Premium
On the Roles of Context and Literal Meaning in Understanding
Author(s) -
Dascal Marcelo
Publication year - 1989
Publication title -
cognitive science
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.498
H-Index - 114
eISSN - 1551-6709
pISSN - 0364-0213
DOI - 10.1207/s15516709cog1302_6
Subject(s) - tel aviv , pragmatics , context (archaeology) , sentence , meaning (existential) , linguistics , literal and figurative language , psychology , sociology , philosophy , computer science , epistemology , library science , history , archaeology
In my recent defense of literal’meaning (Dascal, 1987), my main concern was to show that such a theoretical construct is “psychologically real”. At least in one sense, Gibbs (1989, p. 249) grants this point. For he acknowledges that the meanings I call “literal” are among the “variety of products that result from language understanding,” and adds: “Nobody disputes this as an aspect of psychological reality.” What he disputes is that there is anything special about these products, which would grant them a privileged status (a) as being somewhat “basic” or “primary,” (b) as being the output of a unique cognitive process, and (c) as playing some necessary role in the processes involved in engendering the other, nonliteral, products of language understanding. Gibbs argues against (b) and (c), and concludes that (a) cannot be the case. I will try to show that: