1 Fictive Motion in Igbo: A Cognitive Linguistic Approach Charity O. Mbah1 Chinedu Uchechukwu 2 Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka, Anambra State co.mbah@unizik.edu.ng1 c.uchechuku@unizik.edu.ng Abstract This study investigates Igbo fictive motion constructions of coextension paths within Talmy's framework. Fictive motion, as a cognitively universal phenomenon, expresses a static entity by using motion verbs and other dynamic linguistic structures. As a result, static and dynamic situations may be expressed alike. The effort of this paper is to investigate the existence of fictive motion in Igbo language. It focuses on one of the fictive motion categories identified by Talmy (2000) known as ‘Coextension path’ with the aim of identifying fictive motion expressions in the Igbo language in order to ascertain if it uses the same constructions that are used in Talmy's model. However, Talmy’s (2000) fictive motion framework was adopted in the analysis of the data drawn from the Igbo novel ‘juo Obinna’ by Tony Ubesie through the use of a corpus software known as Antconc 3.4.0w (windows) 2014, and analyzed based on Talmy's (2000) WA framework. The results of this study reveal that motion verbs are predominantly used in expressing Igbo fictive motion. Additionally, it establishes that Igbo fictive motion can as well occur in serial verb constructions and the constructions are evident in coextension path. We therefore confirm that, like in other languages, Igbo language has a fictive motion system. Finally, this study is a contribution to the ongoing research on fictive motion in cognitive linguistics. mailto:c.uchechuku@unizik.edu.ng Fictive Motion in Igbo – Mbah & Uchechukwu 2 Keywords: Cognitive linguistics, fictive motion, motion verbs and serial verb constructions. 1. Introduction This study is an attempt to investigate fictive motion constructions in Igbo language from a cognitive linguistic stand point, which considers language as both a mirror of the human mind and an instrument for construing and conveying information. Cognitive linguistics is a radical school to study language, based on human experience of the world and the way we perceive and conceptualize it. It assumes that the relationship between language and reality is mediated by human cognition. It studies how linguistics phenomena, like metaphor, metonymy, motion, etc., are cognitively conceptualized. The concept of Fictive motion has been utilized by cognitive linguists to refer to the dynamic descriptions of static scenes. Motion is one of the most fundamental experiences in our daily life and also in our communicative needs. It refers to everyday experience in locomotion, event perception, and action. It is the basic category in the physics of the real world as well as in the cognitive processes of perception, control, memory, and in human linguistic conceptualization. The concept ‘motion’ is the fundamental mechanism in cognitive linguistics. The study of motion has attracted a great deal of attention in recent times because its study has revealed some noticeable differences which transcended many languages. Different cognitive linguists have suggested various models for representing and understanding the semantics of motion. Traditionally, motion is characterized as a Source-Path-Goal configuration, that is, the direction in which we move from the Awka Journal of Linguistics and Languages, Special Edition 1, 2022 3 starting to the ending points. However, Talmy rejects this idea, replacing it with his notion of Figure-Move-Path-Ground formula. He believes that the two concepts of Figure and Ground are more comprehensive than those suggested by Fillmore: Source, Goal, Location and Path. Talmy states that ‘The basic Motion event consists of one object (the Figure) moving or located with respect to another object (the reference object or Ground)". The spatial relation between them is called Path, and it may be enlarged and specified by what is called Co-Events. It is pertinent to distinguish between two types of motion: Factive motion and Fictive motion. Zlatev (2014) argues that there are two ways of representing the concept motion as a cognitive process: one that limits the process as an actual perceived motion, and the other extends motion to be more ‘imaginary’ or abstract scenarios. In other words, actual motion verbs such as 'go', 'run', ‘walk’, ‘crawl’ and ‘climb’ express situations in which