurations while discouraging others. It focuses on the importance of framing epistemologies (e.g., locally distinct ethnotheories of experience, emotion, and self) in giving rise to distinct topographies of self-experience, allowing individuals to sidestep certain conflicts and dilemmas, while simultaneously throwing others into high relief. I argue that a sustained interpretive tacking between these fields lends greater dimensionality to ethnographic analyses: Psychoanalytic ideas help to illuminate dynamic intrapsychic and interpersonal processes of meaning making, while ethnographic data emphasize the powerfully constitutive role of ethnotheories and social practices in conditioning the form, function, and expression of basic psychodynamic processes.

Why is the comic-book superhero such a persistent topic of cultural representation?  Citing Denis Dutton’s evolutionary aesthetic, we argue that comic-book superheroes persist because they offer a cultural means of negotiating the gap between the small group size that human beings have evolved a cognitive architecture to deal with, and the much larger group size that is entailed by modern social arrangements.  This position implies four predictions: the superhero should (1) exhibit punitive prosociality, (2) be supernatural or quasi-supernatural, (3) be minimally counterintuitive and (4) display kin-signalling proxies.  These predictions are tested against seventeen superhero figures from various comic-book universes.

Musical and phenomenological analysis of the two jazz versions recorded by the Django Reinhardt, Eddie South, Stéphane Grappelli trio in 1937 of J.S. Bach's Double Concerto in D minor (BWV 1043),. The analysis is  based on the complete transcription, published in the book, of the two recordings.

This study focuses on social change, resource management, cooperation, and fairness among Tzotzil-Maya communities in the highlands of Chiapas, southern Mexico. Maya groups in Chiapas have undergone drastic changes over the past five decades. While modernization has upended some of their traditional dependence on agriculture, Maya political systems have become more decentralized, with communities now managing resources autonomously. Other recent transformations include increasing market integration, greater access to urban centers, the expansion of formal schooling, and the advent of state-sponsored social change. This dissertation investigates the effects of this multifaceted process of change on local resource management by comparing rural and urban Tzotzil communities that differ in degree of access to markets and modern infrastructure. The study uses a mixed-methods approach combining: (1) ethnographic methods to document the processes through which communities and households make resource allocation decisions; and (2) economic and behavioral experiments to index moral preferences in how people solve hypothetical problems of resource allocation. Each chapter delves into a different factor shaping how Tzotzil communities cooperate and manage resources. These topics include ethnicity, fairness and equity norms, kinship and land tenure systems, and labor allocation. I find that modernization causes resource allocation to shift from a prestige-based to a need-based logic. I assert that this change reflects the evolving social structure of Tzotzil groups. As modernization undermines traditional prestige hierarchies, novel notions of fairness and equity emerge in response to new resource conflict configurations. The research shows how cognition, moral values, and social structure can be interlinked and reinforce each other in a context of ongoing social change. These findings can inform environmental and social policy in the developing world by shedding light on how modernization processes taking place rural settings affect local resource management. The study proposes new methods for researching the relationship between culture, cognition, and the environment.

‘The Çatalhöyük evidence as a whole’, write Hodder and Pels, ‘gives many indications that, indeed, people began to link themselves to specific pasts, by burying pots, tools, humans and hunting trophies in ways that indicate particular memories rather than a generic reference to a group’. Such striking claims about Neolithic cognitive change seem to chime neatly with the other ambitious hypotheses explored in this volume, intended to link measurable changes in the archaeological record to historical changes in consciousness, creativity, and self. In this essay I return to memory as a test case for evaluating claims about cognitive change in the Neolithic, trying to flesh out and generalise Hodder’s suggestive remarks about memory at Çatalhöyük by setting them in the context of a broad theoretical approach to personal memory which might both make sense of and in turn be buttressed and developed by the archaeological case study. I proceed by first explaining and defending the possibility of historical changes in autobiographical memory, anchoring this exercise in speculative cognitive archaeology and cognitive history in the picture of the ‘scaffolded mind’ suggested by the ‘distributed cognition’ framework. In section 3, I discuss features of autobiographical memory and its components which are highlighted in various domains of recent science and theory, and which taken together reveal personal remembering as a rich and complex set of learned and enculturated skills. Section 4 lays out the background conditions for the putative historical changes, in or before the Neolithic, before I go on in section 5 to sketch a picture of the nature, causes, and implications of the hypothesised changes in memory capacities and practices.

