Metonymy in Word-Formation: Russian, Czech, and Norwegian

Publication abstract: A foundational goal of cognitive linguistics is to explain linguistic phenomena in terms of general cognitive strategies rather than postulating an autonomous language module (Langacker 1987: 12-13). Metonymy is identified among the imaginative capacities of cognition (Langacker 2009: 46-47). Whereas the majority of scholarship on metonymy has focused on lexical metonymy, this study explores the systematic presence of metonymy in word-formation. I argue that in many cases, the semantic relationships between stems, affixes, and the words they form can be analyzed in terms of metonymy, and that this analysis yields a better, more insightful classification than traditional descriptions of word-formation. I present a metonymic classification of suffixal word-formation in three languages: Russian, Czech, and Norwegian. The system of classification is designed to maximize comparison between lexical and word-formational metonymy. This comparison supports another central claim of cognitive linguistics, namely that grammar (in this case word-formation) and lexicon form a continuum (Langacker 1987: 18-19), since I show that metonymic relationships in the two domains can be described in nearly identical terms. While many metonymic relationships are shared across the lexical and grammatical domains, some are specific to only one domain, and the two domains show different preferences for SOURCE and TARGET concepts. Furthermore, I find that the range of metonymic relationships expressed in word-formation is more diverse than what has been found in lexical metonymy. There is remarkable similarity in word-formational metonymy across the three languages, despite their typological differences: Russian and Czech present lexicons comprised almost entirely of word-formational families (Dokulil 1962: 14), whereas Norwegian is more he avily invested in compounding. Although this study is limited to three Indo-European languages, the goal is to create a classification system that could be implemented (perhaps with modifications) across a wider spectrum of languages.
This study involves the collection of three databases representing the types of suffixal word-formation found in Russian, Czech and Norwegian and their metonymic interpretations, giving the vehicle (starting point) for the metonymy (also called the source in the published article), and the target of the metonymy, and a single example for each type. Other factors that were examined were also the number of metonymy designations (vehicle-target pairs) for each suffix, whether a given metonymy designation was represented also in lexical metonymy, whether a given metonymy designation could be reversed (i.e. both agent for action and action for agent).

出版物摘要：认知语言学的基础目标在于以普遍的认知策略来阐释语言现象，而非假设一个独立自主的语言模块（Langacker 1987: 12-13）。转喻被认定为认知的创造性能力之一（Langacker 2009: 46-47）。尽管关于转喻的大多数研究集中在词汇转喻上，本研究却探讨了转喻在词形构成中的系统性存在。我认为，在许多情况下，词根、词缀及其构成的词语之间的语义关系可以用转喻来分析，并且这种分析比传统的词形构成描述更为精妙，更具洞察力。我提出了三种语言（俄语、捷克语和挪威语）中后缀词形构成的转喻分类。该分类体系旨在最大化词汇转喻与词形构成转喻之间的比较。这种比较支持认知语言学的另一核心观点，即语法（在此为词形构成）与词汇构成一个连续体（Langacker 1987: 18-19），因为我展示出这两个领域的转喻关系可以用几乎相同的术语来描述。尽管许多转喻关系在词汇和语法领域共享，但也有一些仅限于一个领域，这两个领域在源（SOURCE）和目标（TARGET）概念的选择上表现出不同的偏好。此外，我发现词形构成中表达的转喻关系范围比词汇转喻中发现的更为广泛。尽管这三种语言在类型学上存在差异，但在词形构成转喻上却表现出显著的相似性：俄语和捷克语几乎完全由词形构成的家族构成（Dokulil 1962: 14），而挪威语则更倾向于复合词。尽管这项研究仅限于三种印欧语言，但其目标是创建一个分类体系，该体系可以在更广泛的语言范围内实施（或许需要一些修改）。本研究涉及收集三个数据库，代表俄罗斯、捷克和挪威中发现的各类后缀词形构成及其转喻解释，包括转喻的载体（起点）以及转喻的目标，并为每种类型提供一个单独的例子。其他考察的因素还包括每个后缀的转喻名称（载体-目标对）的数量，特定的转喻名称是否也出现在词汇转喻中，以及特定的转喻名称是否可以反转（即动作的执行者和动作本身）。