an animate agent physically moves from one location to another. However, Fictive motion verbs express situations with no observable physical or real motion. Rojo and Valenzuela (2009) exemplified this distinction: 1. a) Frodo climbed to the top of the hill b) The path climbed to the top of the hill In the first sentence (1a), Frodo physically moves, changing his location from the bottom to the top of the hill. However, in the second sentence (1b), the path does not move in any physical way; instead, this sentence prompts the hearer for a conceptualization of the scene in which the path is scanned in a given direction. Therefore, this study is concerned with this second type of motion. The goal of this paper is to investigate the existence of fictive motion in Igbo language. The rest of this paper is organized as Fictive Motion in Igbo – Mbah & Uchechukwu 4 follows. Section two reviews some related literature. Section three presents the data collection method. Section four presents the data analysis. Finally, section five summarizes and concludes the study. 2. Literature Review This section reviews the treatment of motion verbs in the literature and also presents the definitions of fictive motion that will be adopted for this work. 2.1 Motion Verbs Motion verbs are verbs that express movement of some entity. In other words, they describe how a physical entity changes from one place in space to another place in space (Matsumoto, 1996). For instance, ‘She drives to Lagos from Port-Harcourt’ means that the driver starts her journey in Port-Harcourt and ends it in Lagos. Uwalaka (1988:94), in consonance with the above definition, asserts that motion verbs are verbs which denote activities that result in a change of location of some entity. O’Grady and Archibald (2008:203) define motion verbs as words that can describe movement through space or those verbs that express a kind of movement such as go, walk, and run. Pablo and Gutiérrez (2001) explain such verbs as words which describe the situation in which an object which is the figure moves with regard to a reference point which is the ground following a trajectory which is the path. Furthermore, according to Matlock (2004), motion verbs are verbs that show motion and action in the verb itself. For instance ‘Peter runs along the river’. The verb ‘run’ is a motion verb which requires a subject to perform the action. Also, Matsumoto (1996) opines that motion verbs do not only denote actual changes of location of self – moving agents as in ‘This tourist goes from the station to the airport’ but are also used to describe immobile linear Awka Journal of Linguistics and Languages, Special Edition 1, 2022 5 entities as in ‘The highway runs through the mountains’. In this second sentence, there is no physical movement in the external world, but such expression reflects human conceptualization of linear entity; that is, the use of a motion verb mirrors visual or mental scanning along the path. 2.2 Fictive motion Fictive motion, which is the metaphorical motion of an object or abstraction through space, has become a subject of study in psycholinguistics and cognitive linguistics and as such has been defined by different authors both in the field of cognitive linguistics and also in the field of psycholinguistics. Within the field of cognitive linguistics many authors have paid attention to the conceptualization of motion in English. Also, fictive motion has received different labels in the previous linguistic literatures, such as fictive motion (Talmy 1983, 1996, 2000, Matlock and Richardson 2004), abstract motion (Langacker 1987, Blomberg and Zlatev 2014) or subjective motion (Matsumoto, 1996). Based on these different labels used to refer to this conceptualization of motion, the term ‘fictive’ is adopted to represent people’s imaginative ability since it is the preferred and accepted term in the field nowadays. These fictive expressions can only be conceptualized via the use of motion verbs. According to Radden and Dirven (2007), fictive motion is defined as the construal of a static scene as motional. They further explain that in physical motion, the moving object continually changes its location in time; whereas in fictive motion, our eyes mentally scan an imaginary path, as in the following examples: 2. a) The gate leads into the garden. b) The cliff drops down 600 feet. Fictive Motion in Igbo – Mbah & Uchechukwu 6 Like physical