Current Developments in Cognitive Linguistics

After 30 years of theoretical development,we need to address the question whether the internal evolution of Cognitive Linguistics can be synthesized:what are the fundamental underlying trends in Cognitive Linguistics,and how do they shape the current developments within Cognitive Linguistics This paper argues that Cognitive Linguistics is essentially characterized by a gradual recontextualization of the grammar.First,the development of 20th century grammar is characterized by a succession of a decontextualizing and a recontextualizing movement.Second,the various stages in the development of Cognitive Linguistics involve the gradual recovery of the various types of context that were discarded by generative grammar.These involve the experiential and embodied context of meaning in natural language,the pragmatic context of actual language usage,and the social and cultural context of language as a shared code.