Lexical and Syntactical Constructions and the Construction of Meaning: Proceedings of the bi-annual ICLA meeting in Albuquerque, July 1995(150 Current Issues in Linguistic Theory)

The basic tenet of cognitive linguistics is that every linguistic expression is a construal relation. The first section of this volume focuses on issues of such construal and presentation of information, including figure-ground relations, image-schematic structures, and the role of syntactic constructions in information structure.In sections two and three papers are presented on cross-categorial polysemy between lexical and grammatical uses of a morpheme, and between different grammatical senses, and on the relationship between earlier lexical senses and later grammatical ones.
The final section of the volume brings together studies which shed further light on transitivity and argument structure. The study of transitivity necessarily entails exploration of the relationship between syntactic constructions and the pragmatics and semantics conveyed by such constructions.
As a whole, this collection of papers gives new evidence on the complexity and motivation of the mapping between linguistic form and function and offers a wealth of new directions for research on the construction of meaning at every level of the sentence.

Table of Contents:
1. Acknowledgements; 2. Introduction; 3. Part I: Image Schemas and Construal Relations; 4. Some Properties and Groupings of Image Schemas (by Cienki, Alan); 5. Construal Transformations: Internal and External Viewpoints in Interpreting Containment (by Dewell, Robert B.); 6. The Role of Figure, Ground, and Coercion in Aspectual Interpretation (by Hayase, Naoko); 7. Verb-First Constructions in German (by Diessel, Holger); 8. The Mental Manipulation of the Vertical Axis: How to go from "up" to "out", or from "above" to "behind" (by Ekberg, Lena); 9. A Prosodic/Pragmatic Explanation for Word Order Variation in ASL with Typological Implications (by Wilbur, Ronnie B.); 10. Part II: Grammatical Morphemes versus Lexical Units; 11. Japanes ni: The Particulars of a somewhat Contradictory Particle (by Kabata, Kaori); 12. Observations on Wanka Quechua Conjecture Marking and Subjectification (by Floyd, Rick); 13. Implementation of the FIGURE-GROUND Distinction in Polish (by Janda, Laura A.); 14. Genitives and von-Datives in German: A Case of free Variation (by Campe, Petra); 15. Two-way Prepositions in German: Image and Constraints (by Serra-Borneto, Carlo); 16. Part III: Grammaticalization Processes; 17. The Conventional Association of a Lexeme with a Metaphor: The Case of the Wolof Verb fekk-e (by Moore, Kevin Ezra); 18. Conceptual Blending: The Afrikaans verbs doen 'do' and maak 'make' (by Botha, Willem J.); 19. The Spanish Copulas SER and ESTAR (by Delbecque, Nicole); 20. The English Tense-System as an Epistemic Category: The Case of Futurity (by Brisard, Frank); 21. From Attribution/Purpose to Cause: Image Schema and Grammaticalization of some Cause Markers in Japanese (by Matsumoto, Yo); 22. Part IV: Degrees of Transitivity; 23. Reflexive Markers in Polish: Participants, Metaphors, and Constructions (by Dancygier, Barbara); 24. Transitivity and the Incorporation of Ground Information in Japanese Path Verbs (by Muehleisen, Victoria); 25. The Samoan Transitive Suffix as an Inverse Marker (by Cook, Kenneth William); 26. The Transitive-Ergative Interplay and the Conception of the World: A Case Study (by Lemmens, Maarten); 27. The Relationships between Verbs and Constructions (by Goldberg, Adele E.); 28. German Impersonal Passives (by Arnett, Carlee); 29. An Account of Implicit Complement Control in English and German (by Panther, Klaus-Uwe); 30. Predicate Adjuncts and Subjectification (by Verspoor, Marjolijn); 31. Index