This book shows that given the new findings of cognitive linguistics, it is possible to offer a unified account of not only linguistic meaning but also that of meaning in a wide variety of social and cultural phenomena. It is suggested that cognitive linguistics is a much more comprehensive enterprise than is commonly accepted--both inside and outside the field. The book presents a comprehensive account of meaning in many linguistic and cultural phenomena that is crucially based and dependent on cognitive capacities that human understanders and producers of language possess independently of their ability to use language.