Idioms

Processing, Structure, and Interpretation

Cristina Cacciari, Patrizia Tabossi

• Publisher: Psychology Press
• Year: 2014
• ISBN:
  9781317782629
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Personal Development
• Subtopic: Writing & Presentation Skills

"The book draws on a lot of research, is friendly to the reader, and will be of good value to teachers."

Paul Nation, Victoria University of Wellington, Australia

This comprehensive, up-to-date, and accessible text on idiom use, learning, and teaching approaches the topic with a balance of sound theory and extensive research in cognitive linguistics, psycholinguistics, corpus linguistics, and sociolinguistics combined with informed teaching practices. Idioms is organized in three parts:

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• Part I includes discussion of idiom definition, classification, usage patterns, and functions.

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• Part II investigates the process involved in the comprehension of idioms and the factors that influence individuals' understanding and use of idioms in both L1 and L2.

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• Part III explores idiom acquisition and the teaching and learning of idioms, focusing especially on the strategies and techniques used to help students learn idioms.

To assist the reader in grasping the key issues, study questions are provided at the end of each chapter. The text also includes a glossary of special terms and an annotated list of selective idiom reference books and student textbooks.

Idioms is designed to serve either as a textbook for ESL/applied linguistics teacher education courses or as a reference book. No matter how the book is used, it will equip an ESL/applied linguistics students and professionals with a solid understanding of various issues related to idioms and the learning of them.

I

IDIOM INTERPRETATION AND THE LITERAL FIGURATIVE DISTINCTION

1	Idiom Meanings and Allusional Content

Sam Glucksberg

Princeton University

People who live in glass houses should not throw stones.

For most readers, this proverb should elicit the experience of apprehending several kinds of meanings simultaneously. The meaning of the sentence itself—the literal meaning—would be apprehended by anyone who reads English fluently. In addition, readers familiar with the proverb will apprehend immediately a second kind of meaning, the meaning of the proverb. The expression is not just about glass houses and stones, but also about the vulnerability of people criticizing others for faults that they themselves have. The idiomatic meaning itself derives from the allusion to the glass house as a metaphor for vulnerability. Despite being able to determine both the literal and idiomatic meanings of the proverb, however, few readers experience the most important meaning of all: What did I, the writer, intend by my use of this proverb? In the absence of any relevant contextual information, the proverb can be understood only as an example or illustration of some point, which of course it is.

The proverb is one example of the class of expressions that mean something other than their constituent words and phrases. At one end of the continuum are phrases such as by and large, which seem to be nothing more than long words. Furthermore, not only does this expression mean something other than its constituents, its meaning seems to bear no relation to those constituents. At the other extreme are familiar proverbs and idioms that allude to apocryphal events, such as residents of glass houses throwing stones, people carrying coals to Newcastle, and farmers locking barn doors after horses have been stolen. In these cases, the meanings of the constituents are relevant, but the meaning of each expression is not just something other than the meanings of the constituent parts. The expression’s meaning is also something more than the meanings of the parts. The expression itself alludes to an archetypical case of the class of events that it typifies. It does not matter one whit whether anyone actually threw any stones while living in a glass house, or carried coal to the English city of Newcastle, or ever locked a barn door after having horses stolen. These expressions are, in essence, metaphors for the general situations or events that they typify.

In between the wordlike by-and-large idioms and the metaphorlike coals-to-Newcastle idioms are those that can have quite variable relations between their constituent and idiom meanings. Like by and large, phrasal idioms such as kick the bucket have meanings that bear no discernible relation to their idiomatic meanings, in this case “to die.” Like coals to Newcastle, other phrasal idioms such as spill the beans bear a somewhat metaphorical relation to their idiomatic meanings, in this case divulge secrets. Given the diversity among the idioms people use in everyday discourse, it should not be surprising that theories of idiom comprehension are diverse as well.

Idiomatic Meaning: Direct Access Versus Compositional

Two classes of models have been proposed for idiom comprehension. Reflecting the characteristics of such idioms as by and large and kick the bucket, one class treats idioms as expressions that have meanings that are stipulated arbitrarily. According to this class of models, idioms are understood simply by retrieving the meaning of an idiom as a whole. I refer to this type of model as a direct look-up model. The second class of models reflects the characteristics of such idioms as carrying coals to Newcastle. The meanings of these kinds of idioms are not arbitrary. The relation of coals to Newcastle is a matter of historical fact, and the literal act of carrying coals to the coal-mining center of Newcastle is a stereotypical instance of uselessly bringing something to some place. According to this second class of models, idioms are understood by ordinary linguistic processing combined with a pragmatic interpretation of the use of the expression in discourse contexts. I refer to this class of models as compositional.

