2. Introduction
Cognitive Linguistics is a new approach to the study
of language that emerged in the 1970’s as a reaction
against the dominant generative paradigm which
pursues an autonomous view of language. Some of
the main assumptions underlying the generative
approaches to syntax and semantics are not in
accordance with the experimental data in linguistics,
psychology and other fields; the ‘generative
commitment’ to notational formalism, that is to say
the use of ‘formal grammars’ that views languages as
systems of arbitrary symbols manipulated by
mathematical rules, is used at the expense of
descriptive adequacy and psychological realism.
3. Introduction
What Lakoff refers to as ‘nonfinitary phenomena’, i.e.
mental images, general cognitive processes, basic-
level categories, prototype phenomena, the use of
neural foundations for linguistic theory and so on, are
not considered part of these grammars because they
are not characterisable in this notation. It is from this
dissatisfaction with the dominant model that
Cognitive Linguistics is created. Cognitive Linguistics
is not a totally homogeneous framework. Ungerer
and Schmid (1997) distinguish three main
approaches: Experiental view, the Prominence view
and the Attentional view of language.
4. Introduction
The ‘Experiental view’ pursues a more
practical and empirical description of
meaning; instead of postulating logical rules
and objective definitions based on theoretical
considerations, in this approach it is the user
of the language who tells us what is going on
in their minds when they produce and
understand words and sentences. Eleanor
Rosch et al. (1977, 1978) carried out the first
research within this approach, mainly in the
study of cognitive categories, which led to the
prototype model of categorisation.
5. Introduction
Within this framework, the knowledge and experience
human beings have of the things and events that they
know well is transferred to those other objects and
events, which they are not so familiar with, and even
to abstract concepts. Lakoff and Johnson (1980)
were among the first ones to pinpoint this conceptual
potential, especially in the case of metaphors.
However, this does not only apply to the field of
metaphor but to other figurative resources which are
not considered part of the language in more
traditional linguistics, such as metonymy.
6. Introduction
The ‘Prominence view’ is based on concepts of
profiling and figure/ground segregation, a
phenomenon first introduced by the Danish gestalt
psychologist Rubin. The prominence principle
explains why, when we look at an object in our
environment, we single it out as a perceptually
prominent figure standing out from the ground. This
principle can also be applied to the study of
language; especially, to the study of local relations. It
is also used in Langacker’s grammar, where profiling
is used to explain grammatical constructs and, figure
and ground for the explanation of grammatical
relations.
7. Introduction
Finally, the ‘Attentional view’ assumes that
what we actually express reflects which parts
of an event attract our attention. A main
concept of this approach is Fillmore’s (1975)
notion of ‘frame’, i.e. an assemblage of the
knowledge we have about a certain situation.
Depending on our cognitive ability to direct
our attention, different aspects of this frame
are highlighted, resulting in different linguistic
expressions.
8. Introduction
The question of the complex relationship
between language, experience, and the mind
has been one with which every approach to
linguistics has grappled. The cognitive
perspective holds that language is part of a
cognitive system which comprises perception,
emotions, categorization, abstraction
processes, and reasoning. All these cognitive
abilities interact with language and are
influenced by language.
9. Introduction
Thus, the perspective on language
offered by Cognitive Linguistics
emphasizes the effect of human
experience of the world, the unique way
humans perceive and conceptualize
that experience, and how these are in
turn reflected in the structure of
language itself.
10. Introduction
A central claim of a cognitive approach is that
grammar forms a continuum with the lexicon and is
fully describable in terms of form-meaning pairings.
Thus, grammar is not represented as an autonomous
component. The problem of how people construct
meaning in thought and language is at the heart of
research in a cognitive approach to language. As
such it emphasizes a usage-based conception of
language and evidences a concern for
contextualized, dynamically constructed meanings
and for the grounding of language use in both
cognitive and social interaction.
11. Introduction
Cognitive Linguistics has been developed by
scholars like George Lakoff and Ronald
Langacker. Basically Cognitive Linguistics
relates language to conceptualization and
human experience. Meaning is said to reside
in conceptualization, and grammar is not
seen as autonomous. Cognitive processing
plays an important role in this model, and
basic cognitive abilities such as viewing,
distancing and scanning are incorporated into
the theory.
12. Introduction
Experiental realism or experientalism is the
term used to describe the philosophical view
that linguistic meaning cannot be described
independently of the nature and experience of
the organisms doing the thinking. Conceptual
structure is meaningful because it comes
from and is linked to our pre-conceptual
bodily experiences.
13. Introduction
There is no objective, disembodied truth, and
consequently the world is not objectively
reflected in language. Language is much
more than just a mirror, it describes our
individual and collective experiences of the
world. Conceptual and linguistic universals
arise from the fact that we have similar
bodies and brains, that we inhabit similar
environments and that we communicate with
each other.
14. Introduction
Cognitive Linguistics is by nature cross-disciplinary
and among the most obviously related fields are
psychology, neurophysiology, computer science and
general cogntive science. In my view, this openness
is part of what makes cognitive linguistics such an
exciting venue. Much of the research has focused on
metaphor, semantic change, prototype effects,
blends, prepositional expressions and many other
topics. There has also been a great deal of work
carried out in establishing appropriate formalisms.
Key concepts include metaphors, prototype theory,
radial structures, mental spaces and embodiment.
