Pluricentric Languages and Non-Dominant Varieties Worldwide
Part II: The Pluricentricity of Portuguese and Spanish. New Concepts and Descriptions
Summary
Excerpt
Table Of Contents
- Cover
- Title
- Copyright
- About the author
- About the book
- This eBook can be cited
- Table of Contents
- Preface
- I. Theoretical aspects of the pluricentricity and the description of variation in Portuguese
- The cognitive approach to pluricentric languages and the pluricentricity of Portuguese: What’s really new?
- The system of national standards and the demolinguistic evolution of Portuguese
- II. Characteristics and developments of Brazilian Portuguese
- Codification and Standardisation in Brazilian Portuguese
- The use of clitics in Brazilian Portuguese – the development of an endogenous standard variety
- The Portuguese language and its non-dominant varieties: how to teach them?
- On the use of subjunctive mood in Portuguese: regional and national variation
- Xokó identity and ethnogenesis – Indigenous identity and the development of Brazilian Portuguese
- III. Features of non-dominant varieties of Portuguese in Asia and Africa
- New words, old suffixes: Nominal derivation in the African varieties of Portuguese compared to European Portuguese
- The contact induced partial restructuring of the non-dominant variety of Portuguese in East Timor
- IV. Characteristics of national varieties of Spanish
- Comprehensive Dictionaries and the Delimitation of the Argentine Variety of Spanish
- Linguistic ideas in pre-scientific codifications of American Spanish
- Non dominant-Varieties of Spanish: The Central American Case
- Queísmo in the Spanish of Utica, New York: pluricentric variable?
- Phraseological localization: parallelisms in multi-word expressions between European Spanish and the Latin American varieties of the language
- V. Second level pluricentricity in European Spanish and European Portuguese
- Second level Pluricentrism in European Spanish: Convergence-divergence in Andalusian Spanish
- Second level pluricentrism in European Portuguese: linguistic attitudes of Braga speakers
- VI. Migrant pluricentricity of Portuguese
- The Portuguese language in the particular context of the “Portuguese community” of Montreal
(Universidade Católica Portuguesa, Braga, Portugal) assilva@braga.ucp.pt
Abstract
The paper discusses the potential and the possible contribution of Cognitive Linguistics to the emerging branch of Cognitive Sociolinguistics and for the study of the pluricentricity of languages. Initially the paper identifies the research agenda for pluricentric languages and the theoretical, methodological and descriptive contributions of Cognitive (Socio)Linguistics to the research on pluricentricity. Special attention is paid to theoretical models of Cognitive Linguistics that are used to describe the conceptual and social factors that shape the variation of meaning in pluricentric scenarios as well as the mental representations of variation in the language users’ minds. The paper also focuses on advanced empirical methods capable to account for the multivariate dimensions intervening in pluricentric variation. The second part of the paper provides an overview of ongoing socio-cognitive research on the pluricentricity of Portuguese, especially the diachronic processes that form the divergence between European Portuguese and Brazilian Portuguese, which are based on lexical, constructional and attitudinal variables and by means of the concept-based measure of onomasiological variation.
1. Introduction
Within Cognitive Linguistics (Geeraerts & Cuyckens 2007, Dabrowska & Dagmar 2015), the last decade has seen a considerable productive increase of studies into language-internal variation in all its dimensions (Geeraerts 2005; Kristiansen & Dirven 2008; Croft 2009; Geeraerts, Kristiansen & Peirsman 2010; Kristiansen & Geearerts 2013; Geeraerts & Kristiansen 2014). This new and burgeoning field of research, known as Cognitive Sociolinguistics, examines the social, cultural and conceptual meaningfulness of lectal variation (all types of language varieties or lects), thus developing methods which are capable of unraveling the multivariate ← 13 | 14 → dimensions intervening in the interplay between conceptual meaning and variationist factors. Pluricentricity is a special case of lectal variation, marked by questions of national identity and power. Therefore, Cognitive Sociolinguistics is well-prepared to deal with pluricentricity, a fact that is well illustrated by the recent studies gathered in Soares da Silva (2014).
