A contrastive study on the meanings of the verb “run” in english and “chạy” in vietnamese from a cognitive semantic perspective

THESIS A CONTRASTIVE STUDY ON THE MEANINGS OF THE VERB “RUN” IN ENGLISH AND “CHẠY” IN VIETNAMESE FROM A COGNITIVE SEMANTIC PERSPECTIVE NGHIÊN CỨU PHÂN TÍCH ĐỐI CHIẾU NHỮNG Ý NGHĨA

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING

HANOI OPEN UNIVERSITY

M.A THESIS

A CONTRASTIVE STUDY ON THE MEANINGS

OF THE VERB “RUN” IN ENGLISH AND “CHẠY” IN

VIETNAMESE FROM A COGNITIVE SEMANTIC

PERSPECTIVE

(NGHIÊN CỨU PHÂN TÍCH ĐỐI CHIẾU NHỮNG Ý NGHĨA CỦA ĐỘNG

TỪ “RUN” TRONG TIẾNG ANH VÀ “CHẠY” TRONG TIẾNG VIỆT

TRÊN QUAN ĐIỂM NGỮ NGHĨA HỌC TRI NHẬN)

NGÔ THU TRANG

Hanoi, 2016

Back hard cover

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING

HANOI OPEN UNIVERSITY

M.A THESIS

A CONTRASTIVE STUDY ON THE MEANINGS

OF THE VERB “RUN” IN ENGLISH AND “CHẠY” IN

VIETNAMESE FROM A COGNITIVE SEMANTIC

PERSPECTIVE

(NGHIÊN CỨU PHÂN TÍCH ĐỐI CHIẾU NHỮNG Ý NGHĨA CỦA

ĐỘNG TỪ “RUN” TRONG TIẾNG ANH VÀ “CHẠY” TRONG TIẾNG

VIỆT TRÊN QUAN ĐIỂM NGỮ NGHĨA HỌC TRI NHẬN)

NGÔ THU TRANG

Field: English Language Code: 60220201

Supervisor: Do Kim Phuong, Ph.D

Hanoi, 2016

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CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY

I, the undersigned, hereby certify my authority of the study project report entitled A STUDY ON THE MEANINGS OF THE VERB “RUN” IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE FROM A COGNITIVE SEMANTIC PERSPECTIVE A CONTRASTIVE ANALYSIS submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master in English Language Except where the reference is indicated, no other person‟s work has been used without due acknowledgement in the text of the thesis

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This thesis could not have been completed without the help and

support from a number of people

First and foremost, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to

Ms Do Kim Phuong, my supervisor, who has patiently and constantly supported me through the stages of the study, and whose stimulating ideas, expertise, and suggestions have inspired me greatly through my growth as

an academic researcher

A special word of thanks goes to my best friends and my colleagues, without whose support and encouragement it would never have been possible for me to have this thesis accomplished

Last but not least, I am greatly indebted to my family, my husband for the sacrifice they have devoted to the fulfillment of this academic work

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ABSTRACT

The study is aimed at the meanings of the verb “run” in English and

“chạy” in Vietnamese from a cognitive semantic perspective by using

Contrastive Analysis as the major method The research is done to

investigate the semantic features of the English verb “run” in the light of

cognitive semantics and find out several the similarities and differences

between Vietnamese and English verb” run” In doing the research,

descriptive method and contrastive analysis are done either to describe the

meanings conveyed by the English verb “run” in the light of a cognitive

semantic perspective or to determine the differences and similarities

between verb “run” in English and its equivalents in Vietnamese Data for this study were collected from three novels, namely, the Vanity Fair by Thackeray [58], A Game of Thrones by Martin [38], and Gone with the

wind by Mitchell [40] and all of their Vietnamese translational equivalents,

namely “Hội chợ phù hoa” translated by Trần Kiêm [63], “Trò chơi vương

quyền” translated by Hà Ly [65] and “Cuốn theo chiều gió” translated by Vũ

Kim Thư [67] This study has been primarily carried out to answer two questions, one is to investigate the possible meanings of the English verb

“run” and the other is to investigate its Vietnamese equivalents in the light

of cognitive semantics The results provide some supports for learners to have a good understanding in learning and translating English verb from a cognitive semantic perspective

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LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES

Table 4.1 Possible meanings of run and frequency of occurrences 43

Table 4.2.Vietnamese equivalents of run and frequency of occurrences 59

2.2.1 A brief overview of cognitive linguistics 6

2.2.1.2 Major principles of cognitive linguistics 6

2.2.2.2 Major principles of cognitive semantics 8

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2.2.3.2 Classification of English motion verbs 10

2.2.3.3 Syntactic and semantic features of English motion verbs 12 2.2.3.4 Syntactic and semantic features of the verb “run” 15 2.2.4 Cognitive semantic approach to motion verbs 16

