A Study On Cognitive Models Of Polysemic Network Of Compound Prepositions

Polysemy is an important and pervasive semantic phenomenon in all languages, English preposition is polysemic as well. Zhang Zhenbang says,"English is a language of preposition."That is to say, English preposition has been widely used with great frequency. Therefore, polysemic preposition has become a hot issue in the current linguistic study as it is being analyzed from a cognitive view. In cognitive linguistics, the study of polysemy has the character of different methods caused by various models of cognition. The constitution of cognitive models is the best way to understand prepositions. Polysemic prepositions have various semantic networks based on different dimensional cognitive models. A simple preposition has a complicated semantic network, let alone the compound prepositions. The thesis probes into the characters of polysemic relationship and the construction of cognitive models based on the general principles of cognitive linguistics.This thesis consists of five chapters.The first chapter introduces the originality and novelty of the polysemy and preposition study.The second chapter reviews the development, the classification and the main studies of polysemy by different schools of linguistics. It provides a theoretical basis for the discussions in the subsequent chapters.Chapter Three is the introduction of the main theories about the polysemic network of prepositions provided in this thesis. First the author has given a general review on the study of polysemic network and the previous approaches to it as well, especially, Tyler and Evans'model theory. From a cognitive view, categorization is a fundamental cognitive process. In the course, people conceptualize the world based on prototype theory and on the principle of family resemblance, and then form cognitive categories and concepts. And linguistic structure is a kind of cognitive category that bears proto-typicality. Polysemy category, as a kind of linguistic structure, is organized with respect to a primary sense from which the extended meanings are derived via metonymy, metaphor and image schemas. These meanings form an interrelated complex structure by radiation and concatenation. Since all the meanings are related with each other by at least one node, thus they form a polysemic network. This chapter presents the definition and hypothesis of compound prepositions, and points out some distinctive features of compound prepositions as well.Chapter Four expounds the polysemic network of the compound preposition. It discusses the process of categorizations and the features of compound prepositions, and different kinds of cognitive models to construct polysemy semantic network of compound prepositions. It also discusses in detail the process of the devices of polysemy semantic network by some examples of several compound prepositions, such as within and without, based on OALECD. This thesis sets up the theoretical framework of analyzing and interpreting polysemy network of compound prepositions based on fundamental theories of cognitive linguistics. Furthermore, the analysis extends to the cognitive models of polysemic constructions in the aspect of clause of compound by citing two examples, and also the possibilities of the production of new meanings in the aspect of text. The thesis still probes into the construction process of compound prepositional polysemic network in the text of poems and its dependence of the context.Chapter Five is a conclusion. It explains that the compound preposition is a special and complex kind of preposition, and the interpretation of polysemic network of compound preposition is not only a process of understanding polysemic senses but also a construction of cognitive models, it is significant to recognize such a linguistic phenomenon in the interpretation of English prepositions and in the field of English teaching.In addition, the deficiencies of the research and the directions of more study in this field are pointed out in the conclusion.