Metagrammar

This book highlights the grammatical structure of thought and behavior as a blueprint for scientific discovery and innovation. It defines the new concept of metagrammar as the unnoticed transfer of linguistic functions and skills to and from our interaction with the world. Viewing grammar as language engineering, the author argues that metagrammar charts a new mode of reasoning central to critical thinking, problem solving and goal setting in all areas of human endeavor. He shows how metagrammatical structures and genres mediate in the conceptualization of phenomena, as well as in the production of plans, policies, systems and designs. This uniquely human capability is contrasted with mechanistic models in computers and AI that threaten to replace human agency and decision making. This book will be of interest to the educated reader who wants to keep abreast of transformational research in language and cognition as it applies to self and society, current events, digital media and emerging technologies, from artificial intelligence to autonomous systems, from a human-centered perspective. It will be particularly relevant to organizations such as the Modern Languages Association, for its focus on linguistic and narrative theory, cultural studies and critical theory.

Erik Camayd-Freixas is Professor of Modern Languages at Florida International University, USA. A cultural critic, literary theorist and forensic linguist, he is an award winning author of nine books including Realismo mágico y primitivismo, Primitivism and Identity in Latin America, Etnografía imaginaria, Orientalism and Identity in Latin America and U.S. Immigration Reform and Its Global Impact. Drawing from cognitive linguistics, semiotics, genre theory and narratology, he has coined the term 'metagrammar' as a new mode of inference and critical reasoning whose application to public policy has earned him international human rights awards.