Usage-based models of language: Difference between revisions

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West Coast cognitive functionalism (WCCF) played a major role in the creation of the usage-based enterprise.

Firstly, a crucial point in WCCF was [[Eleanor Rosch]]’s paper on semantic categories in human cognition,<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Boyes-Braem |first1=P |last2=Johnson |first2=D |last3=Gray |first3=W. |last4=Mervis |first4=C.B.|last5=Rosch |first5=E. |title=Basic objects in natural categories |journal=Cognitive Psychology |date=1976}}</ref> which studied fuzzy semantic categories with central and peripheral concepts. Subsequently, [[Robin Lakoff]] (1987) applied these concepts to linguistic studies. For usage-based models of language, these discoveries legitimized interest in the peripheral phenomena and inspired the examination of the ontological status of the rules themselves.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Iverson, G.K. |last2=Corrigan, R.L. |first1=Lima, S.D. |title=The reality of linguistic rules |___location=Amsterdam |publisher=John Benjamins |date=1994}}</ref>

Secondly, WCCF focuses on the effects of social/ textual context and cognitive processes on human thought, instead of established systems and representations, which motivated the study of external sources in usage-based language research. For example, in analyzing the differences between the grammatical notions of subject vs. topic, Li and Thompson (1976), found that the repetition of certain topics by a [[speech community]] resulted in the surfacing and crystallization of formal properties into syntactic entities, namely the subject.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Givon |first1=T |chapter=From discourse to syntax: Grammar as a processing strategy |editor=T. Givón |title=Discourse and Syntax |volume=12 |pages=81-10981–109 |___location=New York |publisher=Academic Press |date=1979b}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Givon |first=T. |title=On understanding grammar |___location=New York |publisher=Academic Press|date=1979c}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last1=Givon |first1=T |chapter=Modes of knowledge and modes of processing. The routinization of behavior and information|title=Mind, Code, and Context: Essays in Pragmatics |pages=237-268237–268 |___location=Hillsdale, NJ |publisher=Erlbaum|date=1989}}</ref> This notion of syntax and morphology being an outcome of pragmatic and cognitive factors<ref>{{cite book|last1=Hopper |first1=P. J. |chapter=When 'Grammar' and Discourse Clash: The Problem of Source Conflicts |editor1=J. Bybee |editor2=J. Haiman |editor3=S. A. Thompson |title=Essays on Language Function and Language Type |pages=231-247231–247 |___location=Amsterdam |publisher=John Benjamins|date=1997}}</ref> was influential in the development of usage-based models.

Thirdly, the WCCF methodology of [[linguistic typology]] <ref>{{cite journal |last1=Greenberg |first1=J.H. |title=A quantitative approach to the morphological typology of language |journal= International Journal of American Linguistics |volume=26 |pages=178-194178–194|date=1960|issue=3 |doi=10.1086/464575 |s2cid=144261944 }}</ref> is similarly practised in usage-based models, in collecting data from real communicative contexts and analyzing them for typological regularities. This highlights an important aspect of usage-based research, the study of methods for the integration of synchrony and diachrony.

'''Langacker’s Cognitive Grammar'''

The term ‘usage-based’ was coined by [[Ronald Langacker]] in 1987, while doing research on [[Cognitive Grammar]]. Langacker identified commonly recurring linguistic patterns (patterns such as those associated with Wh- fronting, subject-verb agreement, the use of present participles, etc.) and represented these supposed rule-governed behaviours on a hierarchical structure. The Cognitive Grammar model represented grammar, semantics and lexicon as associated processes that were laid on a continuum, which provided a theoretical framework that was significant in studying the usage-based conception of language.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Murkherjee |first1=J.|titleDUPLICATE_title=Corpus Data in a Usage-Based Cognitive Grammar |editor1=K. Aijmer |editor2=B. Altenberg |title=Advances in Corpus Linguistics: Papers from the 23rd International Conference on English Language Research on Computerized Corpora (ICAME 23) Göteborg 22-26 May 2002 |series=Language and Computers: Studies in Practical Linguistics |volume=49 |pages=85-10085–100 |___location=Amsterdam |publisher=Rodopi|date=2004}}</ref> Consequently, a usage-based model accounts for these rule-governed language behaviours by providing a representational scheme that is entirely instance-based, and able to recognize and uniquely represent each familiar pattern, which occurs with varying strengths at different instances. His usage-based model draws on the cognitive psychology of schemata,<ref>{{cite journal |first1=Schank, R.C.|last1= Abelson, R.P.|title=Scripts, plans, goals, and understanding: an inquiry into human knowledge structures.|journal=Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.|date=1977}}</ref> which are flexible hierarchical structures that are able to accommodate the complexity of mental stimuli. Similarly, as humans perceive linguistic abstractions as multilayered, ranging from patterns that occur across whole utterances to those that occur in phonetic material, the usage-based model acknowledges the differing levels of granularity in speakers’ knowledge of their language. Langacker’s work emphasizes that both abstract structure and instance-based detail are contained in language, differing in granularity but not in basic principles.

'''Bybee’s Dynamic Usage-based framework'''