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From: dmark@cs.Buffalo.EDU (David Mark)
Newsgroups: sci.lang,comp.cog-eng
Subject: Re: Geographical uses of "in" and "on"
Keywords: spatial language, prepositions, metaphor
Message-ID: <5584@cs.Buffalo.EDU>
Date: 29 Apr 89 20:05:48 GMT
References: <5434@cs.Buffalo.EDU> <17765@cisunx.UUCP> <136@crltrx.crl.dec.com> <17842@cisunx.UUCP>
Reply-To: dmark@sunybcs.UUCP (David Mark)
Organization: SUNY/Buffalo Geography
Lines: 54

In article <17842@cisunx.UUCP> hirtle@unix.cis.pittsburgh.edu (Stephen Hirtle) writes:
>In article <136@crltrx.crl.dec.com> treese@crl.dec.com (Win Treese) writes:
>>In article <17765@cisunx.UUCP> hirtle@unix.cis.pittsburgh.edu (Stephen Hirtle) writes:
>>>... in American English, "in" is used
>>>for larger political divisions, as "in Ireland," whereas "on" is used
>>>for smaller units, as "on Staten Island."  
>>
>>Hmm.  I don't think that the size is the critical issue in the usage for
>>political divisions.  ...  ...  The use of
>>"on" for the Staten Island example seems to me to be related more to
>>the nature of the island.  But then, we do say "in Manhattan", which
>>is very similar to Staten Island as a political subdivision and as an
>>island.

But does not have "Island" in it's name!  [see below]

>
>You are correct.  The key fact that I left off was that all small 
>*islands* or similar units use "on,"  "on Staten Island", "on Nantucket", 
>but larger units (even though they are islands or land masses) use "in", 
>"in Ireland", "in Cuba".  Both Cuba and Nantucket are islands, yet
>suggest different prepositions.  Note that "on" is used with units 
>that are isolated or self-contained, even if they are not islands, 
>provided that they are relatively small.  For example, we say "on Cape 
>Cod", but "in North America."  It is also true that "in Manhattan"
>is used suggesting that Manhattan is seen as a larger political unit
>rather than a small island.  And your point is well taken that
>small political units (e.g., Kendall Square) that are not isolated 
>(unlike Cape Cod) would use "in".

I think that size per se has almost nothing to do with this.  
In fact, I think it is a case of overlapping image-schemas, again.  
Conceptualizing something as <<an island>> more-or-less forces one to
select the <PLATFORM> image-schema, and use the preposition "on".  If
the word "island" appears in the name, this almost requires the speaker to
use the platform I-S, and say "on".  "Who lived on Manhattan Island before
the Europeans came?"  When there is a political unit, not having "Island"
in its proper name, which happens to be in 1:1 correspondence with a 
physical island, then either "in" or "on" might be used, to force a
particular schema, or to indicate whether we are talking about a
physical island or a country.  "Did anyone live on Cuba before 1492?"
sounds a little odd, but the same sentence with "in" would be even more
strange, since Cuba-the-country did not exist then.  If I say: "My friend
Ron lives in Hawaii" he hight live in Honolulu, or anywhere else in the
state, but if I say: "My friend Ron lives on Hawaii", then if you know the
geography, you know that this means "the Big Island", where Hilo and Kona
are.  So this seems to be a good case of what Len Talmy calls "schema-juggling"
where in this case we can at times lower ambiguity by forcing one schema or
the other.  Size comes in very indirectly through the observation that
small islands almost always have "Island" as part of their proper names, 
whereas larger islands often do not.

David Mark
dmark@cs.buffalo.edu