4.1.1.1 Prototypical schema for English verb “run” 29

4.1.1.2 Non-prototypical meanings of the verb “run” 30

4.1.2 The English verb “run” and its Vietnamese equivalents 44 4.1.2.1 “Run” in English corresponds to “chạy” in Vietnamese 44 4.1.2.2 “Run” in English corresponds to “chạy trốn/ trốn” in Vietnamese 47 4.1.2.3 “Run” in English corresponds to “chạy dọc” in Vietnamese 48 4.1.2.4 “Run” in English corresponds to “trải dài” in Vietnamese 49 4.1.2.5 “Run” in English corresponds to “chạy đua” in Vietnamese 50 4.1.2.6 “Run” in English corresponds to “lan khắp” in Vietnamese 50 4.1.2.7 “Run” in English corresponds to “chảy” in Vietnamese 50 4.1.2.8 “Run” in English corresponds to “tràn” in Vietnamese 51 4.1.2.9 “Run” in English corresponds to “quản lý” in Vietnamese 52 4.1.2.10 “Run” in English corresponds to “vận hành” in Vietnamese 52 4.1.2.11 “Run” in English corresponds to “nhìn” in Vietnamese 53 4.1.2.12 “Run” in English corresponds to “gặp” in Vietnamese 53 4.1.2.13 “Run” in English corresponds to “trở nên” in Vietnamese 54 4.1.2.14 “Run” in English corresponds to “lướt/ lùa” in Vietnamese 55

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4.1.2.15 “Run” in English corresponds to “hết” in Vietnamese 55 4.1.2.16 “Run” in English corresponds to “kéo dài” in Vietnamese 56 4.1.2.17 “Run” in English corresponds to “tăng lên” in Vietnamese 56 4.1.2.18 “Run” in English corresponds to “hoạt động” in Vietnamese 57 4.1.2.19 “Run” in English corresponds to “phát hành” in Vietnamese 57 4.1.2.20 “Run” in English corresponds to “có hiệu lực” in Vietnamese 57 4.1.2.21 “Run” in English corresponds to “kiểm tra” in Vietnamese 58 4.1.2.22 “Run” in English is translated as a copular verb in Vietnamese 58

5.2 Conclusions on each of the thesis objectives 64

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Chapter I: Introduction 1.1 Rationale

As Palmer [44] points out, learning a language is to a great extent learning how to operate the verbal forms, the patterns and the structures of the verbs

in that language Undoubtedly, verbs are most widely used and as a result which plays a key role in any language system A verb is the backbone of the sentence as it is the verb that provides the central meaning for a sentence However, there is a well-established fact that learners of English

as a foreign language tend to consider verbs as one of the most complex classes of words for their great complexity of the internal semantic and syntactic structure

Actually, many studies have been done on the verbal characteristics, especially the systematic relationships between the different senses of English verbs They have paid much attention to polysemy Unlike other approaches, cognitive linguistics, especially cognitive semantics has made use of image-schema to visualize the sense networks of various polysemous words

As far as motion verbs are concerned, many experimental studies have confirmed the differences in encoding motion across different languages [41] [45] [53] Thus, native speakers of different languages express

movement according to the specific language they speak Verb “run” is one

of the verb belongs to motion verbs Vietnamese learners almost don‟t know when and how it is used and how to translate this verb from English to Vietnamese in collocations in different respects They tend to apply its

straightforward correspondence in their mother tongue, such as run means

chạy in Vietnamese Moreover, although there has been a vast amount of

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research on the verbal characteristics in English, in Vietnam, there isn‟t an in-depth analysis of meanings of a particular English verb from a cognitive semantic perspective

For all the above-mentioned reasons, it is strongly desirable for the author to

carry out the thesis titled: A contrastive study on the meanings of the verb

“run” in English and “chạy” in Vietnamese from a cognitive semantic perspective

1.2 Aims of research

The research is done to investigate the semantic features of the English verb

“run” in the light of cognitive semantics and find out several the similarities and differences between Vietnamese and English verb” run” The research

results will enable learners to have a good understanding in learning and translating English verb from a cognitive semantic perspective

1.3 Objectives of research

In order to achieve the aims mentioned above, a number of objectives will

be carried out, including:

(i) Describing the semantic features of the English verb “run” in the light

of cognitive semantics;

(ii) Finding out the similarities and differences between Vietnamese and

English verb “run”;

(iii) Suggesting implications for learning and translating English verb from a cognitive semantic perspective

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1.4 Scope of research

Academic scope:

