Some reflections on what Usage-Based Cognitive Construction Grammar(s) can offer for linguistic description and explanation, a cargo de Francisco Gonzálvez-García

This talk outlines a number of theoretical and methodological aspects underpinning Usage-Based Cognitive Construction Grammar(s), with special focus on Goldberg’s Cognitive Construction Grammar (1995, 2006, 2019) and the Lexical-Constructional Model (Mairal Usón & Ruiz de Mendoza Ibáñez 2009, Ruiz de Mendoza Ibáñez 2021, 2022).

First, a theoretical review is provided by looking at the positioning of these two models within functional-cognitive space (Butler & Gonzálvez-García 2014, Butler 2024) with particular reference to the following substantive issues: (i) communication and motivation, (ii) coverage, and (iii) the form of grammar. Within this context, this talk then concentrates on one aspect where the LCM and cognitively-influenced constructionist approaches can mutually benefit, namely, the issue of lexical-constructional integration (or subsumption). The Goldbergian view of lexical-constructional integration (Goldberg, 2006: 38) can be further refined by taking on board the degree of semantic (in-) compatibility between lexical items and constructional meaning (Langacker 2009, Ziegeler 2010, Gonzálvez-García 2011, Leclercq 2019, Leclercq & Morin 2025). Within this more nuanced understanding of lexical-constructional integration, the LCM’s notions of parameterization and linguistic cueing (Ruiz de Mendoza Ibáñez & Galera Masegosa, 2014: 95) are particularly helpful in providing a principled account of the impact of (con)textual factors on the interpretation of a construction at all levels of linguistic description (Ruiz de Mendoza Ibáñez & Galera Masegosa, 2014: 14).

Finally, at a lower-level of resolution, this talk illustrates how a Goldbergian, usage-based analysis of coercion involving the intensification of a prima facie non-gradable category, such as nouns, in attributive (e.g. “Un estilo muy Madonna”) and predicative contexts (e.g. “Es muy Madonna”) can adequately capture, from a descriptive and explanatory viewpoint, the generic for specific metonymic parameterization (Ruiz de Mendoza Ibáñez and Galera Masegosa 2014) observable in this construction.