In the summer of 1966, seven Navajo community members from Pine Springs, AZ were the subjects of one of the most provocative experiments in cognitive and visual anthropology, the Navajo Film Project, resulting in Sol Worth and John Adair’s seminal work Through Navajo Eyes and seven short films produced by Navajo filmmakers that garnered worldwide attention.  In 2011, the films were repaired and returned to the Navajo Nation for public screenings, the first step in a process of repatriation and resignification that mirrors the repatriation of other visual media to Navajo and indigenous communities.  The return of the films offers a unique opportunity to reexamine the meanings of the films and the project, reframing the discussion in terms of their role in context of visual sovereignty, community reengagements, and “reclaiming” Diné/Navajo histories.

Kamares Ware is one of the most famous pottery styles in archaeology. Its shapes and creative decorations have been differentially studied in the past, mainly from a stylistic perspective. However, its complexity and the fragmented state of the Middle Minoan Cretan contexts have at times hindered our attempts to make sense of its horizontal and vertical dynamics of transmission. Publications accumulated in decades have produced descriptions of Kamares Ware pottery styles from various centres around Crete. These genealogies of pots illustrate continuity in both material forms and correlated practices that lasted for several generations. By looking at style from the perspective of Material Engagement Theory and radical enactive theories of cognition, I illustrate that the long-term development of the Knossian Kamares style describes something more than a succession of forms and decorations: a novel form of memory. Specifically, I argue that the Knossian Kamares style is a form of transgenerational memory continually re-created every time potters made new vessels in this style. Furthermore, by rethinking the notion of autobiographical memory from psychology and the cognitive sciences, I present for the first time the idea that transgenerational memory might also be productive of identity.

Ce chapitre est une discussion méthodologique concernant la possibilité de décrire des compétences perceptives dans le cadre d’activités culinaires domestiques et professionnelles. Outre le souhait de contribuer à une ethnographie de la cuisine – qui est aujourd’hui essentiellement tournée vers l’acte de consommation et non vers les conditions et moyens de la trans-formation des ingrédients – nous souhaitons mettre à l’épreuve une démarche que nous avons appelée ethnographie cognitive des perceptions et dont le principal objectif est de questionner la possibilité de décrire ethnographiquement des compétences perceptives. En particulier, elle permet de répondre à l’invita-tion formulée par David Howes de rendre compte des techni-ques des sens en mettant l’accent sur l’activité des sens et en considérant, à la différence de l’auteur, que les différence individuelles sont significatives dans le projet d’une anthro-pologie des sens.

This chapter presents ethnographic and social neuroscientific insights on the emerging subculture of juicing: an extreme eating practice grounded in food beliefs about purity and pollution enacted through a set of highly prescriptive rituals to ‘flush’ out undesirable substances and achieve ‘cleansing’. Drawing on our ethnographic evidence and recent work in cognitive anthropology, the philosophy of psychiatry, and social neuroscience, we argue that the positive results achieved by juicers are largely attributable to the prosocial rewards of constructing a juicer identity reinforced in ritual, and to implicit sociocognitive substrates of the placebo effects. The cult-like dimensions of juicing culture, in turn, presents us with a fascinating window for the study of emergent sociality and its physiological effects, and, by extension, for the theoretical and empirical study of embodiment in cultural epidemiology

在当前人类学与认知科学、生物-演化科学等多领域交融的思潮下，早期儿童发展成为解开这个人类道德起源之谜的核心领域，中国社会则为探索道德发展提供了独特的实验场。从心理认知人类学视角出发，本文以儿童道德发展为题，梳理人类学和心理学的理论交集历程，回顾汉学人类学相关研究，并以作者“好孩子”系列作品为案例介绍引入心理学前沿理论和方法的人类学经验研究;同时，呼吁推动人类学和认知科学在理论、方法论和经验研究层面的全方位对话、给“人类学道德伦理研究”开拓新视野、注入新活力。
Influenced by the recent synergy between anthropology, cognitive science, and bio-evolutionary sciences, a new research agenda emerged to uncover the origins of human morality. Moral development during early childhood has become a core domain within this agenda. Specifically, contemporary Chi⁃ na has provided a unique field to investigate moral development for this line of research. This article pro vides a systematic introduction to the works on children’s moral development from the perspectives of psychological and cognitive anthropology. The article situates traditions on moral development research under broader theoretical conversations between anthropology and psychology. It reviews relevant research under these theoretical traditions in the history of sinological anthropology, because prior studies of Chinese children not only were influenced by these traditions but also exemplified them. The article then introduces re⁃ cent works in anthropology on Chinese children’s moral development that incorporated cutting-edge psychological theories and methods, through the example of“The Good Child”project based on my fieldwork in a Shanghai preschool. To sum up, this article calls for comprehensive engagements in theoretical, methodological, and empirical realms between anthropology and cognitive science. By doing so, we can expand the research scope and bring new potentials to anthropological research on morality and ethics.

