Prepositions from the Perspective of Cognitive Study

Abstract

Prepositions as function words, plays very important role in English. Prepositions are deemed as very difficult items both in English learning and teaching, because the senses of them are quite complex and abundant and the usage and collocation of them are quite flexible and complex. According to the English corpus statistics, there is a preposition in every eight word in any English text. In American English Brown Corpus, 12.21% of the word is a preposition; in its corresponding LOB corpus of British English, there are 12.34% of the word is preposition. Thus, the preposition plays an indispensable role in the English vocabulary. At the same time, prepositions research plays an important role in cognitive linguistics.