motion, fictive motion involves directionality. In sentence (2a), we mentally follow the path from the gate into the garden, while in sentence (2b) our eyes roam from the top of the cliff down to the sea. Therefore, based on the above examples Slobin (1996, and 2000), defines fictive motion as a motion in which a sentence prompts the hearer for a conceptualization of the scene in which the path is scanned in a given direction. He further posits that in fictive motion expressions, one cannot find any element which physically changes place and moves from one place to another. Rather, the displacement that is found in fictive motion is ‘mental’, this means that the hearer, when reconstructing the scene evoked by the sentence, mentally traces a given object in a certain direction. As Huumo (2005) puts it, in fictive motion expressions: … “the motion verb and the directional locatives reflect the direction of a mental scanning performed by the conceptualizer in building up the mental representation of the situation. The position of an elongated entity is represented gradually as if mentally proceeding along the entity”. In view of the above, Talmy (2000) defines fictive motion as an implicit mental simulation of ‘movement’ through a construed scene. This implies that fictive motion is a linguistic phenomenon covering instances dynamically depicting such situations that are believed to be static and using language characteristic of the description of motion. Owing to this fact, fictive motion allows the conceptualiser to subjectively impose a state change on what is otherwise understood as a stationary scene. That is, it is the imaginative ability of conceptualizing a static physical entity or scene as dynamic via the use of motion verbs. In harmony with Talmy, Núñez and Marghetis (2014) refer to this phenomenon as a Awka Journal of Linguistics and Languages, Special Edition 1, 2022 7 cognitive mechanism through which we unconsciously (and effortlessly) conceptualize static entities in dynamic terms whereby the entities do not actually move anywhere. Literally, motion, in these cases, is fictive, imaginary, and not real as exemplified below: (3) This fence goes from the plateau to the valley. In the sentence above, the doer of the verb go (i.e., this fence) does not actually move anywhere. The relation between the fence, the plateau and the valley is simply static, and there is no movement of the fence in reality. But linguistically, we may conceive and conceptualize it as a dynamic movement (moving from the plateau to the valley) which is represented by the motion verb 'go' and directional prepositions 'from…to…' . In addition to the above authors views, Langacker (1987) explains that this spatial description is a dynamic conceptualization that structure description of static scenes such as “the mountain range goes from Mexico to Canada, and in so doing invokes a subjective scene of motion or state change. He further opines that in everyday conversation, people routinely use language about motion to describe static situations which is common practice when people are describing stationary spatial layouts. In talking about ‘a mountain range’, they use descriptions such as “The mountain range goes from Mexico to Canada or the mountain range follows the coastline”. Also, in talking about ‘a trail’, they use expressions such as “The trail crosses an earthquake fault or a trail runs along the coastline”. Even when talking about ‘a tattoo’, they use language such as “A tattoo goes down his back or the tattoo runs along his spine”. This construction, according to Langacker (1987), features a subject noun phrase referent that lacks volition such as mountain range, trail, tattoo and a motion verb that convey no motion such as (go, follow and run). He further posits that constructions such as Fictive Motion in Igbo – Mbah & Uchechukwu 8 “the mountain range goes from Mexico to Canada” were of interest to cognitive linguists because they appealed to the idea that meaning is conceptualization. Based on this view, dynamic perceptual and cognitive processes are seen to motivate linguistic form. 2.3 Types of Fictive Motion Talmy (2000) classifies fictive motion into six categories. They are: emanation paths, pattern paths, frame-relative motion, advent paths, access paths, and coextension paths. 