Filologías Modernas

what is implicated. In this paper we examine the relevance-theoretic notion of enrichment as a procedure for developing what is said into a fully specified proposition or explicature. We make the claim that there are two forms of such a procedure, viz. grammatically-motivated and conceptually-motivated enrichment, and discuss their role in communication. We further contend that the notion of enrichment and the other procedures of propositional development recognized in the relevance-theoretic literature are insufficient to account for all cases of explicated meaning. In this connection, we propose other cognitive mechanisms such as mitigation andmore interestingly-metaphoric and metonymic mappings. This discussion allows us to cast some light on the implicature/explicature division line and to rank as explicatures some cases of inferences which have so far been considered as implicatures, including those where metaphor and metonymy are involved. Finally we examine the role of metaphoric and metonymic mappings -both in isolation and as part of conceptual interaction systems-in the production of explicatures, which allows us to understand better the communicative potential of these cognitive mechanisms.

A metaphor can combine with another metaphor, or a metonymy with another metonymy, into a single meaning unit, thus giving rise to either a metaphorical or a metonymic amalgam. The combination of a metaphor and a metonymy, as discussed in and Ruiz de Mendoza and Díez , gives rise to so-called "metaphtonymy". Amalgams and metaphtonymy are cases of conceptual complexes. Several such complexes have been identified in previous studies (e.g. Ruiz de Mendoza and Díez 2002, Ruiz de Mendoza and Mairal 2011). Here we revisit such studies and postulate the existence of metaphoric chains as an additional case of metaphoric complex in connection to the semantic analysis of phrasal verbs. Metaphoric chains, unlike amalgams (Ruiz de Mendoza and Mairal 2011), do not involve integrating the conceptual structure of the combined metaphors. Instead, metaphoric chains involve a mapping sequence in which the target domain of a first metaphoric mapping constitutes the source domain of a subsequent metaphor.

The notion of "conceptual mapping", as a set of correspondences between conceptual domains, was popularized in Cognitive Semantics, following seminal work by , as a way of accounting for the basic cognitive activity underlying metaphor and metonymy. Strangely enough, Cognitive Semantics has paid little, if any, attention to other cases of so-called figurative language such as hyperbole, irony, paradox, and oxymoron. This paper contends that it is possible to account for these and other figures of thought in terms of the notion of conceptual mapping. It argues that the differences between these and other figurative uses of language are a matter of the nature of the domains involved in mappings and how they are made to correspond. Additionally, this paper examines constraints on mappings and concludes that the same factors that constrain metaphor and metonymy are operational in the case of mappings for the other figures of thought under discussion.

This article investigates the role played by motion in the conceptualization of result in the English resultative and caused-motion constructions. We argue that there is a strong preference for the figurative use of caused motion to express a state change when the affected entity experiences a complete transformation. However, if the affected entity acquires a new property but retains its essence, an adjectival phrase is preferred. Another category encompasses figuratively exploited resultatives that formally employ the caused-motion construction, but semantically do not codify the same kind of change. This article also discusses the motivating role of the metaphor A CHANGE OF STATE IS A CHANGE OF LOCATION to express result and proposes the additional activity of other high-level metaphors and metonymies.

This monograph studies cognitive operations on cognitive models across levels and domains of meaning construction. It explores in what way the same set of cognitive operations, either in isolation or in combination, account for meaning representation whether obtained on the basis of inferential activity or through constructional composition. As a consequence, it makes explicit links between constructional and figurative meaning. The pervasiveness of cognitive operations is explored across the levels of meaning construction (argument, implicational, illocutionary, and discourse structure) distinguished by the Lexical Constructional Model. This model is a usage-based approach to language that reconciles insights from functional and cognitive linguistics and offers a unified account of the principles and constraints that regulate both inferential activity and the constructional composition of meaning. This book is of value to scholars with an interest in linguistic evidence of cognitive activity in meaning construction. The contents relate to the fields of Cognitive Grammar, Cognitive Semantics, Construction Grammar, Functional Linguistics, and Inferential Pragmatics.

