From the linguistic sign to cultural models

An argument is made for a holistic (integrated) approach to language, culture, and cognition. The two aspects of Saussure’s model of the linguistic sign, form and meaning, are viewed as inherently integrated and only dissociated for analytical convenience. The discussion moves on to Ogden and Richards’ semiotic triangle, which is expanded into a trapezium to accommodate Jackendoff’s notion of the experienced world . A metonymic and holistic view of the trapezium leads one to the notion of languaculture in that the use of linguistic form activates the whole trapezium, including its cultural aspects. Finally, a discussion is offered of cultural models as configurations of experience within the languacultural domain.