In contrast to symbol-manipulation approaches, Cognitive Linguistics offers a modal rather than an amodal account of meaning in language. From this perspective, the meanings attached to linguistic expressions, in the form of conceptualisations, have various properties in common with visual forms of representation. This makes Cognitive Linguistics a potentially useful framework for identifying and analysing language-image relations in multimodal texts. In this paper, we investigate language-image relations with a specific focus on intersemiotic convergence. Analogous with research on gesture, we extend (...) the notion of co-text images and argue that images and language usages which are proximal to one another in a multimodal text can be expected to exhibit the same or consistent construals of the target scene. We outline some of the dimensions of conceptualisation along which intersemiotic convergence may be enacted in texts, including event-structure, viewpoint, distribution of attention and metaphor. We take as illustrative data photographs and their captions in online news texts covering a range of topics including immigration, political protests, and inter-state conflict. Our analysis suggests the utility of Cognitive Linguistics in allowing new potential sites of intersemiotic convergence to be identified and in proffering an account of language-image relations that is based in language cognition. (shrink)

Sounds like h-nmm, hh-aaaah, hn-hn, unkay, nyeah, ummum, uuh, um-hm-uh-hm, um and uh-huh occur frequently in American English conversation but have thus far escaped systematic study. This article reports a study of both the forms and functions of such tokens in a corpus of American English conversations. These sounds appear not to be lexical, in that they are productively generated rather than finite in number, and in that the sound¿meaning mapping is compositional rather than arbitrary. This implies that English bears (...) within it a small specialized sub-language which follows different rules from the language as a whole. The functions supported by this sub-language complement those of main-channel English; they include low-overhead control of turn-taking, negotiation of agreement, signaling of recognition and comprehension, management of interpersonal relations such as control and affiliation, and the expression of emotion, attitude, and affect. (shrink)

The purpose of this paper is to apply theEntrenchment-and-Conventionalization Model(EC-Model hereafter; seeSchmid 2014,2015,2016,2017,2018;Schmid & Mantlik 2015) of language knowledge to genre, with the aim of showing how a unified theory of the relation between usage and linguistic knowledge and convention can shed light on the way genre knowledge becomes entrenched in the individual and shared conventional behavior in communities. The EC-Model is a usage-based and emergentist model of language knowledge and convention rooted in cognitive linguistics and usage-based approaches. It sees (...) knowledge as emerging from language usage, and explains the processes underlying the intertwining of social practice and cognition. However, so far, no suggestion has been advanced on how to extend the model to account for entrenchment and conventionalization at the supra-sentential level. In the area of genre studies various attempts have been made by scholars to develop or apply theories belonging to different scientific domains to understand the nature of genre. However, so far, there has been no research that applies a unified model in the attempt to link entrenchment of genres in individuals to their conventionalization at the societal level. I largely focus on the long tradition of rhetorical studies of genre, one among the different approaches that, over time, have regarded genre as their main topic of investigation. I concentrate on this tradition as it opens up the entire field of enquiry that defines contemporary genre research. To these I add by showing how the explanations provided so far can be cognitively clarified and unified under the EC-Model. The paper, then, argues that the EC-Model is theoretically apt to address questions about the nature of genre, capturing in an elegant way the interplay between cognition and social interaction in genre emergence, evolution, stabilization and variation. (shrink)

This paper presents a study of modality in Iranian Sign Language (ZEI) from a cognitive perspective, aimed at analyzing two linguistic channels: facial and manual. While facial markers and their grammatical functions have been studied in some sign languages, we have few detailed analyses of the facial channel in comparison with the manual channel in conveying modal concepts. This study focuses on the interaction between manual and facial markers. A description of manual modal signs is offered. Three facial markers and (...) their modality values are also examined: squinted eyes, brow furrow, and downward movement of lip corners (horseshoe mouth). In addition to offering this first descriptive analysis of modality in ZEI, this paper also applies the Cognitive Grammar model of modality, the Control Cycle, and the Reality Model, classifying modals into two kinds, effective and epistemic. It is suggested that effective control, including effective modality, tends to be expressed on the hands, while facial markers play an important role in marking epistemic assessment, one manifestation of which is epistemic modality. ZEI, like some other sign languages, exhibits an asymmetry between the number of manual signs and facial markers expressing epistemic modality: while the face can be active in the expression of effective modality, it is commonly the only means of expressing epistemic modality. By positing an epistemic core in effective modality, Cognitive Grammar provides a theoretical basis for these findings. (shrink)

Journal Name: Cognitive Linguistics Issue: Ahead of print.

Constructional approaches to genre model genre knowledge in terms of genre-based constructions. Like all constructions, these represent conventionalized pairings of meaning and form, of varying degrees of length and schematicity, whose pragmatic specifications include their association with a particular socio-cultural context. In this state-of-the-art article I review genre-related constructional work, discussing grammatical patterns that are licensed only in particular contexts, including conversational genres, as well as expressions that qualify as constructions simply on the basis of socio-cultural currency. The appropriateness of (...) constructional analysis for the language of genre derives from the definitional incorporation of discourse-pragmatic information in constructional descriptions and the possibility of relating genre-bound, idiosyncratic patterns to the rest of the constructions in a language through relations of inheritance. I further highlight the compatibility of Frame Semantics with the notion of genre and critically discuss the concept of conventionality as it applies to genre language. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Cognitive Linguistics Jahrgang: 26 Heft: 2 Seiten: 261-287.

Name der Zeitschrift: Cognitive Linguistics Jahrgang: 27 Heft: 4 Seiten: 465-477.

Narratives are an integral part of human expression. In the graphic form, they range from cave paintings to Egyptian hieroglyphics, from the Bayeux Tapestry to modern day comic books (Kunzle, 1973; McCloud, 1993). Yet not much research has addressed the structure and comprehension of narrative images, for example, how do people create meaning out of sequential images? This piece helps fill the gap by presenting a theory of Narrative Grammar. We describe the basic narrative categories and their relationship to a (...) canonical narrative arc, followed by a discussion of complex structures that extend beyond the canonical schema. This demands that the canonical arc be reconsidered as a generative schema whereby any narrative category can be expanded into a node in a tree structure. Narrative “pacing” is interpreted as a reflection of various patterns of this embedding: conjunction, left-branching trees, center-embedded constituencies, and others. Following this, diagnostic methods are proposed for testing narrative categories and constituency. Finally, we outline the applicability of this theory beyond sequential images, such as to film and verbal discourse, and compare this theory with previous approaches to narrative and discourse. (shrink)

The present article investigates a set of discourse connectors in the academic lecture genre from the viewpoint of the inseparable pair of pragmatics and cognition. Making use of theMICASEcorpus for data retrieval, a selection of discourse constructions encoding comparative contrastive meanings are analysed and their distinctive features are critically described and explained. The aim is to show how each particular genre promotes the use of certain constructions. TheMICASEdatabase reveals that, among all the subgroups of complementary contrastive constructions, some seem incompatible (...) with the academic lecture contexts by virtue of the particular characteristics of this specific genre. (shrink)