Edited by Sonia Zyngier, Marisa Bortolussi, Anna Chesnokova and Jan Auracher
Directions in Empirical Literary Studies is on the cutting edge of empirical studies and is a much needed volume. It both widens the scope of empirical studies and looks at them from an intercultural perspective by bringing together renowned scholars from the fields of philosophy, sociology,… read more
This study aimed to test sound-meaning relations in Japanese poetry. To this end, participants assessed the sentiments expressed in a random selection of Tanka (a specific form of Japanese poetry) on six bipolar scales comprising Evaluation (emotional valence), Potency (dominance), and Activity… read more
In the current study, we explored the hypothesis that the level of language concreteness influences readers’ emotional involvement and, thus, fosters the evocation of suspense. To this end, 141 suspenseful texts with comparable content were assessed altogether by 1226 participants on items… read more
This paper reports results from an empirical study in synaesthetic sound iconicity, a specific form of phonosemantics defined as implicit and systematic associations of acoustic features of phonemes with non-acoustic phenomena. I argue that acoustic features of phonemes are implicitly associated… read more
North Korea is considered by westerners to be a dangerous and unpredictable country and its leader, Kim Jong II, a mad dictator. After its nuclear test in October 2006, nervousness reached a new critical point. Yet first impressions gathered after this test showed that perceptions of this “rogue… read more
