Copyright vested in the author; Creative Commons Attribution Licence Journal of the Southeast Asian Linguistics Society JSEALS 13.2 (2020): 96-113 ISSN: 1836-6821, DOI: http://hdl.handle.net/10524/52475 University of Hawaiʼi Press LEXICALIZATION PATTERNS OF PATH MOTION IN VIETNAMESE: A PERSPECTIVE FROM COGNITIVE LINGUISTICS LY Ngoc Toan Lac Hong University lytoandhcs75@gmail.com Abstract This paper investigates how Vietnamese people express motion by using path verbs. This paper is based on the theory of lexicalization patterns, which is related to the conflation of semantic components into linguistic units. The data consists of expressions of motion verbs and spatial prepositions that were taken from twelve Vietnamese stories and three novels in the 20th century onward. The results of this paper present several lexicalization patterns of semantic components that become path verbs and spatial prepositions. Moreover, this paper clarifies construction grammar of lexical expressions of path motion in Vietnamese, which refers to speakers’ knowledge of motion utilized to express motion. Keywords: path motion, lexicalization patterns, conflation and lexical expression ISO 639-3 codes: vie 1 Introduction Cognitive linguistics is an approach to language study viewing linguistic knowledge as part of general cognition and thinking; linguistic behavior is not separated from other general cognitive abilities allowing mental processes of reasoning, memory, attention and learning, but understood as an integral part of it. Cognitive linguistics has had a profound impact on the study of language in terms of both semantics and grammar from the 1980s onward. Evidence exists that language is learned and processed much in the same way as other information about the world and that the same cognitive processes are involved in language and other forms of thinking (Taylor & Littlemore 2014:1). As a result, Evans & Green (2006:5) conclude that language study from this perspective is the study of conceptualization patterns. That is, language provides windows into cognitive functions and insights into the nature, structure, and organization of thoughts and ideas. Motion is a domain in a language that has been particularly attractive since it is one of the primary experiential domains in human life and bound to be lexicalized in all languages. For this reason, an investigation into motion from the perspective of cognitive linguistics is indispensable, as it illuminates the relationship between language and thought. This can shed light on the role of thought in shaping language. More importantly, this analysis will help to expound different explanations of motion from cultural aspects. One of the dominant works associated with the motion domain is Talmy’s (1985) binary typology. In this research, Talmy delves into the relationship between surface forms and semantic components. More precisely, he examined the way many semantic components (e.g. Figure, Ground, Manner, Motion, Path and Cause) are lexicalized into different surface forms (e.g. path verbs) in motion events. Talmy explains that the basic motion event consists of one object (the Figure), whether moving or located in comparison with the other objects (the Ground). Besides Figure and Ground, it is analyzed as consisting of more components, namely Path and Motion.