COGNITIVE LINGUISTICS (08/05/18)

11 congreso AELCO  en octubre en Córdoba

TOMORROW’S EXAM - 5 QUESTIONS:

- Cognitive Linguistics and Translation (2 points)

- Cognitive Linguistics and Poetics (2 points)
- Cognitive Linguistics and Second Language Acquisition (2 points)
- Cognitive Linguistics and Cultural Studies (2 points)
- Cognitive Linguistics and Sociolinguistics (2 points)

MORE IMPORTANT QUESTION TO ANSWER: How CL is applied to…?

1. Poetics
Trying to rationalize and interpret any literary work through Cognitive Linguistics.
Applying CL to literary studies.
One of the ways in which…… is the theory of prototypes.
In literary work, conceptual metaphors
- Invisible: writers don’t give you source and target, or source, or target (they need
creative input from the reader).
- Visible: writers give you source and target.

Why a literary work is ambiguous? Because it gives you part of the information regarding
metaphors.

In literary work, metaphors are more expressive and less explanatory, metaphors are not
so clear and they give you lots of information.

TRAJECTOR AND LANDMARK: they can foreground or make more salient something.
Through: repetitions, alliterations,… expressive devices can help for that.

2. Second Language Acquisition

ENCYCLOPAEDIC KNOWLEDGE: words are storage in our minds in set of networks, and
when a learner deals with a second language, she/he has to take into account that has
to learn a new set of networks.

3. Translation
It helps to avoid cultural problems in translations. To provide fully contextualized
meanings. Taking into account: the mind of the translator, L1 of translator, L2 of
translator and its level of dominance, field/genre/sth like that… of the translation.
METAPHORS: although some conceptual metaphors are universal, some other
metaphors are different in each language. Thus, knowing each set of mappings and
domains helps the translator to better achieve her/his goal.
PUNS: when translating titles, the translator needs to maintain the conceptual
knowledge that is within the expression, so when translating she/he must be aware of
that, based on culture, context and encyclopaedic knowledge.

4. Cultural Studies
The relation btw language/culture is symbiotic: language – culture / culture – language
 Conceptualizations are related to a specific culture. Meaning is conceptual, but not
individual, it is culture-based.
IMAGE SCHEMA: the fact that future is front is cultural, so our bodily experience is
based on our culture. How do we learn that info? Thanks to interaction and
experience.
If a person comes from a different country, she/he needs to learn that cultural
knowledge. When you face a new situation you go to your schemas.
METAPHORS: metaphors are culturally constructed, so the mappings are not
constructed by each individual, it is the community which creates those metaphors.
Thus, each community has its own metaphors based on culture.

5. Sociolinguistics
Different registers (depending on whom you are speaking to, where you are when you
are speaking. Different varieties of a language (not different languages, like in Cultural
Studies)
BILINGUALISM: code-switching
SPEECH ACCOMODATION: when you change your speech to be better understood for
example (in terms of vocabulary, pronunciation, syntax,…).

CL and translation

- AIM: to avoid cultural problems. Integrating, not only linguistic, but also cultural
aspects to the translation. Mediating between two conceptual worlds.
- THEORIES:
o METAPHOR: some metaphors are universal, but some others are culture-
specific. AIM: to achieve the maximum cognitive equivalence.

CL and poetics

- AIM: understanding and analysing literary texts in terms of cognitive linguistics.

- AUTHOR: Tsur
- THEORIES:
o PROTOTYPES (CATEGORIES)  literary periods
o TRAJECTOR AND LANDMARK: to better analyse characters. (figure – ground)

CL and cultural studies

- AIM: to take into account the importance and relevance of culture in language
- AUTHORS: Sharifian
- THEORIES:
o METAPHOR

CL and sociolinguistics

- AIM: to understand language in a society under a cognitive perspective.

- AUTHORS: Lackoff
- THEORIES:
o BLENDING: code-switching
o CAT (COMMUNICATIVE ACCOMODATION THEORY):