Estudis Anglesos

An attempt is made at refuting the idea that figurative uses of prepositions are chaotic. Figurative uses of the preposition on are explained as the result of metaphorical mappings from the physical domain onto abstract domains. The semantic structure of this preposition in the source domain is explained as a conceptual schema (support), which is formed as a combination of three more basic image schemas, namely, the contact schema, the control schema, and the force downwards schema. The Invariance Principle guarantees the preservation of the logic of these image schemas in target domains. The selection of a particular target domain is, therefore, motivated.

The standard semantic description of the English word in has been traditionally understood as a matter of geometric configuration of the participants in the spatial relation. The landmark is conceived of as an area or volume, or as a three-dimensional entity, the topological relation of inclusion being emphasised. The landmark may also be understood as a MEDIUM configuration, in opposition to the geometric conception based upon the idea of container. Other authors pose a meaning based on the relative function of the participants, i.e. the control of the container over the contained entity. Finally, dynamic uses are acknowledged, but the nature of the motion expressed has not been described.
Our notion of conceptual schema - a gestalt configuration where some elements may be focused upon - refers to the central meaning from which other senses are derived. Our aim is to provide not just a list of uses, but a semantic structure that accounts for all the senses in terms of a radial network. The network extends through three conceptual regions that stand for topological, functional, and force-dynamic dimensions of the conceptualisation of the relationship. Three main imaginative procedures are described for meaning extension: First, shifts of the conceptual schema (rotation, profiling, semantic bleaching), second, partial sanction, which focuses on one or more dimensions (specialisation of meaning), and finally metaphorical mappings, which account for figurative meaning and idiomatic use.

Learners of English as Foreign Language (EFL), like myself, encounter many difficulties in their quest for fluency in the language. In our struggle to actively master English vocabulary we generally assume that nouns and verbs are mostly important, so that the generalised attitude consists in trying to learn as many of these as possible. The semantic relevance of other words, such as prepositions, is diminished because they are considered "easy words". Learners just tend to apply a straightforward correspondence to "easy words" in their mother tongue, so that Eng. in is used as an equivalent to Sp. en, or Eng. to as an equivalent to Sp. a, and so on. By doing so, learners tend to think that the learning job is done. In my opinion, the consequence of that mistaken attitude is so crucial that it may delay the fluent native-like mastery of the language -or a near idiolect-for decades. Moreover, linguists have not usually considered the semantic factors that determine prepositional choice in use, but have generally described this type of words only according to their syntactic function or their position in the clause. However, as linguists we should consider the fact that these words might mean a lot more. Whenever their choice in language use is difficult to explain, the general claim states that this use is chaotic, capricious, or that these words form part of other lexical units where they do not contribute any meaning, i.e. prepositional verbs or phrasal verbs. The lexical units at, on and in are three of these words. In this paper, I will use these three words for illustration, and I will try to dismantle these two general assumptions: on the one hand, that these words are easy to learn or have exact interlinguistic correspondences, and on the other hand, that their use is otherwise chaotic or lexicalised.

It is accepted that prepositions primarily refer to the domain of physical space in terms of objects and their locations (topological relations). Everyday language, however, reveals that not only topological relations, but also dynamic and functional relations between entities are expressed by these lexical units. We discuss the functional patterns expressed by the English prepositions at, on, and in. Contrasts are looked for in colloquial expressions, such as at a job, on a job and in a job.

In this paper, we firstly present a tentative formalization of a Lexical Template (LT) and a meta-language for spatial particle semantics within the framework of the Lexical Constructional Model (LCM). The semantic module consists of a set of Lexical Functions, which operate on a semantic primitive in order to produce a hyponym by elaborating topological, dynamic and functional information. The syntactic module expresses situations (positions or states) plus the argument structure. Secondly, we illustrate and discuss several LTs with the purpose of exploring spatial particle subsumption constraints with constructions such as caused motion and intransitive motion, as well as the types of verbal Aktionsart that might fuse with them. The COCA is used as a data source. We conclude that spatial particles contribute meaning to the extent that they partially determine the type of Aktionsart of the verb licensed by the motion construction.

In this paper, firstly different perspectives on the notion of metaphor are introduced, along with a characterization of types within Conceptual Metaphor Theory (CMT), in terms of correspondences between domains. Secondly, cognitive functions of metaphor are discussed, including categorization and conceptualization, as well as discourse communicative functions, such as deliberate and novel usage. Then, cognitive and communicative functions of conventional metaphors in a set of genres from medical discourse on cancer are illustrated and discussed. The corpus of data consists of research papers, scientific news notices and press articles. Conclusions are drawn on the characterization of genres on the basis of metaphorical usage particularly the cognitive and communicative functions of metaphor.

In this paper, an analysis of conceptual metaphor types and their relation with cognitive and communicative functions is carried out on a sample of oncology research papers. According to Conceptual Metaphor Theory (CMT), four conceptual types are described: imagistic, orientational, ontological and structural. The purpose is to explore the cognitive functions of metaphor – categorization and conceptualization – and their role in knowledge construction. On the other hand, communicative aspects, such as deliberate versus unconscious metaphor usage, as well as the conventional character of metaphorical expressions are observed, with the purpose of characterizing the discourse of medical science research articles in English.

