Prepositions “in, on, at” in English and Vietnamese from a cognitive semantic perspective = Các giới từ "in, on,at" trong tiếng Anh và tiếng Việt dưới góc độ ngữ nghĩa học tri nhận. M.A. Thesis Linguistics: 602202

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF GRADUATE AND POSTGRADUATE STUDIES HÀ THỊ TUYẾT PREPOSITIONS “IN, ON, AT” IN ENGLISH AND

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF GRADUATE AND POSTGRADUATE STUDIES

HÀ THỊ TUYẾT

PREPOSITIONS “IN, ON, AT” IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE

FROM A COGNITIVE SEMANTIC PERSPECTIVE

CÁC GIỚI TỪ “IN, ON, AT” TRONG TIẾNG ANH VÀ TIẾNG VIỆT

DƯỚI GÓC ĐỘ NGỮ NGHĨA HỌC TRI NHẬN

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Linguistics Code: 60220201

HANOI – 2017

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF GRADUATE AND POSTGRADUATE STUDIES

HÀ THỊ TUYẾT

PREPOSITIONS “IN, ON, AT” IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE

FROM A COGNITIVE SEMANTIC PERSPECTIVE

CÁC GIỚI TỪ “IN, ON, AT” TRONG TIẾNG ANH VÀ TIẾNG VIỆT

DƯỚI GÓC ĐỘ NGỮ NGHĨA HỌC TRI NHẬN

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Linguistics Code: 60220201

Supervisor: Dr Hà Cẩm Tâm

HANOI – 2017

Hanoi – 2017

Hà Thị Tuyết

I would also like to give my sincere gratitude to all of the lecturers at ULIS –VNU, Hanoi for their scholarly knowledge and enthusiasm in their lectures

My profound thanks are also to all my friends and classmates in the cohort

23, who have always stayed by my side, given me constructive comments and perked me up every time I need

Last but not least, my heartfelt thanks go to my family, especially my husband and my daughter, for their immeasurable support and continual encouragement

The Master thesis could not have been fulfilled without them

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ABSTRACT

In light of reference frames used in spatial location coined by cognitive linguist Talmy in 2000, this thesis is intended to investigate the semantic features of English prepositions of place in, at, on with reference to Vietnamese The reason for this choice of topic is that spatial conceptualization

is basic in a human being‘s development and it reveals meaningful insights into the patterns of thinking and viewing the world in cross-linguistics This paper compiles a set of typical cases using prepositions ―in‖, ―on‖ and ―at‖ in the two languages, pointing out the ways they are conceptualized and making a comparison from the data collected The final aim is to give valid construals about spatial conceptualization processes that native speakers employ in the language The results show that these prepositions in both languages have some similarities and differences in term of semantics

1.1 An overview of Cognitive Linguistics and Cognitive Semantics 4 1.2 Spatial Prepositions and Semantic Perspectives on Spatial Prepositions 7

1.4 Spatial characteristics of Trajectors and Landmarks 10

3.1 Conceptualization of ―in‖, ―on‖, ―at‖ in English 22

3.2 Limitation and recommendation for further studies 43

APPENDIX: A sample of a page in the novel The Great Gasby I

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PART 1: INTRODUCTION

In this part, the author presents the statement of the problem, aims of the study, the research question, and organization of the study

1 Statement of the Problem

Nowadays, English has been widely used all over the world The language

is currently considered as a second language in many countries However, learners of English as a Foreign Language (EFL) have a lot of difficulties in conceptualize and perceive the language Beside essential notional categories namely nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs, such functional categories as prepositions are also challenging to learners of this language EFL leaners often try to relate the use of English prepositions to their mother tongue prepositional system

It is worth noting that cognitive semantics is concerned with investigating the relationship between experience, the conceptual system, and the semantic structure encoded by language (Lakoff, 1987) As far as spatial prepositions are concerned, cross-language research in cognitive semantics has shown that although spatial cognition exists in any language, there are differences in strategies of spatial conceptualization employed by people using each language The linguistic encoding of spatial concepts in different language is different (Choi & Bowerman, 1991)