The starting point for the present paper is the classification of constructions, understood as fixed pairings of form and meaning, into four levels of meaning representation, i.e. the argument-structure, implicational, illocutionary, and discourse levels. The meaning part of constructions contains fixed and variable elements. In argument-structure constructions the fixed elements are generic and, as such, they are open to parameterization through the integration of lower-level lexical structure into them. For example, the ‘caused-motion’ construction, which takes the form X CAUSES Y TO MOVE Z (cf. Goldberg 1995), can parameterize ‘cause to move’ by means of such predicates as ‘push’, ‘kick’, and ‘drag’. In constructions from other levels of description, the fixed part, which is non-generic, contains sets of conditions that are stably realized by specific formal configurations, which are highly idiomatic. For example, the sentence Who's been messing up the bulletin board? is usually not a question about the identity of the person that has performed the described action, but an expression of irritation on the part of the speaker at someone having handled the notices on the board inefficiently. The underlying configuration, which can be labeled Who's Been VP-ing (Y)?, is an implicational construction whose VP component –which completes the past perfect form of the fixed part– is necessarily a progressive form, thus indicating that the action has taken place in the recent past and is of consequence to the present moment. The rest of the meaning cannot be derived compositionally but is obtained from previous inferential activity based on the non-grammatical content of the “VP Y” part of the construction: people are expected not to misuse what is not theirs. Such content is a matter of socio-cultural conventions that regulate human interaction with other humans and the inferences originally derived from it have become entrenched through frequent association with the expressive pattern that now constitutes the formal part of the construction. The same is the case with illocutionary meaning, which is often captured by idiomatic constructions. For example, Can't you please stop making noise? derives its combination of directive and expressive force (it is a request and a complaint at the same time) from the entrenchment of meaning implications arising from the fact that it is not socially acceptable for people to act in ways that bother other people. Along these lines, the paper explores other such socio-cultural conventions, examines the type of inferences that they underlie, and makes correlations with formal expression patterns. Such a correlation reveals networks of meaning relations among formal patterns that enable us to give structure to the implicational and illocutionary segments of the ‘constructicon’ of English. It also sets up explicit connections between the constructional and inferential domains of linguistic research.

The starting point for the present paper is the classification of constructions, understood as fixed pairings of form and meaning, into four levels of meaning representation, i.e., the argument-structure, implicational, illocutionary and discourse levels. The meaning part of constructions contains fixed and variable elements. In argument-structure constructions the fixed elements are generic and, as such, they are open to parameterization through the integration of lower-level lexical structure into them. For example, the ‘caused-motion’ construction, which takes the form X CAUSES Y TO MOVE Z, can parameterize ‘cause to move’ by means of such predicates as ‘push’, ‘kick’ and ‘drag’. In constructions from other levels of description, the fixed part, which is non-generic, contains sets of conditions that are stably realized by specific formal configurations, which are highly idiomatic. For example, the sentence Who's been messing up the bulletin board? is usually not a question about the identity of the person that has performed the described action, but an expression of irritation on the part of the speaker at someone having handled the notices on the board inefficiently. The underlying configuration, which can be labeled Who's Been VP-ing (Y)?, is an implicational construction whose VP component- which completes the past perfect form of the fixed part-is necessarily a progressive form, thus indicating that the action has taken place in the recent past and is of consequence to the present moment. The rest of the meaning cannot be derived compositionally but is obtained from previous inferential activity based on the non-grammatical content of the “VP Y” part of the construction: People are expected not to misuse what is not theirs. Such content is a matter of socio-cultural conventions that regulate human interaction with other humans and the inferences originally derived from it have become entrenched through frequent association with the expressive pattern that now constitutes the formal part of the construction. The same is the case with illocutionary meaning, which is often captured by idiomatic constructions. For example, Can't you please stop making noise? derives its combination of directive and expressive force (it is a request and a complaint at the same time) from the entrenchment of meaning implications arising from the fact that it is not socially acceptable for people to act in ways that bother other people. Along these lines, the paper explores other such socio-cultural conventions, examines the type of inferences that they underlie and makes correlations with formal expression patterns. Such a correlation reveals networks of meaning relations among formal patterns that enable us to give structure to the implicational and illocutionary segments of the ‘constructicon’ of English. It also sets up explicit connections between the constructional and inferential domains of linguistic research.