Explicating The Polysemy Of English Progressive From The Perspective Of Subjectivity

Language is not just a sheer description of objective situations, butalso the self-imprint’s realization of the speakers involved, which isreferred to as SUBJECTIVITY of language. Thus, language is not anindependently self-contained system, the study of which cannot beseparated from the cognitive process of human being. Time, one basiccategory of human language, is represented as tense and aspect inthe system of English grammar. In the latest years, English progressiveand its polysemy have aroused considerable interest of many scholars.This thesis analyzes the realization of discourse subjectivity in Englishprogressive’s polysemy from the viewpoint of cognitive linguistics. Therealization of speaker’s subjectivity in English progressive’s polysemymainly consists of three areas: perspective, affect, and epistemicmodality. Three significant findings are as follows in the present thesis.First, speaker’s perspective involves their various aspectual choices atthe macro level and the alteration of a situation type’s semanticfeature at the micro level. The latter refers to making a non-standardassociation with stative, punctual or telic situations by endowing anactual situation with the idealized aspectual property. Second,speaker’s affect is realized by progressive’s functions of tentativeness,politeness and other emotions. Third, speaker’s epistemic modalitymainly consists in the development from a pure statement be going+to place (indicating a space direction) to a future marker be going to(do) as an epistemic modality.This research points out that speakers exert their subjectivity to thepolysemy of English progressive. Being a device to present speaker’ssubjectivity, progressive aspect in English indicates a hierarchicaldegree of speaker’s discourse subjectivity. Besides, the expression ofsubjectivity in English progressive can be visible or invisible. In conclusion, speaker’s subjectivity is the internal cause of English progressive toacquire new meanings; and there is a tendency for thesenewly-derived meanings to develop towards subjectivisation.