The aim of this paper is to identify the theoretical, methodological and descriptive contributions of Cognitive Linguistics, as well as those of the emerging Cognitive Sociolinguistics, and attest to their relevance when it comes to the study of pluricentric languages. Theoretically, key concepts in Cognitive Linguistics will increase our understanding of national and local varieties as socio-cognitive entities. Methodologically, advanced corpus-based and experimental multivariate techniques as well as concept-based socio-lectometrical methods allow convergence and divergence between national variables and internal stratificational differences to be measured and correlated with all types of sociolinguistic variables. Descriptively, the cognitive perspective covers all types of meaning variation in pluricentric languages, and the language users’ cognitive representation of pluricentric variation. These theoretical, methodological and descriptive contributions will be illustrated taking as its base our recent studies on the pluricentricity of Portuguese, especially the process of divergence between European and Brazilian Portuguese (Soares da Silva 2010, 2012, 2014a, b).
2. Research agenda for pluricentric languages
Despite the long and rich tradition of research on language variation, the investigation on pluricentric languages is still reduced. More than two decades ago, Clyne (1992) edited the seminal volume Pluricentric Languages, gathering comparative data concerning a representative selection of pluricentric languages. Since then, the basis for the discussion of national varieties has shifted from a “deviation from the center” model to a “several interacting centers”, or pluricentric, one. In the last five years, the Working Group on Non-dominant Varieties of Pluricentric Languages has developed extensive research on pluricentric languages in general and their non-dominant varieties in particular (see Muhr et. al. 2012, 2013, 2015 and the overview in press). A new and highly stimulating opportunity has been offered by Cognitive Sociolinguistics in the last decade (Geearerts 2005, Kristiansen & Dirven 2008; Croft 2009; Geearerts, Kristiansen & Peirsman 2010; Kristiansen & Geeraerts 2013; Geeraerts & Kristiansen 2014). Research on pluricentric languages involves a number of descriptive, methodological, representational and applied issues and questions. The most central issues in pluricentricity research are of the following kind. ← 14 | 15 →
1. Descriptive issues:
– Do national linguistic differences reflect cultural differences? To what extent do the former correlate with conceptual differences?
– To what extent do lexical, grammatical and phonological variables correlate when it comes to linguistic pluricentricity?
– What is the impact of pluricentricity on language change?
2. Methodological issues:
– What methods are needed to unravel the complex and multivariate dimensions intervening in pluricentric variation?
– How can we measure diachronic convergence and divergence between national varieties and synchronic internal stratification of national varieties?
3. Representational issues:
– How do language users perceive national varieties and how do they evaluate them attitudinally? What cultural cognitive models are at work?
– What is the role of ideology in cognitive representations of national variation?
– To what extent do objective linguistic distances and language attitudes influence intelligibility?
4. Applied issues:
– How do national identity, power relationships and national varieties correlate? How symmetrical can pluricentricity be in an unequally distributed world?
– What are the effects of current processes of globalization on the relationship between national varieties?
– What bi/multilateral language planning and policies are needed?
From the Cognitive Linguistics perspective, what is new in pluricentricity research concerns three fundamental issues. The first issue is the relationship between national linguistic variation, culture and cognition. Taking into account the meaning-oriented nature of Cognitive Linguistics, the central research topic is variation of meaning in pluricentric languages and the fundamental research question is how national linguistic variation affects meaning. Although meaning is crucial for sociolinguistics, because the very notion of a sociolinguistic variable refers to meaning (Labov 1972: 271), sociovariationist research has had many difficulties in dealing with semantic issues, such as the interaction of meaning with other sources of variation and how to establish equivalence of meaning (Lavandera 1978). Therefore, Cognitive Sociolinguistics can offer an important contribution to deal with these problems of variation of meaning.
The second issue is the development of advanced empirical methods that may adequately unravel the multidimensionality of the variation of meaning. Taking into account the usage-based nature of Cognitive Linguistics, the fundamental ← 15 | 16 → research question is how conceptual and social dimensions of national variation combine and intertwine and what methods are necessary to deal with the interplay between conceptual meaning and variationist factors.
Finally, the third issue is the cognitive representation of national language variation. Taking into account the cognitive nature of Cognitive Linguistics, the fundamental research question is how language users perceive, categorize and evaluate national variation. Adapting the desiderata for Cognitive Sociolinguistics as presented by Geeraerts, Kristiansen & Peirsman (2010: 6–10), the socio-cognitive research agenda for pluricentric languages includes both the variation of meaning, particularly the interplay between conceptual and social factors, and the meaning of variation, i.e. the cognitive reality of meaningful national variation in the mind of language users.
