Publications
Publication details [#10527]
Sweetser, Eve E. 1992. English metaphors for language: Motivations, conventions, and creativity. Poetics Today 13 (4) : 705–724. 20 pp. ![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
Publication type
Article in journal
Publication language
English
Keywords
cognitive semantics | combat metaphor | conceptual metaphor theory | creative extension of conventional metaphor | game metaphor | LANGUAGE IS AN EXCHANGE OF OBJECTS | metap | metaphorical structure | MIND IS A BODY IN SPACE | poetic metaphor | polysemy | semantic change | SPEECH IS A SHARED JOURNEY | THOUGHT IS A JOURNEY | use of metaphor in everyday life
Abstract
Motivations for everyday English metaphors for speech and linguistic communication are analyzed in the framework of a set of basic metaphorical structures: directionality, language as an exchange of objects, mapping of mind as a body in space, thought as a journey and speech expanse as a shared journey, and game and combat metaphors. Arguments are presented for the cognitive reality of this pervasive, systematic metaphor complex, and its creative extensions in poetic language are explored. The extent to which the effectiveness of poetic metaphor results from activation of an underlying conventional system is assessed, and the correlation between metaphors and instances of polysemy and semantic change is discussed. (Copyright 1993, Sociological Abstracts, Inc., all rights reserved.)
(J. Hitchcock in LLBA 1993, vol. 27, n. 3)