Introduction to the special issue

This is the introduction to a selection of papers presented at the international conference Thirty Five Years of English Studies in Osijek (35YESO) held from 18-19 October 2012 in order to mark the 35th anniversary of English studies at the University of Osijek

Introduction to the special issue

This is the introduction to a selection of papers presented at the international conference Thirty Five Years of English Studies in Osijek (35YESO) held from 18-19 October 2012 in order to mark the 35th anniversary of English studies at the University of Osijek

THE SCHEMATISATION PROCESS OF ENGLISH LIGHT VERBS

U radu se predstavlja korpusno-kognitivno istraživanje temeljnih odrednica u procesu shematizacije tzv. laganih (light) glagola u analitičkim glagolsko-imenskim konstrukcijama u suvremenom engleskom jeziku. U povijesnom se osvrtu na dijakronijsku motivaciju početaka shematizacije glagola have, give, take i make upućuje na rano prepoznavanje njihova tvorbenog potencijala koji je utemeljen na istodobnim procesima (super)shematizacije i metaforičkog elaboriranja. Predstavljeni su mrežni modeli (prema Langacker 1991b) tih glagola kojima se pokušava predstaviti kompleksno sučelje koje je omoguilo tvorbu konstrukcijske sheme koja je istodobno i vrlo produktivna i visoko frekventna pojava u korpusu engleskog jezika.The paper presents a corpus-cognitive study of basic elements in the schematisation process of the so called light verbs in the analytic verbo-nominal constructions in the contemporary English language. The historical overview offers a diachronic motivation for the initial schematisation processes of the verbs have, give, take and make and reveals an early recognition of their productive potential based on the simultaneous processes of (super)schematisation and metaphoric elaboration. Network models (cf. Langacker 1991) of the verbs are presented in order to elaborate on the complex interface facilitating a constructional schema which is at the same time highly productive and very frequent in the corpus of the English language

Nije ni potrebno govoriti o tome (iako ću svejedno reći)

It is not very frequently assumed that negation may play an active role in achieving specific conceptual frames, but as claimed by Langacker (2008) or Lakoff (2004), language enables the actual physical presence of words, even if in some kind of a negative construction, to create the positive conception of what is being denied. Our research focuses on the phenomenon of praeteritio or apophasis as a rhetorical device in political discourse, where we noticed a frequent use of various types of negation constructions as introductory lines for the content which is actually not being negated but rather accentuated. Structures like ‘It goes without saying…’, ‘We don’t want to mention that…’, etc., which are then followed by actual descriptions of affected participants or events, have been spotted in our corpus of public political speech events, particularly in the media discourse and in other types of discourse involved in shaping public opinion. The cognitive and pragmatic functions of apophatic structures in the elicited corpus are analysed as well as their role in creating the persuasive force of this rhetorical device. Their iconic nature and psycholinguistic background are used as a vehicle to explain their unique position in the process of conceptualization of the world around us.Ne smatra se često da negacija može imati aktivnu ulogu u postizanju određenih konceptualnih okvira, no kao što tvrde Langacker (2008) ili Lakoff (2004), jezik omogućava stvarnoj fizičkoj prisutnosti riječi, čak i ako se one nalaze u nekoj vrsti niječne konstrukcije, stvoriti pozitivnu sliku onoga što se niječe. Naše se istraživanje prije svega bavi pretericijom i apofazom kao retoričkim sredstvima u političkom diskursu, gdje smo zamijetili čestu uporabu različitih vrsta niječnih konstrukcija koje uvode sadržaj koji se zapravo ne niječe, već naglašava. Konstrukcije poput ‘Nije ni potrebno govoriti...’, ‘Da i ne spominjemo...’, itd. iza kojih neposredno slijedi opis “prešućenih” sudionika ili događaja, pojavljuju se u našem korpusu javnih političkih govora, u medijskom diskursu te u drugim tipovima diskursa kojima se oblikuje javno mnijenje. U radu se analiziraju kognitivne i pragmatičke funkcije apofaznih konstrukcija u navedenom korpusu te njihova uloga u stvaranju uvjerljivosti ovoga retoričkog sredstva. Njihova ikonička priroda i psiholingvistička pozadina koriste se kao alat za tumačenje njihova jedinstvenog položaja u procesu konceptualizacije svijeta oko nas

