Email this article Forms of encoded pragmatic meaning: semantic prosody. A lexicographic perspective.
Abstract
Abstract – The present paper focuses on ways in which the pragmatic (functional) meaning that arises from various contextual features, known in corpus linguistics as semantic prosody (Sinclair 1996, 2004; Louw 1993, etc.) can become an integral part of lexicographic descriptions. This is especially important for the treatment of phraseology and idiomatics. The workings of semantic prosody are a good example of the ways pragmatic meaning exploits linguistic means to be codified in the text. We thus investigate the meaning that can only be studied in context, as it is completely dependent on collocation, i.e., syntagmatic relations, and therefore cannot be attributed solely to a concrete word form. Corpus analysis has yielded significant results in areas such as the lexicographic treatment of semantic prosody. We believe that in order to improve teaching pragmatics in all its complexity, it is necessary to recognise and assess various aspects of pragmatic meaning both in written and spoken language. Second/foreign language teaching/learning in particular has been strongly dependent on the inclusion of relevant information in dictionaries, in which, traditionally, pragmatic aspects of meaning have been largely neglected. Language technologies have enabled us both to study the subtleties of pragmatic meaning and to design accurate and more user-friendly (pedagogical) dictionaries. We will attempt to demonstrate the value of explicit description of functional pragmatic meaning, i.e. semantic prosody, as implemented in the Slovene Lexical Database (2008-2012). A brief overview of the theoretical background is first provided, after which we describe the definition strategies employed to include pragmatics, as well as presenting a case study and arguing that explicating semantic prosody is crucial in developing pragmatic competence in (young/foreign) language learners.
Keywords: semantic prosody; pragmatics; lexicographic description; dictionary; lexical database
References
Berber Sardinha T. 2000, Semantic prosodies in English and Portuguese: A contrastive study, in “Cuadernos de Filologia Inglesa” 9[1], pp. 93-110.
Barnbrook G. 2002, Defining language: A local grammar of definition sentences. Studies in Corpus Linguistics, John Benjamins Publishing Company, Amsterdam.
Bublitz W. 1996, Semantic prosody and cohesive company: somewhat predictable, in “Leuvense Bijdragen: Tijdschrift voor Germanse Filologie”, 85[1-2], pp. 1-32.
Channell J. 2000, Corpus-based Analysis of Evaluative Texts, in S. Hunston and G. Thompson (Eds.), Evaluation in Text. Authorial Stance and the Construction of Discourse, 2003, OUP, Oxford, pp. 39-55.
Cheng W., Greaves C. and Warren M. 2005, The creation of a prosodically transcribed intercultural corpus: the Hong Kong corpus of spoken English (prosodic), in “ICAME Journal”, 29, pp. 47-68.
Dam-Jensen H. and Zethsen K. K. 2007, Pragmatic patterns and the lexical system – a reassessment of evaluation in language, in “Journal of Pragmatics”, 39[9], pp. 1608-1623.
Ellis N. C., Frey E. and Jalkanen I. 2009, The psycholinguistic reality of collocation and semantic prosody (1): Lexical Access, in U. Romer, R. Schultze (Eds.), Exploring the lexis-grammar interface, Studies in Corpus Linguistics, John Benjamins, Amsterdam, pp. 89-114.
Fillmore C. 1985, Frames and the semantics of understanding, in “Quaderni di Semantica” VI[2], pp. 222-254.
Fillmore C. 1997, Lectures on construction grammar. Available at: http://www.ics.berkeley.edu/̴kay/bcg/lec02.html (May 1999).
Fillmore C., Johnson C.R. and Petruck R.L. 2003, Background to Framenet, in “International Journal of Lexicography”, 16[3], pp. 235-250.
Gabrovšek D. 2007, Connotation, Semantic Prosody, Syntagmatic Associative Meaning: Three Levels of Meaning? In S. Komar and U. Mozetič (Eds.), English Language Overseas Perspectives and Enquiries, IV/1-2, Filozofska fakulteta Univerze v Ljubljani/Oddelek za anglistiko in amerikanistiko: Slovensko društvo za angleške študije, Ljubljana.
