Katarina Rasulic

High Hopes and Tall Tales:

Conceptualization of Vertical Dimension in English and Serbian
This paper deals with the vertical dimension of spatial orientation as the basis
of concrete
and abstract conceptualization in English and Serbian. In both languages vertica
lity as a
very prominent dimension of human functioning is encoded by a number of lexemes,
all of
which are highly polysemous. The lexemes under investigation are verticality adj
ectives English 'high/tall' and 'low' and Serbian 'visok/nizak', and prepositons - Engli
sh 'over/above'
and 'under/below/underneath/beneath' and Serbian 'iznad/nad' and 'ispod/pod/nize
'. The
analysis is focused on contrasting the mechanisms of the transfer of meaning of
these lexemes
into abstract domains in the two languages. It was found that in both languages
polysemy of these verticality lexemes is motivated by the same conceptual metaph
ors, such
as 'more is up', 'goodis up', 'control is up' , etc., and yet there are numerous
cases where no
translation equivalents are available. In particular, such cases are examined an
d accounted
for. Special attention will be paid to idiomatic expressions which include the e
xamined
lexemes. An attempt will be made to enable learners of the second language to gr
asp the
variety of meanings of the examined lexemes, especially of prepositions, by givi
ng an
insight into the conceptual grid against which semantic specificities are profil
ed.