Marcel Danesi

This book gives a general overview of Artificial Intelligence as it is impacting on the world of the arts and culture. What is AI-generated pop culture? What does a movie, a musical work, a novel, or song created entirely by a generative AI imply in terms of our notions of creativity? What is the semiotic dynamic (the meaning-making impulse that humans imprint in sign and textual forms) that is involved in an AI-produced work? No comprehensive treatment exists of the profound implications that AI-generated pop culture entails, including how it might affect cultural evolution and how we interpret artistic artifacts. Such a treatment is critical at this moment, and this book aims to fill this gap.

Demonstrating how semiotic theory and method can be applied to decoding false representations and dangerous discourses, this book explores how semiotics can be used as a potentially powerful science of conscience. Confronting the sometimes negative perception of semiotics as academically inward-looking and lacking in morality, Marcel Danesi turns this view on its head. Instead, Danesi highlights how the same techniques that have allowed the use of semiotics for self-serving commercial purposes, such as advertising or marketing, could also be applied to deciphering current world problems. Through describing the semiotic notions and methods that can be used to analyze misrepresentations, propaganda, or meaning collapses, the book enables readers to become conscientiously aware of their hidden meanings and the harmful effects that they have on society. Identifying key issues of concern, such as climate change and anti-science discourses, it shows how they can be interpreted in terms of basic semiotic theory. This analysis of crucial issues demonstrates how semiotics can be used to raise awareness of critically important matters in modern society, and to encourage the development of more robust and ethical attitudes towards them.

All the skill-building Italian language practice you need—with five books in one value-packed volume—plus support from the McGraw Hill Language Lab appThe most effective way to learn any new language is to practice, practice, and practice, and no other workbooks put as much emphasis on this as the Practice Makes Perfect series. In Practice Makes Perfect: Complete Italian All-in-One, you get five skill-building titles to help you build a solid foundation of verbs, vocabulary, grammar and conversational skills—all in one value-packed workbook.This easy-to-use, one-stop resource includes thorough explanations that are reinforced by hundreds of hands-on practice exercises to help you build the skills needed to break through the barrier to competency and fluency in Italian. Enhanced with a comprehensive index that makes it easy to reference all grammar explanations throughout the book, it's an ideal resource for both advanced beginning and intermediate level learning. This Premium Edition also includes extensive support through McGraw Hill’s unique Language Learning app, featuring streaming audio recordings of 48 dialogues and the answers to 85 exercises, a helpful "record yourself" feature and much more.Value-packed volume contains core content from five titles in the series: Complete Italian Grammar; Italian Conversation; Italian Verb Tenses; Italian Sentence Builder; Italian Problem SolverIntegrated approach allows you to study and develop your language skills at your own level and paceThis edition is supported by the McGraw Hill Language Lab app, with streaming audio recordings to enhance speaking and listening skills, and online flashcards for all vocabulary lists—now with Text-to-Speech pronunciation guidance

All the practice and instruction you need to communicate effectively in Italian—now with an enhanced app featuring text-to-speech!If you are a beginner to intermediate Italian language learner, getting a handle on grammar is your key to communicating correctly and effectively. In Practice Makes Perfect: Complete Italian Grammar, you'll find tons of practice and everything else you need—instruction, clear explanations, and comparisons to English grammar—to build your knowledge and communicate more effectively in Italian.Based on the successful approach of the Practice Makes Perfect series, Complete Italian Grammar, Premium Fourth Edition covers all aspects of Italian grammar you'll need to master, from all the key verb tenses to noun, adjective, pronoun, and preposition usage. Crystal-clear explanations, realistic examples and extensive array of engaging exercises help you focus your efforts on the practical aspects of communicating in Italian. With an additional boost from the high-frequency vocabulary used throughout the book and an answer key for reference and quick feedback, Practice Makes Perfect: Complete Italian Grammar is the best, most indispensable workbook to help you upgrade your command of the language.

