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Article published In:
Issues in Humour Cognition
Edited by Marta Dynel
[Review of Cognitive Linguistics 16:1] 2018
► pp. 1–18
Special issue articles

Taking cognisance of cognitive linguistic research on humour

| University of Łódź
This article is meant to give a state-of-the-art picture of cognitive linguistic studies on humour. Cognitive linguistics has had an immense impact on the development of humour research and, importantly, humour theory over the past few decades. On the one hand, linguists, philosophers and psychologists working in the field of humour research have put forward proposals to explain the cognitive processes underlying specifically humour production and reception (e.g. the incongruity-resolution framework and its refinements). On the other hand, humour research has drawn on theories and concepts advanced in contemporary cognitive linguistics taken as a whole (e.g. mental spaces, conceptual blending, salience or conceptual metaphor). The different notions and approaches originating in these strands of research are in various ways interwoven in order to give new insights into the cognitive workings of humour.
Keywords: bisociation, blending, frame, humour, incongruity(-resolution), irony, mental model, mental space, metaphor
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction: The cognition of humour and irony
  • 2.Cognitive theories of humour
  • 3.Humour in the light of general cognitive theories
  • 4.Content of this thematic section
  • Note
  • References
Published online: 31 May 2018
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/rcl.00001.dyn
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