A construction grammar approach to spatial prepositions in modern standard Arabic

Peate, J

Abstract

The study adopts a construction grammar approach to examining the meaning of spatial
prepositions in Modern Standard Arabic (MSA), critically examines traditional accounts of
the semantic character and syntactic role of MSA prepositions and posits an alternative
approach based on construction grammar theory and findings from interrogation of
corpora. Arguments about the nature of prepositions and their role in meaning
construction have long been afflicted by circularity and methodological opportunism. The
theoretical premises of the study are crucially informed by the works of William Croft and
Ronald Langacker on aspects of construction grammar; George Lakoff, Ronald Langacker
and Leonard Talmy on grammatical theory and lexical categories; George Lakoff, Mark
Johnson and others on conceptual metaphor; and Gilles Fauconnier and others on
conceptual blending. The study attempts not just to address the limitations of formalist
approaches, but also to develop a functionalist approach to the characterisation of MSA
spatial prepositions, something largely unaddressed hitherto.
The study incorporates extensive qualitative analysis and some quantitative data. It
includes a critical discussion of lexically driven accounts of meaning, based on findings
from this data, and posits a non-reductionist construction-based account. It addresses the
distinction made between 'true' prepositions (^-*jj^ j^ 1 hurufal-jarr) and spatio-temporal
contextualisers: 'conditions of place and time' (j^-j^j u^ 1 ^= zarfa al-makan wa-alzamari).
It also includes comparative analysis of MSA and British English (BE), through
the interrogation of a multi-genre translational corpus, to examine issues of languagespecificity
in the category 'preposition'.
The study suggests that MSA prepositions can be understood as a category only through
taxanomic resemblances of a radial character, that their meaning is both construction- and
language-specific and that they exhibit semantic diversity on a spectrum of schematicity,
which is largely diachronic in formative character. The specificities of MSA prepositions
cannot be adduced to universal syntactic categories and researchers need to eschew
analysis framed by the categories of English or other 'reference' languages. The study
finally suggests future areas of investigation.

Citation

Peate, J. A construction grammar approach to spatial prepositions in modern standard Arabic. (Thesis). Salford: University of Salford

• Thesis Type: Thesis
• Deposit Date: Mar 9, 2016