「心」的語意分析：從語言分類和文化認知談起

Abstract

摘要 中文的「心」時常和英文的「heart」和「mind」的二分相對，作為中文將身體、情緒和思考視為一連續整體的證據。本研究經由對中文「心」的詞意網絡、隱喻及轉喻分析，從語言分類的角度出發，觸及了多義詞，隱喻與轉喻的互動，還有語境對語意建構的影響。並探討中文語言特色，以及語言形式和文化分類對認知的影響。 根據Principled Polysemy (Evans 2005)所提出的條件，「心」複合詞所建立的語意網絡，包含四個詞義：Muscular Organ, Mind-heart, Central/Innermost Part, 以及Essential Part。除了符合語意上的條件，每個詞義亦有獨特的搭配詞和結構特性。因Muscular Organ（心臟）最符合歷史上最早的語意，最能自然的從認知和語用推論衍生出其他語意，並且也最貼近人類生活經驗現象的層次，因次被選做最典型的詞義（sanctioning sense）。我們並且發現，「心」的實質的「心臟」意和抽象的「心智」活動的語意間，有著連續性，卻需要語境來確定實際上的語意。因此後面的分析加入了口語及書面的文本語料。 有了「心」的語意網絡做基礎，論文開始專注於隱喻和轉喻這兩個基礎的認知機制之間頻繁的互動。參考 Goossens (2002) 的metpahotonymy理論和 Croft (2002)對domain matrix的定義， 我們在語料中發現了四種隱喻和轉喻的混合類型：(1) metaphor from metonymy, (2) metaphor within metonymy, (3) metonymy within metaphor, and (4) metaphor + metonymy。研究結果顯示，隱喻和轉喻混合的類型，在文本語料中站大多數，「心」的概念，多是經由隱喻和轉喻共同完成的。這樣的互動是由於語境，對世界的知識，以及當下情境因素，和社會文化經驗等產生的結果。從另外一方面來說，結果顯示轉喻在所有「心」的語言使用上佔有最基礎的地位，也支持了Huang (1994)經由對分析詞義延伸所提出的中文為「轉喻語言」的觀察。 最後，我們採用廣義的「語境」定義，探討語境對於語意建構的重要影響。加入了文本的語料之後，我們的分析超越了詞彙層面，進一步說明了中文「心」的本意和引申意（身體和心智）、以及情緒和思想的連續性。「心」可以指涉實質身體器官，也可以指涉抽象的情緒和思考等意義，這三個意義在語言表達形式上有部份重疊。語意的判定和建構，必須由語言形式，當下情境，以及社會文化經驗來決定。

Abstract The study is an exploration of cultural cognition and linguistic categorization via the analysis of xin-expressions. Focusing on the semantic analysis of Chinese xin, we have touched upon the issues of polysemy, interaction between metaphor and metonymy, the importance of context in meaning construction and disambiguation, and most importantly, the significance of culture in human categorization and conceptualization. Adopting Principled Polysemy (Evans 2005) as our framework, we have constructed the semantic network of xin based on xin-compounds. Four senses of xin are identified: Muscular Organ, Mind-heart, Central/Innermost Part, and Essential Part. The distinct senses, aside from containing additional message at the conceptual level, are also manifested in unique collocational and constructional patterns. We have identified the Muscular Organ sense as the sanctioning sense, finding it the historically earliest attested meaning, the most closely related to our socio-phenomenological experience, and the sense that can most naturally develop into other senses based on pragmatic and cognitive inferences. Xin-compounds with both the literal and figurative readings call for further exploration of the impact of contextual cues, and the incorporation of discourse data in our analysis. After the semantic network of xin is constructed, we turn to explore the frequent interaction between two fundamental conceptual strategies -- metaphor and metonymy. Taking metpahotonymy (Goossens 2002) and domain matrix (Croft 2002) as crucial notions to our analysis, we identified four types of expressions involving the combination of metaphor and metonymy: (1) metaphor from metonymy, (2) metaphor within metonymy, (3) metonymy within metaphor, and (4) metaphor + metonymy. Results show that the “mixed types”—the combination of both metaphor and metonymy— prevail in frequency at the discourse level. The finding indicates that conceptualization of xin at the discourse level relies largely on the mixture of both metaphor and metonymy. Such interplay of conceptual contiguity, similarity or contrast is rendered by the linguistic context, world knowledge, and our physical and social-cultural experience. On the other hand, the indispensability of metonymic conceptualizations for all xin-expressions echoes to Huang’s (1994) finding that Chinese is a “metonymic language,” which tends to resort to metonymies for sense extension. Finally, taking a broad view of context, we have provided evidence for the essential role of context in meaning construal. By incorporating discourse data in our discussion and thus extend our analysis beyond the lexical level, we have found two kinds of continuums instantiated by xin-expressions: the literal-figurative (physical-mental) continuum and the heart-mind (emotive-cognitive) continuum. Xin can be divided into “literal” and “figurative” readings, with the literal ones denoting the make-up and condition of the muscular heart, and the figurative ones designating both the emotive and the cognitive. The three conceptualizations of xin overlap in their linguistic manifestations. Disambiguation of meaning of a xin-expression relies largely on context rooted linguistic profiles, immediate situation, and social-cultural experiences.