A Cognitive Linguistics Account of Wordplay

Book excerpt: Even though the ability to create witty puns seems to be an inherent skill of humankind, an apt explanation of their linguistic nature has evaded many academic descriptions. This monograph offers a novel conceptual perspective on the creation of meaning observable beneath the surface of wordplay. The rationale for such an approach lies in the fact that language, and hence wordplay, is a cognitive phenomenon which involves some underlying complex mental processes, such as thinking in terms of image schemas, conceptual metaphor and metonymy, or blending, to mention just a few. The book provides a survey of relevant linguistic research, introduces the main tenets of cognitive linguistics, and offers an analysis of wordplay in the light of available cognitive literature. The final outcome of this work is an array of intricate mechanisms that govern creation and comprehension of wordplay. The book will be of interest to anybody who finds wordplay research appealing, no matter their level of expertise in the field.