Cognitive Grammar: word classes
So far in Part III of this book we have sketched the basic assumptions of a cognitive approach to grammar. We have also explored the conceptual basis of both Talmy’s and Langacker’s models. In this and the next two chapters we explore Langacker’s theory of Cognitive Grammar in more detail. As we saw in Chapter 14, symbolic units can be minimal or simplex, as in the case of morphemes, or complex to varying degrees, as in the case of morphologically complex words, phrases or sentences. Any unit having complex symbolic structure – as opposed to complex semantic or phonological structure – is called a construction in Langacker’s theory. In other words, Langacker does not refer to simplex symbolic units as constructions (although some cognitive linguists do, as we will see in Chapters 19 and 20). Figure 16.1 represents a taxonomy of symbolic units according to Langacker.
In this chapter we will begin our detailed survey of Cognitive Grammar by looking at Langacker’s model of word classes, which we touched on briefly in the previous chapter. We will look at the properties of grammatical constructions in the next chapter. Of course, as Figure 16.1 shows, there is some overlap between words and constructions, given that complex words count as constructions in Langacker’s model. It follows, therefore, that there will be some overlap between this chapter and the next in that both will have something to say about words. In this chapter, we will concentrate on describing word classes and on exploring Langacker’s semantic account of these linguistic categories. This will involve some discussion of the morphemes that help to identify certain word classes, but we defer a detailed discussion of word structure for the next chapter.
This chapter is divided into five main sections in which we examine in more detail Langacker’s schematic characterisation of the open classes noun, verb, adjective and adverb, as well as the closed classes adposition and determiner.
We begin by setting Langacker’s approach to word classes in a broader context in terms of categorisation (section 16.1). We then proceed to explore in more detail Langacker’s characterisation of nouns in terms of nominal predications, an approach that was briefly introduced in Chapter 15 (section 16.2). This is followed by a discussion of the differences between nominal and relational predications (section 16.3). As we will see, the distinction between profile and base is central to this account, an idea that was also introduced in Chapters 7 and 15. Within the category of relational predications, we explore the distinction between and temporal and atemporal relations, where we will see that the distinction between the cognitive processes of summary scanning and sequential scanning is fundamental to Langacker’s account (section 16.4). Finally, we look at determiners and quantifiers and explore Langacker’s accounts for these closed-class expressions in terms of grounding (section 16.5). As we will see, Langacker exploits independently motivated cognitive phenomena, particularly those related to attention, in order to develop an account of word classes that emerges from a generalised model of human cognition.
