Showing papers in "Review of Cognitive Linguistics. Published under the auspices of the Spanish Cognitive Linguistics Association in 2020"

An extended view of conceptual metaphor theory

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 (Kovecses, 2020).

What's in a villain's name? Sound symbolic values of voiced obstruents and bilabial consonants

Abstract: This paper reports two case studies of sound symbolism using the naturalistic name corpora of characters from Disney and Pokemon. Building upon previous studies of sound symbolism, we tested two hypotheses: (1) voiced obstruents, which are generally associated with negative images, are favored in villainous characters’ names, while (2) bilabial consonants, which are symbolically associated with cuteness, are disfavored in such names. The results show that these tendencies hold in our corpora, suggesting that a concept that is as complex as “villain” can be signaled via sound symbolism. Theoretical implications for cognitive linguistics based on our results are discussed.

Gesturing in the wild: Evidence for a flexible mental timeline

Abstract: Psycholinguistic evidence shows that spatial domains are automatically activated when processing temporal expressions. Speakers conceptualize time as a straight line deployed along different axes (mostly sagittal, though also vertical). The use of the lateral axis, which cannot be lexicalized in any language, has nonetheless been attested in temporal tasks in laboratories using a variety of experiments. This leads to the question of what axes are actually at work when conceptualizating time in oral communication. The present study examines a great number of temporal expressions, taken from television shows, noting their associated co-speech gestures. Our results show that (1) speakers overwhelmingly use the lateral axis; (2) they are not performing simple space-to-time mappings, but are using instead a “timeline”, a material anchor which is a far more complex construct and that can explain some of the intricacies and contextual variations shown in the pattern of results.

The embodied teaching of complex verbal constructions with German placement verbs and spatial prepositions

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’.

A multimodal cognitive analysis of visual metonymies in picture books featuring same-sex-parent families

Abstract: Verbal metaphor and also metonymy have been theorized from a conceptual perspective since Lakoff and Johnson published Metaphors we live by in the 1980s. However, the final years of the twentieth century saw a new approach into non-verbal monomodal or multimodal tropes (Forceville & Urios-Aparisi, 2009). In an attempt to expand upon the theorization and communicative functions of visual metonymies, this study aims to explore the meaning potential of metonymic representations of characters in a sample of six picture books which portray same-sex-parent families. A multimodal cognitive approach has been adopted to find out whether, and if so how, metonymic representations of characters contribute to the positive portrayal and acceptance of same-sex-parent families in children’s picture books. The results reveal that monomodal visual metonymies are essentially used to introduce new characters in the story and highlight important aspects of the plot which boost the acceptance of non-traditional families.

Meaning construction and motivation in the English benefactive double object construction: Verbal and constructional semantics at work

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).

Boundary-crossing events across languages: A study on English speakers, Spanish speakers and second language learners

Abstract: This study analyses how speakers of two typologically distinct first languages (English (N = 12) and Spanish (N = 16)) and a group of 19 Spanish second language learners of English express boundary-crossing events, what type of verb they use, and how they segment these motion events. The stimuli used were 12 pictures of boundary-crossing events indicating motion into, out of and over a bounded space. In task 1 participants described each of the 12 scenes freely and in task 2 they were provided with a specific Manner verb between brackets. Significant differences were found in boundary-crossing and event segmentation in both L1 and L2. Participants also differed significantly in the type of verb used in the two tasks.

“Hi, Mr. President!”: Fictive interaction blends as a unifying rhetorical strategy in satire

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.

The role of echoing in meaning construction and interpretation: A cognitive-linguistic perspective

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.

Delivering the unconventional across languages A Cognitive Grammar analysis of nonce words in “Jabberwocky” and its Ukrainian renditions

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.

Everyone "leaves" the world eventually: culture-based homogeneity and variation in Death Is Departure

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.

Exploring the cultural conceptualization of emotions across national language varieties: A multifactorial profile-based account of pride in European and Brazilian Portuguese

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.

Semantic comprehension of idioms: Their effectiveness and psychological reliability

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

A comparative critical metaphor analysis on the concept of democracy in Turkish and American English

Abstract: This corpus-based study concentrates on the metaphorical conceptualizations of the concept of ‘democracy’ in Turkish and American English to find out how this socio-political term is conceptually represented in the minds of Turkish and American speakers. The database consists of 4000 concordance lines that were extracted from four different corpora: TNCv3.0, TS Columns, COCA, and NOW. Critical Metaphor Analysis (Charteris-Black, 2004) and MIP (Pragglejaz, 2007) were employed in the identification, explanation and interpretation of metaphors. Findings indicate various linguistic metaphors that can be grouped under several source domain categories including physical object, conflict and living organism as the most frequent ones. The most widespread metaphor in Turkish is democracy is a destination, whereas it is democracy is war in American English, embodying two different worldviews. The study proposes that the way the concept of democracy is composed has a role in manipulating people’s perception of the type of a democracy they are ruled by.

