This book proposes a new synthesis of the functions of proper names, from a semantic, pragmatic and syntactic perspective. Proper names are approached constructionally, distinguishing prototypical uses from more marked ones such as those in which names are used as common nouns. Since what is traditionally regarded as 'the' class of names turns out to be only one possible function of name-forms (though a prototypical one), the notion of 'proprial lemma' is introduced as the concept behind both proprial and appellative uses of such categories as place names and personal names. New formal arguments are adduced to distinguish proper name function from common noun or pronoun function. The special status of proper names is captured in a unified pragmatic-semantic-syntactic theory: a proper name denotes a unique entity at the level of langue to make it psychosocially salient within a given basic level category. The meaning of the name, if any, does not determine its denotation. An important formal reflection of this characterization of names is their ability to appear in such close appositional constructions as the poet Burns or Fido the dog. The neurolinguistic finding that proper names constitute a separate category is introduced and interpreted within a general linguistic frame of reference. The different kinds of meanings associated with names (categorical, associative, emotive, and grammatical) are shown to be presuppositional in nature. In addition, the book proposes an entirely new classification of proper names as forming a continuum ranging from prototypical (personal and place names) to nonprototypical categories (brand and language names) to citations and autonyms, and a new diachronic classification of family names and nicknames. This book fills an important gap in the current literature, because the most recent linguistic book in English on name theory dates back to 1973. It is explicitly interdisciplinary, taking into account linguistic, philosophical, neurolinguistic, sociolinguistic and dialect geographical aspects of proper names.

This book proposes a new synthesis of the functions of proper names, from a semantic, pragmatic and syntactic perspective. Proper names are approached constructionally, distinguishing prototypical uses from more marked ones such as those in which names are used as common nouns. Since what is traditionally regarded as 'the' class of names turns out to be only one possible function of name-forms (though a prototypical one), the notion of 'proprial lemma' is introduced as the concept behind both proprial and appellative uses of such categories as place names and personal names. New formal arguments are adduced to distinguish proper name function from common noun or pronoun function. The special status of proper names is captured in a unified pragmatic-semantic-syntactic theory: a proper name denotes a unique entity at the level of langue to make it psychosocially salient within a given basic level category. The meaning of the name, if any, does not determine its denotation. An important formal reflection of this characterization of names is their ability to appear in such close appositional constructions as the poet Burns or Fido the dog. The neurolinguistic finding that proper names constitute a separate category is introduced and interpreted within a general linguistic frame of reference. The different kinds of meanings associated with names (categorical, associative, emotive, and grammatical) are shown to be presuppositional in nature. In addition, the book proposes an entirely new classification of proper names as forming a continuum ranging from prototypical (personal and place names) to nonprototypical categories (brand and language names) to citations and autonyms, and a new diachronic classification of family names and nicknames. This book fills an important gap in the current literature, because the most recent linguistic book in English on name theory dates back to 1973. It is explicitly interdisciplinary, taking into account linguistic, philosophical, neurolinguistic, sociolinguistic and dialect geographical aspects of proper names.

Recent research has shown that proper names morphosyntactically differ from common nouns in many ways. However, little is known about the morphological and syntactic/distributional differences between proper names and common nouns in less known (Non)-Indo-European languages. This volume brings together contributions which explore morphosyntactic phenomena such as case marking, gender assignment rules, definiteness marking, and possessive constructions from a synchronic, diachronic, and typological perspective. The languages surveyed include Austronesian languages, Basque, English, German, Hebrew, and Romance languages. The volume contributes to a better understanding not only of the contrasts between proper names and common nouns, but also of formal contrasts between different proper name classes such as personal names, place names, and others.

In this handbook, scholars from around the world offer an up-to-date account of the state of the art in different areas of onomastics, in a format that is both useful to specialists in related fields and accessible to the general reader. Since Ancient Greece, names have been regarded as central to the study of language, and this has continued to be a major theme of both philosophical and linguistic enquiry throughout the history of Western thought. The investigation of name origins is more recent, as is the study of names in literature. Relatively new is the study of names in society, which draws on techniques from sociolinguistics and has gradually been gathering momentum over the last few decades. The structure of this volume reflects the emergence of the main branches of name studies, in roughly chronological order. The first Part focuses on name theory and outlines key issues about the role of names in language, focusing on grammar, meaning, and discourse. Parts II and III deal with the study of place-names and personal names respectively, while Part IV outlines contrasting approaches to the study of names in literature, with case studies from different languages and time periods. Part V explores the field of socio-onomastics, with chapters relating to the names of people, places, and commercial products. Part VI then examines the interdisciplinary nature of name studies, before the concluding Part presents a selection of animate and inanimate referents ranging from aircraft to animals, and explains the naming strategies adopted for them.

For the first time, proper names are made the topic of a cross-linguistic account of morphosyntactic properties which formally distinguish place names, personal names, and common nouns. It is shown that the behaviour of place names and personal names in morphology and syntax frequently disagrees with the rules established for other word classes independent of the language’s genetic affiliation, grammatical structure, and geographic location. Place names and personal names each boast a grammar of their own. They are candidates for the status of a distinct word class. Their special grammar comes frequently to the fore in the domain of spatial and possessive relations. This fact is explained with reference to functional notions.