2.3.1 Emanation Paths This category is the fictive motion of intangible entity moving fictively from a source, which continues along its emanation path and terminates by hitting a distal object. That is, the motion of emanation paths does not include the factive (actual) movement of an entity. The movement is fictive and it does not involve any physical form, and therefore, what is conceived as fictively moving is an object rather than the observation of that object. Thus, the emanation of fictive motion is characterized as [-animate],[- movable]and[+emissive]/[+perceptible].The feature values of emanation path expressions are summarized as follows: a) Factive motion of some elements need not be present for the fictive effect. b) The fictively moving entity is itself fictive. c) The fictive effect is observer-neutral. d) What is conceived as fictively moving is an entity. Talmy further divide this emanation path into four subcategories: orientation paths, radiation paths, shadow paths, and sensory paths. Awka Journal of Linguistics and Languages, Special Edition 1, 2022 9 2.3.1.1.1 Orientation Paths Orientation paths are linguistically conceptualized and perceived as a continuous linear intangible entity that emerges away from the front of some object. This object can be conceived as either an intangible line in motion or an intangible abstraction that moves along an intangible line. Orientation Paths are further subdivided into five subcategories, depending on whether the front of entity is a face type or a point type, or whether the fictive motion of the intangible line is axial or lateral. These subtypes include: prospect paths, alignment paths, demonstrative paths, targeting paths and line of sight. 2.3.1.1.2 Prospect Paths It is the orientation of an object which a face-type front has relative to its surroundings and can be conceptualized and perceived as a fictive motion. The front face of the entity has a “prospect” which is characterized as if an intangible line emerges from the front and moves continuously away from the main object relative to the other object. The intangible line is referred to as a ‘Figure’ which moves continually to the other object (“Ground” or “Reference Object”) along a path indicated by directional adposition as the following example illustrates: (4) The cliff wall faces toward the valley. 2.3.1.1.3 Alignment Paths It refers to a stationary straight object with a point-type front. The straight object is linguistically conceptualized and perceived as an intangible entity that moves along the axis of the object, emerging Fictive Motion in Igbo – Mbah & Uchechukwu 10 from its front end, and continuing straight along a prepositional path relative to some distal object. (5) The snake is lying toward the light. 2.3.1.1.4 Demonstrative Paths It involves a linear object with a point-type front from which an intangible line emerges. In demonstrative paths, the fictively moving line functions either to direct or guide someone’s attention along its path. (6) The arrow on the signpost pointed toward the town. 2.3.1.1.5 Targeting Paths An agent in targeting path intentionally sets the orientation of a front-bearing object so that the fictive line that is perceived as emerging from this front follows a desired path relative to the object’s surroundings. The fictive motion establishes a path along which the Agent intends that a subsequent motion (either real or fictive) will travel. (7) I pointed my gun into the living room. 2.3.1.1.6 Line of Sight The concept ‘line of sight’ underlies some linguistic patterns and, according to Talmy, it is also a component of perceptual structure. It is an intangible line which emerges from the visual apparatus located on the front of an animate or mechanical entity. It deals only with the lateral line of sight motion, that is, its shifts of orientation. (8) I slowly turned my camera toward the door. Awka Journal of Linguistics and Languages, Special Edition 1, 2022 11 2.3.1.1.7 Radiation Paths This second type of emanation is the linguistic conceptualization of a radiation emanating continuously from energy source and moving steadily away from it. Radiation paths differ from orientation paths, in that while, radiation paths are often possible to detect the presence of the radiation, orientation paths consist of the motion of a wholly imperceptible line. This type of emanation has only one conceptual or perceptual form viable for the sun (or fire/flashlight etc.) from the sun to an object as seen in example (10). Such motions are generally perceived to be static, but linguistically they are conceptualized as dynamic processes in which the light moves from one place to another. (9) The sun is shining into the cave. However, Talmy (2000:111) posits that in this type, the radiating event can be characterized as involving three entities such as: the radiator, the radiation itself, and the irradiated object. This radiating event then involves three processes such as: the emanation of radiation from the radiator, the motion of the radiation along a path, and the impingement of the radiation on the irradiated object, as illustrated in the sentence above. 