Pragmatics & Cognition - Volume 12, Issue 1, 2004

This article discusses the potential of using interactive environments in autism therapy. We specifically address issues relevant to the Aurora project, which studies the possible role of autonomous, mobile robots as therapeutic tools for children with autism. Theories of mindreading, social cognition and imitation that informed the Aurora project are discussed and their relevance to the project is outlined. Our approach is put in the broader context of socially intelligent agents and interactive environments. We summarise results from trials with a particular mobile robot. Finally, we draw some comparisons to research on interactive virtual environments in the context of autism therapy and education. We conclude by discussing future directions and open issues.

It is commonplace to maintain that technology will never be able to reproduce a natural object in full detail. Nevertheless, if one tries to rigorously demonstrate the methodological foundation on which such an assumption is based, one finds a number of interesting problems to clarify. This paper attempts to provide a general framework for the understanding of naturoids (man made objects that aim at reproducing some natural object), arguing that every naturoid — and the cognitive model upon which it is based — is the result of a reduction in the complexity of natural objects due to an unavoidable multiple selection process. Naturoids take on their own new complexity, which leads to a transfiguration of the natural exemplars and their performances. On the one hand, this transfiguration poses severe problems for those who try to gain knowledge from naturoids regarding the analogous natural objects. On the other hand, a generalized replacement of natural objects and processes with naturoids will change our way of looking at nature. Therefore, the technology of naturoids could develop through successive generations, each of which would take as exemplars already artificialized objects, giving rise to a new kind of evolution.

The aim of this paper is to examine some actual examples of written verbal irony that contain apposition. Meta-linguistic knowledge about apposition as a syntactic structure is claimed to be involved in the interpretation process of the utterance and especially in recognizing the victim of the irony. This discussion demonstrates the interdependence between apposition, its echoic quality in particular cases, and the victim of the irony. Since syntactic structure may serve as a cue to indirect meaning, pointing at the specific meta-linguistic knowledge used for interpreting ironic utterances may enrich the discussion and enhance the description of the interpretation process. Different types of echoing are demonstrated and examined. The analysis also suggests that untruthfulness may serve mainly as a cue to the presence of irony, rather than as an essential component of this phenomenon.

The paper examines the metaphorical expressions derived from anim ‘face’ in Akan, a major language in Ghana. It analyses and discusses face metaphoric expressions in relation with the universal concept analysed by Face Theory. The paper projects this concept onto the Akan cultural system and looks at how the concept is used in Akan communicative interaction. The sociolinguistics and pragmatics of anim are considered. In particular, it focuses on face-to-face interaction and the typical situations and discourses within the Akan speech community where the concept of face plays a role.