Typology of fixed expressions

Typology of fixed expressions

Fixed expressions are not a unified phenomenon. Therefore, no clear classifications are possible. This typology of FEIs involves identifying reasons why each potential FEI might be regarded lexicographically as a holistic unit, i.e. whether the string is problematic and anomalous on grounds of lexicogrammar, lexicogrammar, pragmatics , or semantics. semantics. This led to three macrocategories of FEIs.

3 macrocategories
Anomalous collocations problematic in terms of lexicogrammar Formulae - problematic in terms of pragmatics Metaphors - problematic in terms of semantics

Anomalous collocations
Anomalous collocations are problematic in lexicogrammatical terms they are syntagmatically or paradigmatically* aberrant. Therefore, they cannot be decoded (i.e. understood) purely compositionally nor encoded (produced) freely.

Anomalous collocations
SYNTAGMATIC - pertaining to a relationship among linguistic elements that occur sequentially in the chain of speech or writing, as the relationship between the sun and is shining or the and sun in the sentence The sun is shining. shining.

Anomalous collocations
PARADIGMATIC - pertaining to a relationship among linguistic elements that can substitute for each other in a given context, as the relationship of sun in The sun is shining to other nouns, as moon, moon, star, light, star, or light, that could substitute for it in that sentence, or of is shining to was shining, shone, shining, shone, will shine, etc., as well shine, as to is rising, is setting, etc. rising, setting,

Subclassification of anomalous collocations

Anomalous collocations are subdivided according to the nature of the anomaly into: (1) Ill-formed collocations break the conventional grammatical rules of IllEnglish (e.g. at all, by and large, of course, stay put) all, large, course, put) (2) Cranberry collocations include items that are unique to the string and not found in other collocations (e.g. in retrospect, kith and kin, on behalf of retrospect, kin, someone/something, short shrift, to and fro) someone/something, shrift, fro) (3) Defective collocations cannot be decoded purely compositionally mostly because a component item has a meaning not found in other collocations or contexts, although it has other compositional meanings; or because one or more of the component items is semantically empty (e.g. at least, a least, foregone conclusion, in effect, beg the question, in time) conclusion, effect, question, time) (4) Phraseological collocations consists of cases where there is a limited paradigm in operation and other analogous strings may be found, but where the structure is not fully productive (e.g. in action, into action, out of action; action; on show, on display; to a ____ degree, to a ____ extent) show, degree, extent)

Formulae
Formulae are problematic because of their discoursal functions: they are functions: specialized pragmatically. They generally conform to lexicogrammatical conventions of English, and are generally compositional semantically, although some similes and proverbs are obscure or metaphorical.

Subclassification of formulae
(1) Simple formulae routine compositional strings; nevertheless, they have some special discoursal function or are iterative or emphatic, as well as syntagmatically fixed (e.g. alive and well, Im well, sorry to say, not exactly, pick and choose, you know) say, exactly, choose, know) (2) Sayings include formulae such as quotations, catch-phrases catchand truisms* (e.g. curiouser and curiouser, dont let the bastdards grind you down, thats the way the cookie crumbles) crumbles) (3) Proverbs metaphorical proverbs (e.g. you cant have your cake and eat it, every cloud has a silver lining), non-metaphorical lining), nonproverbs (enough is enough, first come first served) (enough enough, served) (4) Similes institutionalized comparisons that are typically transparent, but not always, and are signalled by as or like (e.g. as good as gold, as old as the hills, like lambs to the slaughter, live like gold, hills, slaughter, a king) king)

Subclassification of formulae
TRUISM - an undoubted or self-evident selftruth CATCH-PHRASE - a phrase or expression CATCHrecognized by its repeated utterance. Such phrases often originate in popular culture and in the arts, and typically spread through a variety of mass media (such as literature and publishing, motion pictures, television and radio), as well as word of mouth

Subclassification of formulae
dont let the bastdards grind you down = Often given in the Latin version - 'nil carborundum illegitimi'. The phrase originated during World War II. Lexicographer Eric Partridge attributes it II. to British army intelligence very early in the war. war. The phrase was adopted by US Army general "Vinegar" Joe Stillwell as his motto during the war. war. It was later further popularized in the US by 1964 presidential candidate Barry Goldwater curiouser and curiouser = from Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll

Metaphors
Metaphors are strings that are nonnoncompositional because of their semantics: they include pure idioms. idioms. Sublassification of metaphors reflects degrees of transparency. transparency.