Kinship classification systems play a critical role in understanding human cognition because of their cross-cultural prevalence and paradigmatic completeness. In place of the historically used componential analysis method, this paper instead utilizes Optimality Theory, which argues that languages share constraints, but apply them differently to choose between linguistic efficiency and accurate communication. To negotiate the rigidity of OT and remember the humanity behind the structure, an extensive analysis of family and social structures among Hausa language speakers was applied to the formal method. The study engages with questions about the extent to which cognitive structures and cultural factors interact in kinship term production and presents evidence for how term use influences thought patterns of Hausa speakers and their conceptions of familial relationships.
By applying cultural practice to theory, the model proposes a cognitive framework, particularly malleable to cultural values, that produces kinship terminologies in the Hausa language. Using a variety of ethnographic texts, language learning resources, and the author’s study of the Hausa language, this paper analyzes sets of kinship terms contextually, applying the linguistic and cultural data to Optimality Theory. The model proposed claims that speakers are equipped with a cognitive structure that creates a need for efficient communication and accuracy, resulting in linguistic variation in kinship terminology production when speakers must negotiate with the above constraints. Therefore, Hausa language speakers rank their most valued terminological distinctions based on cognitive constraints and cultural influences in order to produce the kinship terms found in the lexicon.

Keywords: kinship, language and cognition, culture

Commentary on Sarah Janes' article "A Quest for a temple to sleep in," (Paranthropology, same volume). This article discusses how, in historical, archaeological and anthropological works,  external means of altering consciousness are preferred as mechanisms of culture transformation over techniques of ecstasy that are endogenously sourced (particularly, the ritual use of sleep deprivation, dreams and hypnagogia).

Attraverso un esperimento svolto nel 2011, riprendendo la teoria di Turner sui fenomeni liminoidi in relazione ai drammi sociali, sono andata alla ricerca del dramma sociale rappresentato attraverso le performance di improvvisazione in danza. L’esperimento ha quindi coinvolto 6 performer in un workshop dando vita a un ciclo di 12 performance all’aperto nel centro storico di Firenze, durante le quali è stato intervistato il pubblico di passaggio sulle impressioni e parole chiave che le performance suscitavano in loro. Dalla ricorrenza di alcuni termini è stato evidente il collegamento con il concetto postmoderno di libertà. Secondo Bauman viviamo in una società in cui è stato guadagnato in libertà individuale perdendo però quella sicurezza che teneva insieme la società moderna.
Nel mondo postmoderno vige la frammentazione e la mancanza di un quadro, sembrano mancare gli strumenti concettuali per esaminare la situazione in modo coerente e integrato. La vita individuale è concepita più che altro come un opera o come un’impresa, come qualcosa che va sviluppata, perfezionata e rielaborata fino a raggiungere il massimo potenziale. Al giorno d’oggi sembra che anche semplici scelte, come quale detersivo comprare, ci mettano di fronte a una crescente incapacità di scegliere. Nel gioco di specchi dell’improvvisazione come fenomeno liminoide possiamo quindi vedere chiaramente quali sono i nessi tra questa pratica performativa e la società postmoderna: il performer, improvvisando, si definisce nel presente della performance, compiendo le sue scelte passo dopo passo sulla scena. Si pone in una situazione di “precarietà creativa”, di “crisi volontaria”, come se avesse riprodotto una “scenografia postmoderna”.
Sembra che l’arte abbia proposto uno spazio protetto in cui potersi liberare
dall’ansia della scelta, in cui le parole chiave sono accettazione, ascolto e
mancanza di giudizio. Sembra inoltre aver riportato l’attenzione su un nodo
cruciale: la scelta non è quasi mai razionale, è intuitiva e sociale.

