Chapter 9
The mouth of the speaker
Italian metonymies of Linguistic Action
Among body parts, speech organs are a default source of metonymic mapping towards the domain of linguistic action. In Italian this conceptual metonymy is responsible for several representations of types of speaker and linguistic behavior, and may be encoded in nominal modification and in word formation by compounding or evaluative suffixation. Within these construction schemas, the semantics of the lexical bases and of the additional lexical/morphological elements interact in conjuring the metonymic (-metaphoric) denotations of the four Italian linguistic items analyzed in the chapter. Their semantics involves value judgment, which partly depends on the target domain, and the contribution of scalar dimensional notions such as size and quantity. The data are primarily drawn from two corpora of contemporary written Italian.
Article outline
- 1.Introduction
- 1.1
Linguistic scope, sources and methodology
- 2.Morphology and semantics of individual lexical items
- 2.1
malalingua/mala lingua
- 2.2
lingua lunga/lingualunga
- 2.3
Evaluative derivates linguaccia and boccaccia
- 2.3.1
linguaccia
- 2.3.2
boccaccia
- 3.Metonymy in the speech organs sub-domain of linguistic action
- 4.Conceptual processes in the representation of speakers/verbal behaviors in Italian
-
4.1
malalingua/mala lingua
- 4.2
lingua lunga/lingualunga
- 4.2.1
lingua lunga A
- 4.2.2
lingua lunga B
- 4.2.3
lingua lunga C
- 4.3
linguaccia and boccaccia
-
5.Conclusions
-
Acknowledgments
-
Notes
-
References
References (32)
References
Barcelona, A. 2003. On the plausibility of claiming a metonymic motivation for conceptual metaphor. In A. Barcelona (Ed.), Metaphor and metonymy at the crossroads: A cognitive perspective (31–58). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. 

Barcelona, A. 2005. The multilevel operation of metonymy in grammar and discourse, with particular reference to metonymic chains. In F. J. Ruiz de Mendoza Ibáñez & M. S. Peña Cervel (Eds.), Cognitive Linguistics. Internal dynamics and interdisciplinary interaction (313–352). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
Battaglia, S. 1966–2004. Grande dizionario della lingua italiana. Torino: Utet.
Clausner, T., & Croft, W. 1999. Domains and image schemas. Cognitive Linguistics 10(1), 1–31. 

De Mauro, T. 1999–2003. Grande dizionario della lingua italiana dell’uso. Torino: Utet.
Deignan, A., & Potter, L. 2004. A corpus study of metaphors and metonyms in English and Italian. Journal of Pragmatics, 36, 1231–1252. 

Goossens, L. 1990. Metaphtonymy: the interaction of metaphor and metonymy in expressions for linguistic action. Cognitive Linguistics, 1, 323–340. 

Goossens, L., Pauwels, P., Rudzka-Ostyn, B., Simon-Vandenbergen, A.-M., & Vanparys, J. (Eds.) 1995. By word of mouth. Metaphor, metonymy and linguistic action in cognitive perspective. Amsterdam & Philadelphia: John Benjamins. 

Grandi, N. 2002. Morfologie in contatto. Le costruzioni valutative nelle lingue del Mediterraneo. Milano: Franco Angeli.
Jing-Scmidt, Z. 2008. Much mouth much tongue: Chinese metonymies and metaphors of verbal behavior. Cognitive Linguistics 19(2), 241–282.
Langacker, R. 1987. Foundations of Cognitive Grammar, volume 1: Theoretical prerequisites. Stanford (CA): Stanford University Press.
Littlemore, J. 2015. Metonymy: Hidden shortcuts in language, thought and communication. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 

Nissen, U.-K. 2011. Contrasting body parts. In Z.-A. Maalej & N. Yu (Eds.), Embodiment via body parts. Studies from various languages and cultures (71–92). Amsterdam & Philadelphia: John Benjamins. 

Merlini Barbaresi, L. 2004. Alterazione. In M. Grossmann & F. Rainer (Eds.), La formazione delle parole italiano (264–292). Tübingen: Niemeyer.
Pannain, R. 2005. Attività linguistiche e parti del corpo: nessi metonimici e metaforici. In I termini per le lingue e per le attività linguistiche, Atti delle giornate di studio, Napoli 3–4 giugno 2004. Annali del Dipartimento di Studi del Mondo Classico e del Mediterraneo Antico, sezione linguistica, Università degli Studi di Napoli “L’Orientale” (
AIΩN
), 27, 315–328.
Pharies, D. 2002. Diccionario etimológico de los sufijos españoles y de otros elementos finales. Madrid: Gredos.
Pfister, M. 1979–2011. Lessico etimologico italiano. Wiesbaden: Reichert Verlag.
Prieto, V.-M. 2005. Spanish evaluative morphology: Pragmatic, sociolinguistic, and semantic issues. PhD Dissertation. University of Florida, USA.
Radden, G. 2004. The metonymic folk model of language. In B. Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk & A. Kwiatkowska (Eds.), Imagery in Language (543–565). Bern: Peter Lang.
Ricca, D. 2004. Derivazione avverbiale. In M. Grossmann & F. Rainer (Eds.), La formazione delle parole italiano (472–489). Tübingen: Niemeyer.
Rohlfs, G. 1969. Grammatica storica della lingua italiana e dei suoi dialetti. Vol. 3. Sintassi e formazione delle parole. Torino: Einaudi.
Corpora
La Repubblica Corpus: [URL]
On-line dictionaries
Diccionario de la lengua española (DRAE), Real Academia Española, [URL]
Sabatini, F., & Coletti, V. Dizionario della Lingua Italiana. RCS Libri, [URL]
Cited by (1)
Cited by one other publication
Soriano, Cristina & Javier Valenzuela
This list is based on CrossRef data as of 17 november 2024. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers.
Any errors therein should be reported to them.