Book review: N.I. Stolova. Cognitive Linguistics and lexical change. Motion verbs from Latin to Romance. Amsterdam & Philadelphia: John Benjamins, 2015

This book studies the semantic evolution of translocativemotion verbs fromLatin to Romance from a historical cognitive linguistics perspective. It is divided into ten chapters plus references and two indexes, one for language and language families and another for subjects and terms. It has two main goals: (i) to apply cognitive linguisticsmethodologies and theoretical tools (mainly, lexicalisation patterns and conceptual metaphor) to explain the onomasiological (Chapters 2–4) and semasiological (Chapters 5–7) evolution of motion verbs, and (ii) to bring useful insights from (Romance) historical linguistic practice into cognitive linguistic research (Chapters 8–9). Chapter 1 outlines the main goals, explains key concepts (motion verb, lexical change), and contextualises the research to follow. This investigation examines how the structural and semantic characteristics of Latin motion verbs diachronically develop into Romance from both a general Pan-Romance stance as well as a language-specific level. Ten categories of translocative motion are examined: one general motion (neutral GO), six path-related (TOWARD, AWAY, INSIDE, OUTSIDE, UPWARD, DOWNWARD), and three manner-related (WALK, RUN, JUMP). Data mainly come from ten languages..

The role of force dynamics and intentionality in the reconstruction of L2 verb meanings:A Danish-Spanish bidirectional study

This paper examines the role of force dynamics and intentionality in the description of placement events by two groups of native speakers of typologically and genetically different languages, Danish and Spanish, and by two groups of intermediate adult learners, Danish learners of L2 Spanish and Spanish learners of L2 Danish. The results of the study showed that (a) force dynamics and intentionality are important semantic components in both languages, but their distribution and relative focus differed crosslinguistically, and (b) the two learner groups had difficulties in reconstructing the meanings of the L2 verbs involving these two semantic components. Learning difficulties were observed when moving from a less to a more complex L2 system, when moving in the opposite direction, i.e., from a more to a less complex L2 system and when moving to an L2 system that is as complex as the learners native one

Ideófonos y poesía

Los ideófonos, conocidos popularmente (y erróneamente) como onomatopeyas, son unos elementos lingüísticos muy especiales, debido a sus características estructurales y a su forma de representar el significado de una manera muy vívida. De ahí que, además de cumplir una función representativa, los ideófonos se hayan utilizado de forma constante con funciones expresivas y estéticas. En este artículo, tras una breve introducción al propio concepto de ideófono y a sus características lingüísticas, se explora su papel fundamental en la poesía de varias lenguas ideofónicas. Se mostrará que el ideófono es un catalizador estético que involucra activamente tanto al emisor como al destinatario del evento que describe. Como consecuencia de este involucramiento interlocutivo, el ideófono facilita la intertextualidad y activa un vínculo grupal íntimo entre los hablantes de la comunidad lingüística ideofónica

How to become a woman without turning into a Barbie: Change-of-state verb constructions and their role in Spanish as a foreign language

Pseudo-copulative change-of-state (PCOS) verbs are predicates that involve a change in the composition of an entity undergoing a particular event. Due to their complex linguistic nature, these verbs are not easy to be accounted for and consequently, they represent a real challenge to language teachers and learners. First, this paper critically examines the specialized L1 and L2 literature on PCOS verbs in Spanish. Then, it is shown that previous studies are unable to provide a unanimous theory, but rather offer heterogeneous explanations that are full of exceptions and overlook semantic nuances. The second part of this work presents a corpus-based constructional study of the PCOS verbal structure [Vcl+NP] in two PCOS verbs, hacerse ‘make.cl’ and volverse ‘turn.cl’. It is argued that a multi-level family of PCOS constructions captures both the specificity of fully-saturated constructions (María se hizo mujer ‘María became a woman’), as well as the more general abstract patterns ([Subject PCOS-verb Object]). This constructional approach offers a unified and motivated explanation for these PCOS verbs that can be very useful for Spanish as a Foreign Language (SFL)

