The Book of Proper Names

The Book of Proper Names PDF Author: Amelie Nothomb
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
ISBN: 1250091039
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 98

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Book Description
The Book of Proper Names is set in contemporary Paris, its main character an orphan named Plectrude. Before the child's birth her nineteen-year-old mother shoots and kills her nineteen-year-old (and somewhat feckless) father because she hates the names he's devised for their child--she fears they will doom their unborn child to mediocrity. The mother confesses openly to what she has done, and why. She is arrested and thrown into prison, where she gives birth to the child, names her, to everyone's bafflement, Plectrude--an obscure saint, and an albatross of a name--and then hangs herself. The novel therefore begins on the borderline between tragedy and absurdity, but as Plectrude grows--raised by a loving, indulgent, and eccentric aunt--it becomes a deeply moving and simultaneously chilling portrait of girlhood. Plectrude's great gift turns out to be for ballet, and she throws herself into dance as if her life depended upon it. Few novels have shown us the implacable and unforgiving world of ballet with more intuitive sympathy, yet also with a keen-eyed assessment of the true price of artistic perfection.. Inevitably, the doom hovering over Plectrude's life from birth returns to haunt her, and in the end she learns to survive in the only way she knows how--by committing an act of deadly self-preservation her mother would have perhaps understood best. The Book of Proper Names is vintage Amelie Nothomb--alternatively mordant and poignant, a portrait of adolescence that is fierce and funny at the same time. There is nothing mediocre either about Nothomb nor her creations.

The Book of Proper Names

The Book of Proper Names PDF Author: Amelie Nothomb
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
ISBN: 1250091039
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 98

Get Book Here

Book Description
The Book of Proper Names is set in contemporary Paris, its main character an orphan named Plectrude. Before the child's birth her nineteen-year-old mother shoots and kills her nineteen-year-old (and somewhat feckless) father because she hates the names he's devised for their child--she fears they will doom their unborn child to mediocrity. The mother confesses openly to what she has done, and why. She is arrested and thrown into prison, where she gives birth to the child, names her, to everyone's bafflement, Plectrude--an obscure saint, and an albatross of a name--and then hangs herself. The novel therefore begins on the borderline between tragedy and absurdity, but as Plectrude grows--raised by a loving, indulgent, and eccentric aunt--it becomes a deeply moving and simultaneously chilling portrait of girlhood. Plectrude's great gift turns out to be for ballet, and she throws herself into dance as if her life depended upon it. Few novels have shown us the implacable and unforgiving world of ballet with more intuitive sympathy, yet also with a keen-eyed assessment of the true price of artistic perfection.. Inevitably, the doom hovering over Plectrude's life from birth returns to haunt her, and in the end she learns to survive in the only way she knows how--by committing an act of deadly self-preservation her mother would have perhaps understood best. The Book of Proper Names is vintage Amelie Nothomb--alternatively mordant and poignant, a portrait of adolescence that is fierce and funny at the same time. There is nothing mediocre either about Nothomb nor her creations.

Theory and Typology of Proper Names

Theory and Typology of Proper Names PDF Author: Willy Van Langendonck
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter
ISBN: 3110197855
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 397

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Book Description
This book proposes a new synthesis of the functions of proper names, from a semantic, pragmatic and syntactic perspective. Proper names are approached constructionally, distinguishing prototypical uses from more marked ones such as those in which names are used as common nouns. Since what is traditionally regarded as 'the' class of names turns out to be only one possible function of name-forms (though a prototypical one), the notion of 'proprial lemma' is introduced as the concept behind both proprial and appellative uses of such categories as place names and personal names. New formal arguments are adduced to distinguish proper name function from common noun or pronoun function. The special status of proper names is captured in a unified pragmatic-semantic-syntactic theory: a proper name denotes a unique entity at the level of langue to make it psychosocially salient within a given basic level category. The meaning of the name, if any, does not determine its denotation. An important formal reflection of this characterization of names is their ability to appear in such close appositional constructions as the poet Burns or Fido the dog. The neurolinguistic finding that proper names constitute a separate category is introduced and interpreted within a general linguistic frame of reference. The different kinds of meanings associated with names (categorical, associative, emotive, and grammatical) are shown to be presuppositional in nature. In addition, the book proposes an entirely new classification of proper names as forming a continuum ranging from prototypical (personal and place names) to nonprototypical categories (brand and language names) to citations and autonyms, and a new diachronic classification of family names and nicknames. This book fills an important gap in the current literature, because the most recent linguistic book in English on name theory dates back to 1973. It is explicitly interdisciplinary, taking into account linguistic, philosophical, neurolinguistic, sociolinguistic and dialect geographical aspects of proper names.

