The Oxford Handbook of Cognitive Linguistics Part 47. In the past decade, Cognitive Linguistics has developed into one of the most dynamic and attractive frameworks within theoretical and descriptive linguistics The Oxford Handbook of Cognitive Linguistics is a major new reference that presents a comprehensive overview of the main theoretical concepts and descriptive/theoretical models of Cognitive Linguistics, and covers its various subfields, theoretical as well as applied. | 430 RONALD W. LANGACKER Figure . Extension said to manifest a particular linguistic expression. Moreover the set of categorizations provide an assessment of the expression s degree of well-formedness or conventionality . The two kinds of categorizing relationships depicted in figure elaboration and extension respectively correspond to whether the target conforms to the conventional unit invoked or distorts it in some manner. If all the categorizations effected on a given occasion are elaborative the expression is fully well-formed. Each categorization involving extension represents a measure of nonconventionality ill-formedness . Since linguistic resources are always being stretched to accommodate new circumstances a certain amount of nonconventionality is typical of normal language use. It is only when the distortions are drastic enough individually or collectively that an expression is judged as being deviant. Figure depicts a particular unit A being employed for the categorization of B in the context of a single usage event. Whether it constitutes an elaboration or an extension B represents the contextual value assumed by A on that occasion. Suppose now that A is used with comparable value on a number of occasions . a lexical item might be used repeatedly with the same extended meaning . If both B and B s categorization by A occur across a series of usage events they like any other facet of such events are subject to progressive entrenchment and conventionalization. The result as shown for the case of extension in figure is that both achieve the status of conventional linguistic units and are thus incorporated in the linguistic system as a matter of definition . Starting from a single unit A successive developments of this sort can eventually yield a network of related units linked by categorizing relationships which can themselves be recognized as units . This network is a complex category with A as its prototype Lakoff 1987 Langacker .
