Publications
Publication details [#6865]
Kövecses, Zoltán. 1995. Anger: Its language, conceptualization, and physiology in the light of cross-cultural evidence. In Taylor, John R. and Robert E. MacLaury. Language and the Cognitive Construal of the World. Berlin: Mouton De Gruyter . pp. 181–196. 16 pp. ![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
Publication type
Article in book
Publication language
English
Keywords
ANGER IS HOT FLUID IN A CONTAINER | anger metaphor | Chinese | cognitive semantics | conceptual metaphor theory | conceptualization | cross-linguistic approach | emotion concept | emotion terminology | Hungarian | metaphorical understanding of anger | metonymic understanding of anger | Tahitian | Wolof
Place, Publisher
Berlin: Mouton De Gruyter
Abstract
It is suggested that either the physical experience of emotion or its conceptualization is the primary factor motivating the existence of emotion terminology, and it is contended that the English metaphors that indicate anger as a hot fluid in a container are physiologically based to some degree. Similar metaphors in Japanese, Chinese, Hungarian, Tahitian, and Wolof are identified, and it is argued that human concepts of anger are constrained by the experience of the physical body. The link between metaphorical and metonymical understandings of anger is investigated, and it is concluded that commonalities among cultural conceptions of anger indicate the importance of the body in these conceptions. (Copyright 1997, Sociological Abstracts, Inc., all rights reserved.)
(D. Weibel in LLBA 1997, vol. 31, n. 2)