Subclassification of metaphors
(1) Transparent metaphors are those that are institutionalized but the image or vehicle of the metaphor is such that the reader/hearer can be expected to decode it successfully by means of his real-world knowledge (e.g. alarm realbells ring, behind someones back, breathe life into something, on ring, back, something, someones doorstep, pack ones bags) doorstep, bags) (2) Semi-transparent metaphors require some specialist knowledge in order Semito be decoded. Not all speakers of a language may understand the reference. If the institutionalized idiomatic meaning is unknown, there may be two or more possible interpretations (e.g. grasp the nettle, on an even nettle, keel, keel, the pecking order, throw in the towel, under ones belt). order, towel, belt). Grasp the nettle means tackle something difficult with determination and without delay, but someone not knowing the metaphor might easily interpret it as do something foolish which will have unpleasant consequences. (3) Opaque metaphors are pure idioms, and in them compositional decoding and interpretation of the image are practically impossible without knowledge of the historical origins of the expression (bite the bullet, kick the bucket, (bite bullet, bucket, over the moon, red herring, shoot the breeze) moon, herring, breeze)

Collocation and chunking

Collocation
Language is strongly patterned: many words occur repeatedly in certain lexicogrammatical patterns. Psycholinguistic research language is processed in chunks. The basic unit for encoding and decoding may be the group, set phrase, or collocation, rather than ortographic collocation, word. This is relevant to FEIs because it may shed light on how they are processed, how they fossilize, and on their function in discourse.

Collocation - definition
Collocation is the occurrence of two or more words within a short space of each other in a text. (J.M. Sinclair, Corpus, Concordance, Collocation, OUP, 1991) Collocation, Collocation denotes frequently repeated or statistically significant co-occurrences, cowhether or not there are any special semantic bonds between collocating items.

Collocation
Collocation simple co-occurrence of coitems Anomalous collocation designates a class of FEIs, with subtypes (ill-formed (illcollocation, collocation, cranberry collocation, collocation, defective collocation, phraseological collocation, collocation) collocation)

Kinds of collocation
Collocations are the lexical evidence that words do not combine randomly but follow rules, principles, and real-world motivations. Different kinds of realcollocation reflect different kinds of phenomenon. The simplest kind arises through semantics: co-occurrence of co-members cocoof semantic fields, represenring co-occurrence of the referents in the real coworld, e.g. word jam co-occurs with other words from the lexical set food, cosuch as tarts, butty, doughnuts, marmalade, apricot, strawberry. tarts, butty, doughnuts, marmalade, apricot, strawberry. A second kind of collocation arises where a word requires association with a member of a certain class or category of item, and such collocations are constrained lexicogrammatically as well as semantically, e.g. word rancid, adj. adj. is typically associated with butter, fat, and foods containing butter or fat. butter, fat, In other cases, a word has a particular meaning only when it is in collocation with certain other words, e.g. face the truth/facts/problem. Also, selection truth/facts/problem. restrictions on verbs may specify certain kinds of subject or object, e.g. the verb drink normally requires a human subject and a liquid as object.

Kinds of collocation
A third kind of collocation is syntactic, and arises where a verb, adjective, or nominalization requires complementation with, for example, a specified particle. Such collocations are grammatically well formed and highly frequent, but not necessarily holistic and independent, e.g. to be, one of, had been, you know, thank be, of, been, know, you very much, are going to be, etc. much, be,

Two principles underlying language

The open choice principle The idiom principle These two principles are diametrically opposed,and both are required in order to account for language. The open choice principle a way of seeing language text as a result of a very large number of complex choices. At each point where a unit is completed (a word or a phrase or a clause) a large range of choices opens up, and the only restraint is grammaticalness. The idiom principle a language user has available to him a large number of semi-prestructured phrases that constitute single choices. semiThus at a point in text where the open choice model would suggest a large range of possible choices, the idiom principle restricts it over and above predictable semantic restraints that result from topic or situational context. A single choice in one slot may be made which dictates which elements will fill the next slot/s, and prevents the use of free choice.

Two principles underlying language

Example: of course orthography and the open choice model suggests that this sequence comprises two different choices: one at the of slot, and one at the course slot. the idiom principle suggests that it is a single choice which coincidentally occupies two word spaces.

The idiom principle

This principle is seen not only in fixed strings (e.g. of course) course) but also in other kinds of phraseological unit, e.g. greetings and social routines demonstrate the idiom principle. Sociocultural rules of interaction restrict choices within an exchange which may be realized in fairly fixed formulations. Sayings, similes, and proverbs also represent single choices, even when they are truncated or manipulated, and they may be prompted discoursally as stereotyped responses, e.g. (every cloud has) a silver lining; no news is good news these are predictable comments on common experiences.