2.3.1.1.8 Shadow Paths Shadow path is a linguistic conceptualization (and perhaps also a perception) in which the shadow of an object, visible on some surface, fictively moves from that object to that surface. Thus, the shadow can be linguistically conceptualized as the Figure (the moving entity) and the object that carries the shadow as the Source. The surface on which the shadow is located is described as Goal. Moreover, the predicate of shadow expressions can only be a motion Fictive Motion in Igbo – Mbah & Uchechukwu 12 verb (like throw, cast, project, or fall), and a path preposition (such as into, onto, across or against). (10) The tree threw its shadow down across the valley. The active verb threw is used here, to refer to static shadow of the tree, as if it moved from the shadow-bearer (the tree) to the valley. 2.3.1.1.9 Sensory Paths This last type of emanation paths is the conceptualization of two entities: the Experiencer and the Experienced, along with something intangible moving in a straight path between the two, in one direction or in another. Experiencer “emits a Probe that moves from the Experiencer to the Experienced and detects it upon encounter with it”, whereas the Experienced “emits a Stimulus that moves from the Experienced to the Experiencer and sensorily stimulates that entity on encountering it”. Thus, the direction can either go from the Experienced (we) to the Experiencer (the enemy). According to Talmy, Experiencer can be: A. Non-agentive -- permits both fictive directions i. The verb is lexicalized to take the Experiencer as subject: • I can hear him all the way from where I’m standing. ii. The verb is lexicalized to take the Experienced as subject: • The old wallpaper shows through the paint even to a casual passer-by. B. Agentive -- only permits Experiencer as Source • I looked toward the valley. C. Lateral motion of the sensory emanation from an agentive Experiencer • I slowly looked toward the door. Awka Journal of Linguistics and Languages, Special Edition 1, 2022 13 Sequel the above examples, Sensory path can be described as moving from the 'Experiencer' to the ‘Experienced’ object. 2.3.2 Pattern Paths It involves the fictive conceptualization of some entity as moving through space. The fictive effect occurs when the physical entities factively exhibit some form of qualitative change, but these in themselves do not constitute the fictive motion. Rather, it is the pattern in which the physical entities are arranged that exhibits the fictive motion. 2.3.3 Frame-Relative Motion According to Talmy (2000), a global frame of reference factively refers to an observer as moving relative to her surroundings. Alternatively, it can be referred to by adopting a local frame around the observer as centre. Within this frame, the observer can be represented as stationary and her surroundings as moving relative to her from her perspective. Thus, frame-relative motion is a form of fictive motion in which the factively stationary surroundings are fictively depicted as moving. 2.3.4 Advent Paths This depicts a stationary object’s location in terms of its arrival or manifestation at the site it occupies. In advent path, the stationary state of the object is factive, whereas its depicted motion is fictive. The two main subtypes of advent paths are ‘site arrival’, which involves the fictive motion of the object to its site, and ‘site manifestation’, which is not fictive motion but fictive change/fictive manifestation of the object at its site. Fictive Motion in Igbo – Mbah & Uchechukwu 14 2.3.5 Access Paths This shows a stationary object’s location in terms of a path followed by another entity to the point of encounter with the object. The factive representation is the object being stationary without any entity traversing the depicted path, while the representation of some entity traversing the depicted path is fictive, whether this is plausible or implausible. The fictively moving entity can be imagined as being a person, some body part of a person, or the focus of one’s attention, depending on the particular sentence. 