한중 신체어 ‘귀’의 의미 확장 대조 연구

Abstract

In our everyday language, words describing body parts are often used not only to indicate physical parts but also refer to non-physical concepts when used with expanded meanings into various areas. Focusing on this phenomenon, this research investigated the pattern and principle of the meaning expansion of a body-part term, ear, with its Chinese and Korean equivalents of ‘耳’ and ‘귀’ from the viewpoint of cognitive linguistics as follows: First, conceptual metaphor and conceptual metonymy play the role of typical mechanism in the process of meaning expansion of body-part terms; this is based on our physical experience and is calculated in the relationship of similarity and adjacency. Second, the difference of recognition in the two peoples is meaning expansion into different concept areas; as narrators using different languages observe the subject from different angles and emphasize different aspects, each Chinese and Korean shows unique meaning expansion. For instance, even the same subjects originate from different body-part terms and have different names; even meaning expansion into the same area can specifically indicate different subjects. Third, the meaning of the Chinese body-part term ‘耳’ was expanded in the order of human > animal > plant > object > action > space > abstraction areas, while the Korean term ‘귀’ was expanded in the order of human > animal > plant > object > action > space > quantity > abstraction areas. Although both languages - Chinese and Korean - did not have a meaning item originated from ‘functional characteristics’ in the dictionary, the characteristics played the biggest role in meaning expansion in actual linguistic life. For example, our conceptual system is essentially figurative, and rich experience, cultural difference, and cognitive difference of narratives using each of the languages is that they recognize different concepts and express them in language, showing different meaning expansion patterns.