The symbolic function of language
المؤلف:
Vyvyan Evans and Melanie Green
المصدر:
Cognitive Linguistics an Introduction
الجزء والصفحة:
C1P6
2025-11-22
46
The symbolic function of language
One crucial function of language is to express thoughts and ideas. That is, language encodes and externalises our thoughts. The way language does this is by using symbols. Symbols are ‘bits of language’. These might be meaningful subparts of words (for example, dis- as in distaste), whole words (for example, cat, run, tomorrow), or ‘strings’ of words (for example, He couldn’t write a pop jingle let alone a whole musical). These symbols consist of forms, which may be spoken, written or signed, and meanings with which the forms are conventionally paired. In fact, a symbol is better referred to as a symbolic assembly, as it consists of two parts that are conventionally associated (Langacker 1987). In other words, this symbolic assembly is a form-meaning pairing. A form can be a sound, as in [k t]. (Here, the speech sounds are represented by symbols from the International Phonetic Alphabet.)
A form might be the orthographic representation that we see on the written page: cat, or a signed gesture in a sign language. A meaning is the conventional ideational or semantic content associated with the symbol. A symbolic assembly of form and meaning is represented in Figure 1.1.
It is important to make it clear that the image of the cat in Figure 1.1 is intended to represent not a particular referent in the world, but the idea of a cat. That is, the image represents the meaning conventionally paired with the form pronounced in English as [k t]. The meaning associated with a linguistic symbol is linked to a particular mental representation termed a concept. Concepts, in turn, derive from percepts. For instance, consider a piece of fruit like a pear. Different parts of the brain perceive its shape, colour, texture, taste, smell and so on. This diverse range of perceptual information deriving from the world ‘out there’ is integrated into a single mental image (a representation available to consciousness), which gives rise to the concept of PEAR. When we use language and utter the form pear, this symbol corresponds to a conventional meaning, and therefore ‘connects’ to a concept rather than directly to a physical object in the external world (see Figure 1.2).
Our cognitive abilities integrate raw perceptual information into a coherent and well-defined mental image. The meanings encoded by linguistic symbols then, refer to our projected reality (Jackendoff 1983): a mental representation of reality, as construed by the human mind, mediated by our unique perceptual and conceptual systems.
We stated above that the symbolic function of language serves to encode and externalise our thoughts. We are now in a position to qualify this view. While our conceptualisations are seemingly unlimited in scope, language represents a limited and indeed limiting system for the expression of thought; we’ve all experienced the frustration of being unable to ‘put an idea into words’. There is, after all, a finite number of words, with a delimited set of conventional meanings. From this perspective then, language merely provides prompts for the construction of a conceptualisation which is far richer and more elaborate than the minimal meanings provided by language (Fauconnier 1997; Turner 1991). Accordingly, what language encodes is not thought in its complex entirety, but instead rudimentary instructions to the conceptual system to access or create rich and elaborate ideas. To illustrate this point, consider the following illustration adapted from Tyler and Evans (2003):
This sentence describes a jump undertaken by a cat. Before reading on, select the diagram in Figure 1.3 that best captures, in your view, the trajectory of the jump.
We anticipate that you selected the fourth diagram, Figure 1.3(d). After all, the conventional interpretation of the sentence is that the cat begins the jump on one side of the wall, moves through an arc-like trajectory, and lands on the other side of the wall. Figure 1.3(d) best captures this interpretation. On first inspection, this exercise seems straightforward. However, even a simple sentence like (1) raises a number of puzzling issues. After all, how do we know that the trajectory of the cat’s jump is of the kind represented in Figure 1.3(d)? What information is there in the sentence that provides this interpretation and excludes the trajectories represented in Figures 1.3(a–c)?
Even though the sentence in (1) would typically be judged as unambiguous, it contains a number of words that have a range of interpretations. The behaviour described by jump has the potential to involve a variety of trajectory shapes. For instance, jumping from the ground to the table involves the trajectory represented in Figure 1.3(a). Jumping on a trampoline relates to the trajectory represented in 1.3(b). Bungee jumping involves the trajectory rep resented in 1.3(c), in which the bungee jumper stops just prior to contact with the surface. Finally, jumping over a puddle, hurdle, wall and so on involves an arc-like trajectory as in 1.3(d).
If the lexical item jump does not in itself specify an arc-like trajectory, but is vague with respect to the shape of the trajectory, then perhaps the preposition over is responsible. However, over can also have a range of possible interpretations. For instance, it might mean ‘across’, when we walk over a bridge (a horizontal trajectory). It might mean ‘above’, when an entity like a hummingbird is over a flower (higher than but in close proximity to). Equally, over could mean ‘above’ when a plane flies over a city (much higher and lacking close proximity). These are just a few of the possibilities. The point to emerge from this brief discussion is that over can be used when different kinds or amounts of space are involved, and with a number of different trajectories or paths of motion.
Consider a further complication. Figure 1.3(d) crucially represents the cat’s motion ending at a point on the opposite side of the wall relative to the starting position of the jump. Yet no linguistic element in the sentence explicitly provides us with this information.
Example (1) therefore illustrates the following point: even in a mundane sentence, the words themselves, while providing meanings, are only partially responsible for the conceptualisation that these meanings give rise to. Thought relies on a rich array of encyclopaedic knowledge (Langacker 1987). For example, when constructing an interpretation based on the sentence in (1), this involves at the very least the following knowledge: (1) that the kind of jumping cats perform involves traversing obstacles rather than bungee jumping; (2) that if a cat begins a jump at a point on one side of an obstacle, and passes through a point above that obstacle, then gravity will ensure that the cat comes to rest on the other side of the obstacle; (3) that walls are impenetrable barriers to forward motion; (4) that cats know this, and therefore attempt to circumnavigate the obstacle by going over it. We use all this information (and much more), in con structing the rich conceptualisation associated with the sentence in (1). The words themselves are merely prompts for the construction process.
So far, then, we have established that one of the functions of language is to represent or symbolise concepts. Linguistic symbols, or more precisely symbolic assemblies, enable this by serving as prompts for the construction of much richer conceptualisations. Now let’s turn to the second function of language.
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