15. MAIN TENETS
As human beings the way in which we interact with
our world through our spatial and temporal
orientation, our manipulation of objects, our
perception of the things that surround us and our
bodily movements influences how we construct and
understand meaning. Based on empirical research in
different areas such as Cognitive Psychology, and
Anthropological Linguistics, Cognitive Linguistics
argues that both the design features of languages,
and our ability to learn and use them are accounted
for by general cognitive abilities, our human
categorisation strategies, together with our cultural,
contextual and functional parameters.
16. MAIN TENETS
Human conceptual categories, the meaning
of words and sentences and the meaning of
linguistic structures at any level, are not a set
of universal abstract features or uninterpreted
symbols. They are motivated and grounded
more or less directly in experience, in our
bodily, physical, social and cultural
experiences, because after all, “we are
beings of the flesh”.
17. MAIN TENETS
The second main idea is related to the theory of
linguistic meaning. Most cognitive linguists reject
‘objectivist’ theories of meaning. For Cognitive
Linguistics, meanings do not exist independently from
the people that create and use them; all linguistic
forms do not have inherent form in themselves, they
act as clues activating the meanings that reside in
our minds and brains. This activation of meaning is
not necessarily entirely the same in every person,
because meaning is based on individual experience
as well as collective experience.
18. MAIN TENETS
Therefore, for Cognitive Linguistics, we
have no access to a reality independent
of human categorisation, and that is
why the structure of reality as reflected
in language is a product of the human
mind. Semantic structure reflects the
mental categories which people have
formed from their experience and
understanding of the world.
19. METHODOLOGICAL PRINCIPLES
Human categorisation is one of the major issues in
Linguistics. The ability to categorise, i.e., to judge that
a particular thing is or is not an instance of a
particular category, is an essential part of cognition.
Categorisation is often automatic and unconscious,
except in problematic cases. This can cause us to
make mistakes and make us think that our categories
are categories of things, when in fact they are
categories of abstract entities. When experience is
used to guide the interpretation of a new experience,
the ability to categorise becomes indispensable.
20. METHODOLOGICAL PRINCIPLES
The classical view on categorisation, that of Aristotle,
claims that categories are defined in terms of a
conjunction of necessary and sufficient binary
features, that is to say that linguistic analytical
categories impose a set of necessary and sufficient
conditions for the membership in the category. This
requirement not only implies that categories have
clear boundaries and that all members of a category
have equal status but also that there is an abstract,
general definition with which all the members of that
category must comply.
21. METHODOLOGICAL PRINCIPLES
Instead of relating these different senses to
an abstract default sense that includes all of
them, the cognitive approach adopts a
prototype categorization model. In this model
human categories have two types of
members: the ‘prototype’ and several less-
central members related to the former in a
motivated way. The prototype is the best, the
most prominent and the most typical member
of a category.
22. METHODOLOGICAL PRINCIPLES
Another consequence of the primacy of cognitive
abilities is that there is no strict distinction between
encyclopaedic and linguistic knowledge. Objectivists
differentiate between these two different
epistemological types of knowledge. On the one
hand, ‘linguistic’ or ‘definitional’ knowledge that
“corresponds to the essential properties of the
entities and categories that the words designate”; and
on the other, ‘encyclopaedic’ knowledge
“corresponds to the contingent properties of the
entities and properties that the words designate”.
23. METHODOLOGICAL PRINCIPLES
This dictionary-encyclopaedia distinction
leads objectivists to postulate a ‘meaning per
se’, independent of whatever the speaker
may know about the states of affairs that he is
referring to. This paradigm also induces the
distinction between literal (objectively true or
false) and figurative meaning (no direct
correspondence to entities and categories in
the real world).
24. METHODOLOGICAL PRINCIPLES
This continuum between language and
experience has led cognitive linguists to
study how conceptual structures or
cognitive models are reflected in
language. According to Langacker,
most concepts invoke other concepts
and without making an explicit
reference to them, they cannot be
adequately defined.
25. METHODOLOGICAL PRINCIPLES
Research on metaphor occupies a central position in
Cognitive Linguistics. One of the major problems that
cognitive linguists still face is the question of how to
constrain metaphorical mappings. Attempts to
constrain the mapping process in metaphorical
production and comprehension can be found in
Lakoff’s ‘Invariance Principle’, i.e. “metaphorical
mappings preserve the cognitive topology of the
source domain in a way consistent with the inherent
structure of the target domain”.
26. METHODOLOGICAL PRINCIPLES
The Invariance Principle is useful in order to
constrain the nature of those mappings: that
is to say, it is not possible to map from the
source domain structure that does not
preserve the inherent structure of the target
domain. The only problem with this principle
is that it does not show exactly what part of
the source domain is the one that must be
consistent with the structure of the target
domain.
27. METHODOLOGICAL PRINCIPLES
Another important and interesting area of research is
the interaction between metaphor and metonymy.
Goossens proposes the term ‘metaphtonymy’ to
cover the possible interrelations between metaphor
and metonymy. Among these interrelations, he
distinguishes two as the dominant patterns: one
where the experiential basis for metaphor is a
metonymy (‘metaphor from metonymy’) and another
where a metonymy functioning in the target domain is
embedded within a metaphor (‘metonymy within
metaphor’).
