Abstract
We hardly every realize that we speak like “poets” as the Italian philosopher Giambattista Vico so ingeniously observed. By this he meant that much of our discourse and conversations are guided by metaphorical, and more generally, figurative, cognition. This means that language is not organized fundamentally as a set of literal ideas, but rather as a means of connecting ideas through resemblance and inference in order to blend experiences holistically. The scientific study of figurative language took off after the 1980 book, Metaphors We Live By, written by George Lakoff and Mark Johnson. Since then, the study of metaphor and rhetorical structure in all codes, from language to painting, has become a major research enterprise in semiotics and linguistics. Starting with Aristotle and ending with an analysis of the rhetorical basis of material and ritualistic culture, this chapter is intended to show how meaning unfolds when concepts are joined together in accordance with our innate sense of the connectivity of things in the world. There is currently so much information and writing on metaphor scattered in journals and books in all kinds of disciplines that it would take a gargantuan effort just to organize and classify it. For this reason, the chapter selects only the main findings of the research.
Midway between the unintelligible and the commonplace, it is metaphor which most produces knowledge.
—Aristotle (384–322 BCE)
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Notes
- 1.
Giambattista Vico, The new science, translated by Thomas G. Bergin and Max Fisch, 2nd ed. (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1984), par. 821.
- 2.
Ibid., par. 142.
- 3.
Ibid., par. 144.
- 4.
Ibid., par. 1106.
- 5.
Ibid., par. 1106.
- 6.
Ibid., par. 1106.
- 7.
Ibid., par. 1108.
- 8.
I. A. Richards, The philosophy of rhetoric (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1936).
- 9.
Solomon Asch, “On the use of metaphor in the description of persons.” In On Expressive Language, edited by Heinz Werner, 86–94 (Worcester: Clark University Press, 1950).
- 10.
W. Booth, “Metaphor as Rhetoric: The problem of evaluation.” In On Metaphor, edited by S. Sacks, 47. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1979).
- 11.
Ellen Winner and Howard Gardner, “The comprehension of metaphor in brain-damaged patients,” Brain 100 (1977): 717–29.
- 12.
Howard Pollio, Jack M. Barlow, Harold J. Fine, and Marylin R. Pollio, The poetics of growth: Figurative language in psychology, psychotherapy, and education (Hillsdale, N. J.: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1977).
- 13.
George Lakoff and Mark Johnson, Metaphors we live by (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1980).
- 14.
Walter J. Ong, Interfaces of the word: Studies in the evolution of consciousness and culture (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1977), 134.
- 15.
George Lakoff, Women, fire, and dangerous things: What categories reveal about the mind (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987); Mark Johnson, The body in the mind: The bodily basis of meaning, imagination and reason (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987).
- 16.
Lakoff, Women, fire, and dangerous things, op. cit.
- 17.
A panoramic survey of the major findings on metaphor can be found in Raymond W. Gibbs , The poetics of mind: Figurative thought, language, and understanding (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), and in Marcel Danesi , Poetic logic: The role of metaphor in thought, language, and culture (Madison: Atwood Publishing, 2004).
- 18.
Lakoff and Johnson, Metaphors we live by, 35–40.
- 19.
Linda Hutcheon, Irony’s edge: The theory and politics of irony (London: Routledge, 1995).
- 20.
Gilles Fauconnier and Mark Turner, The way we think: Conceptual blending and the mind’s hidden complexities (New York: Basic, 2002).
- 21.
Lakoff and Johnson, Metaphors we live by, 49.
- 22.
Alice Deignan, “Metaphors of desire.” In Language and Desire, edited by Keith Harvey and Celia Shalom, 41 (London: Routledge, 1997). An in-depth treatment of love metaphors is the one by Zoltán Kövecses , The Language of love: The semantics of passion in conversational English (London: Associated University Presses, 1988).
- 23.
Northrop Frye, The great code: The Bible and literature (Toronto: Academic Press, 1981).
- 24.
K. C. Cole, Sympathetic vibrations (New York: Bantam, 1984).
Bibliography
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Booth, Wayne. 1979. Metaphor as rhetoric: The problem of evaluation. In On metaphor, ed. S. Sacks. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Cole, K.C. 1984. Sympathetic vibrations. New York: Bantam.
Danesi, Marcel. 2004. Poetic logic: The role of metaphor in thought, language, and culture. Madison: Atwood Publishing.
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Frye, Northrop. 1981. The great code: The Bible and literature. Toronto: Academic Press.
Gibbs, Raymond W. 1994. The poetics of mind: Figurative thought, language, and understanding. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Hutcheon, Linda. 1995. Irony’s edge: The theory and politics of irony. London: Routledge.
Johnson, Mark. 1987. The body in the mind: The bodily basis of meaning, imagination and reason. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Kövecses, Zoltán. 1988. The language of love: The semantics of passion in conversational English. London: Associated University Presses.
Lakoff, George. 1987. Women, fire, and dangerous things: What categories reveal about the mind. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Lakoff, George, and Mark Johnson. 1980. Metaphors we live by. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Ong, Walter J. 1977. Interfaces of the word: Studies in the evolution of consciousness and culture. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.
Pollio, Howard, Jack M. Barlow, Harold J. Fine, and Marylin R. Pollio. 1977. The poetics of growth: Figurative language in psychology, psychotherapy, and education. Hillsdale: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Richards, I.A. 1936. The philosophy of rhetoric. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Vico, Giambattista. 1984. The new science. Trans. Thomas G. Bergin and Max Fisch, 2nd ed. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.
Winner, Ellen, and Howard Gardner. 1977. The comprehension of metaphor in brain-damaged patients. Brain 100: 717–729.
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Danesi, M. (2018). Kisses Sweeter Than Wine: Metaphor and the Making of Meaning. In: Of Cigarettes, High Heels, and Other Interesting Things. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-95348-6_5
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