Arbitrariness, motivation and idioms

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.

Dialogic constructions and discourse units:: The case of think again

Abstract: Adopting a constructionally-oriented analysis, the present paper examines the pattern ‘think again’ (i.e., an instance of a mental state verb + adverbial adjunct) in synchronic, corpus-derived data. On the basis of both qualitative and quantitative analyses we show that think again merits constructional status in language; while it inherits features of fully-compositional meaning from its constituents it has also developed its own idiosyncratic properties. We further argue that think again may ultimately function as a discourse marker of challenge that regulates the relationship between Speaker (S) and Addressee (A), correlating with certain contextual regularities and interdependencies. It thus qualifies as a discourse construction that imposes a dialogic construal on its context and contributes fundamentally to discourse unit delimitation.

Less is more: Motor fluency impairment and body-specific representation of valence

Abstract: According to the Body-Specificity Hypothesis, humans preferentially associate positive features with their dominant side with which they interact more fluently, and negatives features with their non-dominant side with which they act more clumsily. The current research investigated implicit space-valence mappings in two clinical populations, namely, patients with unilateral stroke and individuals who suffered the loss of a limb. Across the two studies, our findings offered general support for the Body-Specificity Hypothesis with important caveats. Specifically, the body-specificity effect was more detectable in the two groups of right-handed individuals with motor fluency impairment on their left side than healthy controls. This is possibly because the former can gain more fluent experience with their dominant hand since they exclusively use the intact hand for self-sufficiency, which may increase their bias toward “right-is-good” pattern. Taken together, the results provided converging evidence that individual differences in action fluency may moderate the body-specificity effect.

N. I. Stolova (2015). Cognitive Linguistics and lexical change. Motion verbs from Latin to Romance

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

Pò (‘break’), qiē (‘cut’) and kāi (‘open’) in Chinese: A diachronic conceptual variational approach

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 po (‘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 po, qiē, and kāi In doing so, this study, situated in Diachronic Prototype Semantics, has revealed that: (1) The conceptual ranges of po, 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-po-qiē” (3) Language selection, semantic specialization, as well as conceptual reorganization are proposed as contributing factors for these changes

Echoing-contrast combination in non-ironic constructions

Abstract: The Lexical Constructional Model (LCM) describes ironic constructions as containing echoes that invoke two contrasting situations: expected and real. The reconciliation of the contrast, which happens at the implicational level, gives rise to specific meaning effects in terms of speaker’s emotional reaction (see Ruiz de Mendoza & Galera Masegosa, 2014). The present study elaborates on these insights showing that echoing and contrast can cooperate in non-ironic constructions. In these cases, however, a full-fledged interpretation of the speaker’s reaction happens at the illocutionary level as bearing the value of an indirect invitation to the hearer to assess the truth value of the expected situation. Hence, the collaboration of echoing and contrast in non-ironic constructions may effect conceptual change/development. This is consistent with yet another observation made by the LCM; namely, that the cooperation of echoing and contrast operations in ironic constructions involves a concept-building operation (Ruiz de Mendoza, 2017).

Review of Hilpert (2019): Construction Grammar and its application to English

Abstract: This article reviews Construction Grammar and its application to English 978 1 4744 3360 0978 1 4744 3361 7978 1 4744 3362 4978 1 4744 3363 1

‘I hear the smell of roses’: Semantic aspects of synaesthetic constructions in Persian

Abstract: This paper investigates the synaesthetic constructions in Persian with the aim of finding out what motivates them despite their incongruous syntactic-semantic assignments. It is argued that these paradoxical elements require a metaphoric/metonymic frame to assign appropriate lexical units (LUs) to their corresponding syntactic categories (NP + rɑ +VP and NP + AP). The discrepancy derives from the semantic aspects for which frame semantics provides two types of explanations: internal and external frame factors. Internal factors deal with the metaphoric/metonymic compatibility or similarity between frames, while external factors underline the use of lexical items from one subframe to fill the vocabulary gap of a different subframe. The argument is that this gap owes much to the indirect contact between the Phenomenon (e.g., an odorous substance) and the Body-part (e.g., nose) that perceives it. In short, the analysis of our data reveals that synaesthesia is not only an economical strategy for modifying the senses, but also a natural mental strategy for interpreting vague experiences. A configuration of the incongruent construction of ‘smell’ and ‘hearing’ will be proposed to generalize such an analysis.

The strength of phonological cues for noun categorization in child-directed speech

Abstract: One of the most important tasks for language learning children is the identification of the grammatical category to which words belong. This is essential in order to be able to form grammatically correct utterances. The present study investigates how phonological information might help English-learning infants in the categorization of nouns. We analyze four different corpora of English child-directed speech in order to explore the reliability with which words are represented in mothers’ speech based on several phonological criteria. The results of the analysis confirm the prediction that most of the nouns to which English-learning children are exposed share several phonological characteristics, which would allow their early classification in the same grammatical category.