В книге рассматривается вопрос о воздействии структуры языка на познавательные способности его носителей, или проблема лингвистической относительности. В первом разделе представлен подробный анализ развития релятивистских идей с конца XVIII в. по 1990-е гг. Во втором разделе рассматриваются компаративные исследования 1990–2010-х гг., посвященные пространственной семантике, концептуализации времени, цветообозначениям и другим эмпирическим и теоретическим проблемам, связанным с тем, что можно охарактеризовать как неорелятивистское направление в психолингвистике и когнитивной антропологии. В третьем разделе представлена новая модель взаимосвязи структуры языка и когнитивных процессов, названная автором пострелятивизмом; также намечена программа будущих пострелятивистских исследований. На обширном материале (около 250 языков и несколько сотен эмпирических исследований) демонстрируется, что язык в режиме реального времени вовлечен в работу многих познавательных механизмов, и это отражается на характере когнитивного стиля его носителей.

The book deals with the problem of influence of natural language structure on cognitive processes of its native speakers - the problem of "linguistic relativity". The first part contains detailed analysis of the development of relativistic ideas from XVIII century to the 1990-s. The second part deals with comparative studies of 1990-2010-s that consider spatial semantics, conceptualization of time, color-terms and other theoretical and empirical problems within "neo-relativist" framework of psycholinguistics and cognitive anthropology. The third part is dedicated to the new model of interaction between the structure of language and cognitive operations; this model was named "post-relativism" by the author. Also there is detailed program for the future post-relativist investigations. The book represents the idea (grounded in the analysis of massive empirical data - 250 languages and more than several hundreds empirical researches) that natural language is integrated in the work of many cognitive processes, and this fact is reflected in the cognitive style of its native speakers.

There isn’t a single "world of lucid dreaming" (apologies to Stephen LaBerge), but a multitude of worlds. For myself, a helpful frame for the plethora of these multidimensional lucid realms is the tiered cosmos that is acknowledged in traditional cultures around the world as well as the deep Paleolithic past: the Middle World, and the Upper and Lower Worlds [1]. While I am using the metaphor of “landscapes” or “worlds,” I am describing styles of thinking and acting within the dream. They are cognitive lifeworlds which are available at any time.

Chapitre 3 de "Improvisation, Culture, Audiotactilité". Il s'agit d'une analyse musicale et phénoménologique des deux versions jazz enregistrées par le trio Django Reinhardt, Eddie South, Stéphane Grappelli en 1937, du Concerto pour deux violons et orchestre en ré mineur BWV 1043 de J.S. Bach. L'analyse est basée sur la théorie de la musique audiotactile et a été réalisée au moyen de la complète transcription en notation musicale, publiée dans le livre, des deux enregistrements.

The image of a figure holding two wild animals, often called the "Mistress/Master of Animals", has appeared across many ancient periods and regions, on artifacts from proto-literate Mesopotamia in the Near East to the Aegean Iron Age. This motif has a demonstrable chain of cultural custody that is closely tied to concepts of both divinity and royalty. Rather than following a linear progression of diffusion with consistent interpretation, the Master/Mistress motif is culturally translated by adopting populations to suit the understandings of the individuals within those populations. Though some concepts such as healing remained constant from culture to culture, the symbol was reinterpreted or modified based on the role it played in adopting populations' cultural schemas. This resulted in the two seemingly separate motifs of the "Master" and "Mistress". This translation demonstrates the close relationship these early cultures had to one another in spite of their perceived distinctness.

