The role of semiotics in the unification of langue and parole: an Agentive Cognitive Construction Grammar approach to English modals

This article introduces Agentive Cognitive Construction Grammar, an emerging field that seeks to connect the linguistic system with speaker-meaning. The stated purpose is thus to tackle a pervasive disconnect in both cognitive linguistics and construction grammar, whereby the linguistic system (langue) and speaker selections (parole) are separated in the belief that language is essentially a mental process associated with the brain, and hence, separated from bodily experience. I contend this view by introducing a triadic model of construction (based on the Peircean sign) in which form and function are inextricably bound up with agency. This is possible because language is tethered to senses of movement and balance that connect experiences with the physical world with the mental. A major insight of the paper is that argument structure constructions partake of both linguistic and non-linguistic signs, which provides speakers with a means to verbalize their thoughts and distribute agency in specific events.

Beyond the Language of Covid-19: Transformation of Social Discourse and Reproduction of Cultural Capital

The research draws on the concept of ‘cultural capital’ as well as assumptions of critical discourse analysis and cognitive linguistics to argue that the Covid-19 pandemic may be viewed as a global turning point. The article explores the context and the means that have facilitated the transformation of cultural capital during the coronavirus outbreak. The dramatic changes to culture have been successfully pushed through due to the public’s incessant exposure to institutionalized, governmental and mass media discourses, which have been urging people to adopt new communicative and cultural practices with a varying degree of argumentation and imposition. The changes entail reviewing social structure, spatial and relational stereotypes and standards, which in the long run transforms cultural capital. The global scope of the pandemic and the relatively identical regulations imposed by governments on their citizens generate a tentative tendency to cultural convergence: individuals are made to abandon their culture specific practices and values and adopt those that ensure physical survival. Received: 8 September 2021 / Accepted: 16 November 2021 / Published: 3 January 2022

Bilingual Mental Lexicon and Collocational Processing

The chapter starts with a definition and models of mental dictionary. It then builds on the bilingual lexical activation models and goes on to discuss formulaic language (collocations in particular). After explaining the basics of formulaic language processing, the author attempts to address the issue of lexical and collocational priming theory by Hoey, which has its roots in cognitive linguistics and usage-based language models. Last but not least, some suggestions for future research are provided in an attempt to address the needs of the lexical research literature in the Turkish setting.

Linguacognitive and Linguoculturological Features of the Opposition Concept Good and Bad in Different Structural Languages (In English and Uzbek)

Annotation: The relevance of this study is due to its connection with the modern direction of language learning - cognitive linguistics, which makes it possible to identify the specifics of the representation of human knowledge, including evaluative ones, in the semantics of linguistic units. The prospect of the cognitive approach in studying the processes of evaluative conceptualization and evaluative categorization is explained by the fact that it makes it possible to assess the role of a person in the perception and evaluation of the surrounding reality and the formation of evaluative values, taking into account the interaction of cognitive and linguistic factors. Accordingly, the evaluative categories "good" and "bad" in this study are considered from the point of view of the mental processes of evaluative conceptualization and evaluative categorization and their refraction in linguistic meanings. Keywords: concept, language, linguacultural study, linguacultural concept "bad", linguacultural concept "good", linguistic materialization of a concept, linguacultural research.

Peculiarities of Greek Origin Words Perception by the Representatives of Contemporary Russian Linguistic Culture: Associative Experiment

The article describes the associative experiment as one of the most productive methods of modern psycholinguistics. The theoretical works of Russian and foreign researchers on the theory and practice of the associative experiment in modern linguistics are reviewed. To illustrate the associative experiment, the analysis of the associative fields, formed by the reactions of the Russian-speaking respondents to the words of Greek origin is presented. The relevance of the work is determined by the fact that the authors make an attempt to study the peculiarities of the perception of borrowed words, using the mechanisms of perception of these or those concepts by native speakers, their evaluation and connotations. This seems interesting not only for contemporary psycholinguistics, but also for semantics, stylistics, cognitive linguistics and other branches of linguistics. The linguocultural value of the study lies in the fact that the experiment allows determine how a word of foreign origin, occurring in Russian, retains the charge of the original culture from which it came. The linguistic material for the study is the most common or typical Greek expressions from the poems of A.S. Khomyakov, a Russian poet of the 19th century, one of the founders of the Slavophile movement. The novelty of the research lies in the fact that the language of A.S. Khomyakovs works is still understudied. The study of the Greekisms as a foreign cultural phenomenon in the texts of a Slavophile poet, whose philosophical concept is connected with "traditionalism" both in the understanding of culture and language, is of scientific interest. We describe the associative fields to the words-stimuli prophet and ether , using Y.N. Karaulov's methodology, which implies the consideration of associations from lexico-syntactic, morphological, cognitive, pragmatic and statistical points of view. From the linguocultural point of view it is important to identify the cognitive features of the perception of the stimuli. The experiment helped to discover that words of Greek origin continue to carry a charge of Greek culture, in addition, they have become an integral part of Russian culture, manifesting themselves in the minds of native speakers through association with Russian precedent texts. The analysis of associative fields made it possible to reveal the peculiarities of the perception of words of Greek origin by native speakers of modern Russian, and to compare the obtained meanings with those that the words had when they were written in the 19th century. The transformation of semantics, as well as the re-accumulation from one meaning to another, the emergence of new meanings, which corresponds to the historical development of words, are noted.