The preposition ―in, on, at‖ are very popular spatial prepositions in English It is essential to grasp the related meanings of these English prepositions within the framework of cognitive semantics and this way

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immensely understand what native speakers conceptualize spatial relations of the physical world objects and how they map from these spatial domains to non-spatial domains How these prepositions can be understood in different collocations have so far not been thoroughly investigated The thesis hopes to contribute to the research into how different language express the various spatial relations that hold between entities in the world

2 Aims of the Study

This study investigates the prepositions ―in, on, at‖ in English and Vietnamese from cognitive perspectives Therefore, it is aimed at:

- Finding the ways the prepositions ―in, on, at‖ are conceptualized in English and in Vietnamese and their differences, if any

3 Scope of the study

The study is limited to investigating the ways the prepositions ―in, on, at‖ are conceptualized in English and in Vietnamese and identifying the differences between the spatial conceptualization in these two languages, if any

4 Research question

The following question is proposed in the current research:

- To what extend do English and Vietnamese differ in the conceptualization

of prepositions ―in, on, at‖ regarding the cognitive semantic perspective?

5 Organization of the study

The present paper is organized in four main parts The INTRODUCTION part is devoted to presenting statement of the problem, aims of the study, scope

of the study, significance of the study, research questions and organization of the study The DEVELOPMENT part is subdivided into three chapters: CHAPTER

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1 discusses the ―LITERATURE REVIEW‖ which provides necessary and relevant general theoretical concepts for the main contents of the study; CHAPTER 2: ―METHODOLOGY‖ includes data collection, analytical framework and research method of the study; CHAPTER 3: ―DATA ANALYSIS AND FINDINGS‖

comprises data analysis, findings and discussion The CONCLUSION part demonstrates the conclusions of this piece of research, pedagogical implications, and suggestions for further studies

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PART 2: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW

1.1 An overview of Cognitive Linguistics and Cognitive Semantics

Vyvyan Evans (2006:156), cognitive semantics sees linguistic meaning as

a manifestation of conceptual structure: the nature and organization of mental

According to Talmy (2000), Lakoff & Johnson (1980), and Geerearts (1999), there are four guiding principles that cognitive semantics conform to: (i) Conceptual structure is embodied; (ii) Semantic structure is conceptual structure; (iii) Meaning representation is encyclopedic; (iv) Meaning construction is conceptualization

The first guiding principle means that the nature of conceptual organization arises from bodily experience Because of the nature of our bodies, including our neuro-anatomical architecture, we have a species specific view of the world (Geerearts, 1999; Talmy, 1985, 2000) In other words, our construal of reality is mediated, in large measure, by the nature of our embodiment We can only talk about what we can perceive and conceive, and the things that we can perceive and conceive derive from embodied experience From this point of view, the human mind must bear the imprint of embodied experience This position holds that conceptual is a consequence of the nature of our embodiment and thus is embodied

The second guiding principle; that is to say, semantic structure is conceptual structure, asserts that language refers to concepts in the mind of the speaker rather than, directly, to entities which inhere in an objectively real

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external world Put another way, semantic structure (the meanings conventionally associated with words and other linguistic units) can be equated with conceptual structure (i.e., concepts) (Rosch, 1973) However, the claim that semantic structure can be equated with conceptual structure does not mean that the two are identical Instead, cognitive semanticists hold that the meanings associated with linguistic units such as words, for example, form only a subset of possible concepts in the minds of speaker-hearers After all, we have many more thoughts, ideas and feelings than we can conventionally encode in language (Evans, 2006; Evans & Green, 2006)

The third guiding principle holds that semantic structure is encyclopedic in nature This means that lexical concepts do not represent neatly packaged bundles of meaning Rather, they serve as ‗points of access‘ to vast repositories

of knowledge relating to a particular concept or conceptual domain (Langacker, 1987) Of course, to claim that lexical concepts are ‗points of access‘ to encyclopedic meaning is not to deny that words have conventional meanings associated with them Nevertheless, cognitive semanticists argue that the conventional meaning associated with a particular linguistic unit is simply a

‗prompt‘ for the process of meaning construction: the ‗selection‘ of an appropriate interpretation against the context of the utterance