The study is an attempt to explain the meanings conveyed by the English

verb “run” and its Vietnamese equivalents within cognitive semantic

theoretical framework The prototypical sense, derived meanings, and metaphorical extensions of the verb are taken into account This

investigation is based on the author‟s manual corpus of run-examples in form of S + run and S + run + O, where run functions as a verb, to the exclusion of others where run functions as a noun

The data were collected from three sources, namely, the English

versions of Vanity Fair by Thackeray [58], A Game of Thrones by Martin [38], and Gone with the Wind by Mitchell [40] Vietnamese equivalents to those run-occurrences were also identified and grouped in terms of

frequency and percentage

1.5 Significance of research

(i) Theoretical significance

Thanks to the research and findings, the writer can get more knowledge of cognitive semantics and cognitive semantic studies on verbs from a cross-linguistic perspective

(ii) Practical significance

Hopefully, the results of the research will help learners be able to make gorgeous improvements in their English language learning in general and English-Vietnamese translation in particular

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1.6 Organizational structure of thesis

The thesis starts out with Introduction where background for the research should be established, that is, why it was done It is vital to state clearly the reasons for doing the research and the objectives of the thesis as well as the scope and the significance of the research

The Literature Review summarizes the results of others who worked on the problem or on a similar problem It is important to uncover all important literature and summarize the theoretical background/preliminaries employable as tools for conducting the research

The Methodology describes all the research-governing orientations and research methods applied for implementing this research

The Finding and Discussions describes and discusses about investigate the

semantic features of the English verb “run” in the light of cognitive

semantics as well as some similarities and differences between Vietnamese

and English verb “run” and sets out some possible implications for learning

and translating English verb from a cognitive semantic perspective

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Chapter II: Literature review

This section presents the thorough and in-depth studies which are done by previous researchers This will also present the synthesis of the theoretical and conceptual framework to fully understand the research A new research based on previous studies and theoretical background will be studied

2.1 Review of previous studies

The following is previous research work related to the theme studied in the research

Nguyen Hung Tien (2010) A Contrastive Analysis between the Verb „Run‟

in English and the Verb „Chạy‟ in Vietnamese, University of Language and

International Studies

The research aimed at finding the similarities and differences between the verb „run‟ in English and the verb „chạy‟ in Vietnamese mainly in terms of MiCA and briefly in term of MaCA and providing recommendations for the teaching and learning as well as some tips when translating „run‟ and „chạy‟ into the target language

2.2 Review of theoretical background

In this chapter, the cognitive semantic framework of the study is presented Particularly, the theories of cognitive linguistics, cognitive semantics and motion verbs are demonstrated Several primary notions in cognitive semantics employed to investigate the meanings of motion verbs are explicitly put forward

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2.2.1 A brief overview of cognitive linguistics

2.2.1.1 Definition of cognitive linguistics

Cognitive linguistics, a modern and innovative approach to the study of language and mind, has been of special interest since it emerged in the late seventies and early eighties It concerns the relationship between the way people communicate with each other and the way people think [25] Or, as Fauconnier [13] states it is the study of language, conceptual systems, human cognition, and general meaning construction Cognitive linguistics argues that the language peope use and their ability to learn and use it is accounted for by general cognitive abilities, their visual and human categorization strategies, together with their cultural, contextual, and functional parameters [1] To put it in another way, cognitive linguistics views linguistic knowledge as a part of human general thinking and cognition; people‟s linguistic performance is not separated from other general cognitive abilities which allow mental processes of reasoning, memory, attention or learning, but understood as an integral part of it [26]

In short, cognitive linguistics is the scientific study of human languages in relation to human cognition It is concerned with investigating the relationship between human language, human mind and human socio-physical experiences

2.2.1.2 Major principles of cognitive linguistics

There are two fundamental principles of cognitive linguistics The first fundamental principle is embodiment This means that language is not an abstract cognitive faculty, independent from other human cognitive processes; on the contrary, human language is created from human daily and real experience “We construct and understand our categories on the basis of

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concrete experiences, and under the constraints imposed, first and foremost our bodies” [1, p.9] According to Barcelona [1], human conceptual categories, the meaning of words and sentences, the meaning of linguistic structures at any level are not just a set of universal abstract features, or of uninterpreted symbols; quite the opposite: they are activated and motivated directly in human daily experience in human life: in human bodily, social, physical, or social experiences [21] [24] To put it in another way, people experience the real world and examine what they perceive, then it is their perception that filters the experience And it is a fact that no one is alike; thus, their perception about the world differs, resulting in the difference in their description of what they experience

The second main principle of cognitive linguistics is the theory of linguistic meaning Cognitive linguists clarify that language is symbolic in nature as it

