불변화사 UP의 인지의미론적 접근

Abstract

Nowadays English phrasal verbs tend to be more and more colloquial and informal in spoken English. But learners of English as a foreign language may have some difficulties in using phrasal verbs. This causes the students to avoid using the phrasal verbs, thus choosing single-word equivalents or synonyms instead. The reason is that their meanings are considered to be arbitrary and idiomatic expressions. However, according to recent studies of Cognitive Semantics, languages reflect our conceptual systems, which can be structured by conceptual metaphors and image schemas. The central claim of this thesis is that particles invariably can contribute to the analysis of the meaning of phrasal verbs in a cognitive respect. Lexical items like up have many meanings both concrete and abstract. Three major sub-meanings of up such as ‘vertically higher', ‘approach', and ‘perfection' are linked by a chain of family resemblances. Up includes concepts of ‘increasing and improving', ‘preparing', ‘approaching', ‘disrupting and damaging'. Therefore, one way of teaching English phrasal verbs on the basis of meaning has been suggested. The first step is to give students examples of phrasal verbs and let them understand the literal meaning of particles and verbs. The second step is to let them understand the enlarged figurative meaning from the literal meaning of particles and verbs.