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As anticipated in discussing the meaning of the verb eis-ana-baínō ‘go up to’, entities are usually located with respect to other entities functioning as reference points (Talmy 1983; Langacker 1987). This way of locating entities implies a further asymmetrical relation holding between the located entity and the reference-entity.

Talmy (1983) introduces the terms “Figure” and “Ground”, borrowed from Gestalt psychology (Köhler 1929; Koffka 1935), to describe this asymmetrical relation: the Figure is the object to be located, while the Ground is the object with respect to which the Figure is located. In reference works, other terms are also used to identify the participants in a spatial relation, including the pairs “locans”-“locatum” and “referent”-“relatum” (e.g. Rappaport & Levin 1985; Levinson 1996). In this work, I opt for Langacker’s (1987, 2008) terminology, which describes Talmy’s Figure and Ground in terms of focus of attention. Langacker argues that, while profiling a spatial relation holding between two entities, one of such entities is always more focused than the other one. Langacker calls the more prominent and located entity the Trajector (henceforth TR), and the less prominent reference-entity Landmark (henceforth LM).

Langacker employs the concepts of TR and LM beyond the cognitive domain of space. Following his lead, let us take as an example the kinship relations of having a child and having a parent. Both relations share the base, that is, the domain of KINSHIP RELATIONS. In addition, they profile the same kinship relation, as they involve two participants, of whom one is the child or the parent of the other. What changes is the directionality of the relation, and thus their TR-LM alignment: having a child is primarily concerned with parents, who thus function as a TR. By contrast, having a parent is a predication concerning the child, who in turn functions as a TR. Figure 2 shows both the profile-base and TR-LM asymmetries:

Fig. 2: Kinship relations: profile-base and TR-LM asymmetries (Langacker 2008: 68)

In Figure 2 (a)–(d), bold highlights the profile. Both in (a) and in (b), the profile is a human entity, either the parent or the child. They are both characterized by the relative role that they play in the kinship relation, which is conceptualized as the base. However, in both (c) and (d), the shared kinship relation is profiled. The semantic contrast between have a parent and have a child resides in their opposite directionalities, and thus their TR-LM alignments.