Linguistic, cognitive, and social constraints on lexical entrenchment.

Loading...

View/Download File

Chesley_umn_0130E_12081.pdf (2.06 MB)

Persistent link to this item

https://hdl.handle.net/11299/115691

Statistics

View Statistics

Journal Title

Journal ISSN

Volume Title

Title

Linguistic, cognitive, and social constraints on lexical entrenchment.

Authors

Chesley, Paula

Published Date

2011-08

Publisher

Type

Thesis or Dissertation

Abstract

How do new words become established in a speech community? This dissertation documents linguistic, cognitive, and social factors that are hypothesized to affect lexical entrenchment, the extent to which a new word becomes part of the lexicon of a speech community. First, in a longitudinal corpus study, I find that linguistic properties such as the range of a word's meaning and the donor language of a borrowing affect lexical entrenchment. Contextual factors such as frequency, dispersion, and a borrowing's cultural context also play a role in lexical entrenchment. Second, a psycholinguistic study examines the extent to which speakers remember previously unseen words. Through eye-tracking, lexical decision, and free recall tasks, I determine that, again, linguistic and contextual information plays a role in the memorability of a new word. Speakers are more likely to remember words used in particular contexts, and they are also more likely to remember certain word types than others. In a third study, I find that musical preferences, knowledge of popular culture, and social ties influence comprehension of African-American English vocabulary. Together, these studies suggest that lexical entrenchment is predictable to an extent previously undocumented. Results indicate that information relating to dynamical, non-linear systems could be profitable in further studies on lexical entrenchment.

Keywords

African-American English

Eye-tracking

Lexical borrowing

Neologism

Recall

Social network

Linguistics

Description

University of Minnesota Ph.D. dissertation. August 2011. Major: Linguistics. Advisor: Bruce Downing,. 1 computer file (PDF); xi, 139 pages, appendix.

Related to

Replaces

License

Collections

Dissertations

Series/Report Number

Funding information

Isbn identifier

Doi identifier

Previously Published Citation

Suggested citation

Chesley, Paula. (2011). Linguistic, cognitive, and social constraints on lexical entrenchment.. Retrieved from the University Digital Conservancy, https://hdl.handle.net/11299/115691.

Content distributed via the University Digital Conservancy may be subject to additional license and use restrictions applied by the depositor. By using these files, users agree to the Terms of Use. Materials in the UDC may contain content that is disturbing and/or harmful. For more information, please see our statement on harmful content in digital repositories.