认知语言学与语言类型学的关系.docVIP

Cognitive Linguistics and linguistic typology Johan van der Auwera and Jan Nuyts University of Antwerp 0. Introduction This chapter looks into the relations between Cognitive Linguistics and linguistic typology. Thefirst half of the chapter offers a ‘neutral’ characterization of the field of linguistic typology.Linguistic typology is defined as a cross-linguistic, descriptive as well as explanatory enterprisedevoted to the unity and diversity of language with respect to linguistic form or the relationbetween linguistic form and meaning or function. The second half is devoted to an explorationof the relations between linguistic typology and Cognitive Linguistics. It is argued that the twostrands are eminently compatible, that there is work that illustrates this, but also that mostcognitive linguists and typologists nevertheless work in different spheres. In a first section wediscuss the difficulty of applying typology’s sampling method in Cognitive Linguistics. In asecond one, we focus on the typologists’ prime orientation on grammar and their hesitation torelate their strictly speaking linguistic generalizations to wider cognitive concerns. 1. What is linguistic typology? The term ‘linguistic typology’ is rather general. It could be taken to mean no more than theinvestigation of linguistic types. Linguistic types appear when the linguist has classified linguistic entities in virtue of a similarity. In this sense, any linguistic discipline counts as typology. Inmorphology, for instance, prefixes and suffixes can be said to be entities of the same type, called‘affixes’; and affixes and roots or stems are also entities of the same type, called ‘morphemes’.In sociolinguistics, most Australian languages and most native American languages are of thesame type: they are all threatened languages. Or in historical linguistics one can say thatNorwegian and Danish are languages of the Germanic type. In reality, however, the term‘linguistic typology’ is used in a narrower way. A