A poesia de Augusto de Campos sob a ótica da linguística cognitiva: a interpretação descritiva

Abstract

This study describes through the theoretical framework of Cognitive Linguistics the underlying processes demanded in the interpretation of the verbal signs of poems of Augusto de Campos. The investigations of this sort are called Cognitive Poetics, therefore framing this study. The criterion used to select the seven poems analyzed was the possibility to describe what the author of the study understood by reading them. Since many of the texts of the poet make use of imagistic resources, the analyzed poems were selected for being possible to indicate how the verbal features of them made such interpretations possible, although in some cases some imagistic features were indispensable for the meaning construction. These interpretations were analyzed using the theoretical framework of Cognitive Linguistics, more specifically, image schemas and conceptual structure, frame semantics, prototype theory, conceptual metaphor and metonymy, mental spaces, conceptual blending, construction grammar and morphological construction, and some of Zyskos propositions found in A cognitive account on wordplay, according to the specific demands of each interpretation. The study shows the adequacy of the theoretical propositions adopted, since they were efficient in describing the cognitive apparatus needed to interpret the texts. The interpretations of the poems support one of the central propositions of Cognitive Linguistics, the primacy of semantics in linguistic studies, in opposition to syntax, since some of the texts are composed by only a few words presented in an unusual manner or even without a sentence structure. Another important proposition supported by the analysis is the non-modularity of linguistic ability, which demands cognitive abilities not specialized in its production/reception, since, in some cases, the interpretations were only possible taking imagistic features on account, exacerbating this interdependence. The study also contributes in more specific linguistic issues, such in demonstrating the manifestation of the conceptual structuring system in open class words; the possible description of a morphological construction in Brazilian Portuguese; and the necessity of the emergence of a conceptual blending network in the interpretation of neologisms. The study presented here sums up the evidences of the applicability of the theoretical framework adopted in the description of the interpretation of poetic texts and contributes to the field that is inserted, as much in the corroboration of its theories and premises, as it points to future investigations of interest in the area.