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The relationship between language and conceptualization remains one of the major puzzles in language research. This monograph addresses this issue by means of an in depth corpus based and experimental investigation of the major types of expressions of epistemic modality in Dutch, German and English. By adopting a systematic functional orientation, the book explains a whole range of peculiarities of epistemic expression forms (synchronically and diachronically), and it offers a clear perspective on which cognitive systems are needed to get from the concept of epistemic modality to its linguistic expression. On that basis the author postulates a sophisticated, layered view of human conceptualization. This book is of interest both to scholars working on modality and related semantic dimensions, and to the interdisciplinary field of researchers concerned with the cognitive systems involved in language use.
This study takes George Lakoff's dictum seriously that arguments about conclusions will be pointless unless there is agreement on the premises. Subscribing to the view that linguistic categorization is necessarily theory-driven, it reconstructs and assesses, on the basis of domain-independent parameters derived from General Systems Theory and Leonard Talmy's Overlapping Systems Model of Cognitive Organization, hegemonic western conceptualizations of modality. Arguing against such propositional models of modality, the book outlines, modifies, and extends conceptualizations from a Cognitive Linguistics point of view, grounding «modality» especially on Talmy's Imaging System of Force Dynamics. The authors conceive of modality as an experientially and perceptually motivated radial category of Image Schemata, ultimately challenging the categorial status of modality as a cognitively motivated category.
Modality - the ways in which language can express grades of reality or truth - is the subject of a vast and long-established body of research. In this book, field-leader Jan Nuyts brings together twenty years of his research to offer a comprehensive, fully integrated view on areas of contentious debate within modality, from a functional and cognitive perspective. The book provides an empirically grounded, conceptual reanalysis of modality and related categories including evidentiality, volition, intention, directivity, subjectivity and mirativity. It argues for the dissolution of the category of modality and for an alternative division of the wider field of semantic notions at stake. The analysis also reflects on how to model the language faculty, and on the issue of language and thought. It is essential reading for researchers interested in the semantics of modality and in the implications of this domain for understanding the cognitive infrastructure for language and thought.
To what extent is conceptualisation based on linguistic representation? And to what extent is it variable across cultures, communities or even individuals? Of crucial importance in the attempt to develop a comprehensive theory of human cognition, these remain amongst the most difficult of questions in the cognitive sciences. This volume brings together ten new contributions from leading scholars working in a wide cross-section of disciplines, including linguistics, anthropology, psychology and philosophy.
This volume explores phenomena which come under the heading of epistemic modalities and evidentiality in more or less well-known languages (Germanic, Romance, Balto-Slavic, Hungarian, Tibetan, Lakandon and Yucatec Maya, Arwak-Chibchan Kogi and Ika). It reveals cross-linguistic variations in the structuring of these vast fields of enquiry and clearly demonstrates the relevance and interplay of multiple factors involved in the analysis of these two conceptual domains. Although the contributions present diverging descriptive traditions, they are nonetheless within the broad domain of functional-typological linguistics and give access to distinct yet comparable approaches. They all converge around a number of key issues: modal verbs; the relationship between epistemic modality and evidentiality; the relationship of modal notions with some tense and aspect notions; the notions of (inter)subjectivity, commitment and (dis)engagement; the prosodic variation of modal adverbs, the diachronic connections between negation and evidential markers, the connection with mirativity. The volume is of interest to linguists and advanced graduate students working in general and theoretical linguistics, semantics, pragmatics, cognition, and typology.
This book and its companion volume present a detailed guide to three major structural-functional theories: Functional Grammar, Role and Reference Grammar and Systemic Functional Grammar. This first volume provides the necessary background through a discussion of the characteristics of functional theories, followed by a brief analysis of six approaches to language in the light of this discussion. These chapters lead to a characterization of a smaller set of ‘structural-functional grammars’, among which FG, RRG and SFG are central. An overview of each of these theories in relation to the simplex clause is then presented, followed by a more critical comparison. The remainder of the book deals with the structure and meaning of phrasal units, the representation of situations, and the treatment of tense, aspect, modality and polarity, across the three theories. A major feature of the book is the use of examples from corpora of English and other languages, which serve not only to exemplify theoretical and descriptive claims, but also at times to challenge them.
This volume explores phenomena which come under the heading of epistemic modalities and evidentiality in more or less well-known languages (Germanic, Romance, Balto-Slavic, Hungarian, Tibetan, Lakandon and Yucatec Maya, Arwak-Chibchan Kogi and Ika). It reveals cross-linguistic variations in the structuring of these vast fields of enquiry and clearly demonstrates the relevance and interplay of multiple factors involved in the analysis of these two conceptual domains. Although the contributions present diverging descriptive traditions, they are nonetheless within the broad domain of functional-typological linguistics and give access to distinct yet comparable approaches. They all converge around a number of key issues: modal verbs; the relationship between epistemic modality and evidentiality; the relationship of modal notions with some tense and aspect notions; the notions of (inter)subjectivity, commitment and (dis)engagement; the prosodic variation of modal adverbs, the diachronic connections between negation and evidential markers, the connection with mirativity. The volume is of interest to linguists and advanced graduate students working in general and theoretical linguistics, semantics, pragmatics, cognition, and typology.
There is a lot that we don't know. That means that there are a lot of possibilities that are, epistemically speaking, open. For instance, we don't know whether it rained in Seattle yesterday. So, for us at least, there is an epistemic possibility where it rained in Seattle yesterday, and one where it did not. What are these epistemic possibilities? They do not match up with metaphysical possibilities - there are various cases where something is epistemically possible but not metaphysically possible, and vice versa. How do we understand the semantics of statements of epistemic modality? The ten new essays in this volume explore various answers to these questions, including those offered by contextualism, relativism, and expressivism.
Main description: This volume presents strongly empirical, corpus-based studies of a range of English modal auxiliaries and modal constructions in specific uses. It also approaches some of the classic issues in the field of modality from new perspectives, notably that of the 'Theory of Enunciative Operations' developed by the French linguist Antoine Culioli and his colleagues.
Alongside several related ancient languages, Biblical Hebrew possesses two infinitive forms. The rarer of the two is the infinitive absolute, for which no analogous structure exists in modern translation receptor languages such as English. In studying its use, Hebrew grammarians have long noted that the infinitive absolute often appears in modal contexts. However, until the present study this phenomenon has not received further scholarly attention. Employing contemporary cross-linguistic research on modality, Callaham's study presents a new and comprehensive analysis of the function of the infi nitive absolute in Biblical Hebrew. Collected data strongly imply that the combination of an infinitive absolute and a cognate verb is a construction expressing verb focus, which includes focus on any modality present in the cognate verb. Infinitives absolute can also function as full substitutes for finite verbs. Accordingly, these independent uses are also highly modal. Through wide-ranging interaction with previous research and exhaustive examination of textual data, this study advances new findings on the interplay of modality and infinitive absolute employment in the Hebrew Bible.