Cognitive linguistics/poetics

Cognitive linguistics/poetics

Cognitive linguistics is an approach to language that is based on our experience of the world and the way we perceive and conceptualize it. It emerged in the 1970s and is primarily interested in the conceptual level.

Main hypotheses of cognitive linguistics

• Language is not an autonomous cognitive faculty.
• Grammar is conceptualization.
• Knowledge of language emerges from language use.

Concept, conceptual structure, and frame are three important terms in cognitive linguistics. The conceptual structure is a single level of mental representation, while a frame is a system of concepts. In order to understand one of them, you have to understand the whole.

Metaphor in cognitive linguistics

Metaphor is one of the most important elements in cognitive linguistics. Traditional literary criticism has differentiated two main parts of a metaphor: the tenor and the vehicle. The tenor is the familiar element, while the vehicle is the new element which is described in terms of the old familiar element. For example, in "Juliet (vehicle) is the sun (tenor)," the common properties between the two elements (tenor/vehicle) constitute the ground of the metaphor.

In addition, cognitive linguistics models the process of metaphor as a mapping of properties between the two spaces or domains.

Conceptual metaphor

In particular, a conceptual metaphor is a kind of metaphor that involves a relationship between a tenor or source domain (the source of the literal meaning of the metaphorical expression) and a vehicle or target domain (the domain of the experience actually being described by the metaphor).

• Fact thoughts into words – WORDS (target domain) ARE CONTAINERS (source domain)
• Anger boiled over – ANGER/EMOTION (target domain) IS HOT FLUID (source domain)
• Spend time – TIME (target domain) IS MONEY (source domain)
• Life is going – LIFE (target domain) IS A JOURNEY (source domain)

Furthermore, the first to apply cognitive linguistics to literature were Turner and Lakoff (concept of metaphor in literature). According to them, people make sense of their experience and understand many aspects of language through their knowledge of conceptual metaphors. For instance, "Life is a journey" is one of the most analyzed metaphors by Turner and Lakoff.

Text World Theory (TWT)

Text World Theory aims to provide the analytical tools necessary for the systematic examination and discussion of these mental representations or text-worlds. According to TWT, human beings process and understand all discourse by constructing mental representations of it in their minds. Therefore, TWT is a cognitive linguistic model of human discourse processing.

In TWT, a world is a rich and cognitively complex affair. A world is a language event or a discourse world (immediate situation), involving at least two participants.