The forth guiding principle is that language itself does not encode meaning Instead, words (and other linguistic units) are only ‗prompts‘ for the construction

of meaning (Geerearts, 1999) Accordingly, meaning is constructed at the conceptual level Meaning construction is equated with conceptualization, a process whereby linguistic units serve as prompts for an array of conceptual

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operations and the recruitment of background knowledge Meaning is a process rather than a discrete thing that can be packaged by language

1.2 Spatial Prepositions and Semantic Perspectives on Spatial Prepositions

Merriam-Webster (2013) defines preposition as, ―a word or group of words that is used with a noun, pronoun, or noun phrase to show direction, location, or time, or to introduce an object‖

Spatial Prepositions have been the focus of much recent syntactic and semantic research Recent semantic works have thoroughly investigated spatial prepositions and their dimensions of meaning

According to Cuycken (1993), spatial prepositions indicate relation between two arguments x & y, how they are related to each other in space More specifically, in a large number of cases, spatial prepositions describe the place/ position of x by using the argument y as reference It can be understood that they serve to locate x with respect to y, or rather, the place of y For example,

preposition on in “the pen on the book” locates the pen (argument x) with

respect to the book (argument y) This means that it assigns x to a place or location which coincides with the place taken up by top of the book (a place which is assumed to be known)

- Prepositional meaning is defined as a core sense All the uses of a preposition are reduced to a core sense, which is the one introduced in the lexicon, and the context provides other aspects of meaning which do not belong

to the preposition (Leech, 1969; Bennett, 1975) There is only one meaning that occurs in a variety of contexts These contexts introduce nuances of meaning that

1.3 Spatial domain and dimensionality

Each kind of conceptualization, regardless of its degree of complexity, can function as a domain or context in the characterization of semantic structure Whether naturally or culturally established, it is not a textual, syntagmatic or pragmatic context, but rather a field of experience or human knowledge is referred Each domain has its particular specifications or parameters There are very basic domains, such as time, space, smell, color, etc., and very complex ones, related to marginal or more elaborated fields of experience The domain in which prepositions are conceptualized is three-dimensional space: its specifications and parameters will completely determine the semantic analysis that is appropriate The three canonical dimensions of space (height, length and width) are conceptualized in language, and more specifically, in prepositional usage, as zero dimensional, when the LM entity is conceived of as dimensional, when the LM entity is conceptualized as having a vertical or horizontal axis, as

in ‗the child by the flagpole‘ and ‗a cruise down the river‘, two dimensional, when the LM entity is conceptualized as an extended entity, as in ‗the cows in

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the field‘, and three-dimensional, when the area is conceptualized as having volume, as in ‗the marble in the box‘ Not only the landmark entity but also the trajector is conceptualized accordingly in relation to its canonical dimensions: however, in prepositional usage it is the LM entity that bears directly upon the choice of preposition which is appropriate in each case The concept of dimensionality derives directly from the intrinsic characteristics of the spatial domain that prepositions describe I have already pointed out how canonical spatial dimensions are categorized linguistically, via a process of cognitive abstraction We can conceive of three dimensions: vertical, horizontal, and extension In practice, this means that objects can be conceptualized as a dot, irrelevant as regards dimensionality (0 dimensions), as a line (dimension 1), as

an extended area (dimension 2), or as an area with volume (dimension 3) In the course of my analysis, it has not always been an easy matter to determine exactly how physical objects are conceptualized in language in relation to their canonical dimensions What is involved is a process of abstraction in close association with the speaker‘s capacity to construe the mental images that are involved in prepositional usage As such, some degree of flexibility is necessary in relation

to this type of mental imagery Speakers categorize subjectively, in the sense that other factors, such as the speaker‘s knowledge of the world, cultural constraints, etc will necessarily come into play