Direct Look-Up. Three versions of direct look-up models have been proposed: (a) the idiom list hypothesis (Bobrow & Bell, 1973), (b) the lexicalization hypothesis (Swinney & Cutler, 1979), and (c) the direct access hypothesis (Gibbs, 1984). All share the assumption that idiom meanings are apprehended by direct memory retrieval, not by linguistic processing. The three differ in relatively unimportant ways. Bobrow and Bell proposed that idioms are represented in a mental idiom list, that is, an idiom lexicon that parallels the mental word lexicon. Idiomatic meanings are sought when a linguistic analysis fails to yield an interpretable result. When linguistic analysis fails, people turn to a search of the idiom list, and if the linguistically recalcitrant expression is found, then the idiom meaning is taken as the intended meaning. This model is rejected easily by the robust finding that idioms are understood at least as quickly as comparable literal expressions (Gibbs, 1980; Ortony, Schallert, Reynolds, and Antos, 1978). If expressions must always be analyzed literally before any idiomatic meanings are sought, then literal meanings should always be understood more quickly than idiomatic ones. Contrary to Bobrow and Bell, the literal meanings of conventional idiomatic expressions are never understood more quickly than their idiomatic ones.

Swinney and Cutler’s (1979) lexicalization hypothesis accounts quite nicely for the relative ease of understanding familiar idioms. Idioms are represented simply as long words, together with all the ordinary words in the mental lexicon. When a familiar idiomatic expression is encountered, linguistic processing proceeds normally. Lexical access, of course, proceeds as part of linguistic processing, and lexicalized phrases such as by and large or kick the bucket are routinely found in the mental lexicon along with their constituent words, by, and, large, and so on. Which of the two meanings—literal or idiomatic—is apprehended first depends on the relative speed with which full linguistic processing and lexical/idiom access can be completed. Normally, idiom access will be completed more quickly because it does not require the lexical, syntactic, and semantic processing required for full linguistic analysis. Thus, familiar idioms will be understood more quickly than comparable literal expressions.

Gibbs’ (1984) direct access proposal is an extreme version of the Swinney and Cutler (1979) model. Rather than posit a race between idiom-meaning access and linguistic processing, Gibbs argued that linguistic processing may be bypassed entirely if an expression is recognized immediately as an idiom. In essence, idiom-meaning access may be so rapid as to obviate any linguistic analysis at all. Gibbs himself soon adopted a more compositional view of idiom comprehension, based in part on some of his own observations of lexical and syntactic phenomena involved in idiom use.

Compositional. As we have already seen, idioms can vary from apparently unitary phrases (e.g., by and large) to expressions whose idiomatic meanings derive jointly from their literal meanings and allusional content (e.g., carry coals to Newcastle). Nunberg (1978) tried to capture this variability by proposing that idioms can be ordered along a continuum of compositionality. Ordinary language is, by definition, compositional. The meaning of any given linguistic expression is determinable from the meanings of its constituent parts and the syntactic and semantic relations among those parts. The meaning of any idiom, in the standard view, is determinable entirely from its stipulated meaning, whether that meaning is represented in a special idiom list or simply as part of the mental lexicon.

As usual, a simple dichotomy fails to capture natural complexity. In an extension of Nunberg’s (1978) original proposal, Gibbs and his colleagues have shown that people can reliably judge degrees of compositionality of idioms (Gibbs, Nayak, Bolton, & Keppel, 1989; Gibbs, Nayak, & Cutting, 1989). Idioms such as spill the beans, for example, are considered relatively compositional (in Gibbs’ terms, analyzable), in contrast to idioms such as kick the bucket, which are considered noncompositional. In either case, linguistic processing proceeds in parallel with direct idiom-meaning look-up, with direct look-up usually being faster than full linguistic analysis.

A somewhat similar proposal was offered by Cacciari and Tabossi (1988). Linguistic processing and idiom look-up can occur in parallel, but idiom look-up cannot begin until the idiom itself is recognized as a configuration, that is, as a unitary expression with a meaning beyond that of its constituents. This model along with the race models mentioned earlier seem to fit most closely with what we know about idiom processing. In the next section, important idiom phenomena are considered in the context of the issue of look-up versus compositionality.