The Cognitive Psychology of Proper Names

The Cognitive Psychology of Proper Names PDF Author: Serge Bredart
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134779569
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 227

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Book Description
It's on the tip of my tongue, but I can't remember her name." Lots of people have difficulty remembering people's names, even though they can easily recall other information about the person. As memory and retrieval processes are central to cognitive psychology and neuropsychology the study of proper names makes a fascinating and practical focus of study. Using an information processing approach, Valentine, Brennen and Bredart consider evidence from speech production, face recognition and word recognition to develop a new functional model of the production and recognition of people's names. This book will be valuable to all those studying cognitive psychology, cognitive neuropsychology and linguistics. It makes a suitalbe text for higher level undergraduates and postgraduates and those engaged in research.

Proper Names

Proper Names PDF Author: Emmanuel LĂ©vinas
Publisher: Burns & Oates
ISBN:
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 216

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Book Description
"This volume contains Proper Names and its companion piece On Maurice Blanchot. Together they provide and important philosophical consideration of a wide range of modern writers and thinking, including Buber, Derrida, Kierkegaard and Proust."--Book jacket.

Moments Without Proper Names

Moments Without Proper Names PDF Author: Gordon Parks
Publisher: Penguin Putnam
ISBN:
Category : Photography
Languages : en
Pages : 180

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Book Description
This oversized book of photography and verse reflects many aspects of the highly emotional, uncommonly eventful life of the author: the confusion and poverty he experienced as a child growing up in Fort Scott, Kansas; the bigotry, drug addiction, terror, chaos and blatant inhumanity to which he was exposed as a rising journalist and photographer; the beauty and sophistication with which his professional career is associated today.

What's in a Name?

What's in a Name? PDF Author: Eugene Ehrlich
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN: 0805059431
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 252

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Book Description
A fun and informative guide to the how and why of proper names and their haphazard entry into common English language by the author of the bestselling Amo, Amas, Amat and More. Mining the English language to turn up a colorful cast of characters, Eugene Ehrlich finds the historic and literary figures who have given their names to the English language in the interest of keeping it vibrant and their names alive. In What's in a Name? Ehrlich traces the history of eponymous words and their progenitors, illuminating the legacy of Louis Braille, inventor of the system of embossed printing for the blind; the verbal acrobatics of Baron Munchausen; the sadism of the Marquis de Sade; and much more. What's in a Name? will amuse and enlighten word buffs, history lovers, and trivia pursuers alike as Ehrlich, in his inimitable way, uncovers an exhaustive assemblage of characters who have left an indelible mark on the English language.

The Proper Names of the Old Testament Scriptures Expounded and Illustrated

The Proper Names of the Old Testament Scriptures Expounded and Illustrated PDF Author: Alfred Jones
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Bible
Languages : en
Pages : 400

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Book Description


Dictionary of Proper Names and Places in the Bible

Dictionary of Proper Names and Places in the Bible PDF Author: O. Odelain
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780709044000
Category : Christianity
Languages : en
Pages : 479

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Book Description


The Transformation of Biblical Proper Names

The Transformation of Biblical Proper Names PDF Author: Joze Krasovec
Publisher: A&C Black
ISBN: 0567452247
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 168

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Book Description
In the transmission we encounter various transformations of biblical proper names. The basic phonetic relationship between Semitic languages on the one hand and non-Semitic languages, like Greek and Latin, on the other hand, is so complex that it was hardly possible to establish a unified tradition in writing biblical proper names within the Greek and Latin cultures. Since the Greek and Latin alphabets are inadequate for transliteration of Semitic languages, authors of Greek and Latin Bibles were utter grammatical and cultural innovators. In Greek and Latin Bibles we note an almost embarrassing number of phonetic variants of proper names. A survey of ancient Greek and Latin Bible translations allows one to trace the boundary between the phonetic transliterations that are justified within Semitic, Greek, and Latin linguistic rules, and those forms that transgress linguistic rules. The forms of biblical proper names are much more stable and consistent in the Hebrew Bible than in Greek, Latin and other ancient Bible translations. The inexhaustible wealth of variant pronunciations of the same proper names in Greek and Latin translations indicate that Greek and Latin translators and copyists were in general not fluent in Hebrew and did therefore not have sufficient support in a living Hebrew phonetic context. This state affects personal names of rare use to a far greater extent than the geographical names, whose forms are expressed in the oral tradition by a larger circle of the population.

The Theory of Proper Names; a Controversial Essay

The Theory of Proper Names; a Controversial Essay PDF Author: Alan H (Alan Henderson) 1 Gardiner
Publisher: Hassell Street Press
ISBN: 9781013464744
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 96

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Book Description
This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. To ensure a quality reading experience, this work has been proofread and republished using a format that seamlessly blends the original graphical elements with text in an easy-to-read typeface. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.