Characterization of spatial conceptualization

In, on, at are the basic and most general spatial prepositions in English At

is considered as the most ―neutral‖ place preposition which denotes place as a

point of orientation regardless of its physical shape As in the example at the

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airport, at takes the airport as an orientation point for some trajectors but does

not denote whether the trajector is near, inside or on top of the airport area

Preposition on denotes physical contact between trajector and landmark, and

necessitates viewing the landmark as one-dimensional space (a line) or

two-dimensional space (a surface) In denotes the enclosure of the trajector in the

landmark and views the landmark as two- or three-dimensional space (a space or

a volume)

1.4 Spatial characteristics of Trajectors and Landmarks

A detailed discussion of these concepts is not relevant for the purposes of this paper; however, some should be made of them to point out how they affect the analysis in terms of dimensionality and motion, with an indication of the general features that these entities present The terms TR and LM are used in their conventional meanings (Langacker, 1987) As regards prepositional usage, the TR entity carries out the relation described by the preposition, whereas the

LM is the entity in relation to which the relation is carried out

The asymmetry pertaining to the internal structure of relational predications is connected with salience of its participants The status of the participants is not equal as one of them is a figure in the relational predication (is

to be elaborated by the figure of the conceptualization), whereas other salient participants, often referred to as secondary figures, are called by landmarks The very term ‗landmark‘ is motivated by the fact that‖ they are naturally viewed (in prototypical instances) as providing points of reference for locating the trajector‖ (Langacker 1987:217)

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(1) He put a finger through the crack

In this example, ‗finger‘ is the TR and ‗crack‘ is the LM or reference point which permits the location of the TR The term TR typically suggests motion; this is the case in predicates that involve processes However, the definition of

TR does not necessarily entail either physical or abstract motion: the term can be applied to both dynamic and stative relations Consider the following example from Talmy (forthcoming), denoting a stative relation:

(2) Those rods go through the ceiling

All relational predicates involve an LM as part of their profile, regardless

of whether the LM is syntactically specified or not (Langacker 1987) Linguistic convention allows for non-specification of the LM in cases like the following: when it is unique in its class; when the context, either pragmatic or textual, permits a clear identification, or in the case of reflexivity

For the analysis, the following characteristics were borne in mind when describing the TR and LM entities: dimensions of TR and LM, shape of TR and

LM, if it displays a vertical, horizontal or extended form, whether the TR is singular or multiplex, whether it is a stative or dynamic TR, if there is contact or not between TR and LM, if there is reflexivity, deixis, covering, type of trajectory, if there is real or implied motion, if there is end-point focus, etc

1.5 Metaphor and spatial preposition

The study of metaphorical processes is basic to cognitive studies Cognitive linguistics makes no clear distinction between literal and figurative language, and it is maintained that the latter should be accommodated as an integral part of

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linguistic organization Metaphorical conceptualization is regarded as a factor that may interact with grammatical processes, and is viewed as an important semantic phenomenon The existence of cultural and experiential metaphors conventionally sanctions and allows for the regular metaphorization of spatial uses of prepositions (Lakoff and Johnson 1980)

According to Ungerer and Schmid (1999: 120), metaphor is a ―mapping of the structure of source model onto a target model‖ The source and the target domain of a metaphor belong to two different cognitive domains To complicate things these belong to different superordinate domains and it has not been stated precisely what a domain is, neither when one is different from another nor when exactly a domain is superordinate (Barcelona, 2003: 32)

Cognitive semantics does not view metaphor as a speaker‘s violation of rules of competence (Reddy, 1993; Lakoff & Johnson, 1980; Lakoff & Turner, 1989; Lakoff, 1993) Metaphor is a means whereby ever more abstract and intangible areas of experience can be conceptualized in terms of the familiar and concrete It is motivated by a search for understanding One cognitive domain can be understood, or even created, in terms of components more usually associated with another cognitive domain (Lakoff & Johnson, 1980)

Lakoff and Johnson divided the metaphorical concepts into three groups which are presented as follows:

a Structural metaphors

The group of structural metaphors is said to be the biggest group Different parts of experiences which are complex but too abstract are conceptualized with

