Publications

Publication details [#63709]

Clark, Tom, Emily Finlay and Philippa Kelly, eds. 2017. Worldmaking. Literature, language, culture. (FILLM Studies in Languages and Literatures 5). John Benjamins. xv, 235 pp.
Publication type
Book – edited volume
Publication language
English

Annotation

In 1978, Nelson Goodman explored the relation of “worlds” to language and literature, formulating the term, “worldmaking” to suggest that many other worlds can as plausibly exist as the “world” we know right now. One cannot catch or know “the world” as such: all people can catch are the world versions - descriptions, views or workings of the world – that are expressed in symbolic systems (words, music, dancing, visual representations). Over the twenty-five years since then, creative works have played a crucial role in realigning, reshaping and renegotiating people's understandings of how worlds can be made and preserved in the face of globalizing trends. The volume is divided into three sections, each engaging with worlds as malleable constructs. Central to all of the contributions is the question: how can we understand the relationships between natural, political, cultural, fictional, literary, linguistic and virtual worlds, and why does this matter?