A COGNITIVE-LINGUISTIC INVESTIGATION OF ENGLISH PHRASAL VERBS RELATED TO PLANTS

Abstract

The focus of the paper is on the semantics of English phrasal verbs whose constituent verb is related to the concept of plants. The investigated set of verbs includes twenty-two phrasal verbs featuring the particles out, off, up, through, in and away. The analysis is conducted in the framework of cognitive semantics, which states that the meaning of phrasal verbs can be analysed in view of their constituent particles and the interplay between the verb meaning and the particle senses. It is concluded that the general meaning of the examined phrasal verbs is a result of different spatial configurations underlying the conceptual-semantic structure of the constituent particles, while their specific meanings are motivated by different conceptual metonymies stemming from the constituent verb. Numerous abstract meanings are additionally derived via various submetaphors of the basic metaphor complex abstract systems are plants embedded in the conceptual framework of the constituent verbs.