Gantar P., Grabnar K., Kocjančič P., Krek S., Pobirk O., Rejc R.,
Šorli M., Šuster S. & Zaranšek P. 2009, Standard for the compilation of a lexical unit (Indicator 6): Communication in Slovene Project: Style Guide: the Slovene Lexical Database. Kamnik. Slovenia. Available at: http://www.slovenscina.eu/Media/Kazalniki/Kazalnik6/SSJ_Kazalnik_6_Specifikacije-leksikalna-baza_v1.pdf.
Grice H. P. 1975, Logic and conversation, in P. Cole and Morgan J. L. (Eds.), Syntax and Semantics, 3: Speech Acts, Academic Press, New York, pp. 53-59.
Guo X. et al. 2010, Acquisition of conscious and unconscious knowledge of semantic prosody, in “Consciousness and Cognition”, 20 (2011), Elsevier, pp. 417-425.
Hanks P. 1987, Definitions and Explanations, Sinclair (Ed.), in Looking up. Account of the Cobuild Project in Lexical Computing (Collins Cobuild dictionaries), Collins, London and Glasgow.
Hanks P. 2004, Corpus Pattern Analysis, in G. Williams and S. Vessier (Eds.), Proceedings of the 11th EURALEX International Congress, Volume I. Université de Bretagne Sud, Lorient, pp. 87-97.
Hoey M. 2005, Lexical Priming, Routledge, London and New York.
Hunston S. 2002, Corpora in Applied Linguistics, CUP, Cambridge.
Hunston S. 2007, Semantic Prosody Revisited, in “International Journal of Corpus Linguistics”, 12[2], pp. 249-268.
Hunston S. and Francis G. 2000, Pattern Grammar. A Corpus-driven Approach to the Lexical Grammar of English, Benjamins, Amsterdam and Philadelphia.
Kay P. and Fillmore C. J. 1999, Grammatical constructions and linguistic generalizations: The What’s X Doing Y construction?, in “Language”, 75[1], pp.1-33.
Kay P. 1995, Construction grammar, in J.O. Ӧstmann and J. Bloomaerts (Eds.), Handbook of Pragmatics, Benjamins, Amsterdam, pp.171-177.
Levinson S. 1983, Pragmatics, CUP, Cambridge.
Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk B. 1996, Cross-linguistic and language-specific aspects of semantic prosody, in “Language Sciences”, 18, pp. 153-178.
Louw W. E. 1993, Irony in the Text or Insincerity in the Writer?: The Diagnostic Potential of Semantic Prosodies, in M. Baker, G. Francis and E. Tognini Bonelli (Eds.), Text and technology: in honour of John Sinclair, Benjamins, Amsterdam, pp. 157-176.
McEnery T. and Wilson A. 2001, Corpus Linguistics (1st edition 1996), Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh.
Munday, J. 2011 (Ed.), Looming large: A cross-linguistic analysis of semantic prosodies in comparable reference corpora, in A. Kruger and K. Wallmach (Eds.), Corpus-Based Translation Studies: Research and Applications, Continuum, London and New York, pp. 169-86.
Xiao R. and McEnery T. 2006, Near synonymy, collocation and semantic prosody: a cross-linguistic perspective, in “Applied Linguistics”, 27[1], pp. 103-129.
Moon R. 1998, Fixed Expressions and Idioms in English: A Corpus-Based Approach, Clarendon, Oxford.
Partington A. S. 1998, Patterns and Meanings. Using Corpora for English Language Research and Teaching, SCL 2, Benjamins, Amsterdam and Philadelphia.
Partington A. S. 2004, Utterly content in each other’s company’: semantic prosody and semantic preference, in “International Journal of Corpus Linguistics”, 9, pp. 131-156.
Philip, G. 2003, Collocation and Connotation: A Corpus-Based Investigation Of Colour Words In English And Italian, PhD Thesis, Great Britain, University of Birmingham.
Philip G. 2009, Why prosodies aren’t always there: Insights into the idiom principle, at Corpus Linguistics Conference. Liverpool. Great Britain. Available at: http://ucrel.lancs.ac.uk/publications/cl2009/ (17 October 2011).
Piotrowski T. 1989, Monolingual and Bilingual Dictionaries, Fundamental Differences, in M.L. Tickoo (Ed.) Learners’ Dictionaries: State of the Art, SEAMEO Regional Language Centre, Singapore, pp. 72-83.
Sinclair J. McH. 1987, Looking Up: Account of the Cobuild Project in Lexical Computing (Collins Cobuild dictionaries), Collins ELT, London and Glasgow.
Sinclair J. McH. 1991, Corpus, Concordance, Collocation, OUP, Oxford.
Sinclair J. McH. 1996, The Empty Lexicon, in “International Journal of Corpus Linguistics”, 1, pp. 99-119.
Sinclair J. McH. 2003, Preface in B. Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk (Ed.), Practical Applications in Language and Computers, Peter Lang, Frankurt, pp. 7-11.
Sinclair J. McH. 2004 [2005], Meaning in the Framework of Corpus Linguistics, in “Lexicographica”, 20, pp. 20-32.
Sperber D. and Wilson D. 1996, Relevance: Communication and cognition, Wiley-Blackwell.
Stewart D. 2008, In Sinclair’s footsteps? Paper presented at Semantic Prosody: has it set in, or should it be budged? Forlì, Italy, 23 June 2008.
Stewart D. 2010, Semantic prosody: a critical evaluation, Routledge, London and New York.
Stubbs M. 1995, Collocations and semantic profiles: on the cause of the trouble with quantitative studies, in “Functions of Language”, 2[1], pp. 23-55.
Stubbs M. 2001a, On inference theories and code theories: corpus evidence for semantic schemas, in Text, 21[3], pp. 436-465.
Stubbs M. 2001b, Words and Phrases: Corpus Studies of Lexical Semantics, Blackwell, Oxford.
Stubbs M. 2006, Corpus Analysis: the state of the art and three types of unanswered questions, in G. Thompson and S. Hunston (Eds.), System and Corpus: Exploring Connections, Equinox, London, pp. 15-36.
Stubbs M. 2007, On texts corpora and models of language, in M. Hoey, M. Mahlberg, M. Stubbs and W. Teubert (Eds.), Text, Discourse and Corpora: Theory and Analysis, Continuum, London and New York, pp. 127-161.
Šorli M. 2012a, Semantična prozodija v teoriji in praksi – korpusni pristop k proučevanju pragmatičnega pomena: primer slovenščine in angleščine, in M. Šorli (Ed.), Dvojezična korpusna leksikografija. Slovenščina v kontrastu: novi obeti, novi izzivi, Trojina, zavod za uporabno slovenistiko, Ljubljana, pp. 90-116.
Šorli M. 2012b, Pragmatični pomen in semantična prozodija v medjezični perspektivi: primer slovenščine in angleščine, in Š. Vintar (Ed.), Prevodi skozi korpusno prizmo, Ljubljana, Znanstvena založba Filozofske fakultete.
Tognini Bonelli E. 2001, Corpus Linguistics at Work, John Benjamins, Amsterdam and Philadelphia.
Whitsitt S. 2005, A critique of the concept of semantic prosody, in “International Journal of Corpus Linguistics”, 10, pp. 283-305.
Zethsen K. K. 2006, Semantic Prosody: Creating Awareness about a Versatile Tool, in “Tidsskrift for Sprogforskning”, 4[1], pp. 275-294.
Zheng W. 2009, Semantic Prosody and ESL/EFL Vocabulary Pedagogy, in “TESL Canada Journal/Revue TESL du Canada”, 26[2].
Full Text: PDF
Refbacks
- There are currently no refbacks.