HOW IDIOMS ARE UNDERSTOOD

Idioms as Long Words

The primary evidence for direct look-up of idiom meaning is the relative speed of idiom comprehension. Idioms are understood more quickly in their idiomatic senses than in their literal senses. The to-die meaning of kick the bucket, for example, is understood more quickly than the literal meaning of striking a pail with one’s foot (Gibbs, 1980). Similarly, it takes less time to understand the expression spill the beans than to understand the literal paraphrase, tell the secrets (McGlone, Glucksberg, & Cacciari, in press; see also, Ortony et al., 1978). These data suggest that an idiom’s meaning may be retrieved from memory without full linguistic processing, on the assumption that direct memory retrieval takes less time than would standard linguistic processing.

Idioms as Linguistic Expressions

Whatever else they may be, idioms are composed of words that in turn form phrases and sentences. In general, people cannot inhibit their language-processing system. If someone attends to a word, for example, then they cannot ignore that word’s meaning. Even if people are asked explicitly to ignore a word’s meaning, as in Stroop’s classic color-naming experiment, the meaning still comes through. People who try to name the color of the ink that a color name is printed in are delayed momentarily when the color name and ink color differ (e.g., when the word red is printed in green ink; Stroop, 1935). Given the automaticity of the language-processing system, it should not be surprising to find evidence for the ubiquity of lexical and syntactic operations during idiom comprehension.

Phrases Versus Words. Perhaps the most compelling case for idioms as long words can be made with such idioms as by and large. Like a long word, such idioms can be negated, as in:

Tom: By and large, the economy seems to be doing well.

Ned: Not so by and large: Have you seen the latest unemployment figures?

Unlike a word, however, such idioms can be negated internally, as in:

Ned: By but not so large! Have you considered.…

If the string by and large were indeed nothing more than a long word, then substituting but for and, together with inserting two additional words, not and so, should produce an unacceptable string. Not only is the string acceptable, it is perfectly interpretable. Phrases such as by and large, however much they might behave like long words, are still phrases and treated as such.

Do Words Matter? Semantic Compatibility Effects. Some phrasal idioms seem odd when synonyms are substituted for the original words, and indeed may not even be recognized as idioms; for example, people rarely realize that boot the pail is a paraphrase of kick the bucket (Gibbs, Nayak, & Cutting, 1989). Other phrasal idioms, especially those that are judged to be compositional, can survive lexical substitutions, but the substitutions are constrained jointly by the idiom’s meaning and the semantics of the words themselves. The idiom break the ice, for example, refers to a more or less discrete event that results in a relaxation of a stiff, awkward, chilly social situation. Substituting the word crack for break in this idiom is relatively acceptable. In contrast, the words crush, grind, or shave would not be acceptable in this idiom, even though these actions are perfectly appropriate to the actual object, ice. Can the proverbial ice be melted? Perhaps, but only if a gradual change in the social atmosphere were involved. These examples illustrate the potential role of literal word meanings in idiomatic use and comprehension. Lexical substitutions are not only possible but also are semantically constrained precisely because idioms must be processed linguistically, even when such processing is not necessary for determining the idiom’s meaning.

Semantic Constraints on Idiom Use. Idioms such as kick the bucket tend to resist lexical substitutions. Nevertheless, the semantic properties of their constituents may still play important roles in use and in comprehension. Even though there is no apparent relation between the meanings of the words kick and bucket and the concept “to die,” word meanings and idiomatic meaning may still interact to guide and constrain this idiom’s use. On the one hand, our understanding of what it means to die guides and constrains how the idiom kick the bucket may be used. People can die silently, and so it makes sense to say, “He silently kicked the bucket.” People cannot die “sharply,” so even though one can kick sharply, one cannot say “He sharply kicked the bucket.” On the other hand, the meanings of the words kick and bucket can also play important roles. Kicking is a discrete act, and so, even though one can say, “He lay dying all week,” one cannot say, “He lay kicking the bucket all week” (Wasow, Sag, & Nunberg, 1983). This is because the only way one can kick a bucket all week is to kick it over and over again, but one cannot die over and over again.

How real is the bucket? Once used in discourse, the proverbial bucket behaves just as would any other discourse referent, as shown by its availability as an anaphoric referent. Consider the following conversational fragment:

George: Did the old man kick the bucket last night?

Edward: Nah, he barely nudged it.

In this context, the relation of nudge to kick and the use of the pronoun it to refer to bucket are...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Foreword
• Preface
• List of Contributors
• PART I. IDIOM INTERPRETATION AND THE LITERAL FIGURATIVE DISTINCTION
• PART II. ACQUISITION AND PROCESSING OF IDIOMS
• PART III. MEANING AND STRUCTURE
• Author Index
• Subject Index