ON EMBODIMENT OF A REFERENT IN INDIRECT NAMING

ON EMBODIMENT OF A REFERENT IN INDIRECT NAMING

Author:  М.I. Кiose

Affiliation:  Russian Academy of Sciences

Abstract:  The research deals with embodied cognition in indirect naming, viewed as a dynamic process that takes place in discourse. 3100 indirect names and nominal constructions used in modern English and Russian fiction texts are selected for the analysis. Whereas indirect names tend to be unconventional and thus conserve their motivation in text, the method of textual analysis serves well to study the peculiar character of embodiment of referents.
In the course of research a general scheme of embodiment was traced within which we consider bodily centres and embodiment parametres. We discovered particular schemes that tend to prevail and bring them forward in a few conclusions about primary embodiment schemes. Furthermore, the analysis gives evidence on the existence of conventional referent embodiment schemes.
The author examines the focal elements of the referent construal in indirect names to show the complexity of embodiment schemes underlying the phenomenon of indirect naming in texts. The embodiment scheme of the referent construal comprises various perceptual and inferential modi: perception of shape, substance and taste; as well as positive evaluation; knowledge and belief modi. 
In general both concrete and abstract characteristics of the referent can be embodied. One physical characteristics can be embodied by various perceptual centers (e.g. liquidity as physical property can be embodied by tactile centre (feet, fingers, etc.), visual or aural centre) which may further result in different evaluation modi. The most frequent embodiment models involve visual and tactile (hands, fingers) perception modi.

Keywords:  indirect names, embodiment, centres and parametres of embodiment, referential and modal representations

References: 
Vygotskiy, L.S. Myshlenie i rech'. In Sobranie sochineniy: v 8 t. Moscow, (1934) 1982. V. 2.
Zalevskaya, A.A. Problemy organizatsii vnutrennego leksikona cheloveka. Kalinin: Kalininskiy gos. un-t, 1977.
Zlatev, Y. Obraznye skhemy, mimeticheskie skhemy i zhesty detey. Voprosy kognitivnoy lingvistiki, 2013, 1, 14-31.
Rakhilina, E.V. Kognitivnyy analiz predmetnykh imen: semantika i sochetaemost'. 2 izd., ispr. i dop. Moscow: Azbukovnik, 2010.
Sechenov, I.M. Izbrannye proizvedeniya. Moscow: Uchpedgiz, 1953.
Sorokin, Yu.A. Issledovanie vneyazykovoy obuslovlennosti psikholingvisticheskikh yavleniy. In Osnovy teorii rechevoy deyatel'nosti. Moscow: Nauka, 1974. P. 220-232.
Uspenskiy, B.A. Ego Loquens. Yazyk i kommunikatsionnoe prostranstvo. 2-e izd., Moscow: RGGU: Nauka, 2012.
Altman, M. (2009). Understanding embodiment. Psychophisiological models in traditional medical systems. In V. Evans & S. Pourcel (Eds.), New directions in cognitive linguistics, Vol. 24 (pp. 311-329). Amsterdam, Philadelphia: John Benjamin’s Publishing Company.
Barsalou, L.W. (1999). Language comprehension: Archival memory or preparation for situated action? Discourse processes, 28 (1), 61-80.
Bergen, B., Lindsay, S., Matlock, T. & Narayanan, S. (2007). Spatial and linguistic aspects of visual imagery in sentence comprehension. Cognitive Science, 31, 733-764.
Bergen, B.K. (2012). Louder than words. London: Basic Books.
Cienki, A. & Müller, C. (2008). Metaphor and gesture. Amsterdam: John Benjamin’s Publishing.
Clark, A. (1997). Being there: Putting brain, body and world together again. Cambridge: MIT Press.
Gallagher. S. (2005). How the body shapes the mind. N.Y.: Oxford University Press.
Gallagher, S. & Cole, J. (1995). Body schema and body image in a deafferented subject. Journal of mind and behavior, 16, 369-390.
Gibbs, R.W. (2005). Embodiment in metaphorical imagination. In D. Pecher & R.W. Zwaan (Eds.), Grounding cognition: The role of perception and action in memory, language and thinking (pp. 65-92). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Gibbs, R.W. (2006). Embodiment in cognitive science. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Glenberg, A.M. (1997). What memory is for. Behavioral and brain sciences, 20, 1-55.
Hutchins, E. (1995). Cognition in the Wild. Massachusetts: A Bradford Book.
Johnson, M. (1987). The Body in the mind: the bodily basis of meaning, imagination, and reason. Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press.
Lakoff, G. & Johnson, M. (1999). Philosophy in the Flesh: The Embodied Mind and Its Challenge to Western Thought. Basic Books. Pustejovsky, J. (1995). The Generative Lexicon. Cambridge: MIT Press.
Rowlands, M. (2004). The body in mind: Understanding cognitive processes. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Talmy, L. (1996). Fictive motion in language and “ception”. In P. Bloom, M.A. Peterson, L. Nadel & M.F. Garrett (Eds.), Language and space (pp. 211-276). Cambridge MA: MIT Press.
Talmy, L. (2000). Toward a cognitive semantics. Vol. 1. Concept structuring systems. A Bradford Book, Cambridge, Massachusetts, London, England: The MIT Press.
Tomasello, M. (2003). Constructing a language: A Usage-based theory of language acquisition. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Varela, F.J., Thompson, E. & Rosch, E. (1993). The Embodied Mind: Cognitive Science and Human Experience. Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Wilson, M. (2002). Six Views of Embodied Cognition. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, Vol. 9, 4, 625-636.
Zlatev, J. (2007). Embodiment, language and mimesis. In T. Ziemke, J. Zlatev & R. Frank (Eds.), Body, language and mind. Vol. 1. Embodiment (pp. 297-337). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.

Pages:  65-73