MPI Colloquium Petra Schumacher

Title

Linguistic creativity and meaning adaptation in real-time
 

Abstract

Although speakers frequently underspecify certain aspects of meaning, communication tends to be remarkably successful, with addressees typically being able to enrich their interpretation on the spot. What are the underlying mechanisms that allow comprehenders to arrive at the intended meaning? How do sociocultural and individual traits contribute to adaptation and meaning change? 
These questions are addressed through an investigation of the creative use of metonymic expressions, i.e. the use of an expression that refers to something that isn't explicitly included in the conventional denotation of that particular expression (e.g., “The cappuccino asked for the menu.”, where “the cappuccino” refers to the person associated with the cappuccino). The talk presents a series of event-related brain potential studies that investigated the processes involved in the comprehension of metonymic expressions.  (i) The data reveal distinct processing profiles for different types of metonymic use. (ii) Discrete stages in meaning evolution are discussed as one source for this variation in processing. (iii) Turning to naturalistic reports with repeated use of metonymic expressions, meaning adaptation is observed as the communicative situation unfolds. (iv) The ability to adapt to creative language use in real-time is further modulated by an individual’s capacity to handle neural noise.