The recent volume Pluricentricity: Language Variation and Sociocognitive Dimensions, edited by Soares da Silva (2014), addresses three domains of pluricentricity research. The first section of the volume comprises chapters that address the notion of pluricentricity, connecting it to cognitive models of ‘the standard’ and to the ideological construal of national varieties (Auer 2014), arguing for a notion of pluricentricity that incorporates the dimension of situated pluricentric practices (Lüdi 2014), and approaching pluricentricity from a neurological perspective (López-García 2014). Section two brings together contributions that explore pluricentric languages by means of advanced corpus-based and multivariate techniques and that take the variation of meaning as a starting-point (Ruette, Speelman & Geeraerts 2014; De Hertog, Heylen & Speelman 2014; Soares da Silva 2014a). The third section comprises studies that showcase experimental designs on perceptual and attitudinal aspects of pluricentricity or, in other words, on the meaning of variation in pluricentric languages (Schneider 2014; Speelman, Impe & Geeraerts 2014; Norrby & Kretzenbacher 2014).
3. Socio-cognitive contributions to pluricentricity research
Although apparently Cognitive Linguistics does not seem to be the most suitable framework for the study of the social aspects of language, which is due to its natural psychological perspective on language, there are compelling reasons to incorporate lectal variation and to adopt a socio-variationist perspective. As Geerarerts (2005) points out, the very characteristics of Cognitive Linguistics, namely its nature as a meaning-oriented, usage-based and recontextualizing approach to language imply both empirical research on social language variation, being the scope of the emerging Cognitive Sociolinguistics, and a socio-cognitive approach to language (see also Geeraerts 2010 and Geeraerts & Kristiansen 2014). ← 16 | 17 →
Cognitive Linguistics or, more directly, Cognitive Sociolinguistics can bring theoretical, methodological and descriptive benefits and possibilities to pluricentricity research (see also Kristiansen 2014). Theoretically, key concepts in Cognitive Linguistics will improve the existing definitions and taxonomies of pluricentricity, and will increase our understanding of national and local varieties as socio-cognitive entities. Four specific theoretical contributions can be pointed out. Firstly, prototype theory (e.g. Geeraerts 1985, 1997; Taylor 1995) can help to understand that lectal varieties are prototype categories, in the sense that some varieties are perceived as more prototypical or representative than others and the boundaries between adjacent varieties are not clear-cut. Therefore, a pluricentric language exhibits a network of contiguous lects with several prototypical centers. In addition, prototype theory can help to understand that all languages are pluricentric to at least some degree, to the extent that they exhibit internal dialectal variation and differing local norms. Other theoretical cognitive discussions on the definition of pluricentricity are given by Auer (2014), Lüdi (2014), López-García (2014) and Schneider (2014).
Secondly, the notion of entrenchment, i.e. the degree to which a cognitive unit is routinized (e.g. Schmid 2007) can increase our understanding of the crucial role that is played by semantic, pragmatic and social meaning in promoting the success of dominant varieties and in competing between national varieties. Thirdly, conceptual perspectivization, i.e. different ways of construing a particular situation (e.g. Langacker 1987, 1991, 2008) is useful to understand that national varieties not only reflect but also construe national identities and cultural cognitive differences. Kristiansen (2003) shows how linguistic stereotypes are cognitive reference point constructions (Langacker 1993) that allow us to understand and interact with a complex social world. Finally, conceptual metaphors and metonymies (e.g. Lakoff & Johnson 1980) provide the key to identify the cultural cognitive models and ideologies underlying attitudes towards national varieties and to determine the influence of these mental models on pluricentric variation.
Details
- Pages
- 286
- Publication Year
- 2016
- ISBN (Hardcover)
- 9783631679142
- ISBN (ePUB)
- 9783631694350
- ISBN (MOBI)
- 9783631694367
- ISBN (PDF)
- 9783653071139
- DOI
- 10.3726/978-3-653-07113-9
- Language
- English
- Publication date
- 2016 (September)
- Published
- Frankfurt am Main, Bern, Bruxelles, New York, Oxford, Warszawa, Wien, 2016, 286 S., 22 s/w Abb., 40 s/w Tab.
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