A Cognitive Study On The Catchphrase "Shejian Shang De X"

Catchphrases have received quite a lot of attention from all schools of scholars due to their rich expressiveness and sustained vitality. Some studies have used Economics of Languages, tension theories and memetics to discuss the characteristics of catchphrases; others used theories of functional-formal linguistics and cognitive linguistics to analyze certain catchphrases. This paper studies a new catchphrase "Shejian Shang De X" as exemplified by "Shejian Shang De China","Shejian Shang De Regulation and Control","Shejian Shang De Safety" which has not been studied from linguistic perspective. This construction demonstrates irregularities in syntax and semantics:Shejian in this structure cannot contain a location (like China), let alone coexist with adjectives or verbs (like regulate and control, safe). In addition,"Shejian Shang De X" can develop other meanings from its repeated uses. This paper attempts to explain the syntax and semantics irregularities using construction coercion theory and analyze the rich meanings of the construction using conceptual metonymy. This paper firstly describes the meanings of the construction, the properties of X in the construction, and the variants and derivatives of the construction, then study the underlying principles of the construction using the above-mentioned theories.The data of this study is built with the results found by the Baidu news searching engine, with131entries. X in "Shejian Shang De X" can either be nominal phrases denoting place, time, and people such as "China","Summer", and "Mother-in-law", or verb phrases and adjective phrases like the above-mentioned "Regulate and Control" and "Safe" in the data. Construction coercion could supply reasonable explanation for these superficial incompatibilities. The incompatible lexical item is coerced by construction or the context to produce reasonable semantic construal. Specifically, the original meaning of "Shejian Shang De X",[X in gourmet perspective] is expanded to mean [X related to food and drink],[X caued by food and drink],[talkative X], and [hotly discussed X]. In addition to the meaning expansion, the form of the structure also undergoes changes to generate different pragmatic variants and derivatives. In light of cognitive perspective, the meaning expansion mainly involves such metonymies as PART=WHOLE, INSTRUMENT-ACT-PATIENT, INSTRUMENT-ACT, PRODUCT-ACT AND SPECIFIC-GENERIC. In the case of the construction "Shejian Shang De X",the specific metonymies are "Tongue-tip" projected onto "Tongue" which is further projected onto "the perception and conception system","Tongue-tip" projected onto "tasting" which is further projected onto "food","Tongue-tip" projected onto "speaking" which is firstly projected on "word" and then to "the characteristics of being talkative". In essence, these metonymic representations are actual instantiations of the general metonymy principle SPECIFIC FOR GENERIC and FUNCTIONAL OVER NON-FUNCTIONALThis paper falls into five parts. The first part introduces the background, purpose and significance of the study; the second part briefly sets forth the features and categorizations of catchphrases; the third part makes a description of the semantics and the syntax of the construction under study and also analyzes its variants and derivatives; the forth part focuses on the underlying linguistic mechanism of the construction and its variants and derivatives mainly making use of construction coercion and conceptual metonymy; the fifth part, that is the last part summarizes the paper, draws conclusions and makes suggestions for further research.This paper studies catchphrase "Shejian Shang De X",and makes reasonable explanation with respect to the unconventional collocations prevalent in catchphrases using construction coercion and conceptual metonymy. Construction coercion and conceptual metonymy were built on conceptual schema formed through cognitive experience of human. This shows that the use and interpretation of language are in close relationship with human experience.The data built by us compiles only the data from internet. No data are collected from specified groups or in specific time span. Because diachronic study explains better the trend of language change, further studies may be directed towards this respect.