The Semantics of Polysemy


Book Description

This book, addressed primarily to students and researchers in semantics, cognitive linguistics, English, and Australian languages, is a comparative study of the polysemy patterns displayed by percussion/impact ('hitting') verbs in English and Warlpiri (Pama-Nyungan, Central Australia). The opening chapters develop a novel theoretical orientation for the study of polysemy via a close examination of two theoretical traditions under the broader cognitivist umbrella: Langackerian and Lakovian Cognitive Semantics and Wierzbickian Natural Semantic Metalanguage. Arguments are offered which problematize attempts in these traditions to ground the analysis of meaning either in cognitive or neurological reality, or in the existence of universal synonymy relations within the lexicon. Instead, an interpretative rather than a scientific construal of linguistic theorizing is sketched, in the context of a close examination of certain key issues in the contemporary study of polysemy such as sense individuation, the role of reference in linguistic categorization, and the demarcation between metaphor and metonymy. The later chapters present a detailed typology of the polysemous senses of English and Warlpiri percussion/impact (or P/I) verbs based on a diachronically deep corpus of dictionary citations from Middle to contemporary English, and on a large corpus of Warlpiri citations. Limited to the operations of metaphor and of three categories of metonymy, this typology posits just four types of basic relation between extended and core meanings. As a result, the phenomenon of polysemy and semantic extension emerges as amenable to strikingly concise description.




Cognitive Linguistics


Book Description

Cognitive Linguistics: Current Applications and Future Perspectives is an up-to-date survey of recent research in Cognitive Linguistics and its applications by prominent researchers. The volume brings together generally accessible syntheses and special studies of Cognitive Linguistics strands in a sizable format and is thus an asset not only to the Cognitive Linguistics community, but also to neighbouring disciplines and linguists in general. The volume covers a wide range of fields and combines wide accessibility with a highly specific information value. Key features: An excellent source for the study of Applied Cognitive Linguistics, one of the most popular and fastest growing areas in Linguistics. Authoritative and detailed survey articles by leading scholars in the field. Accessible to a general audience, yet also characterized by a highly specific information value.




Statistics in Corpus Linguistics


Book Description

A comprehensive and accessible introduction to statistics in corpus linguistics, covering multiple techniques of quantitative language analysis and data visualisation.




Computational and Corpus-Based Phraseology


Book Description

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the Third International Conference on Computational and Corpus-Based Phraseology, Europhras 2019, held in Malaga, Spain, in September 2019. The 31 full papers presented in this book were carefully reviewed and selected from 116 submissions. The papers in this volume cover a number of topics including general corpus-based approaches to phraseology, phraseology in translation and cross-linguistic studies, phraseology in language teaching and learning, phraseology in specialized languages, phraseology in lexicography, cognitive approaches to phraseology, the computational treatment of multiword expressions, and the development, annotation, and exploitation of corpora for phraseological studies.




Corpus linguistics


Book Description

Corpora are used widely in linguistics, but not always wisely. This book attempts to frame corpus linguistics systematically as a variant of the observational method. The first part introduces the reader to the general methodological discussions surrounding corpus data as well as the practice of doing corpus linguistics, including issues such as the scientific research cycle, research design, extraction of corpus data and statistical evaluation. The second part consists of a number of case studies from the main areas of corpus linguistics (lexical associations, morphology, grammar, text and metaphor), surveying the range of issues studied in corpus linguistics while at the same time showing how they fit into the methodology outlined in the first part.




Hyperbole in English


Book Description

Non-literal language is ubiquitous in everyday life, and while hyperbole is a major part of this, it has so far remained relatively unexplored. This volume provides the first investigation of hyperbole in English, drawing on data from genres such as spoken conversation, TV, newspapers, and literary works from Chaucer to Monty Python. Combining quantitative and qualitative analyses, it uses approaches from semantics, pragmatics, discourse analysis and classical rhetoric to investigate in detail both speaker-centered and emotive aspects of hyperbole, and also addressee-related aspects, such as interpretation and interactional uptake. Illustrated with a range of diachronic case studies, hyperbole is also shown to be a main means of linguistic creativity, and an important contributor to language change. The book concludes with an exploration of the role of hyperbole in political speaking, humour, and literature. Original and in-depth, it will be invaluable to all those working on meaning, discourse, and historical linguistics.




A Valency Dictionary of English


Book Description

This dictionary provides a valency description of English verbs, nouns and adjectives. Each entry contains a comprehensive list of the complementation patterns identified on the basis of the largest corpus of English available at the present time. All examples are taken directly from the COBUILD/Birmingham corpus. The valency description comprises statements about the quantitative valency of the lexical units established, an inventory of their obligatory, contextually optional and purely optional complements as well as systematic information on the semantic and collocational properties of the complements. An outline of the model of valency theory used in this dictionary is provided in the introduction.




Relevance, Pragmatics and Interpretation


Book Description

Showcases recent research by leading scholars working within the relevance-theoretic pragmatics framework.




Cognitive Exploration of Language and Linguistics


Book Description

Cognitive Exploration of Language and Linguistics is designed as a comprehensive introductory text for first and second-year university students of language and linguistics. It provides a chapter on each of the more established areas in linguistics such as lexicology, morphology, syntax, phonetics and phonology, historical linguistics, and language typology and on some of the newer areas such as cross-cultural semantics, pragmatics, text linguistics and contrastive linguistics. In each of these areas language is explored as part of a cognitive system comprising perception, emotion, categorisation, abstraction processes, and reasoning. All these cognitive abilities may interact with language and be influenced by language. Thus the study of language in a sense becomes the study of the way we express and exchange ideas and thoughts. This Second Revised Edition is corrected, updated and expanded. Cognitive Exploration of Language and Linguistics is clearly presented and organized after having been tested in several courses in various countries. Includes exercises (solutions to be found on the Internet).




Multi-word Verbs in Early Modern English


Book Description

The topic of this book fits in with the recently growing interest in phraseology and fixedness in English. It offers a description of multi-word verbs in the language of the 17th and 18th centuries, an important formative period for Modern English. For the first time, multi-word verbs are treated together as a group, as it is argued that phrasal verbs, prepositional verbs, phrasal-prepositional verbs, verb-adjective combinations and verbo-nominal combinations share defining characteristics. These characteristics are also reflected in similar possibilities of usage, in particular the subtle modification of verbal meaning and these verbs' potential for topicalization structures, both leading to a greater expressiveness. Using a new text collection, the Lampeter Corpus of Early Modern English Tracts (1640-1740), the study provides a description of the multi-word verb types found, their syntactic behaviour, and their semantic structure. The composition of the corpus also allowed the examination of the development of these verbs over time and in different registers. The corpus study is supplemented by an investigation of attitudes towards multi-word verbs with the help of contemporary works on language, leading to a more speculative discussion of the factors influencing the choice between multi-word and simplex verbs.