The aim of this thesis is to study, understand and explain the theories and work of the Canadian psychologist Jordan Peterson, whose controversial statements and lectures have made him a darling of certain factions of the political right, as he portrays himself as an enemy of progressive ideology. With a focus on understanding and explaining Peterson and how he provides meaning to his followers, the study will go through Peterson’s work in his two books Maps of Meaning and 12 Rules for Life in order to analyze their content and the follower’s reaction to the books as well as Peterson’s persona as a whole.   To analyze these works, hermeneutic methods based on the work of finnish theologian Björn Vikström will be utilized. The texts will be analyzed on a textual and intertextual level, but the role of the author as well as the readers will also be put under scrutiny in order to elaborate on many aspects of Peterson’s writing. To analyze how he provides meaning to his followers and the definition of the terms lifestance and meaning, the work of Swedish theologian Carl Reinhold Bråkenhielm will be referenced and compared to Peterson’s work.   While Vikström and Bråkenhielm will be the main sources of intertextual comparison with Jordan Peterson, they will also be supplemented with the work of other established theologians such as Hjalmar Sundén and others to further understand and compare the making of meaning undertaken by Jordan Peterson to other academic studies in the field of making meaning.

This thesis examines the narrative reconstructions taken from extended conversations with 25 bereaved individuals, who volunteered their experiences of losing a loved one. By considering the interaction between self and other to be the source of knowledge, these interview conversations provided a vehicle through which the human encounter with death and loss not only found expression but came into being. Bereavement is approached as a ‘cultural object’, so as to capture prevailing ideas, norms and beliefs about how this should be handled and provide further insight into the place of death in contemporary British Society. Such ‘norms’ are taken to be co-constructed through discursive practice, and continually evolving through negotiation between the individual and social processes. Attention is therefore drawn to the way people use available cultural forms to construct and express meanings that are particular and personal to them. This study demonstrates the value of an interactive approach for gaining a fuller understanding of the complexity of social life, thereby contributing to methodological and ethical debates on the implications of using qualitative, interactive methods, particularly with sensitive topics. It highlights the co-constructed nature of the data and the crucial role of self-reflexivity in managing the emotional impact of the research on the researcher as well as the participants. An analysis of interview narratives has revealed how deceased loved ones retained a significant social presence in the life of survivors regardless of other social factors. It has highlighted the diversity of meanings people gave to their experiences, which convey how bereavement interacted with other agendas and priorities to shape their day to day social life and sense of identity. Such findings revise and extend current understandings of the ‘continuing bonds’ people forge with their dead and the nature of ‘personhood’ in contemporary British society.

There has been a strong advocacy of Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) in China since the 1980s. One underlying assumption behind this approach is that acquisition is a process which depends on conversational interaction (Wagner-Gough & Hatch, 1975). A specific kind of interaction, meaning negotiation, which “includes routines or exchanges that involve indications of non-understandings and subsequent negotiations of meaning” (Gass & Varonis, 1991, p. 127) has long been considered to be a key factor in L2 development research. From the interactionist perspective, the facilitative role of meaning negotiation in L2 learning is that it provides comprehensible input, and elicits corrective feedback, helps learners to produce comprehensible output, and has the potential to draw learners’ attention to non-target-like aspects of language output. However, recognising the growing role of synchronous computer-medicated communication (SCMC) in language learning, how EFL learners negotiate meaning and whether the claim of the interactionist approach still holds true in this new medium needs further investigation. Moreover, considering the complexity of tasks used in eliciting meaning negotiation and the SCMC involved in negotiating meaning, the exclusively cognitive approach applied by previous studies seems insufficient to explain the meaning negotiation elaborated. For instance, considering the Chinese culture of learning, some Chinese students may be reluctant to produce negotiated interaction. Also, little research has been carried out to investigate the effect of social factors, such as the context and relationship between interlocutors, in generating meaning negotiation. Furthermore, there is little conclusive evidence in previous research regarding the effects of tasks on the quality and quantity of meaning negotiation. This case study investigated 48 EFL students studying mechanical engineering in a Chinese university. Using the variationist perspective on the interaction approach, this study aimed to investigate the features of learners’ negotiated interaction during task-based SCMC, and their similarities and differences with face-to-face negotiated interaction, based on the Varonis and Gass model. Moreover, it also investigates the relationship between task (i.e., task type and task content) and meaning negotiation (i.e., quality and quantity), and the perceived benefits and difficulties of the use of paired task-based SCMC interaction. Also, as previous studies have neglected the individual differences and social factors, the last aim was to investigate how the social and cognitive factors were inextricably intertwined by studying the participants’ perceptions and their actual performances. The main results of the study indicate a low ratio of negotiated turns in paired task-based SCMC interaction due both to linguistic and social factors. Moreover, task did have an influence on the meaning negotiation generated. However, the five-task typology (Pica et al., 1993) applied by most previous studies investigating meaning negotiation cannot fully explain the influence of task on meaning negotiation in peer-peer SCMC context. Apart from the two recurrent features in task definitions, “interactional activity” and “communication goal”, “task complexity” and “task difficulty” (Robinson, 2003) are also influential factors. Overall, this study argues that task, SCMC, the relationship between interlocutors and the learners themselves are all factors which can influence learners’ generation of meaning negotiation. Both personal information and learning contexts have the potential to shape not only the quantity and quality of meaning negotiation but also the attention to the interaction and further influence the production of learners’ language.

