Cognitive Perspective In Construction Grammar Analysis Of English Constructions

Abstract

The article aims to analyze some structures in English judged within the framework of Construction Grammar with a specific emphasis on the notions of conceptualization and categorization. The grammar of a language is understood as cross-mapping of form and meaning, the grammatical constructions are viewed as regular idiomatic pairings of form and meaning that do not appear compositional when interpreted thus understood as evoking specific mental configurations outside domains of lexical and truth semantics. The analysis of constructions can evolve into an insightful instrument of linguistic analysis if the grammatical constructions are explained as the result of the conceptualization of referential scenes that can be further categorized into several frames as knowledge representations. The article concerns grammatical constructions that express a variety of propositional meanings that are created in the cognitive-communicative process of interpretation which embraces at least three types of knowledge produced by the language user’s mind: conceptualization of referents, activating language knowledge, processing the textual and contextual semantics. The theoretical provisions and framework of Construction Grammar are instrumental in disclosing the nature of the form-meaning unity of grammatical constructions. The article argues that the constructions under study should be viewed not only as typical structure-building mechanisms. Through cataloging certain types of referent object conceptualization, it is possible to make clear what schemata can be cognized in referent scene concepts. The study aims at working out research procedures to treat grammatical idiomaticity, collocational preferences, certain covert constraints imposed by the notion of a grammatical construction on certain lingual expressions.