Multiple analytical perspectives of the Eleme Anterior-Perfective

There is increasing recognition in typology that linguistic categories are language-specific and not universal, increasing the need for explicitness in language descriptions. In light of this development, I argue in this paper that preexisting labels and descriptions for a set of subject-marking TAM prefixes in Eleme do not adequately characterise the distribution and use of these forms, which is conditioned by the complex interaction of person and number features, Aktionsart, epistemic modality and information structure. In response to the challenges raised by these data, I argue that when multiple analytical perspectives are required to understand the function of a grammatical form, fine-grained quantitative analyses with description give a complex but useful basis on which to compare languages

Usage Effects on the Cognitive Routinization of Chinese Resultative Verbs

The present study adopts a corpus-oriented usage-based approach to the grammar of Chinese resultative verbs. Zooming in on a specific class of V-kai constructions, this paper aims to elucidate the effect of frequency in actual usage events on shaping the linguistic representations of resultative verbs. Specifically, it will be argued that while high token frequency results in more lexicalized V-kai complex verbs, high type frequency gives rise to more schematized V-kai constructions. The routinized patterns pertinent to V-kai resultative verbs varying in their extent of specificity and generality accordingly serve as a representative illustration of the continuum between lexicon and grammar that characterizes a usage-based conception of language

The metaphorical construction of complex domains:the case of speech activity in English.

In this article I provide an account of the way in which the domain of spoken communication is metaphorically constructed in English, on the basis of the analysis of over 450 metaphorical references to speech activity in a corpus of contemporary written British English. I show how spoken communication is mainly structured via a set of source domains that conventionally apply to a wide variety of target domains, such as the source domains of MOTION, PHYSICAL TRANSFER, PHYSICAL CONSTRUCTION, and PHYSICAL SUPPORT. Each of these source domains structures a particular aspect of speech activity, such as the achievement of communicative goals, the expression of meanings and ideas, the performance of speech acts, the negotiation of mutual relationships, and so on. I suggest that the particular conceptual mappings that underlie the main patterns in my data are best seen in terms of Grady's (1997) notion of primary metaphors, that is, as simple, basic mappings that have a firm experiential basis and that apply to a wide range of different areas of experience (e.g., "HELP/ASSISTANCE IS SUPPORT"). However, I also show that the main primary metaphors involved in structuring the domain of speech activity can be combined into a single overall physical scenario in which interactants can move in different directions, place themselves in different positions in relation to each other, come into contact with each other in different ways, physically produce texts/utterances/speech acts, physically pass texts/utterances/speech acts to each other, and make meanings visible to each other in different ways. Finally, I argue that a corpus-based methodology has much to offer to metaphor research, particularly in the extrapolation of conceptual metaphors from linguistic data

The Lisbon Treaty and the British Press a Corpus-Based Contrastive Analysis of Evaluation Resources

Evaluation plays an important role in understanding speakers or writers’ attitude towards an event or their feelings about entities and propositions (Hunston and Thompson 2000). Bednarek (2006) argues that evaluation pervades human behaviour and is linked to our beliefs. She also points out the importance of evaluation in actual discourse as it is impossible for any human being not to judge or be completely objective on a particular event. Given the nature of evaluation to be linked to our beliefs, it can be argued that there is a close relationship between evaluation and metaphor as metaphor analysis ‘‘is often, then, an exploration of the inner subjectivity of speakers – what it is that is unique to their perception of the world – and forms the basis for their response to particular situations and particular ideas’’ (Charteris-Black 2004: 11). Against this background, the present paper starts from the findings of a research project on conceptual metaphor analysis in the British press related to the Lisbon Treaty debate and focuses on the evaluative lexis that has often been found to collocate or co-occur with the linguistic expressions of the conceptual conflict and movement metaphors analysed. The evaluative adjectives we are particularly interested in are bullying, desperate, reluctant, arrogant, frightening, surprised, insistent. The evaluative verbs that we intend to explore are admit, blast, praise. However, all the other evaluative terms that might come up to light and have a significant role in the analysis of the event will be taken into account. The aim of this paper is to explore, through the methodology of Corpus Linguistics, how the British press uses the evaluative resources to construe the event of ratification and to what extent it presents a similar description or attributes similar roles to the European leaders and uses both metaphors and evaluation to create a coherent text and image of the ratification issue

Translating English non-human subjects in agentive contexts : a closer look at Dutch

While subjects of transitive action verbs in English and Dutch are typically realized as human agents (see Comrie 1989), both languages also feature instances of nonhuman agents in subject position. However, Vandepitte and Hartsuiker (2011) have shown that there are fewer options in Dutch and that translation issues present themselves in cases where both languages do not overlap. This paper wants to document overlap and differences in terms of non-prototypical subject realization by focussing on the strategies that are used in Dutch translations of six actions verbs (give, demonstrate, show, suggest, offer and tell) in combination with non-human subjects. Results reveal that a fair share of non-human subjects are also translated as such in the target language. Other strategies include occasional humanization of the non-human source text subjects, reduction of valency patterns with reduced agentivity vis-a-vis the English source-text sentences and shifts in the mapping of semantic roles onto syntactic functions