Language and Culture: Within the Four Dimensions

Abstract

The article concentrates on the interaction between the four dimensions of language space (Yu. S. Stepanov) and four mental spaces involved in the contact of two cultures. We argue that all four dimensions of language (semantic, pragmatic, syntactic and cognitive) are activated in the interaction between cultures. The main emphasis is on the cognitive/conceptual line studied through the lens of conceptual blending. We distinguish three levels of conceptual integration. We hold that at every level the mechanism of interactive alignment is at work. It ensures that interlocutors operate on common representations underlying semantic, syntactic and pragmatic linguistic structures of the two cultures in contact.