Understanding Figurative Language: From Metaphor to IdiomsThis book examines how people understand utterances that are intended figuratively. Traditionally, figurative language such as metaphors and idioms has been considered derivative from more complex than ostensibly straightforward literal language. Glucksberg argues that figurative language involves the same kinds of linguistic and pragmatic operations that are used for ordinary, literal language. Glucksberg's research in this book is concerned with ordinary language: expressions that are used in daily life, including conversations about everyday matters, newspaper and magazine articles, and the media. Metaphor is the major focus of the book. Idioms, however, are also treated comprehensively, as is the theory of conceptual metaphor in the context of how people understand both conventional and novel figurative expressions. A new theory of metaphor comprehension is put forward, and evaluated with respect to competing theories in linguistics and in psychology. The central tenet of the theory is that ordinary conversational metaphors are used to create new concepts and categories. This process is spontaneous and automatic. Metaphor is special only in the sense that these categories get their names from the best examples of the things they represent, and that these categories get their names from the best examples of those categories. Thus, the literal "shark" can be a metaphor for any vicious and predatory being, from unscrupulous salespeople to a murderous character in The Threepenny Opera. Because the same term, e.g.,"shark," is used both for its literal referent and for the metaphorical category, as in "My lawyer is a shark," we call it the dual-reference theory. The theory is then extended to two other domains: idioms and conceptual metaphors. The book presents the first comprehensive account of how people use and understand metaphors in everyday life. |
Contents
| 3 | |
Beyond the Literal | 16 |
Beyond Similarity | 29 |
Beyond Comparison Property Attribution | 52 |
Idioms From Metaphors to Just Long Words? | 68 |
Concepts as Metaphors | 90 |
Notes | 109 |
| 117 | |
| 129 | |
| 132 | |
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Common terms and phrases
abstract concepts alignment ambiguous assertion attribution model attributive category claim class-inclusion cognitive cognitive linguistics comparison statements conceptual metaphors considered context conventional Dan Quayle Demjanjuk dual reference example exemplify figurative language fixed expressions function Gentner Gibbs Glucksberg idiom comprehension idiom constituents idiomatic meaning inferred John Demjanjuk Keysar kick the bucket Lakoff lawyer lexical linguistic literal and metaphorical literal comparisons literal meaning literally false literally true low-constraint topics McGlone meta metaphor comprehension metaphor topic metaphor vehicle metaphor-relevant metaphoric comparisons metaphoric expressions metaphorical meanings metonymic model of metaphor modifier msec Nayak nominal metaphors noncompositional noun-noun opaque Ortony paraphrased phor phorically phrase predicative metaphors property attribution property interpretation prototypical provides recognize relation representation role salient semantic semantic memory sense sentence shark similarity simile speaker structural alignment structure substitution superordinate syntactic Tabossi target tences topics and vehicles Torreano ugli fruit unambiguous vehicles understood utterance variant verb Wisniewski word