2.3.6 Coextension paths This is a depiction of form, orientation, or location of a spatially extended object in terms of a path over the object’s extent. This means that Coextension Path involves an extended object over which something is imagined to traverse. Therefore, this category features a motion verb that is couple with a spatially-extended entity which is inanimate and incapable of self-movement. This further implies that fictive sense is the representation of some entities moving along or over the configuration of the object. The fictively moving object can be imagined as being an observer, or the focus of one’s attention, or the object itself. Finally, of all the categories investigated by Talmy, this study shall focus on the Coextension path and its representation in Igbo. 3. Methodology This study is focused on the analysis of six (6) coextension fictive motion constructions in Igbo using the tenets of Talmy’s (2000) Coextension fictive motion model. The data for the research study were extracted from the Igbo novel ‘juo Obinna’ through the use of a corpus software known Antconc 3.4.0w (windows) 2014 and analyzed. Awka Journal of Linguistics and Languages, Special Edition 1, 2022 15 The next section presents and analyses the data on Coextension fictive motion constructions in Igbo using Talmy’s (2000) Coextension fictive motion framework. 4. Data Presentation and analysis This section presents and analyzes the Igbo fictive motion data extracted from the Igbo novel ‘juo Obinna’ using Talmy’s Coextension paths of fictive motion framework as was earlier explained in chapter two. The aim of this study is to understand the nature of fictive expressions in Igbo. It attempts to then describe this phenomenon applying Talmy's category of coextension to see if Igbo uses the same constructions that are used in Talmy's model, or whether there are other categories that can be used in Igbo and absent in his categorization and vice versa. 4.1 Igbo Coextension of Fictive Motion Examples: 11) Ụ́zọ̀ áhụ̀ bànye-re Ájálị́. road DEM enter-rV(PST) Ajali ‘The road entered Ajali’ 12) Ọ́hịá́ áhụ̀ dị́ yá n’ íhú rìgò-rò n’élú úgwū bush DEM be him PREP front climb.up- rV(PST) PREP top hill ‘The bush before him climbed on top of the mountain’ 13) Ngbọ̀rọ̀gwọ̀ ósísí áhụ̀ bànyè-rè n’ímé íyī. root tree DEM enter-PST PREP-inside ocean ‘The tree’s root entered into the ocean’. Fictive Motion in Igbo – Mbah & Uchechukwu 16 14) Úgwú áhụ̀ ọ́ nà-èlé ànyā gáfè-rè Ụ́munzè nà Ájálị ́ Mountain DEM he be looking eye pass - rV (PST) Umunze and Ajali ‘That mountain he was looking at passed across Umunze and Ajali’ 15) Ụ́zọ̀ áhụ̀ gáfè-rè ànyị́ sì n’Òwèrrè Ézúkàlà wèré banye Ajali Road DEM pass- rV (PST) us from PREP Owerre Ezukala then enter Ajali ‘That road that passed across us leads to Ajali from Owerre Ezukala ’ 16) Ndị́ Sójà nnọ̀chì-rì ókpóró ụ́zọ̀ niile bànyè- rè Ájálị́. Those soldier block- rV (PAST) pathway all enter- rV(PST) Ajali ‘The soldiers blocked all the pathways that lead to Ajali’. In the above fictive motion expression, the extended stationary objects ‘ụzọ, ọhịa, ugwu, ngbọrọgwụ osisi’ do not physically move. In other words, the expressions in (11 - 16) describe static scene because the inanimate entities: ‘ụzọ, ‘road’, ‘ugwu ‘mountain’, ‘ọhịa, ‘bush’ and ‘ngbọrọgwụ osisi, ‘the tree’s root’ in the above examples cannot move or perform the action of ịba ‘ to enter’ ịrị ‘to climb’ and ‘ịgafe, ‘to pass/walk across’, this is because the above-mentioned motions depicted in (11 - 16) cannot take place, since our experience in the world enables us to know that the aforementioned inanimate objects cannot perform any physical Awka Journal of Linguistics and Languages, Special Edition 1, 2022 17 movement. Instead what actually moves is our locus of visual or mental attention. From the above analysis, it can be seen that just like in English language, coextension category in the Igbo language features a motion verb that is couple with a spatially-extended entity which is inanimate and incapable of self-movement. 