Processes of conceptualization in language production: language-specific perspectives and event construal

Abstract

Differences in how verbal tasks are solved by speakers of different languages are often attributed to specific cultural and stylistic traditions. In contrast to this position we argue that differences in the organization of information in texts are rooted in structural contrasts between languages. This claim is based on production data from speakers of English, German, and Algerian Arabic which include retellings of a silent film and verbalizations of short video clips. The domains of analysis are patterns of event formation and temporal viewpoint. The data obtained from speakers of the three languages show contrasts with respect to three aspects of information organization: (a) speakers segment the flow of information as presented in the visual input on the basis of different criteria, (b) they systematically select different components when representing a given event in language and (c) they establish different temporal perspectives when anchoring and linking events in discourse. In this paper, we argue that the contrasts observed in selecting and structuring information can be generalized by assuming language contrasts at the level of abstract principles of perspective taking. These principles are in turn rooted in language-specific patterns of grammaticization. 1. The problem There is general agreement as to the fundamental components which are constitutive for the language production apparatus. Conceptualization, formulation and articulation, this three-partitive model — Levelt’s blueprint for the speaker (1989), has been the referential frame for most of the work on language production. Following several years of intensive research in the field of language production, insights have been gained into the two components that involve linguistic structures: the formulator