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A Study of the Cognitive Function of Metonymy

Author: RenZuo
Tutor: WuXianZhong
School: Jilin University
Course: Foreign Linguistics and Applied Linguistics
Keywords: metonymy cognitive function lexical acquisition
CLC: H05
Type: Master's thesis
Year: 2009
Downloads: 472
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Abstract

Metonymy, together with metaphor, is claimed to be one of the most widely used figures of speech. Unlike metaphor, which has been widely studied as an essential way of thinking in the past decades, metonymy has received far less attention, though it also plays an important role in human life and occurs frequently in language use. According to cognitive linguists, metaphor is much more than a figure of speech and it is a powerful cognitive tool for humans. Likewise, metonymy is a cognitive tool.This paper begins by giving a brief survey on the traditional views of metonymy, and then it points out that the traditional views restrict metonymy to the names of things, mere substitution of names, and real-world contiguity. On the above basis, the paper analyzes some modern cognitive ideas of metonymy, which has broadened our understanding of metonymy by delimiting the weaknesses of the traditional notions.Cognitive theory regards metonymy as an essential means that human beings recognize the world of reality. Grounded in human experience, metonymies construct the ordinary, everyday way we think and act. A large number of metonymies in language reflect a common mode of thinking. Metonymic thought plays a crucial role in understanding utterances. Idealized cognitive model is an important notion in understanding metonymy, which not only stores information but also reconstructs the information input; ICM serves as an important role in the human communication with the world.According to cognitive linguists, metaphor is a mapping that occurs between different domains, while metonymy is a mapping that occurs within the same domain, that is, a category is used to stand for another (within the same cognitive domain). The understanding of metonymy must mainly involve the recognition of the salient part of an object as a whole. During the process of recognizing the world, people tend to use the most salient, the well-understood or easy-to-perceive aspect of an object, namely, the salient aspect. Metonymy should be interpreted not as simply substituting one entity for another entity but as a cognitive process in which one more salient conceptual entity mentally accesses another entity.All in all, metonymy is not only a linguistic form, a useful figure of speech, but also a very powerful and efficient tool and a common mode of thinking. Its cognitive function is used in our daily life to a large extent. Furthermore, it plays a positive role in college English vocabulary teaching.

A Study of the Cognitive Function of Metonymy

Abstract

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