Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

"Its publication should be a major event for cognitive linguistics and should pose a major challenge for cognitive science. In addition, it should have repercussions in a variety of disciplines, ranging from anthropology and psychology to epistemology and the philosophy of science. . . . Lakoff asks: What do categories of language and thought reveal about the human mind? Offering both general theory and minute details, Lakoff shows that categories reveal a great deal."--David E. Leary, American Scientist

Table of contents provided by Syndetics

• Acknowledgments
• Preface
• Book I The Mind beyond the Machine
• Part I Categories and Cognitive Models
• 1 The Importance of Categorization
• 2 From Wittgenstein to Rosch
• 3 Prototype Effects in Language
• 4 Idealized Cognitive Models
• 5 Metonymic Models
• 6 Radical Categories
• 7 Features, Stereotypes, and Defaults
• 8 More about Cognitive Models
• 9 Defenders of the Classical View
• 10 Review
• Part II Philosophical Implications
• 11 The Objectivist Paradigm
• 12 What's Wrong with Objectivist Metaphysics
• 13 What's Wrong with Objectivist Cognition
• 14 The Formalist Enterprise
• 15 Putnam's Theorem
• 16 A New Realism
• 17 Cognitive Semantics
• 18 Whorf and Relativism
• 19 The Mind-As-Machine Paradigm
• 20 Mathematics as a Cognitive Activity
• 21 Overview
• Book II Case Studies
• Introduction
• 1 Anger
• 2 Over
• 3 There-Constructions
• Afterword
• References
• Name Index
• Subject Index

Reviews provided by Syndetics

Library Journal Review

Lakoff reviews a wide range of studies in ``cognitive semantics,'' a new field that attempts to understand mind through empirical studies of the way people categorize. He provides several detailed conceptual ``case studies,'' which aptly bring out the richness of the English language, and Whorfian-type examinations of the way different cultures view the world as exemplified in their language (the book's title derives from a classification in Dyirbal, an aboriginal language of Australia). Though this new ``science'' is supposed to yield insights more accurate and useful than traditional (i.e., ``non-empirical'') philosophy, the approach to philosophy here is superficial. For academic linguistics collections. Leon H. Brody, U.S. Office of Personnel Management Lib., Washington, D.C. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

CHOICE Review

First: Ignore the intriguing/puzzling title; second: read the subtitle; third: order this book immediately. The latest offering from one of the foremost linguists of our time should not be missing from any library that claims to have holdings in the humanities, cognitive science, or education. Not only is the work presented here an impressive intellectual contribution in its own right, but its integration of linguistic, anthropological, psychological, and philosophical views of meaning and categorization promise to make it a classic. Lakoff does a superb job of making all of this comprehensible-with frequent definitions, summaries, and reviews. The usual University of Chicago Press fine production. Have you ordered yet? Recommended for all academic levels.-M. Marschark, University of North Carolina at Greensboro