“makes available to the speaker an open-ended set of linguistic signs or expressions, each of which associates a semantic representation of some kinds with a phonological representation” [32, p.11] Linguistic expressions come into being under an inventory of form-meaning parings which are

called symbolic units A symbolic unit consists of a phonological unit at one

pole and a semantic unit at the other pole Therefore, form and meaning are always accompanying, not independent of one another As a result, language

is used as a tool to encode and to transmit ideas, which are carried out via means of symbols

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2.2.2 A brief overview of cognitive semantics

2.2.2.1 Definition of cognitive semantics

Cognitive semantics is a branch of cognitive linguistics Unlike traditional semantics that attributed linguistics to phonology, syntax, pragmatics, etc and that meaning is independent from syntax, cognitive semantics states that meanings come from human mind; or rather, meanings are in the head[15]

Cognitive semantics also sees linguistic meaning as a manifestation of conceptual structure: “the nature and organization of mental representation

in all its richness and diversity, and this is what makes it a distinctive approach to linguistic meaning” [11, p.156] Talmy [54, p.4] describes cognitive semantics as follows: “Research on cognitive semantics is research on conceptual content and its organization in language”

In short, cognitive semantics is concerned with investigating the relationship between experience, the conceptual system, and the semantic structure encoded by language [26] [29] [31] [32] [34] [35] [50] In other words,

cognitive semantics investigates knowledge representation (conceptual

structure), and meaning construction (conceptualization)

2.2.2.2 Major principles of cognitive semantics

Talmy [54], Lakoff & Johnson [31], and Geeraerts [17] identify four guiding principles that collectively characterize the collection of approaches that fall within cognitive semantics in their books, namely: i) Conceptual structure is embodied; ii) Semantic structure is conceptual structure; iii) Meaning representation is encyclopaedic; iv) Meaning construction is conceptualization

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The first principle - conceptual structure is embodied - means that people perceive the world based on what they experience In other words, their construe of the world is intervened by the nature of their embodiment The experience people have of the world is significant to the way they understand it What they understand from the world through their perception becomes their knowledge of it This position holds that conceptual structure

is a consequence of the nature of human embodiment and thus is embodied

The second guiding principle - semantic structure is conceptual structure - asserts that the meanings conventionally associated with words and other linguistics units (bound morphemes, constructions, etc.) can be equated with concepts This is not to say that semantic structure and conceptual structure are identical: linguistic concepts are only a subset of the possible concepts

in the mind of the speaker

The third guiding principle holds that semantic structure is encyclopaedic in

nature This means that words do not represent “neatly packaged bundles of meanings but serve as points of access to vast repositories of knowledge” [55, p.160] In order to understand the meaning of a given utterance, people draw on their encyclopaedic knowledge relating to the specific situation depicted by the utterance to construct its meaning

The fourth guiding principle - meaning construction is conceptualization - means that language itself does not encode meaning Instead, words are only

„prompts‟ for the construction of meaning [17] Accordingly, meaning is constructed at the conceptual level Meaning construction is equated with conceptualization, a process whereby linguistic units serve as prompts for an array of conceptual operations and the recruitment of background knowledge Meaning is a process rather than a discrete thing that can be packaged by language

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2.2.3 Motion verbs

2.2.3.1 Definition of motion verbs

Motion verbs have been the subject of several studies by linguists as they present particularly interesting semantic and syntactic characteristics A motion verb, as its name suggests, is simply a verb that expresses a kind of

motion such as go, walk, run, hurry, and so on [49, p.53] To describe this

terminology more clearly, Valin [62, p.109] argues that “for motion verbs,

we need to present the motion plus the change of location over the time” The English verbs of motion tend to incorporate certain specific kinds of semantic features or components such as manner, cause, or path

2.2.3.2 Classification of English motion verbs

There are different classifications of English motion verbs from the different points of view The author is especially interested in the contributions of Levin [36] for the classification of English motion verbs with regard to transitive and intransitive motion verbs Levin proposes the following seven verb classes:

i) Inherently directed motion

The meanings of these verbs include a specification of the direction of

motion (i.e., path) The meanings of these verbs include a specification of

the direction of motion, example: advance, arrive, ascend, come, depart,

descend, enter, escape, exit, fall, flee, go, leave, plunge, recede, return, rise, tumble

ii) Leave verbs

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These verbs do not specify the manner of motion; they just indicate that motion away from a location has taken place The direct object of these verbs is understood to be the location that has been left The location cannot

be expressed in a prepositional phrase For instance: abandon, desert, leave, etc

iii) Manner of motion

These verbs include roll verbs and run verbs Roll verbs specify manners of

motion characteristic of inanimate entities, that is, the figure does not necessarily control its motion This verb class includes the verbs such as:

bounce, drift, drop, float, glide, move, roll, slide, swing, etc plus verbs

describing motion around an axis: coil, revolve, rotate, spin, turn, twirl,

twist, whirl, wind, etc Run verbs describe manners in which animate entities

can move, although some of them may also be used to describe the movement of inanimate entities Furthermore, no specific direction of motion is implied unless they occur with an explicit directional phrase

