Back to search

IS-MOBIL-Mobilitetsprogr.f.utl.Ph.D-stu

Experiential Constructions in Indo-European languages from a diachronic and typological perspective

Awarded: NOK 46,000

My research project in Historical Linguistics deals with a specific functional domain, i.e. that of experiential constructions, and how the main ancient Indo-European languages managed to find out appropriate morphosyntactic strategies to code these parti cular expressions. I am also interested in investigating the diachronic development of these constructions with a view to making a typological survey of these constructions by comparing them to those exploited in other European languages. Typological stud ies clearly demonstrate that the domain of experience constitutes a cognitively complex area, because the human participant undergoes, rather than acting, a particular situation which cannot control. Therefore, s/he is affected by the action instead of in stigating it. This represents a quite rare situation in human conception of reality and the languages of the world usually reflect this cognitive deviation with marked, more complex morphosyntactic structures. The conceptual and linguistic dinamicity tha t characterizes the domain of experience is ultimately a signal of human mind's creativity.Studying from a linguistic perspective the morphosyntactic behaviour and coding strategies pertaining to the experiential domain could reveal some fascinating funct ions and mechanisms of the human mind.

Funding scheme:

IS-MOBIL-Mobilitetsprogr.f.utl.Ph.D-stu