A Comparative Study On The Polysemization Of Basic Taste Words In Chinese And English

Taste has always been one of the most basic and important senses of human beings in perceiving the world, thus research on it can in fact reflect the cognitive abilities of human beings. This paper chooses the basic taste words,"Suan (酸)","Tian (甜)","Ku(苦)","L(a辣)"in Chinese and their counterparts in English,"sour","sweet","bitter","spicy", and makes a comparative study on the polysemzation of these four pairs of taste words and the cognitive domains they have mapped onto from the perspective of cognitive linguistics.The study first collects the meanings of"Suan (酸)"and"sour","Tian (甜)"and"sweet","Ku(苦)"and"bitter","La(辣)"and"spicy"separately from five authoritative dictionaries in each language as the research subject, classifies them into different categories, with detailed exploration and discussion on the derivation process of each category, summarizes all the major cognitive domains each word has mapped onto with examples in those dictionaries, and finally makes comparisons considering the above aspects. Similarities and differences will be discussed.The result shows that the polysemization processes of these four pairs of taste words are highly and systematically similar. The original meanings in taste category have been extended into the categories of concrete substances, physiology, emotion and others through categorization and it is metonymy and metaphor that function in mapping the meanings onto other more specific cognitive domains within each sub-category."Suan (酸)"and"sour"can both map onto the domains of smell, sight, mind and person, but"Suan (酸)"can map onto the domains of sound, time, physical pain and poverty while"sour"onto the domains of weather, quality (inferior) and relationship (bad);"Tian (甜)"and"sweet"can both map onto the domains of smell, sight, mind, person, time, life, love, business and fantasy, but"Tian (甜)"can map onto the domains of sound, career and sleep while"sweet"onto the domain of animal; "Ku(苦)"and"bitter"can both map onto the domains of smell, sight, sound, mind, person, time, life, weather, suffering, but"Ku(苦)"can map onto the domains of physical pain, poverty and making efforts while"bitter"onto the domain of conflict;"La(辣)"and"spicy"can both map onto the domains of sound and person but"La(辣)"can map onto the domains of physical pan and heat while"spicy"onto the domains of sound and improperness and obscenity. The same bodily experiences and the intrinsic cognitive abilities of human beings are the possible reasons for the similarities and different cultures and thinking modes between Chinese and English people can well account for the differences.The results have presented the polysemization processes and the cognitive domains of"Suan (酸)","Tian (甜)","Ku(苦)","La(辣)"and"sour","sweet","bitter","spicy", strongly supported and verified the theories on polysemization in cognitive linguistics. Also as a comparatively complete coverage of all the basic taste words in Chinese and English, this study may contribute to the breadth and depth of researches on taste words. Besides, the results can also enlighten the teaching of taste words and their translation.