Cover not available

In:Studies in Lexicogrammar: Theory and applications
Edited by Grzegorz Drożdż
[Human Cognitive Processing 54] 2016
► pp. 121–142

Get fulltext from our e-platform
JBE logo with link
PDF logo with download linkDownload Book PDF
authorization required

What? You and me get together? The place of the Incredulity Response Construction in the lexicon-syntax continuum

Published online: 4 August 2016
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/hcp.54.06szc
This study reviews the form and meaning of the Incredulity Response Construction (IRC), a closed-class form claimed by various cognitive linguists to evince fairly unusual properties justifying its special construction status. I will attempt to demonstrate that both the form and the function of the construction are consistent with traditional characterizations of items located on the syntactic side of the lexicon-syntax continuum. Additionally, I argue that the meaning in question is not exactly that of disbelief, but is instead more general, making it possible to express a wider range of emotional responses. The IRC is not an exceptional construction removed from broadly conceived core syntax. Therefore, at least this construction cannot be used to question the traditional lexicon-syntax division.
References (34)
Akmajian, A. 1984. Sentence types and the form–function fit. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory, 2, 1–23. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bally, C. 1905. Précis de stylistique. Genève: Eggimann.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Barðdal, J., & Eythórsson, T. 2012. Reconstructing syntax: Construction grammar and the comparative method. In H.C. Boas & I.A. Sag (Eds.), Sign-based construction grammar (257–308). Stanford: CSLI Publications.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Blakemore, D. 2002. Relevance and linguistic meaning: The semantics and pragmatics of discourse markers. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bowerman, M. 1996. Learning how to structure space for language: A crosslinguistic perspective. In P. Bloom, M.A. Peterson, L. Nadel, & M.F. Garrett (Eds.), Language and space (383–436). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Chafe, W. 1994. Discourse, consciousness, and time: The flow and displacement of conscious experience in speaking and writing. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Croft, W. 1990. Typology and universals. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2000. Lexical and grammatical meaning. In G. Booij, C. Lehmann, & J. Mugdan (Eds.), Morphology: An international handbook on inflection and word-formation (257–263). Berlin: Walter de Gruyter.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cruse, D.A. 1986. Lexical semantics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Drożdż, G. 2012. Conceptualizing the present through construal aspects: The case of the English temporal constructions. In L. Filipović & K.M. Jaszczolt (Eds.), Space and time in languages and cultures (305–328). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Goldberg, A.E. 2006. Constructions at work: The nature of generalization in language. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Greenough, J.B., Kittredge, G.L., Howard, A.A., & D’Ooge, B.L. (1903). Allen and Greenough’s new Latin grammar for schools and colleges. Boston: Ginn & Company.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kay, P., & Michaelis, L.A. 2012. Constructional meaning and compositionality. In C. Maienborn, K. von Heusinger, & P. Portner (Eds.), Semantics: An international handbook of natural language meaning, Vol. 3 (2271–2296). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Lambrecht, K. 1990. What, me worry? – Mad Magazine sentences revisited. Proceedings of the Sixteenth Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society , 215–228.
Langacker, R.W. 1987. Foundations of cognitive grammar. Vol. 1: Theoretical prerequisites. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 1991. Foundations of cognitive grammar. Vol 2: Descriptive application. Stanford: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2008. Cognitive grammar: A basic introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Legallois, D. 2012. From grammaticalization to expressive constructions. In M. Bouveret & D. Legallois (Eds.), Constructions in French [Constructional Approaches to Language 13] (257–281). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Lyons, J. 1982. Deixis and subjectivity: Loquor, ergo sum?. In R.J. Jarvella & W. Klein (Eds.), Speech, place, and action: Studies in deixis and related topics (101–124). Chichester & New York: John Wiley.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
McCarthy, M. 1990. Vocabulary. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Michaelis, L.A. 2010. Sign-based construction grammar. In B. Heine & H. Narrog (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of linguistic analysis (155–176). Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Morrow, D.G. 1986. Grammatical morphemes and conceptual structure in discourse processing. Cognitive Science, 10, 423–455. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Ochs, E., & Schieffelin, B. 1989. Language has a heart. Text, 9, 7–25.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Putnam, H. 1991. Representation and reality. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Słoń, A. 2007. The ‘impersonal’ impersonal construction in Polish: A cognitive grammar analysis. In D. Divjak & A. Kochańska (Eds.), Cognitive paths into the slavic domain (257–290). Berlin & New York: Walter de Gruyter. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Szcześniak, K. 2013. You can’t cry your way to candy: Motion events and paths in the x’s way construction. Cognitive Linguistics, 24 (1), 159–194. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Talmy, L. 1978. The relation of grammar to cognition. In D. Waltz (Ed.), Proceedings of TINLAP-2 (14–24). Urbana: University of Illinois Coordinated Science Laboratory.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2011. Cognitive Semantics: An overview. In C. Maienborn, K. von Heusinger, & P. Portner (Eds.), Semantics: An international handbook of natural language meaning, Vol. 1 (622–642). Berlin, New York: Walter de Gruyter. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Taylor, J.R. 1995. Linguistic categorization: Prototypes in linguistic theory. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2002. Cognitive grammar. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2012. The mental corpus: How language is represented in the mind. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Wexler, K. 2003. Lenneberg’s Dream: Learning, normal language development, and a specific language impairment. In Y. Levy & J.C. Schaeffer (Eds.), Language Competence across populations: Towards a definition of specific language impairment (11–62). Mahwah: Lawrence Erlbaum.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Wilson, D., & Sperber, D. 1993. Linguistic form and relevance. Lingua, 90(1/2), 1–25. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Mobile Menu Logo with link to supplementary files background Layer 1 prag Twitter_Logo_Blue