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the help of simple but known experiences, e.g the example DISCUSSION IS WAR

a rhetorical fought out battle

a guerrilla warfare of words

In these examples, one tries to explain the abstract concept discussion with the help of the concrete concept war and typical words which are linked to it

b Orientational metaphors

Another group is the orientational metaphors These structure concepts linearly, orienting them with respect to non-metaphorical linear orientations Those metaphors are based on the orientation in space Therefore, a spatial relationship is made for a concept This relationship is normally based on our experiences of the physical space For examples:

BEING HAPPY IS UP/BEING SAD IS DOWN

c Ontological metaphors

The last group, the ontological metaphors, is based on the experience with physical objects Those experiences can be identified and categorized as entities restricted by a surface So we can categorize those things that normally do not have such a boundary by using those entities We set up artificial boundaries There are many kinds of ontological metaphors with different purposes one of

them being the concept abstracts are things such as question or art:

a series of questions

The world is full of art

Another concept is the container metaphors According to Lakoff and Johnson, human beings are containers with boundaries and an orientation of inside and outside This orientation is also used for other physical objects But

We will be out of the trouble soon

The problem will be dealt with in the next discussion

A very important group of ontological metaphors is those that describe something as a person, a personification There are innumerable examples like:

This theory explains everything

The facts are against it

A metaphor is a mapping of the structure of a source model onto a target model Based on the concrete world, abstract phenomena is conceptualized Conceptualization of models of abstract categories is grounded in more concrete experience with people, objects, actions and events This is the mechanism which the semantic categories in, on and at activate to be used in abstract domains In the characterization of the abstract usage of prepositions, basic image schemas are used for the spatial conceptualization of abstract domains

1.6 Overview of related studies

Most English prepositions are inherently polysemous and hard to accurately predict - a feature that is important for machine learning As such, prepositions have received relatively less attention compared to nouns, verbs or adjectives from computational linguists

Cienki (1989) compared the English prepositions in, on and at and their Polish and Russian equivalents He found that the uses of these spatial prepositions across the three languages do not fully overlap For example, in

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English, the preposition in is used for the expression a tent in a clearing, whereas

in Russian and Polish the equivalent words for on are used He interpreted this difference as driven by different conventional conceptualizations of reference objects across languages Cienki‘s analysis was based mainly on the comparison

of translation equivalents and on the researcher‘s own linguistic intuitions about how to describe the same spatial scenes in other languages Other researchers have used more controlled comparisons and have elicited the linguistic descriptions of certain spatial scenes from actual language users

There is also a popular acceptance among linguists of the core meaning of

―at‖ as being a zero-dimensional locative expression, implying the location of an entity as being a point Bennett goes even further suggesting that when used in their spatial sense, ―on‖ and ―in‖ are the two- and three-dimensional counterparts

of ―at‖ respectively, but also points out the necessity of a relative variability of

the size of the zerodimensional location described by ―at‖ (Benett, 1975) In the example ‗John is at the market‘, other relationships such as proximity or

containment may also be used to indicate John‘s position relative to the market,

allowing the market to be perceived either as a zero-dimensional point of reference, or as an actual three-dimensional building This more flexible interpretation of ―at‖ does not deviate from its core meaning, and is also consistent with the belief that people do not perceive the world as strictly comprising of points, lines, or other two- or three dimensional geometric shapes Herskovits (1986) argues for a similar interpretation of ―at‖ in examples such as ‗She parked the car at the corner‘, where the conceptually-mapped objects in question—corners of intersection and car—need not be exactly co-

In addition, Tran (2010) mentioned several differences between English and Vietnamese prepositions in terms of semantics and pragmatics First, when describing the higher position, they take the contact meaning between trajector and landmark into consideration For example, they distinguish the meaning of

on, above and over Meanwhile, Vietnamese people almost do not pay attention

to this aspect They just use the only word trên Second, when talking about the relation between above and under, English people are always aware of whether

or not trajector is in the vertical reference of the landmark‘s area

There have been efforts to examine how people understand and perceive the terms used in such frameworks to express the spatial relations From the basis of the previous studies, it can be seen that the investigation of prepositions of place

‗in‘, ‗at‘, ‗on‘ and their Vietnamese equivalents have not discussed so far in both languages, English and Vietnamese A research relating prepositions ‗in‘, ‗at‘,