NEW VISION OF CONCEPT EUROPE (A LINGUISTIC PERSPECTIVE)

This article presents a study of the concept EUROPE, done in the area of cognitive linguistics. The concept EUROPE is considered a conceptual quantum of structured knowledge, possessing of different meanings. The article analyzes the concept EUROPE from a linguistic point of view, which allowed to reveal a number of specific features of its semantics, to get a more comprehensive and diverse view of it by constructing cognitive schemes implementing concept EUROPE, as well as to identify basic metaphorical models. Involvement of methods of conceptual analysis allows to present the analised concept in the form of a certain conceptual model, a special way organized conceptual scheme. With the help of the conceptual model of the Subject frame the cognitive dynamics of the concept development in the European integration discourse is revealed. Political metaphor is one of the most common and effective policy tools. The research material is characterized by the use of metaphors belonging to such basic types, which are related to the reference spheres as the sociomorphic sphere, the anthropomorphic sphere, the sphere of artifacts and the sphere of nature. Conceptual metaphors of European integration discourse use in their codes the conceptual fields “space”, “travel”, “movement”, “construction”, “work results”, “family relations”, “nature”, “sports”, “art”, etc.

Reframing Reality of Online Learning on the Basis of Internet Memes

The paper sets out to investigate the interplay between image and text with reference to chosen cognitive models in order to pinpoint the image of distance learning during the COVID-19 pandemic. The bilateral nature of memes will be discussed in relation to the cognitive linguistics framework, in particular the Conceptual Metaphor Theory (CMT) (Lakoff and Johnson 1980, Kovecses 2002, Forceville 1996, 2008, 2009), Frame Semantics (Fillmore 1988) construal (Langacker 1987, 2008), blending theory (Fauconnier and Turner 2002), Discourse Viewpoint Space (Dancyngier and Vandelanotte 2017).

Conceptual Blending and Two Ways of Feeding on Jesus

Chapter 3 continues the introduction to cognitive linguistics begun in Chapter 2 by exploring conceptual blending, a second-generation development within the field. It presents two strands of Christian piety related to eating and drinking, one based on the eucharistic elements and the other on feeding spiritually on Jesus through scripture and prayer. The author traces these pieties to two scriptural blends of opposite metaphoric directionality, BREAD IS JESUS and JESUS IS BREAD—or, more precisely, THIS LOAF AND WINE ARE JESUS’S BODY AND BLOOD and JESUS’S FLESH AND BLOOD ARE HEAVENLY LIFE-GIVING BREAD AND DRINK. The former arises from the Synoptic and Pauline institution narratives and supports the idea of sacramental communion; the latter arises from John 6 and supports spiritual communion. Both blends are analyzed in detail. The author writes that all Christians can accept Johannine spiritual communion but that an ecumenical divide remains regarding the Synoptic/Pauline blend.

Metaphor, Embodied Realism, and Sacramental Truth

This chapter and the next provide an introduction to the field of cognitive linguistics. This chapter focuses on core concepts including conceptual metaphor, metonymy, polysemy, and prototype theory (conceptual blending is explored in Chapter 3). Based on this overview, the author argues that language “means” not through referential correspondence to objective, observer-independent reality but by prompting for embodied simulation on the part of hearers and readers. Language, then, is true insofar as these simulations are apt to reality as experienced by embodied human beings. The chapter proposes that this epistemological perspective of “embodied realism” is congruent with the critical realism endorsed by many recent theologians and with a sacramental worldview in which the material world can be the arena for God’s self-communication.