A Cognitive Research On Polysemy In Yellow Emperor’s Canon Of Medicine

Having two or more related meanings in one lexical form, polysemy contributesto human memory. As a widespread language phenomenon, polysemy has won muchattention from a great number of cognitive linguists. They have put forward profoundtheories but have failed, to some extent, to approach polysemy in a very practical waywithout sufficient evidence. To make up for the deficiency, this research is carried outin the hope of offering useful examples for the cognitive study of polysemy.Cognitive linguistics emphasizes the role of bodily experience in the formation ofconcepts, which is also the central belief of the theoretical system of traditionalChinese medicine. Based on this coincidence, the research integrates cognitivelinguistics with TCM.Among the numerous TCM literatures, Yellow Emperor’s Canonof Medicine is the earliest and greatest classics extant in China. It has been the “TCMBible” for over two thousand years with a detailed record of medical achievementsand experience since ancient times. Many polysemous words find their way to YellowEmperor’s Canon of Medicine. These words, like live fossil, act as a bridge betweenlinguistic structure and human cognition.Focusing on the cognitive attribute of polysemy, the research consists of sixchapters. The first chapter does a literature review on the causes of occurrence ofpolysemy. This review first finds that traditional studies couldn’t provide reasonableexplanations for polysemy due to their sole emphasis on language itself and then itfinds that polysemy is a convenient way for people to cognize the world by a closeexamination of the Principle of Least Effort as well as the characteristics of wordmeaning. These findings reveal that it is essential to consider polysemy as a cognitivesystem, which is a hallmark of cognitive linguistics.Cognitive linguistics hasEmbodied Philosophy as its theoretical foundation. So, in the second chapter, theresearch expounds on the beliefs of Embodied Philosophy: cognition deriving fromunderstanding human body and space, the mind being inherently embodied, thoughtbeing mostly unconscious and abstract concepts being largely metaphorical. Thesebeliefs are exemplified by such TCM phenomena: the origin of TCM, acupuncture, moxibustion and massage, Four Examination Diagnostic Methods,“people-oriented”philosophy, the regional differences of development, knowledge of Essence/Qi/Mind,TCM’s contemplation and analogy. The link between Embodied Philosophy and TCMphenomena serves as the background for the further research. In the third part, namely,from the Chapert3thto the Chapter5th, the research undertakes a cognitive analysison polysemy. It regards Prototype Theory, Conceptual Metaphor Theory, ConceptualMetonymy Theory and Theory of Frame Semantics as the most effective tools for thestudy of polysemy in Yellow Emperor’s Canon of Medicine. Many distinctpolysemous words such as息，宗，淫，经，金，木，水，火，土，标，本，表，里，上，下，精，气，神，阴，阳are selected from Yellow Emperor’s Canon of Medicineand analyzed carefully to testify to the motivation of the four theories for polysemy.Through the contrast study on cognitive theories and words in Yellow Emperor’sCanon of Medicine, the research, in the last chapter, draws the conclusion that thecognitive mechanism of polysemy is mainly by means of prototype-basedcategorization with metaphor, metonymy and the changing frames as driving force. Inthe categorization, the proto-meaning and the extended meanings of polysemouswords are connected with meaning chains or networks which are based on humanexperience of the world and the way people perceive and conceptualize it.As for its contributions, this cognitive research on polesemy in Yellow Emperor’sCanon of Medicine demonstrates the flexibility and creativity of polysemy, the directlinks between language and cognition as well as the shared cognitive mechanisms ofdifferent cultures. Besides, it offers plentiful words as instances which are oftheoretical and practical importance to cognitive linguistics. What’s more, ithelps to promote the internationalization of TCM by providing new explanations forTCM-related words from a cognitive perspective.