Title :

Exemplification and ad hoc categorization: the genre-construction in French

Author(s) :

Chauveau-Thoumelin, Pierre [Auteur]
Savoirs, Textes, Langage (STL) - UMR 8163 [STL]

Journal title :

Folia Linguistica Historica
Linguistic strategies for the construction of ad hoc categories: synchronic and diachronic perspectives

Pages :

177-199

Publisher :

Mouton de Gruyter

Publication date :

2018

ISSN :

0168-647X

English keyword(s) :

exemplification
ad hoc categories
construction grammar
shell nouns
vagueness

HAL domain(s) :

Sciences de l'Homme et Société/Linguistique

English abstract : [en]

The aim of this paper is to investigate the genre-construction, in which the French noun genre connects a noun phrase (named X) with another constituent (a noun phrase in most cases; named Y). Such a construction has an ...
Show more >The aim of this paper is to investigate the genre-construction, in which the French noun genre connects a noun phrase (named X) with another constituent (a noun phrase in most cases; named Y). Such a construction has an exemplifying function, and, traditionally, authors consider Y to be an example of a category denoted by X. I show that this traditional analysis is not entirely satisfying as it does not give a comprehensive account of the construction’s semantics. Instead, I show through a wide variety of examples that the genre-construction provides a means of expressing ad hoc categorization. Rather than merely exemplifying a category denoted by X, the construction frequently builds up an ad hoc category based on X and examples provided by Y. This analysis can be further extended to other related constructions so as to give a unified account of such constructions. The data analysed consist of internet users’ messages collected from online forums. The analyses are carried out within the framework of construction grammar.Show less >

Language :

Anglais

Popular science :

Non

Collections :

• Savoirs, Textes, Langage (STL) - UMR 8163

Source :

Harvested from HAL