Review of Cognitive Linguistics. Published under the auspices of the Spanish Cognitive Linguistics Association - Volume 18, Issue 1, 2020

Abstract

This study intends to test the Graded Salience Hypothesis, in order to investigate the factors involved in comprehension. This research considered predictions derived from this hypothesis by evaluating the salience of idioms in the Persian language. We intended to measure Reading Time (RTs), and the design comprised 2 Contexts (figurative, literal), 3 Types of Statements (familiar vs. unfamiliar vs. less familiar) and RTs (long, short, equal). Two types of contexts (figuratively inviting and literally inviting contexts) were prepared. The software for this experiment was prepared for the purpose of self-paced reading experiments. Two pretests were performed. In the first pretest, participants rated the expressions on a 1–7 familiarity scale. The second pretest was designed to confirm that contexts are equally supportive. Then, expressions were divided according to their familiarity (familiar, less-familiar, unfamiliar). Sentences were used so that, according to the second pretest, their contexts would be equally supportive. Sentences were displayed on a PC, controlled by Windows 7. The self-paced reading task was applied using the Moving Windows software. In the first part of the experiment, participants read each idiom in figuratively inviting contexts and their RTs were recorded. In the second part of the experiment, participants read each idiom in literally inviting contexts and their RTs were recorded. Results of testing these idioms support the Graded Salience Hypothesis, but not entirely. Such findings suggested that sometimes context affects the access of salient information and a semi serial process is witnessed. Results indicate that the salient meaning of both familiar and less familiar idioms is figurative. In addition, salient meanings in the space following the unfamiliar idiom and the first word of the next (spillover) sentence, were both, figurative and literal.

Abstract

Echoic mention was initially proposed as part of the relevance-theoretic approach to irony (Sperber & Wilson, 1986). The aim of this article is to present an account of echoing as a cognitive operation that goes beyond (and yet includes) the interpretation of ironic remarks. For this purpose, we explore the cognitive mechanisms that underlie the production and interpretation of echoic uses of both ironic and non-ironic language. In the light of the examples under scrutiny, we claim that echoic mentions afford metonymic access to the echoed scenario, which is then contrasted with the observable scenario. The relationship between the two scenarios, which ranges from identity to contrast, passing through type-token similarity and metaphorical resemblance, determines the communicative purpose of the speaker, which may convey different kind of attitudes.

Abstract

Supporting the hypothesis that emotions are culturally constructed, this article compares the cultural conceptualization of pride in European and Brazilian Portuguese (EP/BP). Individualistic/collectivistic as well as other cultural influences that determine the conceptual variation of pride in pluricentric Portuguese are examined. Adopting a sociocognitive view of language and applying a multifactorial usage-feature and profile-based methodology, this study combines a feature-based qualitative analysis of 500 occurrences of orgulho ‘pride’ and vaidade ‘vanity’ from a corpus of blogs with their subsequent multivariate statistic modeling. The multiple correspondence analysis reveals two clusters of features, namely, self-centered pride and other-directed pride. Logistic regression confirmed that EP appears to be more associated with other-directed pride, which is in line with the more collectivist and restrained Portuguese culture, whereas BP is more connected with self-centered pride. Accordingly, morally good pride is salient in EP. Brazil’s high power distance can also explain the prominence of negative and bad pride in BP.

Abstract

What causes metaphors to be similar or different across languages? It can be tempting to associate differences with culture and similarities with embodiment, since human cultures are diverse and human bodies are comparable. However, we argue that the death of a loved one is such a widespread experience that it forms part of every human culture. We argue that linguistic instantiations of death is departure tend to focus on the starting point of the deceased person’s journey and the arrival of the person’s remains in their final resting place. We attribute these trends to the fact that living people around the world are focused on their loved ones’ absence in the here-and-now, and living people often place importance on physical sites associated with deceased loved ones, such as the location of their remains. These cross-linguistic trends emphasize that culture can lead to similarities as well as differences in metaphoric structures.

Abstract

This paper explores the interaction between verbal and constructional semantics in the benefactive double object construction in English. My main aim is to disentangle the semantics of the construction exploring the constructional potential of the main alternating verb classes, i.e., verbs of “obtaining”, “creation” and “preparing” (Levin, 1993), and spelling out the cognitive principles that motivate these and other extended uses as cases of lexical-constructional subsumption within the framework of the Lexical Constructional Model (cf. Galera Masegosa & Ruiz de Mendoza, 2012; Ruiz de Mendoza, 2013). Rather than advocating a polysemous analysis of the ditransitive, as proposed by Goldberg (1992, 1995), the position I take here is that ditransitives with beneficiary arguments and ditransitives with prototypical recipient arguments instantiate two different subconstructions which cannot be treated under the same general rubric, in spite of their “shared surface form” (Goldberg, 2002, p. 330).

