A conceptualização de phrasal verbs com base em representações imagético-esquemáticas animadas do verbo e da partícula

Abstract

As the contemporary lingua franca, English is increasingly sought after by those who wish or need to learn a foreign language. However, learners often report difficulties in understanding certain aspects of the language, such as phrasal verbs. These complex constructions have attracted growing interest in the field of Language Studies, particularly from the perspective of Cognitive Linguistics, an area in which much remains to be explored in Brazil. Internationally, research has been investigating how conceptual metaphor theory can assist additional language learners in conceptualizing phrasal verbs. Nevertheless, many of these studies contrast the cognitive approach solely with traditional teaching methods and focus exclusively on the contribution of particles to meaning construction. Considering the need to also examine the role of verbs in this process, this research analyzes the Image Schemas projected by both the verb and the particle/preposition that compose the phrasal verb. To deepen the understanding of meaning construction, the study additionally draws on Lakoff and Johnson’s (1980) container metaphor and Kövecses’ (2002) image-schematic metaphors as theoretical support for analyzing metaphorical projection across domains. Moreover, aiming to make the dynamics of image schemas more accessible, the study investigates the effectiveness of using animated diagrams to enhance learners’ understanding. An experiment was conducted with two groups of university students: a control group, which had access to static diagrams focused exclusively on particles, created by Rudzka-Ostyn (2003), and an experimental group, exposed to animated diagrams illustrating the image-schematic interaction between verb and particle. The results suggest that the animated diagrams contributed to a better understanding of the metaphorical construction of phrasal verbs, highlighting that the sharing of image schemas between the components can influence the degree of perceived metaphoricity. Thus, this study seeks to contribute to a more effective teaching and learning process of these essential structures in English as an additional language