Meaning Construction Analysis Of English Neologisms From The Perspective Of Conceptual Integration Theory

Vocabulary changing,as the most obvious change of language,is reflected in the emergence of neologisms.The features of neologisms are manifest mainly in two aspects: the first is to create a completely new word based on new things or phenomena;the other is to attach new meanings to an existing word to make it a brand new one.No matter whether it is an existing word with new meanings or a completely new creation,its generation can be regarded as a dynamic construction of a new semantic and concept.On this basis,172 neologisms in the year 2017 are collected from Oxford English Dictionary Online(OED Online)and Word Spy.This thesis,by way of both quantitative,qualitative analysis,and case study,attempts to explore the meaning construction of English neologisms from the perspective of Conceptual Integration Theory(CIT).Through analysis,the main conclusions are summarized as follows.Firstly,English neologisms are mostly formed by word-formation,new meanings in old words,and borrowings from other languages.Secondly,the cognitive process of English neologisms involves establishing input spaces,cross-space mapping and projecting the shared abstract structure to generic space,selectively projecting onto blended space,and generating an emergent structure.Furthermore,this thesis finds that compounding and blending are the most effective ways to create English neologisms,and they are applicable to four conceptual integration networks;affixation,acronym,and borrowings from other languages possess a fixed conceptual integration network-simplex network;both analogy and new meanings in old words can be explained by the single-scope network.Based on CIT,this thesis makes a comprehensive analysis of the meaning construction of English neologisms and reveals its conceptual integration process,presenting the abstract conceptual cognitive process in a concrete manner to explore the cognitive regularities that work within a language.Secondly,throughan in-depth analysis of English neologisms,this thesis to some extent enriches language research and offers some suggestions on language learning and teaching.