The thesis studied the traditional representation of the Belarusians as the world-view system of ethocsience. The author studied the representation through ethnographic field observations, interviews, through the method of cognitive maps. Analysis of sets of representations has shown that the system of the traditional worldview of Belarusians consists of representations of the environment subsystems, man, relationship, traditional economy. Author in environmental studies analyzed Belarus traditional ethoastronomical, ethnometeorological, ethnobiological, ethoecological knowledge. The traditional representation of landscape and ritual practices of natural sacred places affect the management of natural resources. The authors are particularly studied transcendental representation of the person and the substance of the body. In the study of representations of the author it was first discovered by the full composition of the Belarusian network concepts kinship system and describes the specifics of the Belarusian kinship and heritage. The author has shown the relationship between the representations, beliefs and ritual specificity of the national traditional rural farming.
The obtained evidences, conclusions, methods and materials of the dissertation will be useful in the study of Belarusian, Ukrainian and, in general, European social representations, protection of intangible and tangible Cultural Heritage.
У дисертації комплексно досліджено традиційні уявлення білорусів як  світоглядну систему.  Уявлення виявлялися через проведення автором польових етнографічних спостережень, опитувань, метод карт уявлень. На підставі їх аналізу виявлено, що система традиційного світогляду білорусів кінця XX — початку ХХІ ст. складається з підсистем уявлень про: довкілля, людину, спорідненість, господарство. Автором при дослідженні навколишнього середовища аналізувалися білоруські традиційні етноастрономічні, етнометеорологічні, етнобіологічні етноекологичні знання.
Показані вплив традиційних уявлень про ландшафт та ритуальних практик на природно-антропогенних сакральних місцях на природокористування. При дослідженні уявлень про людину було звернуто значну увагу на дослідження трансцендентних уявлень про людину і субстанції організму. При дослідженні уявлень автором вперше був виявлений повний склад мережі концептів білоруського системи спорідненістю і описана специфіка білоруського спорідненості і спадщини. Автор розкрив взаємозв'язок між уявленнями і ритуальної специфікою національного традиційного сільського господарювання.
Отримані основі доказі, висновки, методі та матеріали дисертації будуть корисними при дослідження білоруських, українськім та й загалом європейських соціальних уявлень, охорони нематеріальної і матеріальної культурної спадщини.
У дысертацыі комплексна даследаваныя традыцыйныя ўяўленні беларусаў вывучаюцца як светапоглядная сістэма. Уяўленні выяўляліся праз правядзенне аўтарам  палявых этнаграфічных назіранняў, апытанняў, метад карт уяўленняў. На падставе іх аналізу выяўлена, што сістэма традыцыйны светапогляду беларусаў у канцы XX - пачатку XXI ст. Складаецца з падсістэм уяўленняў пра навакольнае асяроддзе, чалавека, сваяцтва, гаспадарку. Аўтарам пры даследаванні навакольнага асяроддзя аналізаваліся беларускія традыцыйныя  этнаастранамічныя, этнаметэрэалогічныя, этнабіялогічныя, этнаэкалагічныя веды. Паказаны ўплыў традыцыйных уяўленняў пра ландшафт и рытуальных практык на прыродна-антрапагенных сакральных месцах  на прыродакарыстанне. Пры даследаванні уяўленняў пра чалавека была звернута значная увага на даследаванне трансцэндэнтных уяўленняў пра чалавека і  субстанцыі арганізма. Пры даследаванні уяўленняў аўтарам упершыню быў выяўлены поўны склад сеткі канцэптаў беларускай сістэмы сваяцтвам і апісаная спецыфіка беларускага сваяцтва і спадчыны. Аўтар паказаў узаемасувязь паміж уяўленнямі і рытуальнай спецыфікай нацыянальнага традыцыйнага сельскага гаспадарання.
Атрыманыя доказы, высновы, метады і матэрыялы дысертацыі будуць карысныя пры вывучэнні беларускай, украінскай і агулам еўрапейскіх сацыяльных уяўленняў, аховы нематэрыяльнай і матэрыяльнай спадчыны.

Given the shift in ethnography towards greater reflexivity, this paper discusses some of my previous experiences and assumptions concerning identity and how they have changed in light of the past six years of research on Pashtun peoples living in the United States. Prior to conducting this study, my wife and I spent seven years in a mission organization where we were trained to parse the world’s population into ethno-linguistic People Groups or People Group Identity. For nearly twenty years, People Group thinking has shaped my views of culture, peoples, and theology. However, walking alongside my research participants over the past six years has challenged my confidence in the validity of the People Group paradigm.