Construing reality: Aktionsart in the light of the Cognitive Grammar theory

Na temelju engleskih konstrukcija s tzv. 'light' glagolima have, take, give i make proučit ćemo kognitivnu utemeljenost pojma glagolskog načina kao jezičnog koncepta koji u sebi sublimira naizgled oprečne elemente sintakse i semantike. Pojam (ne)omeđenosti područja koje se profilira pri procesu nominalizacije glagolskog elementa koji služi kao argument 'light' glagolima temeljni je dokaz o dubokoj konceptualnoj motiviranosti visokoga tvorbenog potencijala ovih perifrastičnih konstrukcija.English constructions with so called light verbs have, take, give and make should serve as a basis for establishing Aktionsart as a cognitively and linguistically validated concept which under its name merges seemingly oposing elements of syntax and semantics. The concept of boundedness/ unboundedness of the region profiled in the process of nominalisation leading to the creation of the light verbs argument should substantiate conceptually deeply rooted formational potential of these periphrastic constructions

Construing reality: Aktionsart in the light of the Cognitive Grammar theory

Na temelju engleskih konstrukcija s tzv. 'light' glagolima have, take, give i make proučit ćemo kognitivnu utemeljenost pojma glagolskog načina kao jezičnog koncepta koji u sebi sublimira naizgled oprečne elemente sintakse i semantike. Pojam (ne)omeđenosti područja koje se profilira pri procesu nominalizacije glagolskog elementa koji služi kao argument 'light' glagolima temeljni je dokaz o dubokoj konceptualnoj motiviranosti visokoga tvorbenog potencijala ovih perifrastičnih konstrukcija.English constructions with so called light verbs have, take, give and make should serve as a basis for establishing Aktionsart as a cognitively and linguistically validated concept which under its name merges seemingly oposing elements of syntax and semantics. The concept of boundedness/ unboundedness of the region profiled in the process of nominalisation leading to the creation of the light verbs argument should substantiate conceptually deeply rooted formational potential of these periphrastic constructions

Konstruiranje stvarnosti: glagolski način u svjetlu teorije kognitivne gramatike

Na temelju engleskih konstrukcija s tzv. \u27light\u27 glagolima have, take, give i make proučit ćemo kognitivnu utemeljenost pojma glagolskog načina kao jezičnog koncepta koji u sebi sublimira naizgled oprečne elemente sintakse i semantike. Pojam (ne)omeđenosti područja koje se profilira pri procesu nominalizacije glagolskog elementa koji služi kao argument \u27light\u27 glagolima temeljni je dokaz o dubokoj konceptualnoj motiviranosti visokoga tvorbenog potencijala ovih perifrastičnih konstrukcija

English and Croatian citation practices in research articles in applied linguistics: a corpus-based study

As a mandatory constituent of academic writing, citation allows writers to acknowledge other scholarsʼ work and to position their research against it, showing thus both contribution to previous knowledge and research novelty (Hyland 2004). Previous research has documented not only cross-disciplinary (Hyland 2004) but also cross-cultural variations, with a general tendency of Anglo-American writers to use more citations than writers of some other cultural backgrounds (Hyland 2005; Mur Dueñas 2009). By exploring the frequency, preferred types, and reporting structures of citations in two comparable sub-corpora of research articles in applied linguistics in English and Croatian, the present study aimed to provide an insight into the patterns of cross-cultural similarities and differences in the use of academic citation. The corpus comprised 32 research articles that were sampled from the representative English- and Croatian-medium publications in applied linguistics and analyzed manually. The extracted instances of citations were categorized according to the pre-established taxonomies of the citation types (Swales, 1990) and reporting structures in academic writing (Thomson & Tribble 2001). The frequency analysis showed that the English writers used more citations as opposed to the Croatian writers, which is in line with previous cross-cultural research on the use of citations (Fløttum, Dahl & Kinn 2006; Mur Dueñas 2009). In both sub-corpora writers used more non-integral than integral citations, with the highest frequencies reported in the Introduction section of research articles. The overall findings point to the saliency of the congruent types of reporting structures in both citation formats across the two sub-corpora, with the human subjects being most frequently used in integral citations and non-reporting being the most frequent reporting structure in non-integral citations. However, in non-integral citations English writers used non-human subjects at a significantly higher frequency than Croatian writers, which suggests that in the English citations investigated more importance is placed on research activities than human agents. Whereas similarities in the use of citations between English and Croatian writers may be accounted for by the congruent disciplinary variable, the differences seem to be related to the specifics of a wider socio-cultural background in which academic writing is embedded

