Chapter 11
Revisiting Poser’s (1992) “Blocking of phrasal constructions by
lexical items” from the perspective of the economy of language use
principle
Poser
(1992) is an important paper that points out that
blocking applies not only to synonyms but also to synonymous
phrases, using Japanese examples. This chapter aims to update his
discussion and proposal using Ueno’s (2014) “economy of language use” principle
requiring to choose a structurally simpler expression when there are
two semantically rivaling expressions. Considering the significance
of two semantically similar but formally non-identical
representations co-existing redundantly, this chapter also puts
forth Sadock’s (2012)
multi-modular grammar as a model that embodies the idea that grammar
is competition.
Article outline
- 1.Introduction
- 2.Blocking in the past research
- 3.Blocking operates between a word and its periphrasis
- 3.1A few basic facts of the Japanese language
- 3.2Poser’s generalization
- 4.Economy of language use
- 5.Theoretical implication
- 6.Concluding remarks
-
Notes
-
References
-
Appendix