4.2.1 Igbo Fictive Motion Categories and Serial Verb Construction Verb serialization is a syntactic phenomenon in which two or more verbs are put together in a single clause. That is, it is a sequence of verbs which act together as a single predicate, without any overt marker of coordination, subordination, or syntactic dependency of any other sort. Trask (1993: 251-252) describes a serial verb construction (SVC) as: “a construction in which what appears to be a single clause semantically is expressed syntactically by a sequence of juxtaposed separate verbs, all sharing the same subject or agent but each with its own additional arguments, without the use of overt coordinating conjunctions”. In serial verb construction, the two verbs must take the same tense markers. Also, both verbs may tend to share the same argument. For example, the verbs may have the same subject or the object of the first verb may at the same time function as the subject of the second verb. In serial verb constructions, both verbs can function as independent verbs in a fictive motion sentences as can be seen in the examples below. 17) Ụ́zọ̀ áhụ̀ rìgò-rò élú úgwū pụ̀tá Òwèrrè Ézúkàlà . Road DEM climb-PST up mountain come out Owerre Ezukala Fictive Motion in Igbo – Mbah & Uchechukwu 18 ‘This road ascended the mountain and came out from Owerre Ezukala’ 18) Úgwú áhụ̀ rịd́à-rà bànyé n’ímé òbòdò. Mountain DEM descend- rV (PST) enter PREP town ‘The mountain descended into the town’ 19) Ụ́zọ̀ áhụ̀ gà-rà rúé Ájálị,́ gáá áká ịk̀pà wèré pụ̀-tá Òwèrrè Ézúkàlà. Road DEM go-PST reach Ajali, go hand left then come-out Owerre Ezukala ‘This road leads to Ajali from Owerre Ezukala’ In examples 17 to 19, the subjects of the first verbs are the subjects of the second verb. In other words, the two verbs in each construction, share the same subject. Hence, the subjects they share in the examples include: Ụ́zọ̀, and Úgwú respectively. From the data analyzed so far, it can be observed that verb serialization in Igbo fictive motion sentences occur in coextension path category. Also, it is observed that the above constructions can be broken into simple sentences. Examples (17 to 19) are illustrated in (20a to 22c) respectively. 20. a) Ụ́zọ̀ à rìgò-rò élú úgwū. Road DET climb- rV (PST) up mountain ‘The road ascended the mountain’ b) Ụ́zọ̀ à pùtà-rà Òwèrrè Ézúkàlà. Road DET come out- rV (PST) Owerre Ezukala ‘The road came out from Owerre Ezukala’ Awka Journal of Linguistics and Languages, Special Edition 1, 2022 19 21. a) Úgwú à rị́dà-rà n’ímé òbòdò. Mountain DET descend- rV (PST) PREP town ‘The mountain descended into the town’ b) Úgwú à bànyè-rè n’ímé òbòdò. Mountain DET enter- rV (PST) PREP town ‘The mountain entered the town’ 22. a) Ụ́zọ̀ áhụ̀ gà-rà rúé Ájálị.́ Road DEM go-PST reach Ajali ‘This road reached Ajali’ b) Ụ́zọ̀ áhụ̀ gà-rà áká èkpè. Road DET go- rV(PST) hand left ‘This road turned to the left’ c) Ụ́zọ̀ áhụ̀ pùtà-rà Òwèrrè Ézúkàlà. Road DET come out- rV(PST) Owerre Ezukala ‘This road came out from Owerre Ezukala’ 4.3 Findings Findings from this research show that Talmy’s framework suffices to a great extent in describing Igbo fictive motion expressions. It is observed that fictive motion exist in Igbo. Different dynamic linguistic forms (directional preposition and motion verbs) are used in describing static configurations in the language. Motion verbs are predominantly used in expressing Igbo fictive motion. Also, it can be seen from the data presented that the Igbo fictive motions can as well occur in verb serialization which is mostly limited to coextension path; though Talmy did not include verb serialization in his fictive motion categories. Fictive Motion in Igbo – Mbah & Uchechukwu 20 5. Summary and Conclusion This research study has investigated fictive motion in the Igbo language from the cognitive linguistic point of view. The researchers carried out an examination of fictive motion in the Igbo language by identifying the expressions that account for fictive motion in the language in order to analyze them. Hence, this present study reveals extensively the coextension category of Igbo fictive motion expressions. In the cause of the analysis, it is observed that motion verbs are predominantly used in expressing Igbo fictive motion. We therefore conclude that like in other languages, fictive motion can be expressed in the Igbo language. 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List of Abbreviations DET – Determiner DEM – Demonstrative PREP – Preposition CONJ – Conjunction RVPST – R + vowel marking past tense in Igbo language