Semantic leaps: The role of frame-shifting and conceptual blending in meaning construction

The role of context and background knowledge in the productive character of natural language is addressed. Traditionally, cognitive scientists have appealed to algorithmic procedures for combining relatively static representational structures in the knowledge base. In contrast, I suggest that cognitive scientists focus on dynamic aspects of on-line meaning construction in which the speaker integrates on-going aspects of perceptual and conceptual information with more abstract information available from frames in long-term memory.;Two related sets of processes are proposed to reconcile tension between the static nature of frames and speakers' flexible use of language: frame-shifting and conceptual blending. Frame-shifting is semantic reanalysis in which existing elements in the message-level representation are reorganized into a new frame. Conceptual blending is a set of cognitive operations for combining cognitive models from different domains. These processes rely extensively on the establishment of cross-domain mappings: systematic correspondences, based on identity, similarity, or analogy, between elements and relations in different domains.;A variety of research techniques are employed to address phenomena at disparate levels to reveal common aspects of meaning construction. Reading time and ERP data are employed to examine what happens on-line during the process of comprehension. Further, native intuitions are systematically employed to investigate the resultant products of comprehension. Experimental findings substantiate the psychological reality of the frame-shifting process thought to subserve semantic reanalysis in jokes. Further, analysis of rhetorical techniques in moral discourse suggests strategic use of frame-shifting as a persuasive technique.;Analysis of the role of conceptual blending in concept combination, analogy, and counterfactuals suggests that in all three operations the establishment of mappings between elements and relations in blended models and input frames play an important role in meaning construction. These analyses suggest the productive character of language use results from constructive processes which speakers use to assemble, link, and adapt simple cognitive models. By addressing linguistic phenomena often ignored in traditional meaning research, I explain how processes of cross-domain mapping, frame-shifting, and conceptual blending enhance the explanatory adequacy of traditional frame-based systems for natural language processing.