Sanela Pua

CONTENTS
WHAT IS COGNITIVE LINGUISTICS? DEVELOPMENT OF COGNITIVE LINGUISTICS

AREAS OF STUDY
ASPECTS OF COGNITION STUDIED BY COGNITIVE

LINGUISTICS

 Cognitive linguistics (CL) refers to the branch of linguistics that

interprets language in terms of the concepts, sometimes universal, sometimes specific to a particular tongue, which underlie its forms. Basically, cognitive linguistics is the study of the mind through language and the study of language as a cognitive function. The guiding principle behind this area of linguistics is that language creation, learning and usage must be explained by referene to human cognition in general mental processes that apply not only to language but to all other areas of human intelligence.

 Cognitive linguists deny that the mind has any module for language-

acquisition that is unique and autonomous. They argue that knowledge of linguistic phenomena i.e., phonemes, morphemes, and syntax is essentially conceptual in nature. Also, they assert that the storage and retrieval of linguistic data is not significantly different from the storage and retrieval of other knowledge, and that use of language in understanding employs similar cognitive abilities to those used in other non-linguistic tasks. Cognitive linguistics offers a unified account of not only linguistic meaning but also that of meaning in a wide variety of social and cultural phenomena.

THE DEVELOPMENT OF COGNITIVE LINGUISTICS

Cognitive Linguistics grew out of the work of a number of

researchers active in the 1970s who were interested in the relation of language and mind, and who did not follow the prevailing tendency to explain linguistic patterns by means of appeals to structural properties internal to and specific to language. Rather than attempting to segregate syntax from the rest of language in a 'syntactic component' governed by a set of principles and elements specific to that component, the line of research followed instead was to examine the relation of language structure to things outside language.

THE DEVELOPMENT OF COGNITIVE LINGUISTICS

The most influential linguists working along these lines and

focusing centrally on cognitive principles and organization were Wallace Chafe, Charles Fillmore, George Lakoff, Ronald Langacker, and Leonard Talmy. Each of these linguists began developing their own approach to language description and linguistic theory, centered on a particular set of phenomena and concerns. One of the important assumptions shared by all of these scholars is that meaning is so central to language that it must be a primary focus of study. Linguistic structures serve the function of expressing meanings and hence the mappings between meaning and form are a prime subject of linguistic analysis, thus, semantic structures of all meaningful linguistic units can and should be investigated.

THE DEVELOPMENT OF COGNITIVE LINGUISTICS

These views were in direct opposition to the ideas

developing at the time within Chomskyan linguistics, in which meaning was 'interpretive' and peripheral to the study of language. The central object of interest in language was syntax. The structures of language were in this view not driven by meaning, but instead were governed by principles essentially independent of meaning. Thus, the semantics associated with morphosyntactic structures did not require investigation; the focus was on language-internal structural principles as explanatory constructs.

AREAS OF STUDY
Cognitive linguistics is divided into two main areas of study,

which are currently being reunified, as linguists have grown to understand their mutual interdependence: (1) COGNITIVE SEMANTICS , rejecting the traditional separation of linguistics into phonology, syntax, pragmatics and other fields of study , but dividing semantics (meaning) into meaning-construction and knowledge representation instead, whose techniques are native to cognitive semantics and typically used in lexical studies and (2)COGNITIVE APPROACHES TO GRAMMAR, theories of grammar that relate grammar to mental processes and structures in human cognition.

ASPECTS OF COGNITION STUDIED BY COGNITIVE LINGUISTICS

Some of the most relevant aspects of cognition that are studied by CL are the following: Construction grammar (CXG), a family of theories, or models, of grammar that are based on the idea that the primary unit of grammar is the grammatical construction rather than the atomic syntactic unit and the rule that combines atomic units. Cognitive grammar - a cognitive approach to language developed by Ronald Langacker, which considers the basic units of language to be symbols or conventional pairings of a semantic structure with a phonological label. Conceptual metaphor, referring to the understanding of one idea, or conceptual domain in terms of another, for example, understanding quantity in terms of directionality (e.g. "prices are rising"). A conceptual domain can be any coherent organization of human experience. The regularity with which different languages employ the same metaphors, which often appear to be perceptually based, has led to the hypothesis that the mapping between conceptual domains corresponds to neural mappings in the brain.

ASPECTS OF COGNITION STUDIED BY COGNITIVE LINGUISTICS

Conceptual Blending (aka Conceptual Integration) is a general theory

of cognition developed by Gilles Fauconnier and Mark Turner, according to which elements and vital relations from diverse scenarios are "blended" in a subconscious process known as Conceptual Blending, which is assumed to be ubiquitous to everyday thought and language. Insights obtained from these blends constitute the products of creative thinking, though conceptual blending theory is not itself a theory of creativity, inasmuch as it does not illuminate the issue of where the inputs to a blend actually come from. Blending theory does provide a rich terminology for describing the creative products of others, but has little to say on the inspiration that serves as the starting point for each blend. Conceptual organization, including Categorization (the process in which ideas and objects are recognized, differentiated and understood) , Image schemas (a recurring structure within our cognitive processes which establishes patterns of understanding and reasoning., formed from our bodily interactions, from linguistic experience, and from historical context)

ASPECTS OF COGNITION STUDIED BY COGNITIVE LINGUISTICS

Frame semantics - a theory of linguistic meaning relating linguistic semantics to encyclopaedic knowledge. The basic idea is that one cannot understand the meaning of a single word without access to all the essential knowledge that relates to that word. Iconicity, the conceived similarity or analogy between the form of a sign(linguistic or otherwise) and its meaning. Force Dynamics a semantic category that describes the way in which entities interact with reference to force. Not only does it apply to expressions in the physical domain like leaning on or dragging, but it also plays an important role in expressions involving psychological forces (e.g. wanting or being urged) Construal, or how a person perceives, comprehends, and interprets the world around him or her, particularly the behavior or action of others towards him or her Subjectivity, or the subject and his or her perspective, feelings, beliefs, and desires. Gesture and sign language Linguistic relativism he principle of linguistic relativity holds that the structure of a language affects the ways in which its speakers conceptualize their world, i.e. Their world view, or otherwise influence their cognitive processes Cognitive neuroscience, academic field concerned with the scientific study of biological substrates underlying cognition,

COMPLICATIONS AND DISADVANTAGES

Accordingly, CL is a relatively new field of study and there

are strong connections between CL and the research areas of functional linguistics, linguistic description, psycholinguistics, pragmatics, and discourse studies can be seen. However, this implies complications because the terminology of cognitive linguistics is not entirely stable and interfaces with a number of other disciplines.

REFERENCES:
Novakov, Predrag; Milivojevi, Nataa (2006), Introduction to

Linguistics: Workbook I. Geeaerts, Dirk (1955), Cognitive Linguistics: Basic Readings http://www.afls.net/cahiers/10.2/iraide.pdf [June 7th, 2012] http://www.semioticon.com/seo/C/coglin.html# [June 7th, 2012] http://www.cognitivelinguistics.org [June 7th, 2012] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_linguistics [June 7th, 2012]