The book studies general name theoretical questions and universal features of personal name giving and also provides a description of the personal name system of the medieval Kingdom of Hungary. The chapters on name theory introduce a cognitive-pragmatic model that is suitable for the characterization of the anthroponym system of any language in any of its historical eras. In the chapters discussing the features of old Hungarian personal name giving and usage we can find a specific application of the theoretical model. The medieval Carpathian Basin provides an excellent opportunity for such an analysis for several reasons. On the one hand because this region was at the crossroads of languages and cultures in the Middle Ages and this also clearly influenced its anthroponym systems. On the other hand, the time period under scrutiny, the Middle Ages (and more precisely the Old Hungarian Era between 895 and 1526) witnessed the restructuring of the name system on multiple levels, including the appearance and ensuing dominance of personal names of a Latin origin as a result of the country becoming a Christian nation and the emergence of family names as a new personal name category. The book also provides a detailed overview of the historical process in which personal name categories and personal name types were built and relied on one another. Dieses Buch behandelt einerseits allgemeine namenstheoretische Fragen und universelle Charakteristika der Personennamengebung und Personennamenverwendung, andererseits bietet es eine Beschreibung des Personennamensystems des Ungarischen Königreichs im Mittelalter. In den namenstheoretischen Kapiteln wird ein kognitiv-pragmatisches Beschreibungsmodell vorgestellt, das für die Darstellung des Personennamensystems jedweder Sprache in all ihrer Epochen geeignet ist. In den weiteren Kapiteln zu den Besonderheiten der alten ungarischen Personennamengebung und Personennamenverwendung ist die konkrete Anwendung des Beschreibungsmodells zu finden. Das mittelalterliche Karpatenbecken bietet für eine solche Analyse ein ausgezeichnetes Untersuchungsfeld. Zum einen galt diese Region als Sammelstelle von Sprachen und Kulturen im Mittelalter, was natürlich auch in den Personennamensystemen seine Spur hinterlassen hat, zum anderen ist die untersuchte Epoche, das Mittelalter (genauer die sogenannte altungarische Zeit, 895–1526) als das Zeitalter zu betrachten, in dem die Restrukturierung des Namensystems auf mehreren Ebenen zu sehen ist: Die Erscheinung und das rasche Dominantwerden der Personennamen lateinischen Ursprungs als Ergebnis der Einbindung in den christlichen Kulturkreis ist als einer dieser Prozesse anzusehen, während die andere große Veränderung die Entstehung der Familiennamen als neuer Personennamentyp darstellt. Im Buch wird auch der historische Prozess der Aufeinanderschichtung der Personennamenkategorien und Personennamentypen detailliert vorgestellt.

"In Toponymy on the Periphery, Julien Charles Cooper conducts a study of the rich geographies preserved in Egyptian texts relating to the desert regions east of Egypt. These regions, filled with mines, quarries, nomadic camps, and harbours are often considered as an unimportant hinterland of the Egyptian state, but this work reveals the wide explorations and awareness Egyptians had of the Red Sea and its adjacent deserts, from the Sinai in the north to Punt in the south. The book attempts to locate many of the placenames present in Egyptian texts and analyse their etymology in light of Egyptian linguistics and the various foreign languages spoken in the adjacent deserts and distant shores of the Red Sea"--

This book is a linguistic research study of trade names, especially names of firms (in the production and services sector), shops, eating/drinking houses and accommodation locations. It identifies and analyses the onomastic behaviour characteristic of the field of trades in contemporary Romanian public space, in addition to delineating a representative naming pattern for every subcategory of commercial onomastics investigated, according to three coordinates: (1) lexical and grammatical structure, (2) semantics (pointing out different levels of meaning), and (3) language preference. Methodologically, this book relies on the theoretical configuration provided by onomastics, functional, cognitive and generative grammar, semiotics (in the interpretation of trade names as iconic, indexical and symbolic signs), and pragmatics (observing that trade names underlie speech acts). Moreover, the study also refers to psycholinguistics, underlining the cognitive and affective mechanisms that are involved in the creation and use of trade names. The way in which commercial designations behave in society (especially how they contribute to the characterisation of a community both linguistically and culturally) is analysed using the tools of sociolinguistics. From the same point of view, the current context of trade names is also described, with reference to the influence of the English language and the American sociocultural mindset (as instruments of globalisation) on the Romanian language and culture, and particularly on the unprecedented development of commercial onomastics. The methodology employed in this book furthermore includes theoretical precepts specific to linguistic polyphony, emphasising the similarity between trade names and unconventional anthroponyms (particularly nicknames and virtual names). Postcolonial studies, and post-communist studies, as a branch of this field of research, also play a role here. Finally, the reference to translation studies is made in order to be able to define trade names as cultural mediators in contemporary Romanian public space.

Onomastics in Contemporary Public Space aims at analysing names and name-giving from an intercultural perspective, within the context of contemporary public space. As was the case of Name and Naming: Synchronic and Diachronic Perspectives (Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2012), the geographical areas investigated in the studies included in this volume are very diverse, referring not only to European cultural space, but also to American, Asian, African and Australian contexts. Being a collective work, the book brings together 49 specialists from 18 countries; namely Australia, Belgium, Finland, France, Germany, Israel, Italy, Japan, Malta, the Netherlands, Poland, Romania, Russia, Singapore, South Africa, Spain, the United Kingdom and the USA. Thematically, the volume is organised so that it may cover all the dimensions of public space, as far as onomastics is concerned. The specific areas studied are: the theory of names; names of public places (linguistic landscapes); names of public, economic, cultural, religious and sports institutions (names of business establishments, religious institutions – places of worship – and cultural associations, as well as names in journals and magazines); names of objects/entities resulting from various processes in public space (names of foods, drinks and food brands, code names of collaborators in secret service organisations, names in literature, nicknames/bynames/pseudonyms in the world of politics, high life, art and sport, names in virtual space, and zoonyms); and miscellanea. The originality and topicality of the subject lie in the multidisciplinary viewpoint adopted in the research, in which onomastics merges with adjacent linguistic disciplines, such as sociolinguistics, psycholinguistics and pragmatics, as well as other sciences, such as history, literature, anthropology, politics, economy and religion.