The mental space is a theoretical construct proposed by
Gilles Fauconnier
Gilles Fauconnier () (19 August 1944 – 3 February 2021) was a French linguist, researcher in cognitive science, and author, who worked in the U.S. He was distinguished professor at the University of California, San Diego
The University ...
corresponding to
possible world
A possible world is a complete and consistent way the world is or could have been. Possible worlds are widely used as a formal device in logic, philosophy, and linguistics in order to provide a semantics for intensional logic, intensional and mod ...
s in
truth-conditional semantics Truth-conditional semantics is an approach to semantics of natural language that sees meaning (or at least the meaning of assertions) as being the same as, or reducible to, their truth conditions. This approach to semantics is principally associated ...
. The main difference between a mental space and a possible world is that a mental space does not contain a faithful representation of reality, but an
idealized cognitive model
An idealized cognitive model, or ICM, is the name given in cognitive linguistics to describe the phenomenon in which knowledge represented in a semantic frame is often a conceptualization of experience that is not congruent with reality. It has ...
.
Building of mental spaces and establishment of mappings between those mental spaces are the two main processes involved in construction of meaning.
It is one of the basic components in Gilles Fauconnier and
Mark Turner's
blending theory, a theory within
cognitive semantics
Cognitive semantics is part of the cognitive linguistics movement. Semantics is the study of linguistic meaning. Cognitive semantics holds that language is part of a more general human Cognition, cognitive ability, and can therefore only describe t ...
.
Base space and built space
Base space, also known as reality space, presents the interlocutors' shared knowledge of the real world.
Space builders are elements within a sentence that establish spaces distinct from, yet related to the base space constructed.
Space builders can be expressions like prepositional phrases, adverbs, connectives, and subject-verb combinations that are followed by an embedded sentence. They require hearers to establish scenarios beyond the present point of time.
A built space depicts a situation that only holds true for that space itself, but may or may not be true in reality. The base space and built spaces are occupied by elements that map onto each other. These elements include categories that may refer to specific entities in those categories. According to Fauconnier's Access Principle, specific entities of a category in a space can be described by its counterpart category in another space even if it differs from the specific entity in the other space.
An example of a built space can be seen in the example " Mary wants to buy a book". In this case, the built space is not that of reality, but Mary's desire space. Though the book in reality space refers to any book in general, it can still be used to describe the book in Mary's desire space, which may or may not be a specific book...
Foundation and expansion space
‘if A then B’ sentences create another two spaces called foundation space and expansion space in addition to the base space. The foundation space is a hypothetical space relative to the base space set up by the space builder "if". The expansion space is set up by the space builder "then". If the conditions in the foundation space hold, the expansion space follows.
See also
*
Semiotics
Semiotics (also called semiotic studies) is the systematic study of sign processes ( semiosis) and meaning making. Semiosis is any activity, conduct, or process that involves signs, where a sign is defined as anything that communicates something ...
References
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Philosophy of language