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Tables of Semantic Primes

Here are a selection of Tables of Semantic Primes in various languages. The final document describes three different formats for such tables.

Chart of NSM Semantic Primes

This is a revised and updated version of a Chart first published in 2010. It displays English versions of semantic primes and some of their combinatorial possibilities. It is highly recommended that you print this document on A3 paper.

Chart of NSM Semantic Primes (PDF 167k)

Chart of NSM Semantic Primes (French version)

Tableau des primitifs sémantiques de la Métalangue Sémantique Naturelle

Goddard, Cliff & Junker, Marie-Odile (2015), Tableau des primitifs sémantiques de la Métalangue Sémantique Naturelle (PDF 173k)

Here are some "release notes" about the French chart.

Junker, Marie-Odile. (2015) The Chart of French NSM Semantic Primes (PDF 93k)

List of 150 NSM Canonical Sentences

This is an updated version of a list published in 2014 in the journal Studies in Language.

List of 150 NSM Canonical Sentences (PDF 127k)

Downloadable NSM references

List A: Overview, theory, methodology

2010. Cliff Goddard. The Natural Semantic Metalanguage approach (PDF 1.3mb). In Bernd Heine and Heiko Narrog (eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Linguistic Analaysis. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 459-484.
Mental lexicon (PDF 338k). Anna Wierzbicka. In Tilman Berger, Karl Gutschmidt, Sebastian Kempgen and Peter Kosta (eds), The Slavic Languages: An international handbook of their history, their structure and their investigation. [HSK]. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.(Handbücher zur Sprach- und Kommunikationswissenschaft. Handbook of Linguistics and Communication Science.)
'Thinking' across languages and cultures: Six dimensions of variation (PDF 596k). Cliff Goddard. 2003.Cognitive Linguistics 14(2/3), 109-140.
Cliff Goddard. 2003. Whorf meets Wierzbicka: Variations and universals in language and thinking.Language Sciences 25(4), 393-432.
The search for the shared semantic core of all languages (PDF 130k). Cliff Goddard. 2002. In Cliff Goddard (ed.), Meaning and Universal Grammar – Theory and Empirical Findings. Volume 1. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Ch 1, 5-40.
The On-going Development of the NSM Research Program (PDF 68k). Cliff Goddard. 2002. In Cliff Goddard (ed.), Meaning and Universal Grammar – Theory and Empirical Findings. Volume II. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Ch 5, 301-321.
Bad arguments against semantic primitives (PDF 84k). Cliff Goddard. 1998. Theoretical Linguistics24(2/3), 129-156.

List B: Lexical semantics in English and across languages and cultures

2011. Anna Wierzbicka. The common language of all people: The innate language of thought. (The International Dobrushin Prize) (PDF 1.1 mb). Problems of Information Transmission. Vol. 47. No. 4. 378-397.
2010. Cliff Goddard. A piece of cheese, a grain of sand: the semantics of mass nouns and unitizers. In Pelletier, Francis Jeffry (ed.), Kinds, Things and Stuff. Mass Terms and Generics. New York: Oxford University Press. 132-165.
2008. Cliff Goddard and Anna Wierzbicka. Universal human concepts as a basis for contrastive linguistic semantics. In Current Trends in Contrastive Linguistics: Functional and Cognitive Perspectives, edited by María de los Ángeles Gómez-González, Lachlan Mackenzie, and Elsa Gonzáles Álvarez. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. 205-226.
2007. Cliff Goddard. A “lexicographic portrait” of forgetting. In The Language of Memory in a Cross-Linguistic Perspective. Edited by Mengistu Amberber. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. 119–137.
2000. Cliff Goddard. Polysemy: A Problem of Definition. In Polysemy: Theoretical and Computational Approaches. Edited by Yael Ravin and Claudia Leacock. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 129-151.
Introduction (PDF 1mb). Anna Wierzbicka. 1997. Understanding Cultures Through Their Key Words: English, Russian, Polish, German, and Japanese. New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 1-33.
Semantics and lexicography (PDF 461k). Anna Wierzbicka. 1996. Semantics: Primes and Universals. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Ch 9, 259-286.

List C: Ethnopragmatics, Cultural scripts

Cultural scripts: applications to language teaching and intercultural communication (PDF 543k). Cliff Goddard. 2010. Studies in Pragmatics 3, 105–119.
Ethnopragmatics: A new paradigm (PDF 437k). Cliff Goddard. 2006. In Cliff Goddard (ed.),Ethnopragmatics: Understanding Discourse in Cultural Context. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. 1-30.
The ethnopragmatics and semantics of "active metaphor" (PDF 106k). Cliff Goddard. 2004. Journal of Pragmatics 36, 1211-1230.
Russian cultural scripts: The theory of cultural scripts and its applications (PDF 164k). Wierzbicka, Anna. 2002. Ethos 30(4), 401-432.
Discourse and Culture (PDF 135k). Cliff Goddard and Anna Wierzbicka. 1997. In Teun A. van Dijk (ed.),Discourse as Social Interaction. London: Sage Publications, 231-259.

List D: Applications and extensions

Goddard, Cliff and Wierzbicka, Anna. 2015. Global English, Minimal English: Towards better intercultural communication (PDF 180k). Position statement prepared for a Symposium to be held at ANU, Canberra, 2-3 July, 2015.
Semantic primes and cultural scripts in language learning and intercultural communication (PDF 428k). Cliff Goddard and Anna Wierzbicka. 2007. In Gary Palmer and Farzad Sharifian (eds.), Applied Cultural Linguistics: Implications fro second language learning and intercultural communication. Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 105-124.
Cliff Goddard. 2004. The ethnopragmatics and semantics of 'active metaphors' (PDF 106k). Journal of Pragmatics 36, 1211-1230.
The semantics of metaphor and parable: Looking for meaning in the Gospels (PDF 61k). Anna Wierzbicka. 2002. Theoria et Historia Scientiarum IV(1), 85-106. (Special issue on metaphor, edited by Tomasz Komendzinski.)
Cliff Goddard. 2001. Conceptual primes in early language development (PDF 2.3mb). In Applied Cognitive Linguistics I: Theory and Language Acquisition. Edited by Martin Putz, Susanne Niemeier and Rene Dirven. Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter. 193-227.
The double life of a bilingual: A cross-cultural perspective (PDF 65k). Anna Wierzbicka. 1997. In Michael Bond (ed.), Working at the Interface of Culture: Eighteen lives in social science. London: Routledge, 113-125.