The metonymic interpretation of Chinese antonym co-occurrence constructions: the case of you X you Y  

Oleh:

Wu, Shuqiong

Jenis: Article from Journal - ilmiah internasional
Dalam koleksi: Language Sciences (Full Text) vol. 45 (2014), page 189-201.
Topik: Antonym co-occurrence; You X you Y; Metonymy; Metonymy-based metaphor; Relational coercion
Fulltext: 45_Wu.pdf (736.23KB)

Isi artikel

Studies on antonym co-occurrence have mainly focused on its frequency, the lexicogrammatical patterns in which antonym pairs co-occur, its discourse functions and the preferred ordering of antonym pairs. The interpretation of antonym co-occurrence constructions has been understudied. This paper addresses the cognitive motivation underlying the interpretation of antonym co-occurrence constructions based on a detailed analysis of the Chinese construction you X you Y. This construction retains a literal meaning which stems from its juxtaposed syntax, but it also has non-compositional meanings. It can indicate exhaustiveness of the domain involved and express a sense of diversity. We argue that the semantic interpretation of the construction is rooted in metonymic inference triggered by the co-occurring antonym pairs. We also contend that the meaning derived via metonymic inference may exhibit further meaning extension by virtue of conceptual metaphor. Finally, we examine the non-canonical antonym pairs in the construction and propose that the motivation for licensing non-canonical antonym pairs to cooccur in the construction can be attributed to relational coercion exerted by the construction on the sense relation between lexical items.

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