Konstrukcijsko značenje glagolsko–imeničkih konstrukcija u engleskome i hrvatskome

The research of the use of complex lexical and syntactic structures in English which contain the so–called light verbs such as have, take, give and make and deverbal nouns has shown some evidence of a network of meanings. This network is a result of combining the syntactic functions of intransitive verbs into a prototypical transitive construction by introducing the conceptual metaphor EVENTS ARE THINGS (look v. → (take) a look n.) and the process of schematization of light verbs. This process of the so–called predicate decomposition has been recorded in Croatian, too, as well as in many other languages. There is, however, an obvious detachment from the prototypical English structure, which points at the usage based value of Croatian constructions. It is derived from their contextually determined pragmatic meaning, which is particularly evident in functional styles such as administrative and journalese. Our approach to studying this type of constructions is based on the model of constructional meaning which proposes that the grammatical organization of language systematized by specific construction types forms a continuum of causal links. In that model the constructions are studied within a specific ecological niche (Taylor 2004) in which there is a mutual interaction of several construction types. They are the product of specific characteristics of the lexicon and the language typology. The stress is put on the usage–based model of language (Barlow and Kemmer 2000) which serves as a framework to compare the usage value of verbo–nominal constructions in the two languages. The principal goal of the study is to stress their constructional meaning at the expense of flouting the traditional division of syntactic and pragmatic meaning.Istraživanjem uporabe složenih leksičko–sintaktičkih struktura u engleskom jeziku koje u svom sastavu imaju tzv. lagane (engl. light) glagole kao što su have, take, give ili make uz imenice nastale procesom preobrazbe iz glagola, dolazimo do spoznaja o isprepletanju značenja koje proizlazi iz preobrazbe sintaktičkih funkcija neizravnih glagola u prototipne prijelazne konstrukcije uvođenjem konceptualne metafore DOGAĐAJI SU STVARI (look gl. → take a look im.) i procesom shematizacije laganih glagola (Gradečak–Erdeljić, 2009b). Ovaj je postupak dekompozicije predikata (Pranjković, 2001) uočen i u hrvatskome (pojava tzv. perifraznih glagola, Pranjković i Silić, 2005). Kao najočitiji se odmak od prototipne engleske strukture međutim može opaziti upravo uporabna vrijednost ovih konstrukcija u hrvatskom jeziku gdje je vidljivo kako je pragmatičko značenje kontekstualno uvjetovano i mnogo je uočljivije u određenim funkcionalnim stilovima kao što su administrativni i novinarski stil. Horizontalnom kontrastnom analizom engleskih i hrvatskih primjera uspostavili smo temeljne strukturalne relacije između konstrukcijskih jedinica, a vertikalnom smo analizom utvrdili postojanje prototipne konstrukcijske sheme u oba jezika. Naš se pristup proučavanju ovog tipa konstrukcija temeljio na modelu konstrukcijskog značenja jezičnih struktura u kojima gramatička organizacija jezika, usustavljena određenim tipovima konstrukcija tvori kontinuum međusobno povezanih uzročno–posljedičnih veza. U ovome modelu konstrukcije se promatraju unutar određene ekološke niše (Taylor 2004) u kojoj dolazi do međusobne interakcije različitih vrsta konstrukcija, a koje pak izviru iz određenih osobina leksikona i tipoloških značajki nekog jezika. Pri tome se naglasak stavlja na uporabni model jezika (Barlow i Kemmer 2000) u okviru kojega ćemo usporediti uporabnu vrijednost glagolsko–imeničkih konstrukcija u ova tri jezika s ciljem isticanja njihova konstrukcijskog značenja, a nauštrb tradicionalno odvojenoga sintaktičkog ili pragmatičkog značenja