Trabajo de campo

Fieldwork can be described as the systematic data gathering about a specific phenomenon that takes place on its natural environment. After a short introduction about languages and linguistic diversity, this paper introduces the basics of fieldwork methodologies. It starts with an overview about the concept of fieldwork in Linguistics, followed by a description of the main scientific and ethical requirements needed to conduct fieldwork around language. Then, it proposes a ‘must-to-do’ list of basic steps to bear in mind in fieldwork, with a special focus on practical and technological issues. The final part discusses the importance, the scope, and the need to incorporate fieldwork in the language sciences.El trabajo de campo consiste en la recogida sistemática de información sobre un determinado fenómeno in situ, en su entorno natural. En este artículo, tras una breve revisión sobre el lenguaje y la diversidad lingüística, se exponen las bases que sustentan a esta metodología lingüística. Este artículo se divide en dos partes fundamentales. En primer lugar, se explican las diferentes concepciones que abarca esta metodología en el área de la lingüística y los requisitos necesarios para llevar a cabo la interacción entre el investigador, la comunidad lingüística y la investigación. En segundo lugar, se enumeran los pasos necesarios para realizar un trabajo de campo y se profundiza en algunos aspectos prácticos y tecnológicos. Finalmente, a modo de conclusión, se reflexiona sobre la importancia y la necesidad de llevar a cabo trabajo de campo en las ciencias del lenguaje

Smelling and Perception: A Cross-Linguistic Study

Perception verbs have supplied a rich field of research in linguistics: grammaticalisation (Heine, B. & al. 1991). Complementation (Horie, K. 1993) and semantic change (Sweetser E. 1990). Sweetser in From Etymology to Pragmatics. Metaphorical and Cultural Aspects of Semantic Structure (1990) states that inside the semantic field of perception. There are metaphorical mappings from concrete or physical meanings onto abstract meanings and regards vision and hearing as the most salient senses, whereas the sense of smell has fewer and less deep meraphorical connections with the mental domain. The aim of this paper is to show that the verbs of smelling extend semantically into the cognitive domain in more than the ways cired by Sweerser, and that as predicted by her, these connections between the physical and mental domain are not language specific bur cross-linguistic. These statements will be supported with data drawn from Bosque, Spanish and English.Los verbos de percepción han proporcionado un amplio campo de investigación dentro de la Lingüística: gramaticalización (Heine, B. & al. 1991). Complementación (Horie, K. 1993) y cambio semántico (Sweetser, E. 1990). Sweetser en From Etymology to Pragmatics. Metaphoricai and Cultural Aspects of Semantic Srructure (1990) afirma que dentro del cambio senuíntico de la percepción se producen conexiones metafóricas entre los significados concretos o físicos y los significados abstractos; y presenta la vista y el oído como los sentidos más relevantes, mientras que relega el olfato a un segundo plano, ya que lo considera con menos conexiones y no tan profundas con el dominio mental. El objetivo de este artículo es demostrar que los verbos relacionados con el olfato se extienden semánticamente hacia el dominio cognitivo en más formas de las que Sweetser cita y que. Como ella misma predice, estas conexiones entre el dominio físico y mental no son especificas de un idioma sino cros-lingüísticas. Estas ideas se apoyarán con ejemplos del euskera, español e inglés

Trabajo de campo

El trabajo de campo consiste en la recogida sistemática de información sobre un determinado fenómeno in situ, en su entorno natural. En este artículo, tras una breve revisión sobre el lenguaje y la diversidad lingüística, se exponen las bases que sustentan a esta metodología lingüística. Este artículo se divide en dos partes fundamentales. En primer lugar, se explican las diferentes concepciones que abarca esta metodología en el área de la lingüística y los requisitos necesarios para llevar a cabo la interacción entre el investigador, la comunidad lingüística y la investigación. En segundo lugar, se enumeran los pasos necesarios para realizar un trabajo de campo y se profundiza en algunos aspectos prácticos y tecnológicos. Finalmente, a modo de conclusión, se reflexiona sobre la importancia y la necesidad de llevar a cabo trabajo de campo en las ciencias del lenguaje.Fieldwork can be described as the systematic data gathering about a specific phenomenon that takes place on its natural environment. After a short introduction about languages and linguistic diversity, this paper introduces the basics of fieldwork methodologies. It starts with an overview about the concept of fieldwork in Linguistics, followed by a description of the main scientific and ethical requirements needed to conduct fieldwork around language. Then, it proposes a 'must-to-do' list of basic steps to bear in mind in fieldwork, with a special focus on practical and technological issues. The final part discusses the importance, the scope, and the need to incorporate fieldwork in the language sciences

Las lenguas románicas y la tipología de los eventos de movimiento

According to Talmy's semantic typology, Romance languages are classified as verb-framed. is group of languages lexicalizes Path information in the main verb, whereas Manner information, if expressed at all, is usually codified in linguistic elements outside the main verb. Based on a detailed study on oral data from motion events in three Romance languages (Spanish, Italian, and French in contrast with a Germanic language: German), this paper explores the existence of intratypological variation in the description of motion events in these languages. Results show that the three languages behave similarly with respect to the Manner component, but that there is intratypological variation as far as the Path component is concerned. Italian can be considered as a high-path salient language, since it is significantly different from Spanish and French