Os múltiplos jogos da linguagem: uma análise das relações de semelhanças de família no processo de categorização da palavra amor

Abstract

The present research, based in Wittgenstein's philosophical ideas (1999) and on cognitive linguistics, as well as on cognitive semantics, sought to analyze the relations of family resemblances in the process of categorization of the word love, aiming to answer three hypotheses regarding the limit of kinship which the word can hold in the most diverse linguistic contexts. To do so, following specific objectives, it identified and analyzed the main meanings of the word love taken from two Portuguese-language dictionaries, thus defining kinship and the possible limits present in all of them. The research here proposed an advance to the study of categorization for cognitive semantics, which was anchored in Wittgenstein's philosophical ideas to deny the classical approach. The analysis was based on the hypothetical-deductive method, taking into consideration the analytical character of the research. It was restricted to the word love, since this type of word seems to present problems in the application of the concept of family resemblances, because there is a characteristic inaccuracy in human language, as argued by the philosopher Wittgenstein. It was concluded that the word love maintains limits of relations of family resemblances, and that such limits are traced by the contexts in which we use it, thus confirming two hypotheses, among the three that guided this research.