Social scientists and folk views have long had it that there is an association between religiosity and prosocial behaviour, but hard evidence for such a relationship is limited. Studies show that religiosity is correlated with self-reported prosociality, however this relationship is not very clear when it comes to observed prosocial behaviours. Experimental studies reveal a link between religious priming and prosocial behaviours, and remarkably such effects hold irrespectively of degrees of religiosity. Building on and combining the strengths of previous field designs, I report here the results of a field experiment in Mauritius examining the effects of religious environments on cooperation in a naturalistic setting. These results were consistent with previous findings that religious cues may increase cooperation. Importantly, this effect was not dependent on degrees of prior religiosity. Plausible interpretations of such effects are discussed.

The central aim of this chapter is to review how lucid dreaming has been reframed in cognitive anthropology as a state of consciousness that has a deep history of expression and is similar to many states that play with the threshold where consensual reality meets private experience. A secondary aim is to integrate this anthropological reframing with the detailed work of psychologists, neuroscientists, and phenomenologists whose studies of lucid dreaming showcase new (or merely forgotten or misunderstood) potentials.

Anthropological study of the Internet pornography can refer to the cultural
communication between the creators of the contents and authors of pornographic sites, as
well as between the authors of sites and users, the latter being more relevant to this work as it
assumes supracultural activities on the Internet and comprises the pornography users as a
distinct population. The aim of this study is to determine, through the categorization of porn
clips in the Internet, cognitive schemes and cultural models which explain the principles of
such classification and provide the information on the cultural thought that lies behind the
interpretation of the Internet pornography during the organization of that particular part of
virtual reality by the pornographic sites’ authors and their users. Following methodological
means have been applied: ethno-taxonomic analysis and D’Andrade’s folk model of the
mind. Categories which appear on web sites are not organized in hierarchies, which means
their interrelations had to be inferred. Results showed that categories do not carry sufficient
meaning by themselves. Rather, related categories are used to describe concepts, and those
concepts frequently derive their meaning from their relation with other concepts. Users also
perform the partition of this space by using similar larger segments, whereas the categories
themselves are merely preferences within the segment which is currently in focus. One of the
observed user behaviours which affects their approach to categorization is their perception of
the realistic-spectacular relationship. The users perceive most clips as a staged fiction whose
actors take part in it for reasons of self-interest. On one hand, this implies a higher
competence of users population; on the other, this relates to the need to define, justify and
place the perception of one’s own sexuality within the framework of what is socially
acceptable supporting it with the assertion that “no animal was harmed during the making of
this movie”, which to a certain extent corresponds to the context outside the pornography in
which any behaviour on the Internet is believed to be legitimate just because it is virtual,
making the evaluation parameters appear to come down to the esthetic element and the
physical safety, while everything has its price. The Internet pornography represents a
consistent continuation of the history of pornography because the behaviour exhibited during
its use also represents a side effect of a cultural environment of the group using it.

In the current models of cognitive development some phenomena cannot be categorized: self-actualizing people (Maslow), Buddhism and Taoism. Using Piaget´s genetic epistemology we can argue that the human cognitive system is not flexible enough to cope with the fundamental changes in structure of the need-satisfying actions (infant/adult) without adaption delays. In this article the process of cognitive new-adaptation with all related effects is described as the initiation process. Four thought-forms are introduced and derived from the hypothesis, with which it is possible to categorize the phenomena mentioned above. The initiation process is an independent side effect of ontogenesis and therefore requires a new definition for intelligence.

The purpose of this chapter is to assess the future of Cultural Linguistics (Sharifian, this volume) as a tool for exploring a variety of linguistic phenomena along with their intra-group and inter-group cultural instantiations. As a subfield of linguistics, Cultural Linguistics has the potential to bring forth a model that successfully melds together complementary approaches, e.g., viewing language as ‘a complex adaptive system’ and bringing to bear upon it concepts drawn from cognitive science such as ‘distributed cognition’ and ‘multi-agent dynamic systems theory’. This will allow us to move away from essentialist models of the entity we call ‘language’ (Frank, 2008) and hence to adopt and build on theoretical approaches, e.g. ‘enactive cognitivism’, already being exploited by researchers working in related areas more characteristic of the cognitive sciences, that is, by those who no longer subscribe to the tenets of ‘classic cognitivism’. The paradigm emerging from research in Cultural Linguistics draws on a highly nuanced multi-disciplinarily informed approach that allows for a greater appreciation for individual choices and the motivations behind these choices as they coalesce into and around ‘cultural conceptualizations’ (Sharifian, 2003, 2009a, this volume).