This book treats eighteenth-century Italian philosopher Giambattista Vico’s theory of poetic logic for the first time as the originating force in mathematics, transforming instinctive counting and spatial perception into poetic (metaphorical) symbolism that dovetails with the origin of language. It looks at current work on mathematical cognition (from Lakoff and Núñez to Butterworth, Dehaene, and beyond), matching it against the poetic logic paradigm. In a sense, it continues from where Kasner and Newman left off, connecting contemporary research on the mathematical mind to the idea that the products of early mathematics were virtually identical to the first forms of poetic language. As such, this book informs the current research on mathematical cognition from a different angle, by looking back at a still relatively unknown philosopher within mathematics.The aim of this volume is to look broadly at what constitutes the mathematical mind through the Vichian lens of poetic logic. Vico was among the first to suggest that the essential nature of mind could be unraveled indirectly by reconstructing the sources of its “modifications” (his term for “creations”); that is, by examining the creation and function of symbols, words, and all the other uniquely human artifacts—including mathematics—the mind has allowed humans to establish “the world of civil society,” Vico’s term for culture and civilization.The book is of interest to cognitive scientists working on math cognition. It presents the theory of poetic logic as Vico articulated it in his book The New Science, examining its main premises and then applying it to an interpretation of the ongoing work in math cognition. It will also be of interest to the general public, since it presents a history of early mathematics through the lens of an idea that has borne fruit in understanding the origin of language and symbols more broadly.

Politics, Lies and Conspiracy Theories: A Cognitive Linguistic Perspective shows how language influences mechanisms of cognition, perception, and belief, and by extension its power to manipulate thoughts and beliefs. This exciting and original work is the first to apply cognitive linguistics to the analysis of political lies and conspiracy theories, both of which have flourished in the internet age and which many argue are threatening democracy. It unravels the verbal mechanisms that make these "different truths" so effective and proliferative, dissecting the verbal structures (metaphor, irony, connotative implications, etc.) of a variety of real-life cases concerning politicians, conspiracy theorists, and influencers. Marcel Danesi goes on to demonstrate how these linguistic structures "switch on" or "switch off" alternative mind worlds. This book is essential reading for students of cognitive linguistics and will enrich the studies of any student or researcher in language and linguistics more broadly, as well as discourse analysis, rhetoric, or political science.

Politics, Lies and Conspiracy Theories: A Cognitive Linguistic Perspective shows how language influences mechanisms of cognition, perception, and belief, and by extension its power to manipulate thoughts and beliefs. This exciting and original work is the first to apply cognitive linguistics to the analysis of political lies and conspiracy theories, both of which have flourished in the internet age and which many argue are threatening democracy. It unravels the verbal mechanisms that make these "different truths" so effective and proliferative, dissecting the verbal structures (metaphor, irony, connotative implications, etc.) of a variety of real-life cases concerning politicians, conspiracy theorists, and influencers. Marcel Danesi goes on to demonstrate how these linguistic structures "switch on" or "switch off" alternative mind worlds. This book is essential reading for students of cognitive linguistics and will enrich the studies of any student or researcher in language and linguistics more broadly, as well as discourse analysis, rhetoric, or political science.

This book explores how organized crime has adapted and evolved in sync with ever-expanding technologies to update its popular image and to conduct its covert operations. It shows how organized crime operates in dark virtual spaces and how it can now form a dynamic interactive system with legitimate online spaces, solidifying its criminal exploits and resources, and making them attractive to a new generation of computer users. Focusing on Italian Mafias, Russian and Georgian criminal groups and drug cartels, and Asian crime syndicates such as Yakuza and Triads, this book aims to describe and explain the reasons behind the continuity of online and offline crime, taking into consideration whether or not internet culture has radically changed the way we perceive organized crime and if so how, and thus how the shift in popular imagery that the internet has brought about affects its actual illegal activities. We also consider how organized crime has shifted its locale from the physical to the virtual, how cybercrime has allowed criminal organizations to adapt and reinvent themselves, and how the police now use technology against organized crime.To better understand the new generation of criminals, it is becoming increasingly urgent to understand the latest technologies and how criminals utilize them. The Dark Mafia is an engaging and accessible introduction to understanding virtual organized crime. It will appeal to students and scholars of criminology, sociology, policing, and all those interested in the digital age of organized crime.

This book explores how organized crime has adapted and evolved in sync with ever-expanding technologies to update its popular image and to conduct its covert operations. It shows how organized crime operates in dark virtual spaces and how it can now form a dynamic interactive system with legitimate online spaces, solidifying its criminal exploits and resources, and making them attractive to a new generation of computer users. Focusing on Italian Mafias, Russian and Georgian criminal groups and drug cartels, and Asian crime syndicates such as Yakuza and Triads, this book aims to describe and explain the reasons behind the continuity of online and offline crime, taking into consideration whether or not internet culture has radically changed the way we perceive organized crime and if so how, and thus how the shift in popular imagery that the internet has brought about affects its actual illegal activities. We also consider how organized crime has shifted its locale from the physical to the virtual, how cybercrime has allowed criminal organizations to adapt and reinvent themselves, and how the police now use technology against organized crime.To better understand the new generation of criminals, it is becoming increasingly urgent to understand the latest technologies and how criminals utilize them. The Dark Mafia is an engaging and accessible introduction to understanding virtual organized crime. It will appeal to students and scholars of criminology, sociology, policing, and all those interested in the digital age of organized crime.

