A Cognitive Analysis of English Denominal Verbs

Abstract： Based on the viewpoint of cognitive linguistics， language is closely related to human’s cognitive ability and our brains’ thinking activities， by that， competence is essentially a kind of thinking activity， the result of the brain’s cognitive mechanism. Denominal verb， a phenomenon of language innovation which is created to fit in the needs of communication， also a cognitive phenomenon， is the result of metonymy mechanism.

Key words： cognitive mechanism； metonymy； denominal verbs

1.Introduction

Nouns indicate human beings， things， time， places， and so on. Their functions vary from sentences， but they often serve as subjects， objects and predicative； verbs usually show motion and condition， which serve as predicate in sentences. Denominal verbs is that nouns serve as verbs and perform verbs’ syntactic function. （Adam 12）

Denominal verb is considered as one of creative uses of language. Morris points out that the conversion of nouns to verbs is a form of linguistic change as old as the language itself. That is to say， denominal verb has come into being since the language emerged and has become a way of creating a new meaning of the word in English. So through long social practice， those nouns that are used as verbs gradually separate themselves from basic nouns and become independent terms with some usages listed in the dictionary， consequently people may not know they are shifted from nouns. For examples， 鎖门（lock the door），锯木头（saw the wood），锤钉子（hammer the nail），火了（being popular）， and so on in Chinese； eye sb.（打量某人），head the team（率领队伍），back the car（倒车），mouth the food（狼吞虎咽地吃东西）etc.， in English.

2.Studies on Denominal Verbs

One of the most important objectives of the thesis is to probe into the cognitive mechanism in understanding of denominal verbs in English language. In the Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary， denominal words refer to words that derived from nouns. Denominalization is “verbalization by zero suffixes”. According to M.Morris and Quirk， denominal verb is generally considered as \"conversion\". Actually， it is just one part of conversion， which mainly includes noun-verb conversion， verb-noun conversion， and adjective-verb conversion. According to Bauer， conversion is a derivational process in which a word comes to be used as a member of a new word class. What weare to study are Denominal verbs. Clark pointed out “Denominal verbs， nouns that have come to be used as verbs\"， and the nouns where verbs are derived from are called “parent nouns”.

In English， most linguists regard the denominal verb as word-formation， one of zero-derivations. Researchers abroad mainly try to answer these two questions： how to apply it to forming new words； how to understand the sentences in which there are denominal verbs.

3.Cognitive Mechanism of English Denominal Verbs

According to previous studies on denominal verbs in last chapter， we can know that cognitive mechanism is the essential reason for denominal verbs. Among attention system， construal and situatedness， metaphor and metonymy， these four cognitive elements， metonymy is much more important. Denominal verb， a change of speakers’ and hearers’ perspective of construing verbs in cognitive field， shows that reference-point in cognitive field is activated and shifted to one certain salience point of parent nouns. Denominal verb is essentially a grammatical phenomenon mainly caused by metonymy mechanism. Metonymy is the basic cognitive mechanism in using and understanding denominal verbs.

4. Conclusion

This paper mainly studies causes of denominal verbs， cognitive mechanism behind denominal verbs， examples of denominal verbs in Chinese and English. There are many previous studies on denominal verbs. Domestic and abroad linguists usually study denominal verbs from the perspective of word formation， emphasizing classification studies of denominal verbs. Above all， the previous studies on denominal verbs almost concentrate on grammar and pragmatics. To shift focus from grammar to pragmatics shows that scholars start to pay close attention to contextual and pragmatic factors behind denominal verbs rather than to the inherent language systems.

References

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作者简介：

张咪（1992.01），女，汉族，现就读于西安外国语大学英文学院2015级外国语言学及应用语言学专业。主要研究方向：理论语言学。

（作者单位：西安外国语大学英文学院）