‗on‘ in English and Vietnamese from a cognitive semantic perspective has been chosen for my thesis

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CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY

This chapter is devoted to presenting the data for analysis, analytical framework and the methods that will be deployed The data sub-section describes the steps for collecting data from the novel that have been chosen for analysis The analytical framework will be used in the data analysis

2.1 Data collection

In this analysis which follows, I concentrate on the prepositions ―in, on, at‖

in expressions The data are manually collected from the novel Great Gatsby (1925), an English well-known literary work by F Scott Fitzgerald The reason why the author chooses this work is that it is familiar to the readers and represents natural languages Due to the limited time as well as the scope of the

study, only occurrences of ―in, on, at‖ in form of in + NP, on + NP, and at + NP,

where ―in, on, at‖ play the role of prepositions rather than adverbs or affixes, were taken Those examples which are found to be repeated are excluded From

the novel, 134 instances of preposition in, 127 instances of preposition on, 107 instances of preposition at are found

2.2 Analytical framework

The framework of this thesis is based on the particular notions in cognitive semantics, namely, image schemas, prototype theory and radial category, and metaphorical meaning extension

Image Schemas

Because of our physical experience of being and acting in the world of perceiving the environment, moving our bodies, exerting and experiencing force,

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etc – we form basic conceptual structures which we then use to organize thought across a range of more abstract domains

To begin with, in the semantic description of the preposition “in, on, at”,

the conceptual image schemas posited by Johnson (1987) is proposed It is assumed that the conceptual image schemas are acquisitionally previous to meaning extension and that it is the first meaning acquired by children At the same time, it offers a basis from which new extended senses derive by virtue of natural, independently motivated image-schema transformations or shifts Extensions are explained as metaphorical and metonymic mappings from spatial domains onto other domains of human experience (social, scientific, etc…)

According to Johnson (1987), an image schema is a mental pattern that recurrently provides structured understanding of various experiences, and is available for use in metaphor as a source domain to provide an understanding of yet other experiences The groups of image schemas proposed by Johnson (1987), Brugman & Lakoff (1987), Boer (1996), Evans & Tyler (2003) were used for the analysis of the spatial meaning of the prepositions under study Following is the discussion of the schema

According to Johnson (1987), these image schemas are proposed as a more primitive level of cognitive structure underlying metaphor and which provide a link between bodily experience and higher cognitive domains such as language 2.2.1 Containment schema

Containment schema derives from our experience of the human body itself

as a container; from experience of being physically located ourselves within

The ball is in the box

The box – the LM is a physical object which is concrete and takes up some space It is considered as a container and the ball – the TG is in Therefore, the containment schema is used in here

She stays in bed

The preposition in is used to locate the TG “she” with respect to the LM

“bed” The bed is considered as a container due to the boundary of the

imaginary bounded area of the bedding environment

Besides, this containment schema can be extended by a process of metaphorical extension into abstract domains Lakoff and Johnson (1980)

identify container as one of a group of ontological metaphors, where our

experience of non-physical phenomena is described in terms of simple physical

objects like substances and containers For instance: She is in love now

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Love is abstract but regarded as a container like a physical object Being

“in love” means being inside the imaginary bounded landmark of the emotional

state

b Surface schema

Surface schema involves an entity as a surface configuration This schema

is based on the real physical contact of two entities (TR and LM) Surface (ON)

is often expressed by the preposition on, for example, The cup is on the table

(Conventry & Garrod, 2004; Tyler & Evans, 2003; Vandeloise, 2003) This

happens in the cases of floor, ground, table, etc

The boy is on the floor

In this example, the floor is conceptualized as the LM and has a surface The boy is the TG who has a physical contact with the surface of the LM

Adding to that, a surface can also be conceptualized as a container when

the LMs are means of transportation like in cases of bus, plane or train

They are waiting for you on the boat

The boat is a container and some people may argue that it must be “in” rather than “on” The conceptualization is strongly based on the native speakers‘ perceptual experience They use “on” in these cases because they must get onto

their platform to reach their seat Besides, these means of transport are big, comfortable, and do not possess a sense of being contained in a closed space

c Encounter