The fifth edition of Marcel Danesi’s Popular Culture is an accessible, engaging introduction for popular culture, media and society, and sociology of the media courses.The fifth edition features updated coverage on social media and digital cultures, including those surrounding memes, video games, virtual reality, and streaming services.Pop culture surrounds us. It infuses the movies we watch, the music we listen to, the books we read, the clothes we wear, and the food we eat. It comes to us on our televisions, phones, computers, radio, and in every storefront and billboard we pass on the street. Danesi delves into the social structures that create and promote pop culture, showing how it validates our common experiences. Offering a variety of perspectives on its many modes of creations and delivery, Danesi shows why pop culture will always be something we love to hate and hate to love.

Learn to speak Italian as fluently as Italians do—an indispensable guide, now with a timely new chapter on remote communicationWhether you're learning Italian now at an intermediate level or looking to brush up on your Italian conversational skills, Practice Makes Perfect: Italian Conversation offers a unique and effective way to learn to speak the language fluently and spontaneously. You'll get a handle on sentence building right away, through extensive exercises that let you practice what you've learned through engaging dialogues and numerous real-life examples.Based on the successful approach of the Practice Makes Perfect series, Practice Makes Perfect: Italian Conversation, Premium Third Edition is organized around 11 units that present specific conversational functions, from Striking Up a Conversation to Giving Opinions, each exemplified with short dialogues that are also available as audio recordings via app. The units provide you the opportunity not simply to converse, but to build and support your knowledge of the language with essential instruction on correct pronunciation, grammar, syntax and word usage.Proven approach to learning helps you get a handle on Italian conversation right away, and build on your learnings as you goSupported by audio recordings, via app, of all 60 dialogues, plus numerous exercise answers850 exercise questions help you practice what you've learned through dialogues and practical examplesA special conversational "markers" table in the index shows important elements of conversation that have no exact equivalents in EnglishNEW: Includes a timely chapter on remote communication (video conferencing)

The fifth edition of Marcel Danesi’s Popular Culture is an accessible, engaging introduction for popular culture, media and society, and sociology of the media courses.The fifth edition features updated coverage on social media and digital cultures, including those surrounding memes, video games, virtual reality, and streaming services.Pop culture surrounds us. It infuses the movies we watch, the music we listen to, the books we read, the clothes we wear, and the food we eat. It comes to us on our televisions, phones, computers, radio, and in every storefront and billboard we pass on the street. Danesi delves into the social structures that create and promote pop culture, showing how it validates our common experiences. Offering a variety of perspectives on its many modes of creations and delivery, Danesi shows why pop culture will always be something we love to hate and hate to love.

The presidency of Donald J. Trump, has had a considerable impacts on American politics and society. One of these was his altering of the comedic mood in America, taking comedy away from many of its traditions. His presidency turned comedy into political weaponry, as comedians on the liberal side of politics turned their efforts to ridiculing Trump’s buffoonish persona, while on the conservative side, a Trump-supportive group of comedians mocked those very comedians who opposed Trump. Trump himself emerged as a comedian, performing his dark, caustic, comical routines with consummate skill at his rallies. If comedy is a pulse for a country, then it is legitimate to ask if that pulse still beating, even after Trump lost reelection in 2020. This book will address this question, examining how Trump’s presidency interrupted the historical flow of American comedic traditions, and how it spread a dark mood throughout American society.

This concise volume offers an accessible introduction to state-of-the-art artificial intelligence (AI) language models, providing a platform for their use in textual interpretation across the humanities and social sciences.The book outlines the affordances of new technologies for textual analysis, which has historically employed established approaches within the humanities. Neuman, Danesi, and Vilenchik argue that these different forms of analysis are indeed complementary, demonstrating the ways in which AI-based perspectives echo similar theoretical and methodological currents in traditional approaches while also offering new directions for research. The volume showcases examples from a wide range of texts, including novels, television shows, and films to illustrate the ways in which the latest AI technologies can be used for "dialoguing" with textual characters and examining textual meaning coherence. Illuminating the potential of AI language models to both enhance and extend research on the interpretation of texts, this book will appeal to scholars interested in cognitive approaches to the humanities in such fields as literary studies, discourse analysis, media studies, film studies, psychology, and artificial intelligence.

