Publication
Title
Does the need for linguistic expression constitute a problem to be solved?
Author
Abstract
This paper has two objectives. The first is to formulate a critique of present-day cognitive linguistics (CL) concerning the inner workings of the cognitive system during language use, and the second is to put forward an alternative account that is inspired by the phenomenology of Merleau-Ponty. Due to its third-person methodology, CL views language use essentially as a problem-solving activity, as coping with two subproblems: the problem of minimum and maximum, which consists in selecting the appropriate expression out of an unlimited multitude of possibilities, and the problem of the underdetermination of signification. This approach presupposes a notion of an isolated subject and a representationalist view of perception. We defend an alternative view of man's relation to the world in which intersubjectivity is constitutive of embodied subjectivity and which exchanges the representationalist view of perception for a direct nonrepresentationalism. We describe the ensuing view of linguistic action as intra- and interpersonal all-at-onceness. This approach dismisses the two subproblems CL implicitly identifies as constitutive of language use. The first is countered by rethinking what it means to be a situated speaking subject and results in the concept of style. The second is tackled by opposing the concept of overdetermination to CL's notion of underdetermination.
Language
English
Source (journal)
Phenomenology and the cognitive sciences. - Dordrecht, 2002, currens
Publication
Dordrecht : 2010
ISSN
1568-7759 [print]
1572-8676 [online]
DOI
10.1007/S11097-009-9146-2
Volume/pages
9 :1 (2010) , p. 15-36
ISI
000274632800002
Full text (Publisher's DOI)
UAntwerpen
Faculty/Department
Research group
Publication type
Subject
Affiliation
Publications with a UAntwerp address
External links
Web of Science
Record
Identifier
Creation 12.10.2009
Last edited 02.01.2022
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