Overview
Learning About Language is an exciting and ambitious series of introductions to fundamental topics in language, linguistics and related areas. The books are designed for students of linguistics and those who are studying language as part of a wider course.
Cognitive linguistics explores the idea that language reflects our experience of the world. It shows that our ability to use language is closely related to other cognitive abilities such as categorization, perception, memory and attention allocation. Concepts and mental images expressed and evoked by linguistic means are linked by conceptual metaphors and metonymies and merged into more comprehensive cognitive and cultural models, frames or scenarios. It is only against this background that human communication makes sense. After 25 years of intensive research, cognitive-linguistic thinking now holds a firm place both in the wider linguistic and cognitive-science communities.
An Introduction to Cognitive Linguistics carefully explains the central concepts of categorization, of prototype and gestalt perception, of basic level and conceptual hierarchies, of figure and ground, and of metaphor and metonymy, for which an innovative description is provided. It also brings together issues such as iconicity, lexical change, grammaticalization and language teaching that have profited considerably from being put on a cognitive basis.
About the Author:
Friedrich Ungerer is Professor of English Linguistics at the University of Rostock, Germany
About the Author:
Hans-Jorg Schmid is Professor of Modern English Linguistics at the University of Munich, where he has also initiated the Interdisciplinary Centrefor Cognitive Language Studies (ICCLS)
Synopsis
An updated edition of the original classic on cognitive linguistics that brings together both cognitive semantics and syntax.
- Updated and extended comprehensive overview of Cognitive Linguistics, including major recent developments in the field.
- Incorporates additional clarification of basic notions.
- Contains additional diagrams and illustrations to make the theoretical argument more tangible to the reader.
- Includes extended exercises and updated suggestions for further reading
- Previous edition sold over 8,500 copies.