It’s Not Over When It’s Over:

A Cognitive Linguistic Analysis of the

Semantics of English Prepositions

Andrea Tyler

Vyvyan Evans, Yiyoung Kim and Dasha Shakhova made invaluable contributions to this project.

Introduction CL emphasizes a number of basic tenets

that allow us to systematically investigate areas of language that previous models ignore altogether or characterize as uninteresting.

And it turns out that many of these “unexplorable” or “uninteresting” areas pose particularly difficult challenges to second language learners.

The Problem

Traditional accounts have represented the semantics of English prepositions as highly arbitrary; the various uses are presented as unorganized lists of meanings that have accidentally come to be associated with a particular preposition.

By and large, these are the accounts that

ELT texts and grammars are based on.

a. The flag is hanging at half-mast over the capitol building: located higher than

b. Arlington Cemetery is over the river from the White House: on the other side

c. The negotiations are over: completed or finished d. The ship took the troops over to the Gulf region: transfer of an

entity from one location to another e. The woman placed a gas mask over her face: covering f. There are over 300,000 soldiers deployed in the Middle East :

more than g. The President chose intervention over negotiation Preference h. The picture of mom holding an apple pie is over/above the

mantel.

The Alternative CL gives us an alternative. The multiple meanings

associated with English prepositions can be represented as being systematically related within a motivated semantic polysemy network. These meanings are organized around a central, abstract, main meaning.

Some of the central concepts from CL which we have drawn on in our analysis of the semantics of English prepositions are:

Contextualized Nature of Language

In naturally occurring language use, lexical items always occur in context.

The exact understanding of a lexical item is always influenced by the context in which it occurs.

Work in pragmatics shows us that some inferencing is always involved in the interpretation of utterances.

Communicative Nature of Language and Contextualized Interpretation of Lexical Items Lexical item is initially used to indicate an

established meaning A speaker would only use the lexical item to mean

something different from the established meaning if they believed the listener had a reasonable chance of understanding the new meaning

This understanding presumably would come from inferences arising from the contexutalized use of the lexical item

Repetition --> independent distinct senses

General Cognitive Processes

Instead of assuming that there is a separate language module which operates under its own principles, Cognitive Linguists ask how much of language can we explain through general cognitive processes.

Expect to find key principles or facets of general cognition also occurring in language

EX. Basic aspects of perceptual system will be reflected in language

Humans are uniqueMany ways in which we are unique. Only species to develop cloth making and by extension to

wear clothing Only species to develop the ability to develop elaborate

means of deception that doesn’t have anything to do with stimulus in the immediate environment

Only species to develop trade Also only species to develop language.

Wouldn’t want to say we have special modules or genes for cloth making, trading, etc. These are accounted for by our general cognitive abilities. Perhaps language should be analyzed in the same way.

Humans do have a unique neurological and physical architecture

(1) Cognitively: Incredibly good at classifying, drawing generalizations

over several specific instances (which are not exact in color, shape, size, and other physical properties)

Inferring on the basis of very little evidence Remembering past experiences and relating them to

similar, ongoing experiences. Build up complicated, patterned, systematic meaning structures SCHEMA. Use that structure to organize new information

We do not have mental telepathy

Humans do have a unique neurological and physical architecture

(2) Physically: Stand on our hind legs Cannot resist gravity (in the way a

humming bird can) Have an asymmetrical front/back

orientation with our most important perceptual organs located in our faces

Humans live in a particular physical-spatial environment.

The ways we perceive and interact with that environment have important consequences for our conceptualizations, which are in turn reflected in language.

All these elements shape our cognition.

Cognitive linguists argue that 1) human conceptual structure is crucially shaped by our human perceptions of and interactions with the real world and 2) language is a reflection of human cognitive structure. *

How perceptions of the real world are represented in memory is unlikely to be in terms of bundles of linguistic features.

Bird [+feather, +wings, +sits on a nest, etc.] Conceptualized spatial relations coded by prepositions

are not likely to be represented conceptually by semantic features.

Embodied Experience: Concepts Are Not Propositional in Nature

Experiential Correlation

Humans regularly observe the recurrent co-occurrence of two distinct phenomena. With repeated exposures, the two distinct but co-occuring phenomena become closely associated in memory such that we conceptualize and talk about one in terms of the other.

For example, an increase in quantity is associated with an increase in elevation. Thus, we can use language about vertical elevation to describe an increase in quantity.

MORE IS UP (Grady, 1997, 2001; Lakoff & Johnson, 1999)

The Central Meaning of a Preposition Denotes a Spatial Relationship

Prepositions code conceptual spatial relations between two entities, TRAJECTOR (TR) and LANDMARK (LM).

Central Sense- Spatial relationship Prompt for spatial scene

Real World Force Dynamics

As a default, speakers assume that all elements in a conceptual spatial scene are subject to real-world force dynamics, such as the assumption that objects are subject to gravity (Talmy, 1988; 2000).

Ways of Viewing a Scene

Every spatial scene is conceptualized from a particular vantage point. The conceptualizer represents the default vantage point and is usually off-stage. However, the same scene can be viewed from different vantage points. Shifts in vantage points can give rise to new inferences, which in turn give rise to new sense. (Langacker, 1987)

A Cognitive Analysis of over

Central representation of over

We use diagrams to avoid prepositional definitions and because prepositions in their central senses represent spatial relations between two objects. We make no claims about the psychological validity of these diagrams.

In the sentence, The picture is over the mantel the picture represents the TR and the mantel represents the LM.

OVER

The picture of my mother is over the piano.

The doorknob is over the keyhole.

The lamp is over the table.

Extended Senses: the A-B-C trajectory (1). In the real world we often encounter TRs which are in

motion. Sometimes moving TRs encounter some impediment (LM) to forward motion and in order to continue their forward motion at some point move to a position that is higher than the impediment. English speakers use the preposition OVER in describing this motion, as in a sentence such as: The horse jumped over the hurdle.

(2). Only at point B, the TR, the horse, is located higher than the LM, the hurdle. The verb jump implies point A, but nothing in the utterance explicitly refers to point C. We infer point C because of what we know about horses and hurdles and jumping, including knowledge of gravity and momentum.

Thus, we rely on our knowledge of force dynamics to establish a full interpretation of this sentence.

(3). Point C in the ABC trajectory has become associated with a number of consequences.

These associations have, in turn, given rise to several distinct non-spatial meanings associated with over.

Once a distinct meaning, such as COMPLETION, becomes associated with point C in the ABC trajectory, the word over can be used to denote this meaning even when the original spatial configuration of the TR being located higher than the LM is no longer involved.

The On-the-Other-Side Sense

When you move from point A to point C, you end up on the other side of the LM from where you start: Thus the meaning ON THE OTHER SIDE, as illustrated in the sentence

Arlington Cemetery is over the river from the White House.

The Completion Sense

When the TR comes down at point C, that portion of the movement, or the particular action being considered, is completed or finished. Thus the meaning of completion as in the sentence: The negotiations are over.

The Transfer Sense

When an entity moves from point A to point C, the entity has been transferred from point A to point B. Thus the meaning of TRANSFER, as in the sentence The ship carried the troops over to the Gulf region.

JUST

__________!!!

Covering

The table cloth is over the table. The paper is over the hole in the wall. The board is over the hole in the ceiling

Extended Senses: The UP RelationThe More Sense

An essential aspect of the spatial relationship denoted by over is that the TR is in a vertical relationship vis-a-vis the LM and that the TR is in an UP relationship to the LM.

MORE IS UP. We now have over 300,000 troops in the middle

east.

More

The Preference Sense

English speakers identify being in an UP position as generally positive.

Kids usually prefer cake over broccoli.

Preference

ON THE OTHER SIDE

TRANSFER

MAIN

FINISHED

COVERING

MORE THAN

PREFERENCE

ABC TRAJECTORY

OVER VS. ABOVE

ABOVE/OVER

The picture is above/over the desk. The lamp is above/over the table.

She hung the backpack over the back of the chair.

She hung the backpack above the back of the chair.