Abstract

A major insight of Conceptual Metaphor Theory (CMT) is that it added a strong, empirically testable cognitive dimension to the study of metaphor that is capable of changing the way we think about metaphor not only in language, but also thought and action, and, ultimately, the way we do philosophy (Lakoff & Johnson, 1980, 1999). In the paper, I argue that CMT itself needs to be changed in several ways. In particular, I suggest (1) that it has to be given a much more elaborate contextual component than is currently available, (2) that even its cognitive dimension needs to be refined, (3) that it requires a component that can explain the actual usages of metaphors in natural discourse, and (4), and most significantly, that it needs to be changed in such a way that the modifications under (1), (2), and (3) can be integrated into a unified and coherent theory of metaphor. The paper is based on my forthcoming book Extended Conceptual Metaphor Theory (Kövecses, 2020).

Abstract

In recent years, foreign language pedagogy has recognized the need to focus (i) on larger meaningful sequences of words (Nattinger & DeCarrico, 1992; Wray, 2002; Ellis & Cadierno, 2009; Gonzalez Rey, 2013) and (ii) further on communicative goals (Nunan, 1991; Widdowson, 1992; Savignon, 2000). Difficulties in the learning process of a foreign language result from the conceptual and constructional differences between expressions in the native and foreign language. Teaching materials often propose a lexical approach with an unstructured set of constructed examples.

With the postulate of meaningful schematic templates, Construction Grammar (CxG) has a number of assets for foreign language teaching (FLT) and learning (FLL), it allows among others to establish a structured inventory of abstract constructions with prototypical exemplars and inheritance links between the constructions’ instantiations. To be proficient in a foreign language also means to use new words in constructions. Learners can be asked to extend the use of new lexical units as slot-fillers into constructional patterns. This is exemplified with the use of German posture and placement verbs in the caused motion construction and the corresponding intransitive locative construction.

But having learned a vast number of constructional templates of a language does not automatically imply that learners can produce L2-constructions and their instantiations in a creative way. Therefore, CxG must be enriched with further insights from Cognitive Linguistics which claims that conceptual categories and their linguistic expressions are the result of embodied processes (Lakoff, 1987). This chapter makes some suggestions for interactive activities which can foster ‘embodied teaching and learning’.

Abstract

This paper considers the interplay between arbitrariness and the widely-accepted ideals of one form, one meaning and compositionality. They are shown to operate in different domains, and to clash where there is idiomaticity. Idioms provide familiar forms which are not semantically relevant to the context. In effect, this creates homonymy, which goes against any trend towards pairing one form with one meaning. The conflict can be seen as tension between two more fundamental principles. Lack of motivation is considered in an Appendix on word-manufacture, where it is shown how slippery the notion of motivation can be.

Abstract

What makes The Daily Show with Jon Stewart so successful as social and political satire? Rhetorical theorists and critics have identified several mechanisms for satisfying the show’s satiric and parodic aim, which include parodic polyglossia, contextual clash, and satirical specificity (Waisanen, 2009). We present a unified account of meaning construction that encompasses these three mechanisms within the framework of blended fictive interaction (Pascual, 2002, 2008a, b). Satire results from emergent effects of different conceptual configurations that have to be in place to integrate a pastiche of speech whose provenance originates in different and diverse contexts and genres. The integration of contradictory, conceptually disjointed pieces of discourse under the governing structure of the conversation frame accounts for the show’s most conspicuous satirical moments. These imagined interactions highlight facets of the real world for critical commentary. The thick description of an influential Daily Show segment deepens our understanding of contemporary political satire.

Abstract

This study explores the conceptual boundaries among break, cut and open from an under-investigated diachronic perspective and addresses the diachronic conceptual variations of Chinese pò (‘break’), qiē (‘cut’) and kāi (‘open’). The Center for Chinese Linguistics corpus is employed for the extraction of historical data. Correspondence analyses are conducted for uncovering the conceptual boundary variations among pò, qiē, and kāi. In doing so, this study, situated in Diachronic Prototype Semantics, has revealed that: (1) The conceptual ranges of pò, qiē and kāi greatly overlapped in ancient Chinese, but their division of labor becomes increasingly clear-cut in Mandarin. (2) By the stage of Modern Mandarin, these three lexical categories have formed their own prototypical structures and categorize separation events of state change in virtue of a lexical continuum “kāi-pò-qiē”. (3) Language selection, semantic specialization, as well as conceptual reorganization are proposed as contributing factors for these changes.

Abstract

This paper presents an analysis of nonce words that relies on Cognitive Grammar (CG) using the English version of “Jabberwocky” and its two Ukrainian renditions. We identify great variation among the versions, both inter-lingual and intra-lingual. In particular, not only do the versions differ greatly in terms of construal presented in CG terms, but there are various elements that do not, and simply cannot, get through between the English version and the Ukrainian ones. We accordingly propose that the use of Multiple-Parallel-Text (MultiParT) approach can not only help make generalizations across representative text producers within the same language but also allow one to investigate how different systems of human communication are equipped to produce unconventional meaning using its own conventionalized means, and that use of CG is capable of providing a reliable analytical framework with high descriptive adequacy. We also propose that a combination of MultiParT and CG may constitute an advantage in cross-linguistic research of literary semantics and cognitive poetics.

This article reviews Cognitive Linguistics and lexical change. Motion verbs from Latin to Romance

This article reviews Religion, language, and the human mind