Conceptual Structure in Lexical Items

Download or read book Conceptual Structure in Lexical Items written by Kristel Proost and published by John Benjamins Publishing. This book was released on 2007 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume deals with the occurrence of lexical gaps in the domain of linguistic action verbs. Though these constitute a considerable proportion of the verb inventory of many languages, not all concepts of verbal communication may be expressed by lexical items in any particular one of them. Introducing a conceptual system which allows gaps to be searched for systematically, this study shows which concepts of verbal communication are and which are not lexicalised in English, German and Dutch. The lexicalisation patterns observed shed light on the way in which verbal behaviour is conceptualised in a particular speech community. To complete the picture, the volume also addresses the question of whether communication concepts which may not be expressed by verbs may be lexicalised by fixed multiword expressions.