Aspects of cognitive linguistics and neurolinguistics: conceptual structure and category-specific semantic deficits = Aspectos de lingüística cognitiva y neurolingüística: estructura conceptual y déficit semánticos de

Abstract

The goal of this paper is to establish certain links between basic assumptions of Lexical Category Structure in Cognitive Linguistics, and aspects of the organization of semantic memory resulting from the theoretical and experimental work carried out in Cognitive Neuropsychology, through cases of Category Specific Semantic Deficits. These studies highlight the relevance of distinctiveness against that of similarity, which has been mainly focused by Cognitive Linguistics as one of the main parameters for conceptual organization. Also, these deficits evidence the need to consider different conceptual structures according to domains. Moreover, research on these cases contributes to a more specific account of schematization processes for each domain here focused on, the domains of living and that of non-living things.