Polysemic Analysis of the Preposition /læ/ , /wæ/, /-wægærd / and /‌wæpi‌/ in Kalhori Kurdish within Principled- Polysemy Approach

Author
M. Dehghan
Assistant Professor of English Language and Linguistics, Kurdistan University, Kurdistan, Iran
Abstract
Aim of the Research: Looking at the attitude of semantics, the present study aims to investigate some of the most practical prepositions, such as /læ/­, /wæ/, /­wægærd / and /­wæpi­/ in Kalhori Kurdish within principled-polysemy approach (Evans & Tyler, 2004a, 2004b; Evans & Green, 2006).

The Methodology of the Research: The nature of the method of this study is analytic-descriptive and its type is corpus-based. The Selected corpus has been obtained from interviews with the speakers of this dialect from Kurdish language, and their originality have been approved completely that this study has focused on some samples for each distinct meaning due to the limitaition of its pages.

Research Question: This research has done to explore and determine the distinct meanings of the prepositions /læ/­, /wæ/, /­wægærd / and /­wæpi­/ in Kalhori Kurdish within principled-polysemy approach. Thus, the author has represented them in a semantic network seperately.

Research Results: In this regard, the research results show that the prototypical meaning of the preposition /læ/ coming to the speakers' mind immediately is "from" having eighteen distinct meanings and five semantic clusters, such as; "contrast cluster", "collocation cluster", "polysemy cluster", "time-space cluster", and "metaphoric cluster" in its own semantic network. with conducted careful studies, it was found that, in some cases, Kalhori speakers use the preposition /læ/ in the place of /wæ/ in those contexts with those meanings interchangeably, but in addition to these meanings the preposition /wæ/ is used in two other different meanings, i.e; the meanings "by" and "to", in which the preposition /læ/ can't be used. So, /wæ/ has twenty one distinct meanings. The prototypical meaning of the preposition /wægærd/ is "with" having eleven distinct meanings and three semantic clusters, such as; "collocation cluster", "contrast cluster" and "metaphoric cluster" in its own semantic network. The prototypical meaning of the preposition /wæpi/ is "to" having five distinct meanings and two semantic clusters, such as; "contrastive cluster" and the meaning "about" in its own semantic network.

Keywords

Subjects

• Bamshadi, P. et. al., (2016). “Semantic analysis of prepositions wæl, tɑ & ærɑ in Gurani Kurdish within the cognitive perspective”. Language Related Research. 7 (4). Pp:59-80. [In Persian].
• Evans, V. & A. Tyler (2004). Spatial Experience, Lexical Structure and Motivation: The Case of in. In G. Radden and K. Panther (eds.). Studies in Linguistic Motivation .Pp: 157–192. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
• Evans, V. & A. Tyler (2004a). “Rethinking English prepositions of movement: The case of To and Through”. Belgian Journal of Linguistics. 18. Pp : 247–270.
• Evans, V. & A. Tyler (2004b). “Spatial experience, lexical structure and motivation: the case of in”. In G. Radden and K. Panther (eds.). Studies in Linguistic Motivation.Pp: 157–192. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
• Evans, V. & M. Green (2006). An Introduction to Cognitive Linguistics. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
• Golfam, A. & F. Yousefirad, (2006). “Cognitive semantics approach to spatial prepositions of persian from an educational perspective: A case study of preposition dær”. Pazhoohesh-e Adabiyat-e Moaser-e Jahan. 14 (56). Pp. 167-179. [In Persian].
• Golfam, A.; M. Assi; F. Agha Golzadeh & Fatemeh Yousefirad (2010). “The analysis of Persian preposition /az/ within the framework of cognitive semantics and its comparison with the traditional approach”. Journal of the Linguistics Society of Iran. Vol. 5, No.10. Pp: 69-80
• Lakoff, G. & M. Johnson (1980). Metaphors We Live by. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
• Langacker, R.W. (1987). Foundations of Cognitive Grammar (Volume1). Stanford: Stanford University Press.
• Langacker, R.W. (2008). Cognitive Grammar: A Basic Introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press
• Rasekhmahand, M. (2010). An Introduction to Cognitive Linguistics: Theories and Concepts. Tehran: SAMT. [In Persian].
• Talmy, L. (2000). Toward a Cognitive Semantics (2 Vols). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
• Tyler, A. & V. Evans (2003). The Semantics of English Prepositions: Spatial Scenes, Embodied Meaning and Cognition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
• Tyler, A. & V. Evans (2001). Reconsidering Prepositional Polysemy Networks: The Case of Over. In V. Evans, B. Bergen, and J. Zinken (Eds.), The Cognitive Linguistics Reader. Pp : 186-238. London: Equinox.
• Wittgenstein, L. (1958). Philosophische Untersuchungen. trans.G. E. M. Anscombe as Philosophical Investigations, 3rd ed. 1999. Harlow, London: Prentice Hall.
• Yusefirad, F. (2009). A Study of Persian Prepositions within the Frame work of Cognitive Semantics with a particular Look at the Spatial Prepositions. Ph.D. Dissertation in Linguistics, University of Tarbiat Modares.
• Zahedi, K. & A. Mohammadi Ziyarati (2011). “Semantic network of preposition æz within the framework of cognitive semantics”. Tazehha-ye Olum-e Shenakhti. 13 (1). Pp. 67-80. [In Persian].
Language Related Research
Volume 9, Issue 2 - Serial Number 44
May and June 2018
Pages 1-33