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Article published In:
Cognitive Perspectives on Genre
Edited by Carla Vergaro
[Pragmatics & Cognition 25:3] 2018
► pp. 543–575

Genre and constructional analysis

| National and Kapodistrian University of Athens

Constructional approaches to genre model genre knowledge in terms of genre-based constructions. Like all constructions, these represent conventionalized pairings of meaning and form, of varying degrees of length and schematicity, whose pragmatic specifications include their association with a particular socio-cultural context. In this state-of-the-art article I review genre-related constructional work, discussing grammatical patterns that are licensed only in particular contexts, including conversational genres, as well as expressions that qualify as constructions simply on the basis of socio-cultural currency. The appropriateness of constructional analysis for the language of genre derives from the definitional incorporation of discourse-pragmatic information in constructional descriptions and the possibility of relating genre-bound, idiosyncratic patterns to the rest of the constructions in a language through relations of inheritance. I further highlight the compatibility of Frame Semantics with the notion of genre and critically discuss the concept of conventionality as it applies to genre language.

Keywords: Construction Grammar, grammatical constructions, frame semantics, genre, register, conventionality, functional motivation, genre-based (sensitive) constructions
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction: Foundational premises and earlier studies
  • 2.The influence of frame semantics; frames and genres
  • 3.The grammar of genre
    • 3.1The grammar of conversation
  • 4.Socio-cultural currency and constructional status
  • 5.Genre in a constructional perspective: Affinities, limits, conventionality
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 10 January 2020
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/pc.18022.nik
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