CHAPTER ONEINTRODUCTION

1.1. Motivations and scope of this research 

1.2. Research methodology and data collection

1.3. Feasibility of iconicity in word order 

1.4. A brief sketch of the chapters 

CHAPTER TWOLITERATURE REVIEW

2.1. Studies on word order at large

2.2. Previous studies on the order of coordinate idioms 

2.3. Previous studies on the order of prenominal modifiers

within a noun phrase

2.4. Discussion and summary 

CHAPTER THREETHEORETICAL FRAMEWORK: ICONICITY AND

ICONICITY PRINCIPLES

3.1. Arbitrariness versus Iconicity 

3.2. Three principles of Iconicity 

3.3. Summary 

CHAPTER FOURAN ICONIC ANALYSIS OF WORD ORDER WITHIN

COORDINATE IDIOMS

4.1. Definition and general properties

4.2. The analysis of coordinate idioms from Temporal

Order Principle

4.3. The analysis of coordinate idioms from Spatial Order 

4.4. An analysis of coordinate idioms from Markedness Order 

4.5. Discussion and summary 

CHAPTER FIVEAN ICONIC ANALYSIS OF WORD ORDER WITHIN

PRENOMINAL MODIFIERS

5.1. Definitions of modifiers within an English noun phrase 

5.2. Classifications of modifiers 

5.3. Linear order of determiners 

5.4. Linear order of adjectivals as prenominal modifiers 

5.5. Gradability degree of prenominal adjectives 

5.6. Discussion and summary 

CHAPTER SIXCONCLUSION 

6.1. Findings 

6.2. Limitations and further work

References

1.1. Motivations and scope of this research

There are two factors that motivate the present thesis. The first is to exhibit that what cannot be solved in the formalist approachThe formalist approach is one of the two orientations in modern linguistics: it focuses centrally on linguistic form. In the early 1960s, Chomsky and his associates started using the word “structuralist” to refer to those formcentered models that preceded generative grammar, in particular, to those in the American postBloomfield tradition. It seems that the term “structuralist” is a substitute for “formalist”. can find its answer in cognitive linguistics. The present approach can be viewed as a supplementary work to formalists including both Saussure and Chomsky traditions. Saussure maintains that grammar is an arbitrary and selfcontained formal system of rules. Based on generative grammarSome linguists (Bates and MacWhinny 1989, Traugott 1985) express lucidly against generativists, because they believe that grammar is immune to external influence. However, Newmeyer (1998b:158-159) argues that most of them have misinterpreted Chomsky’s views and insists that the module of Universal Grammar has a partly functional motivation and that Chimsky also involves “considerations of language use”., Chomskys view is that linguistic universals are manifestations of humans innate languagespecific faculty, which is modularized and independent of other cognitive systems. This languagespecific faculty is characterized by Chomsky in his Universal Grammar, which consists of inborn sets of principles and parameters.

 It is of course reasonable to assume that there is a significant innate component and that some of the innate properties give rise to human language abilities. However, innateness of cognitive abilities has not been a chief concern of cognitive linguists, who are more concerned with demonstrating the role of general cognitive abilities in language. Much of their research has been devoted to elucidating conceptual structures as they are seen to apply to language. They insist that form should not be independent of its meaning, but mostly, if not entirely, derived from meaning. As Langacker (1993: 1) pinpoints that “language structure furnishes important clues concerning basic mental phenomena”. Tai (1995: 2) agrees that “genuine explanations lie in both the structures of the real world, as conceptualized by the language user, and the linearity of human speech.” In other words, linguistic explanations should be processed in terms of humans perceptual and cognitive structures.

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