A Cognitive Analysis of Focuses of Attention in the Story of Prophet Yusuf (AS) based on Langackerʼs Theory

Cognitive linguistics is an approach that sees language as a means of discovering the structure of human cognition. This approach, which has increasingly received attention in recent decades, considers language as a sign of illustration and construal aspect of human mind. Cognitive linguists believe that scene construal is a cognitive matter and that each story can be more deeply analyzed from the view of cognitive linguistics. Given Langacker's (1987) views about scene construal and its different aspects such as perspective, profiling, scanning and focus of attention, the present descriptive-analytical research analyzed the story of Prophet Yusuf (AS) and then focuses of attention were examined in the ayahs of this surah. Additionally, the frequency of each aspect of scene construal in the 111 ayahs of this surah were studied. The findings show that, out of all scene aspects, perspective and profiling respectively have the most and the least frequency. Furthermore, most of the focus of attention in this surah is devoted to the dimensions of sleep and dreams and their interpretation, shirt, and deception.