Semantics and Cognition

This book emphasizes the role of semantics as a bridge between the theory of language and the theories of other cognitive capacities such as visual perception and motor control. It develops the position that the study of semantics of natural language is the study of the structure of thought, and that grammatical structure offers a much more important source of evidence for the theory of cognition than is often supposed by linguists, philosophers, psychologists, or computer scientists.

Ray Jackendoff is Professor of Linguistics and Chairman of the Linguistics and Cognitive Science Program at Brandeis University. His most recent book, coauthored with Fred Lerdahl, is A Generative Theory of Tonal Music (MIT Press paperback). Semantics and Cognition is included in the series, Current Studies in Linguistics.