A Conceptual Blending And Relevance Analysis Of The On-line Meaning Construction Of Two-part Allegorical Sayings

As a unique Chinese language form, two-part allegorical saying has long been the research focus of Chinese scholars. However, those researches pay their special attention to the static understanding of the two-part allegorical saying, neglecting the dynamic cognitive process and on-line meaning construction process of them. Additionally, two-part allegorical saying has neither equivalent English form nor unified and abundant research methods. As a result, the achievements in foreign researches are relatively insufficient. Moreover, the existing dynamic cognitive researches are always applying Conceptual Blending Theory only to analyze two-part allegorical saying and the combination of other theories is rare. Therefore, this thesis attempts to approach a conceptual blending and relevance analysis of the on-line meaning construction of two-part allegorical saying and tries to clarify the complementary relationship between Conceptual Blending Theory and Relevance Theory.In terms of five types of conceptual integration networks, five conformed two-part allegorical sayings are chosen from an authoritative and popular book A Classification of Two-Part Allegorical Sayings for each type. Then, three of the five two-part allegorical sayings are randomly selected for approaching a conceptual blending and relevance analysis of the on-line meaning construction. Through an extensive study, the current research reaches a conclusion that only the combination of the two theories could present a more accurate interpretation. Specifically, Conceptual Blending Theory adequately presents us a concrete and plausible process of on-line meaning construction, while Relevance Theory contributes a lot to optimize the concrete and plausible process. To be more exact, Relevance Theory assists the deduction of the fuzziness generic space, the refinement of the blend space, the construction of the optimally interrelated input and determines which information are effectively selected from the input spaces to engage in the partly projection to organize the blend. Besides, Relevance Theory could availably optimize the reblending process, achieving the greatest cognitive effects for the smallest processing effort.The significance of the application of the two main complementarities cognitive linguistic theories lies in following three aspects. The first one is that applying two complementary theories to interpret the on-line meaning construction of the two-part allegorical saying, a more in-depth understanding mechanism is achieved, hence facilitating the comprehension of the two-part allegorical saying. The second one is that the explanatory power of Conceptual Blending Theory and Relevance Theory are verified. The third one is that it paves a way for the application of two complementarities cognitive linguistic theories to other different language forms, with an effort to gain better explanatory adequacy and further reinforce those theories strengths and improve their weakness.