Incipient productivity : a construction-based approach to linguistic creativity / by Arne Zeschel.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Zeschel, Arne, 1973-

Series:

Cognitive linguistics research ; 49.

Cognitive linguistics research, 1861-4132 ; 49

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Creativity (Linguistics).

Generative grammar.

Grammar, Comparative and general--Coordinate constructions.

Grammar, Comparative and general.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (280 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Berlin ; Boston : De Gruyter Mouton, 2012.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

How do speakers vary established patterns of language use and adapt them to novel contexts of application? This study presents a usage-based approach to linguistic creativity: combining detailed qualitative with large-scale quantitative analyses of corpus data, it traces the emergence of partial productivity in clusters of conventional collocations. Focusing on English and German intensification constructions, it proceeds in three steps: having first inventoried the lexical means (of a given semantic type) that are recruited for signalling intensity in both languages, collostructional analysis is then used to identify entrenched intensity collocations involving these formatives in three different syntactic constructions. Third, multi-rater manual classification methods as well as distribution-based automatic classification methods are employed to uncover semantic generalisations over the attested types on different levels of abstraction. Collocational expansion is shown to proceed through local analogies within sets of semantically similar stored instances of a construction. Synthesising insights from research on language acquisition, variation and change, it is thus argued that creative extensions of linguistic conventions are intrinsically bound up with aspects of memory and repetition.

Contents:

Frontmatter

Preface

Contents

Chapter 1. Introduction

Chapter 2. Towards a usage-based model of constructional generalisation

Chapter 3. Testing ground: Intensity collocations

Chapter 4. Lexicalisation patterns: From concepts to words

Chapter 5. Fixed expressions: From words to collocations

Chapter 6. Incipient productivity: From collocations to constructional schemas

Chapter 7. Conclusion

Appendix

Notes

References

Index

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9786613627315

9781280597480

1280597488

9783110274844

3110274841

OCLC:

784886967