Scientific evidence for the origin of speech is abundant, but evidence for the origin of language as separate from speech as a naming system remains speculative. What evidence can be utilized that will furnish relevant insights on the origin or language? This book attempts to provide an answer by suggesting that the first riddles of humanity, along with the first myths, reveal that language may have emerged as a mode of reflection via metaphor—a mode that involves blending speech forms together to produce complex, abstract cognition.

Semiotics is being applied more and more to the study of digital media, which have made the production and use of new sign forms a daily event-forms that seem to evanesce almost as quickly as they emerge. These include, especially, memes, emojis, and digital narratives. How are these affecting our perception of meaning? What do they imply for the future narration of history? These are the types of questions that will be examined in this book. It has been written in as non-technical a style as possible, covering the main aspects of traditional semiotic theory and projecting them onto the contemporary world of digital communications.

In Language Creativity: A Semiotic Perspective, Simone Casini aims to frame the concept of creativity within a linguistic dimension by developing a theoretical reflection with constant references to contact languages and to the educational plan. Semiotic creativity abandons the condition of the linguistic property inter pares and rises to the rank of theoretical and first principle by which languages define themselves, function and interact in the negotiation of meaning in relation to the social uses. Casini considers creativity as a premise for the rule changing of boundaries of meaning and creation of language and meaning. The work progresses starting from the historical-critical concept of creativity, discussing the most philosophical and linguistic theories in the North American and European context.

Warning signs are all around us. In ancient Egypt, tombs were lavishly adorned with signs and symbols warning of the dire consequences that would befall any robbers and thieves. And yet these signs were often read as provocations and challenges. Why was this? And how could we more effectively communicate dangers from our world, such as toxic waste, to future civilizations?This book examines and evaluates the kinds of signs, symbols, narratives and other semiotic strategies humans have used across time to communicate the sense of danger. From paleolithic cave art and ancient monuments to the dangers of nuclear waste, carbon emissions and other pollution, Marcel Danesi explores how danger has been encoded in language, discourse, and symbolism. At the same time, the book puts forward a plan for a more effective 'semiotising' of risk and peril, calling on linguists, semioticians and agencies to face up our collective responsibilities, and work together to more clearly communicate vitally important warnings about the dangers we've left behind to civilizations beyond the semiotic gap.

Warning signs are all around us. In ancient Egypt, tombs were lavishly adorned with signs and symbols warning of the dire consequences that would befall any robbers and thieves. And yet these signs were often read as provocations and challenges. Why was this? And how could we more effectively communicate dangers from our world, such as toxic waste, to future civilizations?This book examines and evaluates the kinds of signs, symbols, narratives and other semiotic strategies humans have used across time to communicate the sense of danger. From paleolithic cave art and ancient monuments to the dangers of nuclear waste, carbon emissions and other pollution, Marcel Danesi explores how danger has been encoded in language, discourse, and symbolism. At the same time, the book puts forward a plan for a more effective 'semiotising' of risk and peril, calling on linguists, semioticians and agencies to face up our collective responsibilities, and work together to more clearly communicate vitally important warnings about the dangers we've left behind to civilizations beyond the semiotic gap.

Sharpen your mind with fun, brain-boosting logic puzzlesPuzzles are an entertaining way to improve your memory and cognitive skills. The Ultimate Brain Health Logic Puzzle Book for Adults offers a wide variety of sudoku, calcudoku, logic grids, masyu, nonograms, and cryptic puzzles in a range of difficulty levels so you can enjoy hours of puzzling fun while keeping your brain happy and healthy.What sets this book of brain games for adults apart: Dynamic brain training--Ease into each type of logic puzzle with simple instructions, a breakdown of what it does for your brain, and a quick warm-up--plus tips and trivia for total brain health.Puzzles for everyone--Build brainpower whether you're actively seeking to improve your memory or simply an avid puzzler looking for fun new material.Different difficulty levels--Decide how much of a challenge you're in the mood for with sections for Warm-Up, Easy, Medium, and Hard puzzles.Go beyond other puzzle books for adults with one that's designed to keep your mind and memory in shape.