This thesis investigates language variation among a group of young adults in Beijing, China, with an aim to advance our understanding of social meaning in a language and a society where the topic is understudied. In this thesis, I examine the use of Beijing Mandarin among Beijingborn university students in Beijing in relation to social factors including gender, social class, career plan, and future aspiration. Language variation in this context can further our understanding of Chinese culture in a newlyreformed society while exploring important constructs such as gender and aspiration in China, in part by establishing the social meaning of the local vernacular and its role in identity construction among speakers. The study presents data from both sociolinguistic interviews, conducted with 21 Beijingers who have di erent class backgrounds, career plans, and future aspiration, and self-recordings, from a subset of 10 Beijingers in conversation with their family and/or friends. I focus on three thus far under-examined linguistic variables { neutral tone, classi er omission, and intensi er te { while incorporating an additional variable { erhua (word- nal rhotacisation) in the discussion of stylistic variation in Beijing Mandarin. The results rst provide an overview of language variation in Beijing Mandarin, as shown in the use of di erent features and their linguistic and social constraints. We observe familiar patterns often found in sociolinguistic literature for some social factors (e.g. gender), while more complex interactions exist for others (e.g. aspiration and career path). The ndings suggest that Beijing Mandarin conveys localness and masculinity which is expected for a vernacular variety. Finer distinctions in the social meanings of these variables are found in sub-groups of Beijingers with di erent gender, future career path and/or aspiration. Moreover, speakers are seen to utilise these variables and their meanings in the construction of personae.

This thesis describes a novel methodology, grounded in the distributional semantic paradigm, for building context sensitive models of word meaning, affording an empirical exploration of the relationship between words and concepts. Anchored in theoretical linguistic insight regarding the contextually specified nature of lexical semantics, the work presented here explores a range of techniques for the selection of subspaces of word co-occurrence dimensions based on a statistical analysis of input terms as observed within large-scale textual corpora. The relationships between word-vectors that emerge in the projected subspaces can be analysed in terms of a mapping between their geometric features and their semantic properties. The power of this modelling technique is its ability to generate ad hoc semantic relationships in response to an extemporaneous linguistic or conceptual situation. The product of this approach is a generalisable computational linguistic methodology, capable of taking input in various forms, including word groupings and sentential context, and dynamically generating output from a broad base model of word co-occurrence data. To demonstrate the versatility of the method, this thesis will present competitive empirical results on a range of established natural language tasks including word similarity and relatedness rating, metaphor and metonymy detection, and analogy completion. A range of techniques will be applied in order to explore the ways in which different aspects of projected geometries can be mapped to different semantic relationships, allowing for the discovery of a range of lexical and conceptual properties for any given input and providing a basis for an empirical exploration of distinctions between the semantic phenomena under analysis. The case made here is that the flexibility of these models and their ability to extend output to evaluations of unattested linguistic relationships constitutes the groundwork for a method for the extrapolation of dynamic conceptual relationships from large-scale textual corpora. This method is presented as a complement and a counterpoint to established distributional methods for generating lexically productive word-vectors. Where contemporary vector space models of distributional semantics have almost universally involved either the factorisation of co-occurrence matrices or the incremental learning of abstract representations using neural networks, the approach described in this thesis preserves the connection between the individual dimensions of word-vectors and statistics pertaining to observations in a textual corpus. The hypothesis tested here is that the maintenance of actual, interpretable information about underlying linguistic data allows for the contextual selection of non-normalised subspaces with more nuanced geometric features. In addition to presenting competitive results for various computational linguistic targets, the thesis will suggest that the transparency of its representations indicates scope for the application of this model to various real-world problems where an interpretable relationship between data and output is highly desirable. This, finally, demonstrates a way towards the productive application of the theory and philosophy of language to computational linguistic practice.