Example: float, fly, jump, march, race, run, walk and so forth

iv) Manner of motion using a vehicle

They are vehicle name verbs (bike, cycle, etc.), and verbs not associated with vehicle names (fly, row, etc.) Verbs that are vehicle names mean

roughly “go using the vehicle named by the noun” [36, p.268] Verbs that are not vehicle names denote motion using a vehicle but the vehicle name does not coincide with the verb

v) Waltz verbs

Example: boogie, bop, cancan, clog, conga, dance, foxtrot, tango, tapdance, waltz, etc These verbs mean roughly “perform the dance” No

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specific direction of motion is implied unless there is an explicit directional phrase present Like vehicle nouns, it appears that any dance noun can be

used as a motion verb

vi) Accompany verbs

These verbs relate to one person taking another from one place to another According to Levin [36], these verbs are differentiated semantically by the nature of the relationship between the two participants For example:

accompany, conduct, escort, guide, lead, shepherd, etc

vii) Chase verbs

They are chase, follow, pursue, shadow, tail, track, trail, etc These verbs

are typically transitive, with the chaser as the subject and the person being chased as the object Some of them allow an intransitive use, with the chaser

as the subject and a prepositional phrase headed by after expressing what is

being chased

2.2.3.3 Syntactic and semantic features of English motion verbs

Syntactic features of English motion verbs

According to Biber et al [2], every verb can occur with specific patterns of clause elements which contain a subject and can also include adverbials He proposes five valency patterns for a single-word lexical verb, namely: intransitive, monotransitive, ditransitive, complex transitive and copular Generally speaking, motion verbs should be grouped into intransitive, transitive verbs

The first type of motion verbs, intransitive motion verbs, occurs in the SV pattern with no object or predicative complement Example:

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(1) More people (S) came (V) [3, p.119]

However, this type can occur with optional adverbials as in (2):

(2) He (S) went (V) to the corner shop (A) [3, p.121]

In term of transitive verbs, motion verbs fall into mono-transitive motion verbs which occur with a single direct object in the pattern SVOd (as in 3) and complex transitive motion verbs which occur with a direct noun phrase followed by an obligatory adverbial in the pattern SVOdA (as in 4) or by an object predicative SVOPo (in most cases adjective as in 5)

(3) Then you (S) should move (V) any obstacles (Od) [3, p.106]

(4) He (S) led (V) me (O) to the storehouse (A-obligatory) [3, p.355]

(5) He (S) hit (V) the cat (O) dead (Po) [3, p.201]

Semantic features of English motion verbs

Late traditional grammar classifies verbs into seven major semantic domains: activity verbs, communication verbs, mental verbs, causative verbs, occurrence verbs, existence verbs and aspectual verbs [2] Motion verbs, which primarily denote actions, fall into the group of activity verbs

Semantically, English verbs tend to conflate certain specific kinds of semantic components Manner and path are two important aspects of verb representation that are systematically conflated in motion [22] [54] In this regard, manner-of-motion verbs refer to the way in which a figure carries out a motion; whereas path-of-motion verbs refer to the trajectory over which a figure moves, typically, with respect to another reference object English intransitive manner verbs in general do not encode information about any specific direction of motion unless they combine with an explicit

However, English also has a handful of path verbs which denote the path of

motion such as descend, ascend, exit, leave, etc These verbs exist to a very

limited extent as Latinate borrowings They are mute about any specification of the manner in which the movement is carried out; but they include a specification of the direction of motion, even in the absence of an overt directional complement

In addition, Taylor and Evans [55] state that English particles are spatial oriented; and these spatial particles have numerous meanings associated with them People often assign spatial particles based on the geometry of a visual scene In English, spatial orientation means the location of an object

in relation to another object from the point of view of the speaker, with respect to the orientation of the object itself or with respect to the actual direction of the motion of the object The English particles which complement path to the main motion verbs are likely to encode some

semantic information like goal as in (6), source as in (7), via as in (8) and

direction as in (9) [9]:

(6) Harry sauntered into the room [9, p.62]

(7) Harry sauntered out of the room [9, p.62]

(8) Harry sauntered across the room [9, p.63]

(9) I slid the coupling nut forward [9, p.63]

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2.2.3.4 Syntactic and semantic features of the verb “run”

Syntactic features

The verb “run” consists of one morpheme as a root According to Quirk et

al [46], it has four typical forms: the base form and the past participle form

„run‟, the –s form „runs‟, the past form „ran‟, and the–ing participle

„running‟

“Run” shares the typical syntactic functions of a verb, as following:

(*) Being part of the predicate of a sentence Example:

(10) The tide of the Confederacy‟s fortune was running strong and

full now, sweeping the people jubilantly along on its flood [40, p.238]

(11) Many of them had run away from school to join the

army,… [40, p.295]

(*) Derivatives of “run” have different grammatical functions such as

subjects, objects, or complements, etc as in (13), (14), (15) respectively:

(12) All this running about and worry won‟t help you and may harm

the baby [40, p.269]

(13) That day Rhett had met an ex-blockade runner and they had had

much to say to each other [40, p.866]

(14) So who is the greatest runner of all time? [38, p.234]

(*) Carries markers of grammatical categories such as tense, aspects, person,

number and mood as in the following examples:

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(15) Negroes were running up and down the street, panic in their

faces… [40, p.338]

(16) Fans stopped in mid-swish and a ripple of excited murmuring

ran through the hall [40, p.181]

(*) Run is both a transitive and intransitive verb This means run can work

with or without objects as in (17) and (18) respectively:

(17) I run my boat into New York, buy from Yankee firms, sub rosa,

of course, and away I go [40, p.179]

(18) Oh, Rhett, I just run and run and hunt and I can‟t ever find what

it is I‟m hunting for [40, p.814]

Semantic features

According to the Collins Cobuild E-Dictionary, run is a basic intransitive

verb of motion which expresses movement on foot at a rapid pace so that both feet are off the ground together for part of each stride

As mentioned above, the English verb “run” belongs to the category of manner of motion verbs Besides, run is also a transitive verb which has other meanings The verb “run” has different meanings when it is conflated

with different prepositions and in different collocations This will be discussed in Chapter 3

2.2.4 Cognitive semantic approach to motion verbs

In the present study, the semantic analysis of the English verb “run” and its

Vietnamese equivalents are accounted for and illustrated within the framework of cognitive semantics Hence, primary notions, namely,

experiential realism and image schemas, prototype and radial category,

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metaphor as a mechanism for meaning extension, polysemy are adopted to lay

the foundation for data analysis These notions are reviewed in the ensuing sections

2.2.4.1 Experiential realism, image schemas

According to cognitive semantics, conceptual systems grow out of bodily experience, and are grounded in perception, bodily movement, and experience of a physical and social character [26] Lakoff [29] proposes that

experiental realism goes along with connectionism as well asbiologism and

social realism

Experiental realism argues that the natural categories of human cognition are based on the experience peope have of the world and that the way they perceive the world is influenced by their cognitive apparatus [5] Experiential realism also assumes that metaphorical mapping can be used to conceive situations in terms of previous experiences in different circumstances [26] [29] Lakoff [29] stresses human bodies and recurring activities provide people with a direct experiential basis for understanding a wealth of image schemas

Image schemas play an important part of human knowledge of the world

According to Johnson [26, p.29], image schema is “a recurrent pattern,

shape and regularity” in, or of “actions, perceptions and conceptions” that are on-going Holmqvist [20, p.31] defines image schemas as “that part of a picture which remains when all the structure is removed from the picture, except for that which belongs to a single morpheme, a sentence or a piece of text in a linguistic description of a picture” However, the most condensed account comes from Gibbs and Colston [18, p 349], who define image schemas as “dynamic analog representations of spatial relations and

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movements in space.” Unlike Lakoff and Langacker‟s definitions which focus on the spatial structure of image schemas, this definition puts the dynamics of the representations in focus

Different scholars provide different lists of image schemas Thus, for Lakoff

[29], the container schema that defines the predicates in and out would work

as the basis for understanding the body as a container, the visual field, and

set models The part-whole schema is transferred to domains such as

families, teams, organizations, marriage, etc The link schema helps

conceptualize social and interpersonal relationships The centre-periphery

schema offers the difference between important things or matters seen as central, and less important or secondary matters as peripheral Finally, the

source-path-goal schema gives the clue for purposes in human daily life as

destinations of a journey According to Lakoff, these image schemas might

be also deeply grounded in common human experience, and lead to primary conceptualizations in the domain of physical experience and will define the primigenial use of words The internal structure of word meaning is not autonomous, but exists against a background of people‟s general assumptions about the world (socio-cultural beliefs included), and word meaning is frequently prototype-based rather than being composed of checklists of features

Image schemas are not to be understood as unrelated and discrete units As Lakoff and Dodge [9] note, image schemas are mapped neurologically to so-called secondary brain areas, which basically connect human different perceptual modalities, i.e visual, auditory, sensory, etc Since the brain is massively interconnected, many of the same primitive image schematic structures can be found in different experiences, and many experiences are interpreted through more than one schema [9, p.84-85] Thus, it can be said that image schemas are connected

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With respect to motion verbs, Lakoff and Dodge [9, p.68] posit

