A cognitive grammar analysis of selected Polish reflexive constructions

• Authors: Monika Berlińska

Abstracts

EN

My main aim in this paper is a semantic analysis of Polish reflexive constructions conducted within the framework of Langackers ( I 987, 1991) cognitive grammar with a view to showing that the great diversity of such constructions is only apparent as, at a more abstract level of conceptualization, they all function as contextual realizations of certain basic schematic notions. The analysis focuses on four ofWilczewska's (1966) twelve classes of Polish reflexive verbs: directly reflexive verbs, passive-resultative-spontaneous verbs, passive verbs, and reciprocal verbs. In the analysis I show that whenever Polish speakers make use ofa reflexive construction, they convey one of the following three types of information: an entity acts on itself, two (or more) entities act analogously on each other (one another), and an event seemingly happens on its own. Furthermore, I claim that it is the relational reflexive marker się, which, by dint of its several profiling options, brings different elements of a transitive-construction action chain into focus and makes the above-enumerated information types possible to be communicated. Consequently, I postulate three broad senses of Polish reflexive constructions: those expressing (I) reflexive relationships, (2) reciprocal relationships, and (3) seemingly spontaneous events-each constituting a separate, though closely related, grammatical category. In turn, these three senses/grammatical categories are said to form a crucial part of the schematic network model of Polish reflexive constructions.

• Publisher: Polska Akademia Nauk
• Journal: Linguistica Silesiana
• Year: 2008
• Volume: 29
• Pages: 119-139

Dates

published

2008

Contributors

author

Monika Berlińska

Identifiers

Biblioteka Nauki

59555615