My dissertation details what Nietzsche sees as a normative and philosophical crisis that arises in modern society. This crisis involves a growing sense of malaise that leads to large-scale questions about whether life in the modern world can be seen as meaningful and good. I claim that confronting this problem is a central concern throughout Nietzsche’s philosophical career, but that his understanding of this problem and its solution shifts throughout different phases of his thinking. Part of what is unique to Nietzsche’s treatment of this problem is his understanding that attempts to imbue existence with meaning are self-undermining, becoming pathological and only further entrenching the problem. Nietzsche’s solution to this problem ultimately resides in treating meaning as a spiritual need that can only be fulfilled through a creative interpretive process.

As informações que circulam nas mídias produzem significação ao se materializarem como narrativas, constituindo a rede midiática que se perfaz como troca simbólica, ou seja, em um mecanismo de oferta/demanda que se dá de forma indireta. A base da reflexão é o conceito de troca simbólica formulado por Lévi-Strauss, para quem os seres humanos instituem-se como seres culturais pois estabelecem relações mútuas ao comunicarem-se entre si por trocas que só podem ser apreendidas em um processo metafórico/simbólico, e não por relações diretas, de coisas em si mesmas. Trata-se aqui de repensar a questão da informação inserida no panorama midiático atual. Considera-se para isso tanto sua inerente configuração narrativa, quanto sua ordenação significante, tendo como referências teóricas as discussões advindas da área das ciências da linguagem, em especial as contribuições de Jacques Lacan, em psicanálise, e de Claude Lévi- Strauss, em antropologia, além da referência a Ferdinand de Saussure, considerado fundador da lingüística moderna. / The information that goes around in the media produces meaning as it comes together into narratives, composing a media net that constitutes itself as symbolic exchange, an offer/demand mechanism that happens in an indirect way. This reflection is based on the concept of symbolic exchange coined by Lévi-Strauss, according to whom human beings become cultural beings because they establish mutual relations by communicating with one another through exchanges that can only be conceived in a metaphorical/symbolical process, and not through direct relations. The point here is thinking over the matter of information inserted in the current media field, considering both its inherent narrative configuration and its significant ordination. This paper has as theoretical references the contributions from the area of language science, mainly the works of Jacques Lacan, in psychoanalysis, and Claude Lévi-Strauss, in anthropology, besides the reference to Ferdinand de Saussure, considered the creator of modern linguistics.

A teoria semiótica de linha francesa, em seu início, tinha como preocupação maior as questões do inteligível, quando Greimas propôs um percurso gerativo do sentido capaz de dar conta dos diversos sistemas de significação. Entretanto, com o passar do tempo, as questões da ordem do sensível e do afeto se colocaram como um desafio para os analistas e pediram espaço na teoria trazendo textos em que a narrativa não era central. Claude Zilberberg, em especial, é um dos autores que caminha na direção de propor a primazia do sensível em relação ao inteligível com os recursos do que veio a se chamar semiótica tensiva. Acompanhando o movimento feito tanto pela teoria quanto pela literatura, nossa dissertação tem como objeto um romance experimental, Catatau, de Paulo Leminski, que se apresenta como uma obra de difícil acesso devido à sua pouca linearidade narrativa. Nosso intuito é abordar a obra pelo viés da teoria tensiva tentando apontar caminhos possíveis de leitura a partir de estratégias e procedimentos recorrentes no texto. Assim como Zilberberg encontra no modelo saussuriano da silabação um sistema rítmico passível de ser expandido a todos os domínios semióticos, podemos encontrar em um romance como o Catatau células ou elementos que se repetem em determinados intervalos criando uma lei, uma orientação, enfim, um ritmo. É curioso notar, no entanto, que no caso da obra analisada, tal ritmo se mostra mais como um desorganizador da linguagem que como um organizador. Queremos com isso dizer que é a alternância da célula rítmica que provoca no leitor o efeito ininteligibilidade. Evidentemente que há diversos outros recursos, principalmente de nível discursivo, que também reforçam esse efeito, como mostramos ao longo do trabalho. Enxergamos então o romance de Leminski menos como uma narrativa diluída que como o produto de uma vivência, sendo que tal vivência só é possível por meio de um sujeito sensível, afetado pelo que está à sua volta. É nessa linha de abordagem que encontramos os meios para explicitar a construção do sentido do texto, objetivo por excelência da teoria semiótica / In its beginnings, the French semiotic theory had as its major concern the issues of the intelligible, when Greimas proposed a generative path of meaning capable to comprise many systems of meaning. In the course of time, though, the analysts were defied by issues related to sensibility and affection, which claimed for a place in theory, through texts in which narrative was not central. Claude Zilberberg, in particular, is one of the authors who defends the primacy of the sensibility over intelligibility through the features of which came to be called tensive semiotics. Following this movement both through theory and literature, this dissertation chooses as its subject an experimental novel, Paulo Leminskis Catatau, almost considered an unintelligible work due to its non-linear narrative patterns. We aim to approach this novel through the tensive semiotics theory, proposing some ways for its reading based on the texts iterant strategies and procedures. As Zilberberg finds in Saussures syllabic model a rhythmic system which can be expanded to all semiotic domains, we can find in a novel like Catatau cells or elements which repeat in certain intervals, creating a rule, an orientation, a rhythm at least. In Catatau, this rhythm seems much more to disorganize than to organize the language. It means that its the rhythmic cell interchange that leads the reader to that effect of unintelligibility. Of course that there are more features that reinforce this effect within the novel, as we show along our work. That means that we see Leminskis novel less as a diluted narrative and more as the offspring of some experience only made possible if built upon some persons sensibility, affected by his/her surroundings. On this specific approach we find our means to make explicit the building of the text meaning, which is considered the semiotic theory main goal.