“locomotion” image schema, suggesting an image schematic structure

where differentiation is done on these parameters: goal, path, involved body-parts, gait, speed and effort Thus running and walking can be distinguished in terms of speed Walking a stony mountain path and a plain sidewalk is distinguished in terms of the effort involved Crawling and walking is distinguished in part by the body-parts involved Wandering can

be distinguished from other types of movement, through the lack of any specific goal [9, pp 72-84]

2.2.4.2 Metaphor

Metaphor has been understood as deviant language by generative linguistics where meanings of words are bundles of necessary and sufficient features, and there are clear-cut boundaries between semantic categories The combination of words in generative grammar depends on the compatibility

of the feature specifications of the component forms, compatibility being formalised in terms of selection restrictions

Cognitive semantics, however, does not view metaphor as a speaker‟ violation of rules of competence [31] According to this view, metaphor is a means whereby ever more abstract and intangible areas of experience can be conceptualised in terms of the familiar and concrete It is motivated by a search for understanding One cognitive domain can be understood, or even created, in terms of components more usually associated with another cognitive domain [31]

Lakoff and Johnson [31, p.271] contemplates the “possibility that many areas of experience are metaphorically structured by means of a rather small number of image schemas” According to Lakoff [29], Langacker [34],

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metaphor is the main conceptual mechanism through which people comprehend abstract concepts and perform abstract reasoning Metaphors are mapping across conceptual domains that establish correspondences between entities in the target and source domains, and can project inference patterns from the source domain onto the target domain They are grounded

in the body, and in everyday experience and knowledge, to the extent that they constitute a subsystem of human conceptual system The system of conventional conceptual metaphor is unconscious, automatic, and constantly

in use; it is central to people‟s understanding of experience and to the way they act on that understanding; it plays a major role in both the grammar and lexicon of a language; part of it is universal, part of it culture-specific This assumption implies, on the one hand, that the inference patterns of the source domain remain untouched in the target domain, and on the other hand, that only metaphorical mappings are possible when the inference patterns of the target domain are consistent with all or part of the source domain [4] [30] [60]

In conclusion, metaphors are not just figures of speech in literature, but also pervasive in everyday language Furthermore, metaphors are not just language but also a conceptual tool to understand and create more abstract conceptual domains Thus, metaphors are deeply entrenched in human minds, and function in an automatic, unconscious way The most important metaphors are those that have been long conventionalised and built into the language because they structure the conceptual system of speakers

2.2.4.3 Prototype, radial category

The main ideas of prototype theory are presented by Rosch in her articles [50] [51] [52] In attribute domains, such as colour or shape, Rosch [52] argues categories form around perceptually salient points in the domain, and

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such points form cognitive prototypes for the categories For such categories, prototypes are probably psychologically determined and therefore such categories should be universal; only the category boundaries are expected to vary with culture Object categories are also structured around prototypes, although this content is assumed to vary with culture It is argued that categories of object become organised so as to maximise the correlation and predictability of attributes within categories

So, co-occurrence of attributes leads to a prototype For object categories, prototypes are the objects which most strongly reflect the attribute structure of the category as a whole, thus, by means of prototypes, categories can be made to appear simpler, more clear-cut, and more different from each other than they are in reality Categories and prototypes can vary across cultures but the principles of category formation and of development of prototypes can be expected to be universal As a conclusion, Rosch suggests that categories are not arbitrary but psychologically determined Prototypes serve as reference points for the categorization of less clear instances Entities are assigned membership

in a category by virtue of their similarity to the prototypes The closer an entity to the prototype, the more central its status within the category

Category structures and prototype effects are very important sources of developing the structure of a radial category Prototype effects address

“certain members of the categories as being more representative of the category than other members” [29, p.41] Within the structure of a radial category, non-prototypes are either directly or intermediately radiating outward from the prototype that occupies the most central position of the structure Therefore, the radial category of a polysemy is an elaborated semantic network that essentially consists of its prototypical sense, which is the most central sense, non-prototypical senses, which are less

There have been multiple lines of research that have sought to investigate the intra-lexical structures of polysemous words One of the key concepts in such analyses is image-schema [26] [29] [31], which can be defined as the schematic structures which are generated through people‟ s perceptual interactions and bodily movements in their physical environment that “make

it possible for us to experience, understand, and reason about our world” [26, p.19] Making use of image-schemas, researchers in cognitive semantics have sought to visualize the sense network of various polysemous words [4] [29] There are two major approaches to polysemy, the lexical network approach [12] [29] and the core-schema approach [32] In the lexical network approach, various senses of a given polysemous word are seen to form a network or “radial category” [29], in which metaphorical senses are derived from the central prototype The core-schema approach,

on the other hand, suggests that the various senses can be derived from a single core schema which serves as a base from which different senses derive as a result of cognitive operations such as focalization, vantage point shift [32] and image-schema transformations