The aim of this paper is to disclose linguistic evidence of the use and function of metaphors in medical discourse, by comparing their incidence in two genres, namely research papers and press articles. For that purpose, a sample of texts in both genres is analysed. Four types of conceptual metaphorical projections are identified according to Conceptual Metaphor Theory (i.e. structural, image, ontological, and orientational). Subsequently, the relation of these mappings with cognitive functions-categorization and conceptualization-is described. The purpose is to explore the role these functions play in knowledge construction and their implications for communicative aspects of metaphor usage. The results suggest a characterization of metaphorical concepts in the two medical genres. The conclusions show divergent tendencies in the use of metaphor and its cognitive and communicative functions in the genres analysed.

It is an acknowledged fact that the appearance of new genres in cyberspace has shifted the main focus of instruction strategies nowadays. Learners of any field are challenged by the acquisition of a new type of literacy, digital literacy-how to read and write, or how to interact, in and through the Internet. In this line, websites often show expressions like "home", "visit", "down-load", "link", etc. which are used in a new sense that did not exist before the digital era. Such expressions constitute the manifestation of mental models that have been transferred from traditional conceptual domains onto the new knowledge domain of the Internet. These conceptual metaphors are some of the cognitive models that help in the conceptualization of new cybergenres. This paper points at describing how these cognitive models build our notion of diverse cybergenres in English-e.g. the weblog, the social network, the cybertask. Our aim here consists in detecting these metaphorical models as well as describing and classifying their conceptual mappings between domains. With that purpose, some digital materials are analyzed, so as to test the hypothesis that such mappings and models guide the user's representation of the genre, as a coherent structure. The results make evident some implications on the relevance of Digital Literacy in educational contexts.

In recent decades, new technologies have evolved so rapidly that the use of computers and the Internet has resulted in the appearance of a new type of genre, i.e. Cybergenre (Shepherd & Watters, 1998; Shepherd, Watters & Kennedy, 2004). The medium used by these new genres, their social role, their purpose, their audiences and kinds of skills required to their users differ from those of old genres, and therefore, cybergenres cannot be measured or characterized by means of the same parameters as traditional written (paper format) genres. On the other hand, some authors have described three types of "Reading Modes", such as 'Navigating', 'Browsing', and 'Reading' (Girón-García, 2013), regarding different Internet users' strategies. Our hypothesis is that the type of reading mode-or user strategic mode-not only has to do with types of users and their tendencies but also with the cybergenre itself, its configuration and the types of cognitive frames that it activates in users. Each particular genre activates certain metaphorical models-made apparent through metaphorical expressions-that configure the necessary paths for users to succeed in its adequate processing. In this context, our purpose here is to identify idiosyncratic metaphorical expressions that may guide the movement of the user thought texts precisely because they activate cognitive models. In turn, we provide descriptions of metaphorical models and try to explain and illustrate their coherence within particular genres. Therefore, our procedure consists firstly in selecting genres, such as on-line dictionaries and market sites, secondly identifying metaphorical expressions, and finally describing the models they activate, so that we can elucidate different user strategic modes (reading modes) for each genre type. We claim that different guiding metaphors of topological character (spatial) prompt different users' techniques or strategies. In addition, we suggest that these metaphors provide internal coherence to the genres, as such.

It is an acknowledged fact that the appearance of new genres in cyberspace has shifted the main focus of instruction strategies nowadays. Learners of any field are challenged by the acquisition of a new type of literacy, digital literacy-how to read and write, or how to interact, in and through the Internet. In this line, websites often show expressions like "home", "visit", "down-load", "link", etc. which are used in a new sense that did not exist before the digital era. Such expressions constitute the manifestation of mental models that have been transferred from traditional conceptual domains onto the new knowledge domain of the Internet. These conceptual metaphors are some of the cognitive models that help in the conceptualization of new cybergenres. This paper points at describing how these cognitive models build our notion of diverse cybergenres in English-e.g. the weblog, the social network, the cybertask. Our aim here consists in detecting these metaphorical models as well as describing and classifying their conceptual mappings between domains. With that purpose, some digital materials are analyzed, so as to test the hypothesis that such mappings and models guide the user's representation of the genre, as a coherent structure. The results make evident some implications on the relevance of Digital Literacy in educational contexts.

An attempt is made at refuting the idea that figurative uses of prepositions are chaotic. Figurative uses of the preposition on are explained as the result of metaphorical mappings from the physical domain onto abstract domains. The semantic structure of this preposition in the source domain is explained as a conceptual schema (support), which is formed as a combination of three more basic image schemas, namely, the contact schema, the control schema, and the force downwards schema. The Invariance Principle guarantees the preservation of the logic of these image schemas in target domains. The selection of a particular target domain is, therefore, motivated.

ción del significado) y, por último, proyecciones metafóricas, que dan cuenta de los usos metafóricos e idiomáticos. 1. An interesting reflection on a metalanguage for the description of spatial semantics is found in Sinha & Thorseng (1995).