To most people, a question like “What colour is the letter A?” may seem nonsensical, but to a grapheme-colour synaesthete, each letter and word has an automatically evoked colour sensation associated with it. This thesis asks whether the synaesthetic colours for letters and words are shaped by the same influences that inform the typical use of language – that is, if grapheme-colour synaesthesia is fundamentally psycholinguistic in nature. If this is the case, the colour experiences of synaesthetes for letters and words can also be used to investigate long-standing questions about how language acquisition and processing work for everyone. This thesis addresses two aspects of the psycholinguistic roots of synaesthesia: structure/morphology and meaning/semantics. The first two studies on word structure collected colour responses from synaesthetes for compound words (e.g. rainbow), the constituent morphemes of those words separately (e.g. rain and bow), and the letters that in turn form those words (e.g. R, A, B, etc.). These studies showed that synaesthetic word colouring does indeed encode linguistic properties such as word frequency and morphological structure. Furthermore, both linguistic and colour elements of words were important in determining their synaesthetic colour. The second two studies turned to the semantic aspect of language, asking how the meanings associated with words (e.g. red, fire) and even individual letters (e.g. A, Q) can influence the colours that a synaesthete experiences for them. The first of these studies indicated that the synaesthetic colour for a word like red or fire was measurably influenced by the colour that word typically evokes (e.g. the red of red and the orange of fire). The second showed that trends in letter-colour associations in large-scale studies (e.g. A is typically red) may be rooted in connections to particular words (e.g. A is red because A is for apple and apples are red). Overall, this thesis shows that both word structure and meaning have a systematic, measureable effect on synaesthetic colour, which allows these colours to then be used as a new tool to investigate psycholinguistic questions.

The major objective of this thesis is to provide an alternative to the predominant model of the Western urban home, arguing that it is more detrimental than beneficial to its inhabitants. In order to achieve this, it first explores the development of home through a genealogical analysis. It then considers the concepts with which it is traditionally connected, such as those of identity, safety, privacy and satisfaction, supporting that the idealised home hides numerous issues of concern (e.g. class and sex inequalities, physical and psychological violence). In order to form a more comprehensive picture, the thesis draws on different philosophical approaches discussing the idea of home, while it explores a variety of contemporary habitation and home-making practices (e.g. smart and second homes, new technologies inside the house, home and consumerism). The normative and overly-idealised domestic model, promoted in Western urban societies, is presented as detrimental both on a personal and on a social level. Therefore, alternatives are explored in Adorno's 'Hotel Room', Jameson's 'Dirty Realism' and Deleuze and Guattari's 'Nomadology'. The lack of viability characterising the abovementioned proposals leads to the examination of the Deleuzoguattarian concept of the Body without Organs; the home as a BwO provides the contemporary agents with the tools to reconstruct an autonomous space where they can recreate their personal discourse and influence the social ground accordingly. Through the analysis of home this thesis explores how and why it has been appropriated by systemic forces and highlights a very serious issue: the fact that our personal space is no longer personal. Simultaneously, a common concern of feminist and post-structuralist background is addressed regarding the process of selfredefinition and the ways to approach it. The response entails a reconstructed autonomous home with a respective influence on the public sphere.