The idiom principle

There are also recurrent clauses and other units that demonstrate the idiom principle, e.g. from purely compositional can I come in?, are you ready? to you can lead a horse to water but you can't make it/him drink, or its as easy as falling off a log. drink, log. Memorized clauses and clause sequences form a high proportion of the fluent stretches of speech heard in everyday conversation.

Psycholinguistic aspects of chunking

Research into language acquisition suggests that language is learned, stored, retrieved, and produced in multi-word multiitems, not just as individual words or terms.

Processing of FEIs
Research into the psycholinguistic processing of FEIs adresses questions such as: how FEIs are recognized; how they are stored in the mental lexicon; whether idiomatic meanings are retrieved before, after, or simultaneously with literal meanings; how variations and inflections are handled. In attempting to find out how FEIs are processed, the notion of the idiom list has been incorporated into the hypothesis that idioms are stored separately in the mental lexicon. The analysis of the literal meaning occurs separately from the idiomatic meaning. The literal meaning is normally processed first, and when the processing fails to yield an interpretation for the context, the idiom list is accessed. According to another hypothesis, idioms are stored and retrieved like single words and idiomatic and literal meanings are processed simultaneously. The experiments show that subjects decode idiomatic meanings faster than literal ones. There is a third hypothesis, which introduces the notion of the key word, which is a component word in an FEI that triggers recognition of the whole.

Lexicalization
Lexicalization is the process by which a string of words and morphemes becomes institutionalized as part of the language and develops its own specialist meaning or function. Lexicalization of FEIs results from a three-way tension threebetween quantitative criterion of institutionalization, the lexicogrammatical criterion of fixedness, and the qualitative criterion of non-compositionality, but there are nonproblems with all these criteria: institutionalization and frequency are not enough on their own, fixedness can be misleading (there is instability of forms), nonnoncompositionality is dependent on the ways in which the meanings of individual words are analysed both in dictionaries and notional lexicons.

Diachronic considerations
Institutionalization is a diachronic process much of the lexical, syntactic and semantic anomalousness of FEIs results from historical processes. Cranberry collocations such as to and fro and kith and kin contain lexical items that were formerly current. The ill-formed collocation through thick and thin is an ellipsis of illthrough thicket and thin wood, and of course is an ellipsis of a wood, matter of course, or of course and custom, or of common course. course, custom, course. FEIs disappear, and others emerge. Metaphors, initially transparent, come in from sporting, technical, and other specialist domains, e.g. business metaphors such as theres no such thing as a free lunch. As neologisms become institutionalized and divorced from their original contexts of use, the explanation or motivation for the metaphor may become lost or obscure.

Diachronic considerations
Some metaphorical FEIs and proverbs may be traced back to classical or Biblical sayings or historical events, e.g.better late than never, all roads lead to Rome, an eye for an eye, burn ones bridges/boats. bridges/boats. Catchphrases drawn from cinema, television, politics, journalism and so on become institutionalized as sayings and other kinds of formula this is an obvious way in which English fixed expressions realize intertextuality:

Diachronic considerations
And now for something completely different Didnt she do well Go ahead, make my day I think we should be told Ill be back Ill have what shes having Pass the sick bag, Alice That will do nicely There is no alternative (abbreviated as TINA) This could be the beginning of a beautiful friendship The white heat of this revolution We wuz robbed It takes two to tango (song by Hoffman and Manning) When the going gets tough, the tough get going (popularized by Joseph Kennedy) The opera isnt over until the fat lady sings (Dan Cook)

Diachronic considerations
The catchphrases above are associated with a memorable event or film sequence, or consistent media use, they are repeated as commentary devices, greetings and so on, and become situationally or culturally bound. In other cases, FEIs become established as pithy ways of expressing or referring to concepts; hyphenation is an indicator of the process of institutionalization and lexicalization. The catenation of strings into quasi-single words signals the writers intention to quasiconsider a string as a unit, e.g.: on a first-come-first-served basis first-come-firsthis charity-begins-at-home appeal charity-begins-ata dont-take-no-for-an-answer message dont-take-no-for-anSix months ago it (sc. a hotel) changed owners, but remained in the hello-how-may- help-youhello-how-may-I-help-you-realm The chaos might amuse the man who belonged to the live-fast-dielive-fast-dieyoung-have- good-lookingyoung-have-a-good-looking-corpse school.