Accordingly, cognitive semantics considers linguistic meaning as a manifestation of conceptual structure which emerges from bodily experience It is concerned with investigating the relationship between experience, the conceptual system, and the semantic structure encoded by language

This chapter has also dealt with the definition, classification of motion verbs

as well as several primary notions in cognitive semantics, such as

experiential realism, image schema, metaphor, prototype, radial category,

and polysemy These notions are employed to investigate the meanings of

motion verbs

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Chapter III: Research Methodology 3.1 Research orientations

3.1.1 Research questions

The research questions of the thesis are:

 What are the meanings conveyed by the English verb “run”

in the light of a cognitive semantic perspective?

 What are the differences and similarities between verb

“run” in English and Vietnamese ?

3.1.2 Research setting

The research was executed at home through Internet access to get necessary information Apart from that, the author went to liability in city center to read books, find magazines, proses, verses and previous thesis related to theme studied Then, the researcher collected, took notes significant

information and began doing the research with the assistance of the

supervisor The research was conducted within six months, from 15 April

2015 to 30 September 2016

The data mainly collected from three novels are written in English: The Vanity Fair by Thackeray , A Game of Thrones by Martin, Gone with the wind by Mitchell and their translational versions in Vietnamese, namely

“Hội chợ phù hoa” translated by Trần Kiêm , “Trò chơi vương quyền” translated by Hà Ly and “Cuốn theo chiều gió” translated by Vũ Kim Thư

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3.1.3 Research approaches

It is a common knowledge that there are a variety of research approaches including quantitative, inferential, experimental, simulation, qualitative, deductive, inductive, comparative, contrastive, basic, applied, synthetic and analytic approaches In this thesis, only quantitative and qualitative approaches were applied

As far as the term suggests, quantitative research is concerned with the collection and analysis of data in numeric form It tends to emphasize relatively large-scale and representative sets of data, and is often presented or perceived as being about the gathering of “facts” Qualitative research, on the other hand, is concerned with collecting and analysing information in as many forms, chiefly non-numeric, as possible It tends to focus on exploring,

in as much detail as possible, and aims to achieve “depth” rather than

“breadth” [37]

The main reason for selecting those research approaches was that they brought obvious and satisfactory results with relatively high accuracy Especially, those research approaches helped the researcher to save much time and money during the research process Furthermore, it was so easy to execute those research approaches in an effective way

3.1.4 Principles/criteria for intended date collection and data analysis

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A Game of Thrones by Martin [38], and Gone with the wind by Mitchell

[40], and their translational versions in Vietnamese, namely “Hội chợ phù

hoa” translated by Trần Kiêm [63], “Trò chơi vương quyền” translated by

Hà Ly [65] and “Cuốn theo chiều gió” translated by Vũ Kim Thư [67]

The qualitative procedures are applied to in-depth analyse the similarities

and differences between English verb “run” and its Vietnamese

equivalents

3.1.4.2 Sources of data

In the thesis, primary data will be used for the research by finding and

gathering all the run-instances in English versions and their translation texts

The analysis and classification of those instances will be carried out

3.1.4.3 Reliability and authenticity of data

In terms of reliability, the materials for this research will be carefully compiled from a powerful source of books, dictionaries In addition, all the data quoted in this research were completely the same as the original materials with the clear information of authors, the name of publishers, the time and place of publication as well as the page number of the extracted data

In terms of authenticity, the whole collected English and Vietnamese verb

“run” meet all required criteria in not only its form but also its content Those

were picked out from dictionaries, books, magazines, stories and other reliable sources

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3.2 Research methods

3.2.1 Major methods and supporting methods

In doing the research, descriptive method and contrastive analysis are done

either to describe the meanings conveyed by the English verb “run” in the

light of a cognitive semantic perspective or to determine the differences and

similarities between verb “run” in English and its equivalents in

Vietnamese

3.2.2 Data collection techniques

Observation is used for collecting data

A corpus of 330 run-instances were collected for the author‟s analysis As far as the scope of the study is concerned, only occurrences of run in form

of S + run and S + run + O, where run functions as a verb, to the exclusion

of others where run functions as a noun, were taken from three sources, namely, the Vanity Fair by Thackeray [58], A Game of Thrones by Martin [38], and Gone with the wind by Mitchell [40] All these sources were

chosen for the fact that the objectiveness of translational equivalents could

be reliable In addition, all of their Vietnamese translational equivalents in

their translational versions in Vietnamese, namely “Hội chợ phù hoa” translated by Trần Kiêm [63], “Trò chơi vương quyền” translated by Hà Ly [65] and “Cuốn theo chiều gió” translated by Vũ Kim Thư [67] have been

listed as well