Proseminar Veranstaltung mit Steuerzeichen im Blob Feld

Proverbs, riddles, and jokes are -simple forms- in the tradition of literary and folklore studies (Jolles 1930). In terms of cultural theory, they are memes, replicators of culture which propagate themselves from brain to brain by imitation (Dawkins 1976). To the linguist, the study of simple forms conveys fundamental insights into the nature of idiomatic and figurative language use, textuality, and creativity. Syntactic, semantic, and pragmatic aspects of simple forms will be studied. The course combines well with last semester’s course on idioms. Idioms are forms of -frozen” figurative language at the level of syntactic phrases, whereas simple forms extend idiomatic language to the levels of texts and dialogues. For graded credits students can chose between a term paper or a final Klausur. The basis of the seminar is a Reader which contains a syllabus, a bibliography (see also the library reserve shelf), a text corpus of riddles, jokes and proverbs, and relevant papers to be studied in class. Copies of the reader can be obtained from the Wiso-Pool A Copy Shop (Nora-Platiel-Str. 6, Monday to Thursday 9-18h, Friday 9-17h). Syllabus: Text Linguistics of Simple Forms: Jokes (J), Riddles (R), and Proverbs (P). – PS Prof. Winfried Nöth Date IT Servicezentrum Uni Kassel SoSe 2010 Hollstein Ute